On the topic of Courtois, I have never seen a match with him where I thought "wow, this guy instills confidence". His footwork always looks like he's doing a little anxiety dance + most 1v1 end up in goals which is ofcourse not only his fault. What I'm saying is that the amount of hype behind him as a signing does not correlate with what I'm seeing.
The only reason people have yet to show concerns in regards to Courtois is because at the moment we have bigger issues on other areas of the pitch, once we get the back on track people will start to see just how overrated Courtois is.
Ignore them then. Most people are not. We can see goals being scored that were being stopped before.. If this is what TC is going to do in 1 on 1 situations we are screwed.
I was mad AF after the game, I felt robbed, so I usually tend to cool off with getting busy with something else afterward. Now that the emotions have settled, here are my two cents; - We actually had a pretty good game, the ball in our first and second thirds were pretty decent. However, there's a clear lack of 1 vs.1 in our final third, which Hazard/? Ney would absolutely fix. - Benz was leaving the box creating spaces used to work for CR. Now there's no one that fills that position anymore, not talking about scoring 60+ goals, just talking about drifting from your wide position to a more central role (?Ney). Benz is not going to change his style of play, but maybe Bale can adapt to that role more. - 3 of 4 basic soccer principles were pretty decent; possession, out of position, and attacking transition. However, our defensive transition was disastrous. The goal was not the only chance where Valladolid created a serious opportunity on the counter. - Apart from Carvajal and Zizou, I'm actually happy with everyone's performance. Flo, get us Neymar! And if this game pushes him a little bit, it's totally worth the two points this early... HALA MADRID!
I'm still most upset about the negative football we played after the goal. The biggest club in the world is having it's #9 passing the ball back to the keeper and playing one-twos with the DM to waste time and protect a one goal lead vs. Valladolid. This is the example we're setting for the young players, and this is how you reward the fans who came to the stadium. ******** out of here with that crap, we deserved to lose just for that.
What stats lmao, Courtois played 35 games last season, while Keylor played only 21. It's only natural to concede more goals when you play more matches. Plus, Courtois played in almost all of the tougher matches, while Navas played against weaker opponents and the Copa del Rey.
There was a moment that was ridiculous, we win a foul relatively deep in midfield, they are out of position, and instead of hitting them with a quick attack, two players (I think Carvajal and Casemiro) do high fives and waste time.
Is this the goal? That's how they play and that's always going to happen on counter attacks; with our teams and others. When they push forward, it's up to Casemiro and the defenders to cover them. Problem with the goal was mainly Varane being flat footed and Ramos' failed tackle. Carvajal took a gamble that didn't pay off but Varane should have been much better positions in my opinion
This pic here and a couple of other "clear" cut chances for Valladolid should have been punished by Valladolid but they suck so bad they couldn't make the most of it. Marcelo and Carvajal were obviously asked by Zizou to play up high, especially Marcelo, why was there nobody to cover on that flank is unexplainable. 2 players behind Marcelo strolling freely on our right flank... This is a role issue, whoever had the "role" of covering that spot failed. You can see Varane covering for Carvajal, so Carvajal is barely at fault for using his freedom to go forward in this instance as his original spot is covered. On the other side there is no excuse. There is nobody covering. Forgive me, I can't remember the exact play and how it went. I don't want to be a Debbie Downer cause I think we've played a really decent match overall, but I can't see a mid table team missing any of the 2-3 chances I've mentioned. We definitely need to tighten that defence and both Zizou and the players involved should be held accountable for that. Also, Benzema's goal came off of a failed cross into the box by Varane. Benz made the most out of it, thank God. I just think it's important to call it as it is.
No, I don't think Perez will allow Navas to be the deserved number one. I'm hoping that Keylor leaves ASAP.
Yes, I know, although if Zidane told Keylor today that he was number one he might be convinced to stay. Even if Zidane did that I still would prefer that Keylor leave because, frankly, I don't see the team winning anything this year regardless of who is in goal. PSG seems like a better option (if it happens) because it's always better to be wanted and they have a better shot at various trophies.
It's not bizarre to play with high FBs. It's in fact intelligent. The only thing bizarre is how this forum can't seem to grasp if your on the attack and lose the ball unexpectedly..... you can't magically make everyone get back into position. You're ********ed. That's why you don't lose the ball in awkwarf positions. ... because you'll be ********ed.
Well, we disagree. Profoundly. It is bizarre to play with such hyper offensive fullbacks considering we are unable to mitigate defensive issues anymore, because: 1. defense is older and dumber 2. Casemiro and Modrić work rate is gone, and Kroos being utter imbecile 3. we don`t have prolific goal scorer to answer "score one goal more than opponent" idea. As for unable to grasp part... You realize that you must actually practice such "unexpected" situations? And if this players had any tactical grasp of what to do, meaning they had well defined positioning / movement or in general tasks / roles, they would have solved that situation? That is the whole point.
If I was Zidane, I’d play counter attacking football. Give opponents the ball and defend and keep Benzema up the field. We have players like Bale, Hazard, James and VJ who have the speed to give teams trouble. It would certainly be better than what we’re trying to pull off now. We don’t have players who can break down defenses, hence why we’re constantly relying on crosses hoping it would reach a marked Bale or Benzema. I don’t trust our midfield with the job of breaking up better organized counter attacking teams.
I think high FBs is brilliant, however, our defense transition was atrocious! Luckily, this was not the case in Celta. Liverpool is playing with high FBs for at least a couple of seasons now, with a midfield a full tier or two below ours, yet they do transition to defense a lot better than we did this game. Zidane has some work to do ...
We cannot field players like Kroos, Isco and James if we want to play like that. They are simply too slow.