Re: Argentina vs Australia Basile just said on an interview that hes looking for players who can replace those who are getting old! and he specified a Num 9!!!!!!!!! he said hes trying to find a replacement for Crespo and he brought in Demichilis cause he will probably replace Ayala! wow i wounder if hes replacing Riquelme and Zanetti soon?
Re: Argentina vs Australia depend on how roman's career turns out i guess. Zanetti should be gone by 2010. old people for WC is a joke. Claudio Cannigia anyone?
Re: Argentina vs Australia the Average age should be between 22 - 26 and 3 experienced players would be great Demichelis, Maxi, Saviola, Ferrari thats enough experience by that time
Re: Argentina vs Australia I dont understand why mainly we Argies have this fascination with youth. What is wrong with say about four players that are 30 to 35?? Brazil did it, Italy and even Germany for the longest time. My feeling is as long as we are not taking obvious spots away ala Canigia in 2002, then what is wrong with it. If Zanetti can still play 70% of the time in 2010 then I say take the man!!! If Crespo same thing, if Roman you get the picture
Re: Argentina vs Australia I agree, I think the majority of the squad should be between 26-32, with a couple of youngsters and an older guy if his levels of fitness are high. I think the last couple of WC winners shows a similar makeup. (Although Italy didn't have any youngsters this time).
Re: Argentina vs Australia You both nailed it. I've wondered about this fascination with our youth as well. I look at the guys we have that will be in the 29-34 age range and as you guys said, if they have the fitness and the skills, then bring them on. Then only guarantee you get from youth is pimples, poor decision making and immaturity.
Re: Argentina vs Australia Huh? What are you talking about? Up to the final nobody was complaining about anything and Argentina were playing the best footy of the tournament by far. "We barely ran"? What? Argentina scored more goals than any other team despite not scoring in the final. I don't understand the comment.
Re: Argentina vs Australia I laughed at that comment as well. Fact is when our offense is clicking, we really don't have to run much. Now if his comment is referring to our defenders getting back against the counter, then we don't need fitness, we need sprinters.
Re: Argentina vs Australia At DiVo0oNeH. Where does this over-confidence in our youth come from? If it comes from the U20 WC, then you need to keep in mind that they were playing other U20's. I'm not saying they arent excellent players because they clearly have the talent. What they don't possess are the qualities that come from consistently playing over time. Based on how I read your posts, your ready for a complete overhaul of the national team with the majority of our players being under 23 years of age. We had one crappy (understatement) final against Brazil (normal for us) and you're ready to discount how good this side really is. We are getting ready to go into qualifiers and we need to focus on the here and now. Sure let some of these kids get exposed but to expect these kids to come in and play better is absurd. The pure fact is that coaching/tactics and not our players abilities, heart or fitness cost us in the WC/Fed/CA. Please don't take this as an attack, I just don't understand your logic from a futbol perspective.
Re: Argentina vs Australia In a sense, I do agree with Divooneh. (Not on the age issue) I don't think we really played that well at CA. Going into the tournament, we had by far the most superior squad, and throughout CA we beat up on little teams. I don't think that can be considered playing well. Those were all games that we should have won, and we did. That's not necessarily commendable. As an example, take the Mexico game. This was a weakened Mexico side, and yet the strongest team we had played thus far. Still our goals did not come from superiority. One came from a cheeky FK from Roman, the other from a dive by Tevez. The third goal was a great play by Roman and Messi, but it came as almost a counterattack. However it all changed when we played a world-class team.
Re: Argentina vs Australia I've got to somewhat disagree with your assessment of how we played. When we had the ability to instill our game we offensively could've beaten anyone including Brazil. Our problem was that we had zero contingency plans to adapt. This could happen to any group of players we put on the pitch not just this current crop. With that said, sure a few players I'd never like to see in the shirt again but to revamp the way some have suggested is just over the top. If we qualify for the WC as early as I think we can then I'd say throw caution to the wind and let the kids get a go in games that mean something to another team just not us. At least the intensity will be there to see how they react. To do so during qualifiers is just too much of a gamble while we have a coach like El Coco.
Re: Argentina vs Australia Back at Moishe and Dr Know did u guys seriously think we played good football in CA? i dont know how many times i have to say this but i actually posted 50 times during the CA that if we played a world class team the way we wereperforming after the 2nd game we would get hammered!!!!!!!! and i specified Brazil and we actually did get hammered 3-0 :> good football is not just scoring goals? hell every team scores! thats not good football good football is when u play a great game and even when u lose ur proud of losing cause u played ur game and left everything out on the pitch! our CA team didnt play 90 mins in any game! they played the second 45 and the first 45 were horroble performances! u can watch the games again and give me a good first half! football is not ok Riquelme make something happen or Messi make a run thats not football! i dont know how u guys see the game but thats truely not the game and that was Basile's tactics! Heinze cant push up he proved it the whole yr with Man U!! Millito have always sucked n the NT! Cambiasso and Veron 2 wingers? cme on man! give me a freaking break? making plays from all sides of the pitch is playing some good football and we never pushed up from any side all we tried to do is get in from the middle! if i dont know what im talking about? then Diego Simeone is a ************ coach cause when i read his opinion about the tactics that were being used in CA the guy actually laughed at it! and so did i during the CA Im not saying bring in the whole youth team all im saying if u dont have a good left winger dont put shit head cambiasso in! bring one in from the youth! when there s no Num 9 in Europe dont bring in Millito wh sucked during the friendlies! give Pavone a chance! thats all im saying and dont bring in 33 yr old Veron! cause u seriously dont wanna see how Cafu, Carlos, Ronaldo, Emerson performed the last WC!! and rios is right oldies shouldnt be called up for Wc's when their over 32 when u have younger players that can get the job done!
Re: Argentina vs Australia I have to disagree. I had a similar discussion with another friend before the semifinals who commented that Argentina wasn't really playing that well. Our creativity was only shown when Roman made a particularly incisive pass, or when we scored a good goal. But what wasn't happenning was creativity in attack coming from all direction. IMO apart from Riquelme, the rest of the team was essentially a group of role players who did the job. This is not how a big team with good players in all positions plays. Basically I did expect the team to lose against Brazil, and when we did play them, once Roman was marked out of the game, we really were clueless. I actually don't blame Roman's performance for our loss, (whether I think he should play for the NT is a different story) great players are the ones who opposing tacticians intend to shut down. However almost everyone else on final day did not play well either, and in a big team such as ours, if one player has a bad game, other players are expected to be capable of imposing themselves on the game. I also disagree that the loss was primarily due to tactical reasons. Tactical reasons were critical, but that's only one side of the story. Their players really outplayed us, and showed themselves to be better on final day. The first goal was a damn good play by Julio Baptista. Vagner Love will probably never start in a full strength Brazil NT but he basically pwned our backline before slipping the pass to Alves for the last goal. I don't know that Dunga planned either of these. IMO they came out of the invention of the players. Ultimately tactics are a set of flexible guidelines, and the players are intelligent, dynamic beings who have to make their own decisions on the pitch and show their own initiative. By sending on Alves Dunga probably planned on stretching our backline by adding more width, but I'm not so sure he saw the goal coming considering the good (world class, actually) defenders that we have. And that's the reason I believe in picking experienced players for the NT, who have the requisite decision-making ability gained from experience and can impose themselves on the game. That's why I don't think it's a chess match.
Re: Argentina vs Australia True totally agree but isnt 23 - 26, 27, 28 experience? i mean if a player is 23 yrs of age that means hes experienced well enough to gain a spot doesnt have to be 30! i always thought a team with 4 28-32 players and 5 23-27 and 1 youngster or maybe even 2 is a good solid team but u gotta have those 4 experienced players! right now to me the only 4 i can think of are Demichilis, Mascherano, Saviola, Maxi thats about it and those are the guys who deserve a spot and are well performing but others may come up as well yeah and u can also add Arca if he keeps performing the way he is
Re: Argentina vs Australia By the way Di Maria got the man of the match award today they say he was amazing!!! go to Benefica's thread read what they're writing about him and Lavezzi was involved in 5 goals :/
Re: Argentina vs Australia Strange, I don't remember all these posts from you. Just the way you were bragging about how good we were and how you looked forward to destroy Brazil Now you say it was irony. Then better use emoticons next time...
Re: Argentina vs Australia Moishe, were we separated at birth, I really value your comments most are spot on. It think the line up against Aussies is in all accounts a decent one, I just hope Coco knows what to do with it , with players like Demichelis for example is he going to really test him??, Will he once again pull Messi into a mid role enganche? I really wish that he worked harder watched more tapes, and talked to the clubs management if need be, at this point I dont think he really knows his players well and just goes by rputation alone
Re: Argentina vs Australia To be honest, yes I thought that we did play good football. Was it great? At times yes and at other times meh. What constitutes good futbol to one person will obviously not always be the same to another. Where your view on what is good play is all fine and good, I just happen to subscribe to the school of "take what is given and pick it apart until they adjust". I've got no beef with your opnions of some of the call ups and infact agree with the guys you pointed out. Coaching cost us this trophy that and a lack of tactics. We had no plan B to account for the coach that figures us out. As far as Rios and his over 32 gig, age is irrelevant so long as the player can get the job done. Let's use El Pupi as an example, if at 32 he is still considered one of the best at his position and performance backs it up then why in the heck would you not call him up? The kids deserve chances, that I've never disputed but to overhaul the whole side is over the top going into qualifiers.
Re: Argentina vs Australia I'll respond to your post by paragraph so as not to look like some ramblings. As I replied to DiVoOoNeH, what constitutes a good game lies in who's watching and to a degree your background in the game. If your view of playing well is always going through a team like a hot knife through butter then more often than not you'll be disapointed. If you expect every game to be near perfect then your more of an optimist than I am. Apples and oranges, nothing else. I respect what you have to say just happen to view the game from a defenders perspective. In regards to your second paragraph, I'm glad you realize Roman was not the reason we lost the Copa. Fact is many tried to make him the fall guy as far back as the WC. What didn't he do for us in Germany besides not play defense? As far as your opinions about his not coming back to the NT, I've got no problem with that so long as you can provide me a player that right now can come in read, distribute and control a game. Truth is we have no one and as of right now no player has shown that he has those talents. With the rest of the post, yeah you are right that our players did not step up and react to the way Brazil came at us. The players should accept responsibility for this no doubt but a good coach will recognize this and either change his tactics or more importantly the players and thats where it comes down to tactics. What sucks is that as bad a first half as we played, Romans shots are a few inches over the whole complexion of the game changes and it's possible all our conversations on here could be of a different tone.
Re: Argentina vs Australia Again with the age thing, why do guys hate us viejos so much Demichelis I'm really excited about. I felt he was worthy of a spot on the WC squad and the way he reacted when getting snubbed told me so much about his character and passion. He was more visibly upset in not going to Germany than Ayala was in costing us the Copa America (yeah I said it). Factor that along with how good of a player he's been as far back as that little club in BsAs. Saviola I love because of his off the ball movement and ability to read the game. He was sorely missed at the Copa. Maxi, welcome back and may he regain the form pre-injury. Mascherano goes without saying.
Re: Argentina vs Australia If you're tall and handsome then it's possible Yes it's a good squad for Australia but as you said, does Coco know what to do with it. I adore the man as a coach and personality but I think the game passed him up and no one had the heart to tell him. I'll never dispute what he's done as a club coach but on the national level it's over. I unfortunately expect more of the same. We'll get some results but we'll also drop games we shouldn't.
Re: Argentina vs Australia That's the problem, essentially the description of the playmaker in the team. IMO Roman's job for the NT is not to distribute the ball and read the game. He is not there to connect defense and attack. His role on this team should be to create legitimate chances on goal via incisive passing in the final third of the field. When it comes to distributing the ball, that's the job of the central midfield, to link defense and attack, and maintain posession while spreading the ball around the field. My gripes against playing Roman are: (a) he does not create enough chances for shots on goal (b) he has a tendency to fade (c) his play is more concerned with distributing the ball to the team rather than creating chances in front of goal, which I believe is the main weakness (d) playing Riquelme requires that fullbacks push up in order to give him a lot of targets to pass to, ensuring that the team is (in theory) sort of like a swarm of players surrounding the focal point. However, when (not if) he gets shut down the players are essentially clueless. So who do we have that can avoid this? a) For creating chances, it is true that we have no great playmakers up front. However, we do have many good creative players in Tevez, Messi, Aimar, Saviola, Maxi. So we have to construct a system in which each of the players up front are to do so. b) There is no solution, other than having more players responsible for creating. c) The responsibility for distributing the ball should be with the DM/CM axis and for that I think Gago is the best option. d) More than one playmaker. Such as playing Tevez in a deeper role, or playing Aimar in an advanced position paired with Gago distributing the ball (Like Italy in the WC) When it comes to distributing the ball, I belive the DM/CM partnership of Mascherano and Gago/or another central midfielder who is concerned with distributing the ball. When it comes to creating chances, the best options we have are playing Riquelme in a very advanced position, or playing an attack of Tevez, Messi, and Aimar behind a lone striker.
Re: Argentina vs Australia no no lets not overhaul the whole side butbring in what we lack! left winger? good CB's? num 9? playmaker? thats all im saying if Zanetti can play till 2010 ok keep him there if he can run for 90 mins i dont mind but Heinze is not a good choice! and our CB's have been pretty bad for a while now! dont forget Ayala is not there anymore to clean everyone's mess! and Cambiasso cant be our left winger!