Some stats... He completed 28 of 40 passes and was successful on 4 of 7 tackles and was whistled for 2 fouls. Eurosport gave him a 5 player rating, only Sardo received worse but a few other Chievo got a 5, as well. Interestingly, among Eurosport users he currently has the highest rating for Chievo with a 7.6 and only the goal scorer Moscardelli got higher.
Pretty good first start. He'll get sharper as he plays and gets to know his teammates better. It seemed like he came out much more aggressive in the 2nd half. If he has to defend wingers 1 on 1 as much as he did tonight he will have some trouble. He's always been good at covering for the fullbacks, but he wasn't covering for anyone tonight - he was the RB when they dropped back to defend. I don't think I've ever seen a back 6 like they had, but it got the result.
As an either-sided, box-to-box midfielder in Italy in a 3-man central midfield you're gonna succeed or fail based on how well you help out the fullback on that side. That's just the way it is. I don't watch enough non-Italian football to really comment on how it is elsewhere.
I watched the whole game. It was painful to see him get beat again and again with dribbling and speed. However going forward he looks like he'll do well and his skill should be up to par. If he can get used to not getting really wasted in defense he should do really well, if not he'll be ok. Overall I'm pretty satisfied with his play, and hope he gets better. His work rate was one of his best attributes, not surprisingly.
I understand his sense of opportunity. The question was really because he had an opportunity to very, very likely take a minute or so off the clock with options on the wings as well as space in front of him. I was submitting that taking time off the clock at that point was much more important than taking a flyer on a long shot. Curious that Bradley only completed 70% of his passes...that wasn't what I remember visually.
He had some clearances/headed passes that might be counted in that. It wasn't his sharpest passing game either. He was fine when he kept it simple but tried some more attacking passes that didn't find their targets either from lack of sharpness or understanding with his teammates.
Fair enough. And since Chievo looked like they were all fixed to rails that only went two directions (team wins ball, run directly forward towards the other goal until team loses ball), the forward options were all direct and poor angles. That team needs some lateral movement.
Wait. What??? Showing for the ball has always been a strength of his. And he already has been great moving forward (see Herenveen [sp?]) His team sucks at passing. That's going to make everyone look bad.
Does it count that, IMHO, he was playing both as a right-sided midfielder and as the right sided fullback? Very seldom was there a real fullback helping Mike out while he slowed the wing attacker. He was left with rather a lot to do. Were Chievo playing a 3 man back line?
No it was four, but the outside midfielders were expected to drop in when the ball was on their side.
Soccernet's average position chart (as well as the "on paper" starting formation that they give) had Bradley as the right central midfielder in a 4-3-1-2 skinny-diamond. It also shows about a 30 yard gap between the fullbacks and CB's.
I didn't see this game but Napoli's first team typically play a 3-4-3 with the front three all switching and sometimes defending as AM's. So against a 4-3-1-2 the opposing fullback often has to mark one of the front three, so when the wingback is in the attack it causes a lot of problems.
I'm not so high on his performance. I saw him lose the ball a few too many times. He was completely burned by that little quick man half a dozen times. I think he'll have to improve next game to keep his spot.
what kind of sense does it make for a player who is a slow cmid to repeatedly defend a quick skillful winger on the edge. seems nonsensical to me. i don't see how bradley can succeed going forward with that job requirement. he simply does not have the footspeed of a right back, and he had no right back helping him for the most part. seems like a recipe for embarrassment to me, and he was indeed embarrassed several times in this match. haven't noticed this quirk in serie a before, but then i haven't looked at serie a with any great interest.
I don't think MB was embarrassed. The right back should have been embarrassed. Where was he? Bradley had the speed and acumen to slow the attacker sufficiently to allow a second defender to also apply pressure. That second defender seldom appeared. The winger was a good player, by the way, who he dribbled calmly, efficiently and got his crosses off. If I were the coach, I'd be rather unhappy about the situation because every team Chievo comes up against will now play the same tactic and succeed just as well or more so (i.e., get a goal out of it). Allowing the opposition to repeatedly pull Bradley out of the center is not a good thing.
it happened so often (cmid individual defense of a winger) that it looked like it was by design. and nickyviola suggested in post 153 that bradley will succeed or fail based on how well he does this task. (i know he said "help out", but, like i said, at chievo "help out" seems to be 1v1 defending out on the edge) i know, i know. one game. i'll calm down.
He looked worse than the rest of his teammates to me in this game. I'm a fan of MB's. I'm sure he'll be fine.
No he definitely did not look worse than his teammates. For being new on the team, etc. he looked fine; easily the middle of the pack. I would be shocked if he didn't stay in the starting 11. That said any role relying on him to contain speedy wingers like that better teach him to stop making those lunges. I didn't keep count, but it looked like half of them put him off balance or on the ground *behind* the attacker. Edit: That said, it was sad to watch that team and think what might have been if he'd stuck with BMG who are now 3rd in the BL!