I f'n knew it...what a shame. Sure, Makaay hasn't had his best season so far but he more than made up for his lack of goals with his assists. What a slap in the face from Van Basten to not even name him in the provisional squad which contains some strikers that are NOT better than Roy. Oh well, VB might just regret this.
I doubt it, the one thing the Dutch will never lack is offense. Even if they didnt invite Van Nistelrooy they still would have a much better strike force than atleast 3/4 of the teams in the competition. It sucks because its one of our guys, but we have to move on. Hopefully Roy can just stay concentrated domestically from here on out.
very sad for roy. it sucks. well it is all these debutant coaches who don't know shit about the game. van basten just like klinsi will probably put an end to their careers after this world cup.
just confirms why i believe van basten stands a strong chance of leading holland to world cup glory... hes getting rid of the prima donnas and is looking for hard-working, earnest or supremely talented players whose performances justify their reputation... im one of the very few on this board who believe that the reason ballack has moved so far forward from midfield is because makaay by himself up there has not been able to carry the offensive threat well enough... imho, he is the reason for the imbalance in this squad, and not ballack! (but i wont resort to calling him names or other childish behaviour cos at the end of the day - hopefully not beyond this season - he is still a bayern player!)
that is not the truth. it is the opposite of the truth. it is not makaay's fault it is baLLack's. he is the one who is supposed to supply the passes and he is not. he is getting the service. how many times will have to say this. ballack is the playmaker he does not have a good number of assists. he should be getting about 20+ assists evry season he does not even have 7 this season. makaay has not been missing chances. he has just not been getting the service he needs. ballack misses a lot more than he scores. come on scorpio you know better than that. now it was van basten's opinion it does not mean that van hoijdong is better than makaay. not even van nistelrooy is for that matter (my opinion and i can back it up if necessairy) ballack is not gonna be with us next season and makaay is hopefully gonna stay. you will see next season that makaay will be back to scoring 30+.
Bottom line... All this negative criticism of Makaay wouldn't be going on if he was leading the BL in goals. People weren't calling Makaay a prima donna before this season. Can't a player just have a bad year without people saying he's conceited, temperamental, or that his career is over? Yes, Makaay did have some questionable behavior this season when he was taken out of games, but don't you think that's partially because he desperately wanted a chance to prove himself both to Bayern and the Dutch national team? Now he's not on the World Cup roster. I suppose all the Makaay-haters will assume he'll just pout like a baby and not give it his all against Mainz. 2004/2005, I NEVER thought I'd see so many Bayern fans hating Makaay and wanting to run him out of Munich. I guess things change.
Hah, I've been watching him since he alone (yes alone) beat us in CL while he was with Depor. When the news broke that he played with us, I really broke in tears. Regarding his poor form, I deffinitely agree it's because he really can't get any assit. And yes, someone will lose form once he never touch ball for long. Plus isn't it, VB stupid ass wrongdoing who made makaay injured when he is in his top form? Plus, I think he is the one of the sweetest guy ever. Remember how each time being interviewed for making goals, he always said it's the team winning that's most important for him. And he always try his best after being critizise instead of looking for another club like certain someone (glare).
i dunno who the previous post refers to, but i want to make it clear that i dont hate makaay... i have no reason to... he is the consummate professional and i dont doubt his character or integrity at all... im sure he is a very nice man in real life, and when i say i dont think he fits at bayern, i say that purely in a footballing sense... my problem has been that he is a striker best suited to counter attacking teams where they dont use all avenues to attack, but wait for the opposition to commit before trying to deliver a pass into space for somebody like him to utilize... something depor did very well with mauro silva winning the balls and disrupting play before laying them off to valeron to push into space for makaay to exploit... his off the ball movement is very low for a striker of his reputation, and his workrate, although it has improved during his time at bayern, still irks me... say what you will about makaay not getting opportunities, but you cant honestly tell me you see no difference in the man who took the field for bayern at the beginning of the season, and the man who came back from injury a few months later... he cant play with his back to goal and he cant hold onto the ball long enough to bring his teammates into play often... this season, his strikers instinct has deserted him as well... im not here to villify him... i simply did not want him at bayern in the first place as, with the purchase of ballack, ze roberto and deisler, we should have kept somebody like elber - somebody who works hard for the team and is not just a goalscorer who hangs by the end of the defensive line, trying to beat the offside trap... he is on the wrong side of 30 and instead of continuing to believe that he is the man we should form our team around, we need to start thinking more laterally and long-term... hitzfelds purchase of makaay was his biggest mistake at bayern, imo, especially after having splurged so much on those three midfielders the previous year... it absolutely reeked of a knee jerk reaction to the 1st round exit the previous year and im sure it was purely a result of the pressure he felt after seeing his troops turn in such a dismal performance (in terms of results in europe, not overall play - those two defeats vs eventual champions ac milan were two of the most absorbing, top-notch CL encounters i can remember in recent years) the same year he brought in such high-profile/expensive recruits for the midfield...
Superb point Scorpio. Before i begin though, let me say that its heartbreaking to see that Roy Maakay is not going to be playing the World Cup this summer. Harsh on him considering that the Dutch are playing at his backyard and he is quite possibly the best striker in the BL. My sympathy with Maakay. Now on to your point of Maakay's purchase being the biggest mistake. I tend to agree with it. I really do. And i never thought id say this when we bought him in the first place. But as they say hindsight is 20/20. Also i agree with your point, the first season with Ballack and co. when we exited Europe in the first round was perhaps the best i had seen a Bayern team play. We were just desperately unlucky to be drawn in perhaps the toughest group in the UCL at that time. Bayern played some absorbing games against Milan and the Italians juts pipped us, but we were in no way inferior. Finally i think the logic of less assists is also very flawed. A lot of players who play in Ballack's position do not have too many assists. He is somewhat of a pre-assist player, as i like to call it. He helps in the buildup but often does not provide the finall ball. Countering that he is often on the end of the cross so its almost the same if not better. I remember Zidane at his peak in Real had something like 7-8 assists in one season, which was surprising considering how well he played. But its just that he was often the provider of the defence splitting pre assist ball to the wingers or overlapping players to cut back for a goal. Also i agree with your summarisation of Maakay as having poor off the ball movement. A predator like him should have much more off the ball movement. Id much rather have prefered to have someone like Pippo Inzaghi who isnt half the player Roy Maakay is but would have fitted better into the system.
Ballack is a playmaker, he also is one of our few players not afraid to drill the ball from 20-30 yards away. I think our problem this year we have been pointing too many fingers instead of just sitting back and relaxing because we have a threat this year much bigger than last years. And because there are a bit more Bayern posters this time of year compared to lasts. Every club has some type of flaw at every position but we have basically picked apart our club and dissected it 10 times over instead of just once.
Buying Makaay a mistake? Come on guys, look what he's done for us in the first two seasons....you can't seriously expect him to do ALL the work, he's done what he can. He is a legend in his own right. He is having an off year like many strikers do. Is it really his fault that there is no one else to slip into that scoring position when he isn't? Besides, has he really been that aweful this year? No! He started great, he's come into form as of late, providing great assists. The story of course is the CL and that was a collective performance, not one to blame on Makaay or Ballack per say.
I agree with ForeverRed...the purchase of Roy Makaay was no mistake or bad decision. He helped us immensely last season on our way to the double. Whether he "fits in" at Bayern perfectly is another story, but you can't deny he's helped out.
Since I couldn't care less about the Netherlands, I'm quite happy Makaay can rest & recuperate over the summer and come back even stronger for our FC Bayern next year.
Bayern's problem the last few years has been their over reliance on Makaay and Ballack. It's been crazy. I've heard people say no matter how Makaay loses form, he should not be benched. Rubbish! That's why it'll be hard to duplicate the success of the team Bayern had a few yrs back!
there is nobody who would want their team to play the best football ever and be bottom of the group. i could care less about good football if it did not bring titles. hitzfeld's mistake was not makaay. it was ballack. makaay made at least three assists since the january. makaay is beating ballack this year in assists and goals. he is doing both their jobs better than ballack. come on. we started getting bad results with the arrival of ballack. the two years he spent with hitzfeld were not great for bayern. we could not produce in the CL. instead of getting rid of ballack we got rid of hitzfeld. now that was a big mistake by the management. since magath came in we have switched to a stupid diamond formation and all it did was make ballack look good. last two seasons makaay scored lots of goals and made lots of assists too. he knows where the goal is, he scores and he is most unselfish striker there is. bye the way makaay shoots from 20-30 yards so do scholl, pizza, shweiny, deisler and owen. not only ballack. i am not saying that we should build around him for the future but he still has two good years in him and he is the best striker we can ask for. it is just that we should look at a new style of play for next season and get a playmaker who can make more than 3 assists a season. now ballack does not want to play for us and makaay wants to, they are not in the same boat. we definitly like makaay more than ballack. who cares about the dutch team.
this was a very good post the part i bolded i believe you were talking about my comment made before. my comment was more so aimed at the people bashing ballack. and the way i phrased it was ballack is ONE OF A FEW players that can drill the ball from distance, not the only one. it was just me including ballack in that group. thank you for taking it a step farther and naming all in that group, i would add lucio as well if he gets the chance
Just a tough break for The King. VN isnt really lighting the world on fire over in Manu. Just another victim of "Lets Kiss Ballacks' Ass" style of play. Oh well it will soon be over.
great thread, great posts, just checked in to add a few things. I don't think Makaay's acquisition was a mistake. I didn't think he would fit in at first but he's done a fantastic job at fitting in and he's exactly the kind of player we needed back then and we still need now (however since he's aging, we need at least one more forward like him). The mistake, and it's not really a mistake, but that was Ballack. He's the player we had to build the team around and because he's so good at what he does, we've become incredibely dependent on him. In part Ballack has assisted us in our success over the years, and in the other part he's hindered the team. The Bundesliga being the former and CL the latter. This is the Makaay thread and we've gone to talk about Ballack, that's how important he is to Bayern. But in any event, Van Basten should have picked Makaay, he's still in great form right before the WC and can be very helpful off the bench even. It's a damn shame. On the other hand, I applaud VB for sticking to his policy. Klinsman should take notice.
well makaay said that he kinda expected it. i did too. well less players to cheer for at the world cup. owen might be the next victim but who cares about england. france should pick ismael he is a lot better than mexes, boumsong and silvestre but he won't be. focking hate it when our players hearts are broken like that but better for us in terms of resting. we will be good for next season since a lot of our plyers will rest including the germans who won't compete at the world cup for long.
1. Me 2. Sorry but Ismael is not better than Mexes, the latter had had an outstanding season for Roma and is the more in form defender at the moment. Also, Ismael doesn't have that much of an edge over Silvestre who has more experience for the National Team and is rarely left out. You can make an argument over Boumsong though who has only had one outstanding game for Newcastle this season, he's one player who shouldn't be picked for France.
Of course I'd want other teams to win before england, but i am definately gonna be watching them. if you are the slightest bit interested in soccer you'd watch the big clubs and see how they do. I think that the statement you made SirMan is most definately true about Ismael and what he is up against. Its not really a shame that he is not on the squad for france, itd be nice, but it doesnt bother me.
Bottom line, loyalty does not and should not have a say in team selection or support of fans. If you dont perform this season, you lose ground, regardless of how good you have been in the past.