Manchester United Talk/Gossip/Rumours Thread 11/12

kryogen wrote: »

Seems like a nice time to remind people

Nani >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Young.

I don't agree with you, I think Nani is over-rated and makes wrong decisions more often than not, plus he hasn't improved in this aspect of his game in 5 years. Plus you're evaluation of the squad situation is very positive.....

kryogen wrote: »

Should my evaluation of the squad be negative? The squad is second in the league, separated on goal difference, has had huge injury problems all season, the worst in the league quite easily. The squad is seriously strong.

What do you have to back up your view of Nani though? Is it just since he has come back from injury? Because he has been performing brilliantly for a long time now, at least 2 years. He has improved greatly in his decision making from his younger days, he tracks back more often now, he is a match winner for us, when he plays well United play well.

It's testament to Ferguson's brilliance as a manager that this squad is competing at all this season, plus imo it's not a particularly good PL this year. utd came up short in a terrible CL group and were hammered by Athletico in the EL. Nani is capable of moments of genius but he very often tries shots from ridiculous angles and distances when there is better options on. You say when he plays well Utd play well, I think its the other way round.

Rooney yesterday, Nani today... Either Valencia or Vidic is in for some stick tomorrow.

Mikeyt086 wrote: »

Rooney yesterday, Nani today... Either Valencia or Vidic is in for some stick tomorrow.

Well now that you mention him, he's been in no rush to come back, now has he?

Ashley Young

2011/12 Barclays Premier League

GAMES 23 GOALS 5 ASSISTS 7 SHOTS 46


Strengths: With pace, dribbling ability and a superb cross, Young has every attribute he needs to be a great winger. Weaknesses: Strength and heading ability eludes him, but his game is based on other things.

What United players will have the summer off?

DeGea
Vidic
Berbatov
Scholes
Giggs
Evans
Rafael?
Fabio?

Anyone else?

me-skywalker wrote: »

Yes a CM is exactly what we need. We cannot keep playing Giggs and Park in these postions.

He is a CM with a forward thinking mind. He also hustles, harries and use his tenacity to tackle. He can help us gain the control of a battle with his measured passing and williness to be open for the ball.

Perfect addition beside a ball winner in a 4-4-2 against weaker teams and other 4-4-2's and perfect for a 4-3-3 with a tackler and a deep lying passer against a packed midfield. As above we've used players in this role like Park and Giggs and both don't have the natural skill to play in there.

Yes I think we are on the same page now, I was mislead in your previous post when you quoted another user, sounded like you were signing Modric to play ahead of the 2 CM's in a ACM role.

Orando Broom wrote: »

What United players will have the summer off?

DeGea
Vidic
Berbatov
Scholes
Giggs
Evans
Rafael?
Fabio?

Anyone else?

Either Jones or Smalling, possibly both.

Walker, Johnson, Terry, Rio, Cahill, Cole, Baines and possibly one more from Richards, Jagielka, Jones and Smalling

kryogen wrote: »

Without trying to be a smart arse, thats just someone elses opinion(ESPN stats profile) that you happen to agree with, it is not in any way an example of why you have this opinion, doesnt matter.

But if you wanna play the old statto statto game

Nani has 24 starts in the league this year, 8 goals and 10 assists is not half bad there, he would have been in the running for player of the year but for his injury.

In a stop start season he has a total of 15 goals and 15 assists this season

He scores and makes important goals now

Everton scored 1 assisted 2
Noriwch assisted a goal
Stoke Away scored
Chelsea 1 goal 1 assist
City 2 goals
Villa away 1 assist (included as we won the game 1 nil)

Compare Nani to the much adored Gareth Bale

You have Nani 28 Games 8 Goals 10 Assists 65 Shots
Gareth Bale 33 Games 9 Goals 8 Assists 127 Shots!!
Mata gets plenty of praise 33 Games 6 Goals 13 Assists 64 Shots
Silva? 34 Games 6 Goals 14 Assists 80 Shots


You can pretty much put anybody you like up there who plays a similar role/position a Nani will stack up pretty well against them.

I don't think you're a smart arse and yeah I dont like statistics as you can read them any way you want to be honest. But this part "Weaknesses: Defensively weak and still too often wasteful in possession, needs to understand that sometimes the simple pass or cross will do" still stands. The guy has talent but too often doesn't use it properly.

Excluding the City lads, Nani is the best attacking midfielder/winger in the league in my opinion.

Will De Gea not be playing in the Olymics??

kryogen wrote: »

Compare Nani to the much adored Gareth Bale

You have Nani 28 Games 8 Goals 10 Assists 65 Shots
Gareth Bale 33 Games 9 Goals 8 Assists 127 Shots!!
Mata gets plenty of praise 33 Games 6 Goals 13 Assists 64 Shots
Silva? 34 Games 6 Goals 14 Assists 80 Shots

I don't like including games played as a measurement in these kind of comparisons. Minutes played is much more accurate. A player can come on for 5 minutes at the very end of a game and that can be almost counted as a full game.

I've had a look at some of the top performing midfielders in the league and their stats. Basically I just added their goals and assists together (as I found them on the fantasy football website) and divided into the total minutes.

Valencia: 1944 (minutes played); 4 (goals); 14 (assists); 18 (goals involved in in total); 108 (average of goals per minute)
Bale: 2946; 10; 12; 22; 133
Mata: 2471; 6; 16; 22; 112
Nani: 2095; 8; 12; 20; 104
Young: 1394; 5; 11; 16; 87
Silva: 2626; 6; 16; 22; 119
Dempsey: 3234; 16; 7; 23; 140

The winner by a mile is Young. You could argue though that almost all of his assist came in the first 5 games of the season when United were on fire. There was a gap of 5 months between his 6th and his 7th assist for example.

Nani's goals involved with/game is not as good as last year. But then again he has missed a huge chunk of the season.

Valencia has missed a large amount of the season also and he played at right back for a lot at the start. He lags behind a lot of the other players in goals scored but he makes up for it with his amazing assist record.

Personally I thought Dempsey had a fantastic season. He has had a huge advantage over all the others though in that he has played every minute of every game so far bar 6 minutes against us in December. He has also played up front for a good few games as well. He's not a winger in the sense that Nani and Valencia are.

Bale's stats aren't as impressive as they should be. For an already world class player (according to some people in the game) he has been distinctly average in terms of his output. He has the potential to improve a lot and he is still very young but he's not at a different level to anyone else in the league yet.

If Young had played more games this season he may have improved on his record. It's very impressive all the same to be involved in a goal every 87 minutes.

Having said all that I still think Nani is our best winger. He offers more of a threat in terms of a shot on target than Valencia and his two-footedness puts him at a level above Valencia. He might be the same as Young for crossing but when it comes down to it I'd prefer Nani. I trust him more to go out and win a game for us. He has done it on more than one occasion over the last few years.