Right -judging from other posts, this'll go down like a sack of spanners. Many people suggest that David Beckham's main contribution to his side these days is dead-ball delivery and that he doesn't really contribute anything else. That may or may not be the case but, ladies and gentlemen, off the back of that description I give you................Andrea Pirlo. I don't watch enough Serie A to be 100% sure, but whenever I see Pirlo play, he does very little. Surely one of the more over-rated players in the modern game? A latter-day Demetrio "The Crab" Albertini?
Did you watch him in the WC? To use an English example, Andrea Pirlo is Michael Carrick. Completely different to the likes of David Beckham.
Don't disagree with you there. However, my point still holds in that his main contribution appears to be from dead balls. Otherwise he's a bit of a crab. My Albertini analogy is the main comparison.
oh dear, I didn't see this post. now I see what you meant. I think you are not only wrong, but terribly wrong. he is a vital cog in the midfield of milan that has won a scudetto, coppa italia, two champs leagues and he was vital for the world cup italy won under lippi, with the azzurrini when they won the u21 euros and when italy won bronze in the olympics. he is better than albertini and carrick. he is the best dlpm in my opinion. a david beckham in the middle of midfield, dida in goal, gila as a striker, milan wouldn't have made it past the group stages, lol. seriously, though, you can have that opinion, but pirlo has immense skill on the ball, he also gives lots of cheeky chips and what have you (did you see the one to kaka that was ruled off cause inzaghi was offside), beckham never does that. he also dribbles and controls the ball quite well, and is very difficult to dispossess. beckham exploits the space on the wing and is a wonderful crosser of the ball, but when under pressure will usually always look to pass back, never really reverse field or try to dribble out of trouble. they are two totally different players. pirlo, imho, is a fantastic player, and I think you grossly understate his abilities. no disrespect intended, of course edit: yeah, I forgot to say, but remember pirlo was one of the brightest #10 prospects in italy, so that fact alone should tell you he had more skills and technical ability than say, albertini. he is basically a #10 who has great vision (and the deep-lying role allows you to use that vision and long-passing ability better than if you were up front cause you get more consistent space in front of your defense at times than in ront of the opposing defense) and has now learned to defend (some at least) and help gattuso because he has been back there so long. to say that he has a similar skill set to beckham is just not true imo.
Forget about Beckham. I'm not saying that they're similar players. Simply that they are best known for their dead-ball ability. Many Italians that I know maintain that Albertini was a great player. However, I don't think I ever saw him have a great game, and I haven't seen Prilo do so either
Actually that's not true. I did see him play well against Man U a couple of seasons ago. However, for me he never seems to do it regularly.
Pirlo is a deep lying play maker he wins the ball and distributes and holds. He dies the dirty work for the team. He is not a flashy player but a player that does a very good job at his position. Not Overrated at all
albertini was a very good player. in the mid-90s generally recognized as one of the better passers on the european scene (especially his long passing ability), but he didn't have the technical abilities or full repertoire that pirlo has. albertini was also "il metronomo," but the current "il metronomo" is better. I think most other italy fans and milan fans would agree (admittedly, of course, consensus opinion does not equal fact ) yeah, a better description would be that he elegantly does less glamorous work (at least it is less glamorous when compared to strikers and attacking mids) exactly, he was motm three times that tournament. the germany game he was outstanding, and versus france he garnered another motm performance. even the game versus liverpool he played well. probably behind inzaghi as the most important player for milan, with the possible exception of nesta (in my opinion at least). datasport.it said he was "indispensabile, come sempre," meaning, "indispensable, as always." he has plenty of good to great games on big occasions (and small ones too), not just the man united tie a few seasons back. edit: the ironic thing is that if you had waited a few more months, at least from the national team perspective under donadoni, you might have had a better case, at least with convincing those who don't watch serie a. donadoni seems to favor roma's 4-2-3-1 (at least that is what he went with versus scotland). the three up top are a trequartista (perrotta now, totti if he returns) with wide men on the left and right (di natale and camoranesi seem to be favored for those roles, respectively). in the back two places, you have gattuso, de rossi, and pirlo fighting for those two spots, and since gattuso is our runner/d-mid (who we have noone else that really does his role effectively as he does) he gets one spot, so it comes down to de rossi and pirlo for that last spot. under lippi pirlo was undroppable, under donadoni, he seems to favor de rossi. so i wouldn't be surprised if in the next few years, barring injury to de rossi or gattuso, and unless onadoni change tactics, pirlo will be a bench player for the azzurri . good problem for italy to have, admittedly.
i would agree with most of the assesment of pirlo on here from jpick. my only query is... has he lost his edge on set piece taking? especially direct free kicks.. i'm not expecting him to stick them in the postage stamp every time (like he did against scotland ) but i just feel that recently he's gone off the boil as a free kick specialist. would that be a fair assesment..?
yeah, he doesn't score on direct free kicks as much anymore. He's much better at free kicks where he has to find a teammate. I'd much rather Oddo try direct free kicks. Also this assessment that Pirlo does nothing is 100% wrong. He may not be noticeable all the time, but he is vital. He always keeps possession and rarely loses the ball. He knows how to distribute the ball and pick out open spaces to put the ball into (Pirlo's assist to Grosso against Germany was magical and a prime example of how he knows how to pick out a space).
Yes. What's funny is the creator of this thread is comparing Pirlo to Beckham stating all he's good for is free kicks. If that's true than Pirlo is good for nothing because he has been pretty bad at set pieces this year. Every time he steps up to take a set piece I scream out for Oddo to take it. But that aside, Pirlo allows Milan to play like, well, Milan. If you've ever seen Milan play without Pirlo you don't recognize them. They are a completely different team. He hasn't played as well for Milan this year as he did for Italy at the WC but a sub par Pirlo is still better than most any other midfielder out there.
yeah, he scored something like four freekicks in serie a in the first half of the 2005-2006 serie a campaign, january 2006-january2007 I don't believe he scored for club or country on one free kick. then he has scored twice since then. the one versus cagliari was beautiful. but yeah, he did seem to fall off the boil there for a time, just bad for scotland that his poor free kick form was after the qualifier with them (sorry fraser and teso) yeah, that is one of the reasons why in serie a, pirlo is maybe the most "valuable" player for milan, though kaka is the better player. pirlo is so important, and he has no true backup. we tried gourcuff, but he asn't comfortable in that role. at least when kaka sits, seedorf can slide over into the trequartista role, and gourcuff is much more comfortable in the forward role that seedorf normally plays, so the drop-off in perfromance isn't as bad as you might think when kaka goes off, as ronaldo, seeodrf and gourcuff can at least (sort of) pick up the slack. this is why on the milan board, i am probably becoming known as a ze roberto fanboy, lol. I want to get him from santos cause he would be a true backup to pirlo and that depth would be important for a run at multiple hardware next season.
Another thing about Pirlo is that he is a very good reader of the game. He won't get 'stuck in' like Gattuso, but one of the reasons why he's been able to adjust so well to the deep-lying role is that he very capable of anticipating and making interceptions.
Did you watch Wes in the play-off at the weekend? Probably added another £250K to his transfer value.
well good, cause I took a cheap shot at you on the milan transfer thread, lol. yes, it is an interesting debate. plus, you admitted you hadn't watched him all that often, and you an only go by what you see, eh?
Unfortunately I only caught the two goals. Poor keeping for the first and a great striker for the second. Congrats. Sadly we will probably only get around that amount (at best) for Wes.