Even in Portugal he only really had one good season, nothing ground breaking but yeah his last year there looks better in terms of his possession ability. Still was one of the dispossessed midfielders in Europe which would surely be a concern of us playing him deeper than he currently is (I’m not 100% sure that’s true anyway, at least not all of the time, recently I have seen him playing left side of a diamond in CM which would surely have similarities to being a LCM with us).
He’s probably worth a punt at less than 20m but if the reported 40m is true I just can’t see how he would be the best option. I’d be disappointed if he was one of two midfielders brought in but if two other players are also brought in it may help him to take time to settle - as he has seemingly struggled to do so at Wolves. Not sold on this guy though.
Only really seen him against us, but he passed the ‘eye’ test for me. Seems like you can’t speed him up, he always looks like he has time on the ball, even when he doesn’t, and doesn’t seem to give it away. I’ll have a bit of that.
Players who run with the ball tend to be the most dispossesed. I’m sure if you checked Messi’s stats for dispossession rates they’d be through the roof.
This season has seen us have real trouble transitioning the ball from defence to the forward players, in many games the only real option has to punt it long for Nunez to chase. Having a player who wants to take the ball under pressure run through midfield could have alleviated some of those struggles.
Think it was more of a flat midfield 4 when he played narrow on the left, not the diamond. Did a good defensive job on Trent in one of the games against us, possibly the one when they beat us fair and square. In their last game, I saw that they flipped more to a 4-3-3 (or 4-1-4-1), but then Nunes was dropped to the bench for Gomes (they played Lemina at the base, Neves RCM and Gomes LCM).
To be honest, that’s pretty much all I’ve seen of him. Often if I switch Wolves on he isn’t even playing.
I’m not 100% convinced on him either, I don’t know how anyone could be given how this season has played out. I do think he is better than what he’s shown at Wolves though. Not quite Mascherano at West Ham levels, but there’s something there.
He’s obviously had a difficult season at Wolves but he does have a number of attributes which would benefit us. I’d still rather look elsewhere but this article gives a good idea what he did at Sporting.
Adrien Rabiot, potential free agent in June: “I loved Liverpool a lot because I was a bit fan of Steven Gerrard, who made me dream… and so therefore I followed the Reds”, told Tuttosport !(https://abs-0.twimg.com/emoji/v2/svg/1f534.svg)! “My other idol was Zinedine Zidane"
I think certain things get tagged and dragged along with certain players among fans for too long. He’s viewed as this mamma’s boy (and so what?) who is lazy and what else.
He was promising at PSG, was good for them for a few years, went for a new challenge. Truth is he behaved a bit weird around France at the time. Probably thought he merited more than what he got. Deschamps says he’s matured from that time.
Not saying I’d go for him (I probably wouldn’t), but he’s showing some good quality both at club and international level, he should have a number of options available to him this summer.
Talented players will always have options. But there are far too many talented players to justify looking at a player with a penchant for disruption. Sometimes speaking out shows character and leadership. He has fallen out with pretty much every manager he’s ever had, and done so publicly. You might point to evidence of his new found maturity by pointing out that it’s been a while since his last fall out, but players like are like recovering alcoholics. They might have their 12 month chip, but they’re always on the verge of their next bender.
Interesting to read Jota to Newcastle rumours for that price and the fact he’ll be our 5th choice i’d be happy to see him move on bank the 60-70 and try and find a decent bosman deal for an experianced forward who ideally could play on the centre/right and back up Mo.
Everyone else in front of Jota in the pecking order is better central/left than Jota he is a bit redundant at this point. And thats no reflection on Jota, he had injuries this season and we have recruited players who
play his position and be has slid down the pecking order whilst returning from injury. I cant imagine he wants to be 5th choice either.
Re Bellingham I think he is a done deal tbh. We went down a very similar path with Virg and I think we are too well run a club now to blow up this season without an agreement in place to get Jude and make the pain worthwhile. There has to be a reason we went with a temp deal for Arthur as a stop gap that isnt FSG refuse to open their wallet because they are tight despite what gets said in the media and in this forum.
Overall I think we’ll see a substantial clear out this summer. I can absolutely see players like Jota Jones Gomez Thiago Kellerher and some other fringe and youth players move on in addition to the expiring contracts so we can really free up some space on the wage bill. I think players like Hendo and Fab will move into more squad roles and back up the next generation we recruit this summer and in reality having players of their quality rotating/coming off the bench helps us retain some depth and experience there and the reduced load on those players should hopefully help them rediscover their form.
Interesting window coming, I think we will move on alot of players and give some of the up and comers Morton Gordon Doak etc a real chance to stake their claim next season especially if we are not playing Champions league and direct our funds to a few key purchases in midfield and defence which really improve the spine of the team.
Maybe I have a lack of information, but I don’t see much wrong with the guy. What did he say about almost all his managers? In the past, maybe there were some good enough reasons to avoid him. If that was still the case, he probably wouldn’t be where he is in the last few years. Many players do stupid things. Some are eternally problematic in different ways, some learn and mature.
Sadly feel this is a bit FIFA like and we aren’t sure what Diaz will be like on his return not to mention Doak is still only 16/17.
I’d rather us not leave ourselves relying on 16/17 year olds if we happen to have a couple of injuries.
I’m really not sure what we would have had if Gakpo hadn’t arrived and Firmino was playing game after game up to the World Cup.
I remember we were using Ox and Jones at times in January. It’s all about rotation, the only reason I’d sell Jota is if we miss out Europe completely and even then I personally wouldn’t. Nunez has not shown the ability to play more than 3-4 games until he has some injury or other.
Yup. By all accounts we have money to spend this summer. And we’ve seen how Klopp likes longevity in his squad. All this chat of selling VVD, Salah, Jota etc to raise money makes no sense to me. We’ve plenty of dead wood to get rid of. Then keep our good players and freshen things up with new signings
He’s had Blanc, Emery and Tuchel at PSG and publicly fought with all of them over his position (reluctance to be coached), concerns over future opportunities (not even current game time, but concerns over whether he would play less in the future), and repeatedly fell foul of expectations of a professional and reacted negatively to being held accountable for them. He had the issue in 2018 where he refused a place among the world cup reserve list, which was not a one off, but the culmination of all these same issues already existing in his relationship with Deschamps (disagreement over where he should play and bad reactions to the manager not thinking he was important enough to play him more often in his preferred role).
Even if you exclude the crazy shit his mum has done, like waiting in a parking lot for Blanc to publicly berate him, he himself as been at the heart of much of the disruption. This current season is really the only one he’s had in his 10 year career where he’s been both on form and drama free. At 27 years of age, is one year sufficient to overlook the previous 9 years? For some clubs it will be, but those are mostly the badly run clubs.
