Navas had to fill massive shoes and inspite of the controversy showed up and gave everything for the club. Any conversation about Navas has to start with there and end with his success in Europe. Massively under appreciated.
Gonna watch it tonight. A win is a win. Don't want to spoil myself too much, but I'm sure the critics are blown out. We just started the season.
Neymar makes that average PSG win games. No way they send him out in winter with CL ahead. And Neymar also said something else, check the other thread. It was live on LEquipeTV if you can watch the steam on their website.
A win is a win but letting Levante coming into the match again at home is unacceptable. Let's be honest. We can score which is good but we concede so damn easy.
Shhhhh, no spoiler, I'll see by myself I just said that I am not worried, and won't be worried now even after watching it. We're just in september.
Honestly, I haven't watched Kepa or the games he's played to make a judgement on his goals. I'm objectively judging Courtois vs. what an average keeper should be doing at this level. He has made some amateurish mistakes. On the first goal, while he probably didn't stand much of a chance, going for the ball with his hands rather than a simple kick out of his feet was horrible, and on the second goal, he didn't come out, and he didn't cover the short side. Those aside though, there was also an instance where we were passing the ball in the back where he passed a ball to Carvajal who had his back turned to the opposition with an opponent right on his heel that almost resulted in a takeaway and a clear chance at goal. He has to do far far better than what he has shown. His height has literally become a disadvantage and a weakness, because he's beaten down low so easily and he's not using it to control the area.
Do you think this is simply a height issue or an agility issue? He was shockingly bad at Chelsea as well to the point fans were mocking him every game. Hopefully it doesn't cost us against PSG.
No idea but my buddy who's a huge Chelsea fan laughed when I brought it up. It's a well known issue with him.
the good: Zidane giving change to James, who played a good game. Benzema scoring. Hazard showing what he can bring. Casemiro Zidane, for trusting in James. the bad: Casemiro is the anchor of this team, you take him out and it all crumbles. Vinicius - my guess with Bale would have not start this game. His finish is just not at this club level, not with all the hype around him (should take a look at a much younger youngster who plays for a rival club...). Management should have loaned him out to see if he gets his aim corrected at another club. Kroos - nothing to add, he is just not getting better. Zidane - blindly trusting Varane and Marcelo. enough already. Defense - just bad. Ramos is fading in front of our eyes. Varane is pure crap. Marcelo is a joke defensively and Dani not much better. Poor planning from management shows how thin we are in the midfield. last, Marcelo will start every game. I remember writing to someone here after the last mendy game, that Marcelo will start in the next game. it seems (maybe too early), that we can score with Benzema on form, James in midfield, Hazard doing his thing and Bale staying healthy, but we are going to concede goals like, a lot of them.
Scoring more than one goal for a change, the 3 points and a bit of James action, I'll take that. Hopefully we'll build on it though.
Was pretty happy with James and Vini despite some of the murmurings. Hopefully James builds off this and proves to be a great player for us. Would love to see Vini start against PSG too.
Yup 79 passes @ 98% while creating 3 chances, almost a perfect game from Kroos add to that James 53 passes @ 82% while creating another 6 chances. I've been one of James harshest critics but if he keeps this up it'll be hard to complain about him at all.
James takes more chances which results in more direct play at times and we really need that. I'd happily give up 99% passing accuracy for more forward play.
our defense is disaster, we worth at least one goal every game.. without Ramos we look every worst I saw Eder and Varane yesterday I remembered Karanka and Campo together ZZ must work on shape and defense, his sub to take out Casemiro(doesn't have a sub for him) was catastrophic
Some only see what they want to see, when he has a rubbish game it’s there for all to see, today was not one of them, Carvajal fell over and let his man free and Courtois got beaten on his near post, as soon as that happened, someone posted something to the effect of “ see what happens when Kroos is on the pitch” or something to that effect, odd. Well part of the problem with that is that we want Kroos to be in the box taking more chances but we also want him to be at the back making the defense solid and we want him to always be running, and dictating play in the middle, he’s been lazy, no two ways about that, but expecting all that from him is just never going to happen, he isn’t that player, and that type of play even gassed James today, for that we’d need a genuine box to box player to replace him, at least that’s my opinion.
He has the worst save ratio of all premiership keepers right now. Kepa Arrizabalaga has the worst save percentage in the Premier League this season (44%), he is the only GK to have saved less than 50% of the shots he’s faced. He’s shite and thinks he’s better than he actually is.
Of course, I am not satisfied with the game, but I did see a few positive signs. 1) Hazard has some flash of brilliance. There is still work to be gone. 2) Kroos, Marcelo and VJ improved. 3) Benzema reminded me of Ronaldo. 4) James looking good If Zidane somehow gets James-Benzema-Hazard-VJ into a working unit, we can win the CL.
Barcelona were out there winning topples with Victor Valdes, and keeping their defensive record better with him than we did with Keylor or Iker, and people try to act like us fielding multiple players way past their peak is irrelevant to us playing bad because it's all because of a lack in confidence in Courtois. What nonsense really. Marcelo, Ramos, Varane and Carvajal are only at their peak financially right now.
Meh there are other factors that go into stats like these, Chelsea gives up more chances this year than the majority of prem teams, by your logic Kepa is the worst goalkeeper in the prem; Now contrast this with his record for Spain when he’s only conceded 3 goals? A whole different picture. I’m interested in knowing the manner of goals he’s conceding, that’s one of the major issues with Courtois. Also there is a reason Chelsea currently have a 40% win rate and it ain’t because of Kepa. If this stat were to be taken at face value then Courtois is a better goal keeper than Oblak because the former has a 53% and the latter 50% so far this season, you’d have to be absolutely insane to be believe that’s the case.