What midfielder is suited to partner Bruno in the double pivot?

Zed 101 said:
Dorgu (LWB) needs to step into midfield to cover, it is workable it just needs to be executed properly
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This, absolutely this. Even with a Baleba type, a midfield two with Bruno mandates wingback cover against pacey, physical Prem midfielders. Else it’ll be like hot knife through butter again.
 
I just don't think it will work consistently. How many games does he just get bullied there or just turn into a turnover machine? If he gets time and space yeah it might work but won't get that much on the league, and not like we have much else this season
 
Uncle Mainoo said:
Haidara is available this summer. I wouldn’t mind a sneaky risk on him. Great ball player and he gets around the pitch well. Was linked to him back when Ragnick was in charge.
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We're done with sneaky risks hopefully. How about Premier League proven.

Luiz left Villa for Juve last summer, it hasn't worked out. He was excellent in the Premier league, I'd take him on a loan to buy or a swap for Ugarte. Be brilliant if we could offload Ugarte, he's rubbish.
 
Convert Lisandro Martinez to DM?

Have we ever tried him there?

I’m not so convinced he can be in the three in a 3-4-3. At least a backup DM.
 
With 10s creating space and us scoring goals our midfield situation will feel much better.

We've dominated many games but no end product.

Stamp out the nervous passing the ball to the opposition we do and add goals we'll be fine.
 
If we're going to shoehorn Bruno into a position he isn't suited for we should play him as the striker leading the press and dropping deep to set up chances for the 10s.
 
I think we need a physical beast, really like Onana at Villa, was annoyed we didn't get him.
 
I am driven to wonder if Bruno’s positional ill discipline in CM can sometimes be out down to him feeling the responsibility to make something happen in the final third. We can’t score goals without him and when he’s deep I get the feeling he feels it’s necesssry to get forward and make something happen. It’s somewhat feasible that having better players in front of him, in the likes of Cunha and Mbeumo, will mean he is easier to control in terms of going forwards.

Ugarte isn’t the answer, not because of his quality - which I think is fine - but because he does his defensive work higher up the pitch and is prone to pressing high. Bruno moves forwards too and that leaves a gaping hole behind. Casemiro seems the logical fit as he’s naturally inclined to slot into that anchor hole, but the way the system is built you really need both CMs operating in tandem.

Ideally, I would have seen Bruno move on for a substantial fee and brought in Baleba to replace him. Even if we spent all the Bruno money on him. He would’ve slotted in perfectly alongside Mainoo, which I think would give us a completely different and much more functional midfield. Unfortunately I don’t think Mainoo is the player you can pair with Bruno. If Bruno stays, I feel we end with Bruno and Case, if he leaves we end up with something like Baleba and Mainoo. Bruno really is a conundrum for us.

A few things we haven’t considered are (a) the value of rest and pre-season - something missing last season, (b) the impact of coaching on drilling positional discipline on and off the ball into players, and (c) player progression and development. People often assume players are static but in Mainoo and Ugarte we have two young midfielders who could potentially jump on significantly in their development this season and that shouldn’t be underestimated.
 
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Galactic said:
Convert Lisandro Martinez to DM?

Have we ever tried him there?

I’m not so convinced he can be in the three in a 3-4-3. At least a backup DM.
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No way. I love Licha, but he isn't at all mobile and would get eaten alive in a two-man midfield with Bruno.
 
Devil81 said:
We're done with sneaky risks hopefully. How about Premier League proven.

Luiz left Villa for Juve last summer, it hasn't worked out. He was excellent in the Premier league, I'd take him on a loan to buy or a swap for Ugarte. Be brilliant if we could offload Ugarte, he's rubbish.
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I agree there.. The only thing with Luiz is he suffers the same issues as Ugarte. He has the range unlike Urgarte but he’s erratic like Bruno.

But I would still take him. My favourite option is still Andrè
 
The answer clearly isn't Ugarte, not the right profile, which then raises the question, what will we do with Ugarte? A player we've only just spent 50m on and is clearly not going to be a starter not is he the profile we'd want as a back up.
 
I think it would probably be easier to just make Bruno better at the position. Because there is no one player suited to partner him in the midfield the way he plays.

It’s a big weakness if he continues to play the role as he has, and unless we change to a 3 in midfield there is no fix other than Bruno himself improving on his reading of the game, his positional sense and his general ability to pass and see space.

Too often he and Cas were too far apart and he wouldn’t cover the spaces he is supposed to be so there are many games where there are just massive holes or areas of space for teams to exploit.

Ideally he wouldn’t be in the midfield duo but yeah, it’s really the only place for him as he isn’t really suited to how the 10’s operate in this system. So it’s an issue. We just have to fit him in to positions his skill set doesn’t really suit.
 
In a 'strikerless' formation, we may not have to if we have Mbeumo and Cunha up top with Bruno behind them. Case and Ugarte behind, Dorgu and Amad as WBs.

I'd actually 'prefer' this as I don't think there's a single attainable midfielder that can function with Bruno in a duo but then of course that would mean we would lack a traditional penalty box striker. Don't get me wrong, if we get a Gyokeres then I'd revisit this but I'm tired of losing the midfield battle for the past 10+ years. Playing a midfield two in the PL is already a red herring, let alone playing Bruno there.
 
Not that I advocate for this as the solution, or even expect it to happen, but maybe, just maybe, with better dribblers (Cunha, Mbeumo and Amad coming down to receive the ball deeper), Bruno and Ugarte reinvent themselves into more restrictive positional alignment. Their framework of operation may have been impacted by frontline deficiencies and lack of scoring.

One can hope.
 
Boubacar Kamara is the one. If Villa are open to selling. Classy classy DM with EPL experience.
 
Raoul said:
I can easily see us getting Gyokeres, a top CM, and a keeper as well.
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I don't think we have any intention of signing a CM. Amorim only requires 2 for his system and we currently have Bruno, Casemiro, Ugarte, Mainoo and Collyer with none of them seemingly leaving. We may sign a keeper but only as a replacement for Altay as they have already briefed that Onana is going nowhere. It has been mentioned that we are looking at a few windows to fix the squad and it looks very much like this window is focusing on the attack so Cunha, Mbuemo and a striker would be a nice start. Next summer Casemiro is out of contract and that will free up the salary and squad space to add 1 or 2 serious upgrades for CM.
 
Gandalf said:
I don't think we have any intention of signing a CM. Amorim only requires 2 for his system and we currently have Bruno, Casemiro, Ugarte, Mainoo and Collyer with none of them seemingly leaving. We may sign a keeper but only as a replacement for Altay as they have already briefed that Onana is going nowhere. It has been mentioned that we are looking at a few windows to fix the squad and it looks very much like this window is focusing on the attack so Cunha, Mbuemo and a striker would be a nice start. Next summer Casemiro is out of contract and that will free up the salary and squad space to add 1 or 2 serious upgrades for CM.
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Our current CMs don't necessarily fit Amorim's ideal profile of intensity and physicality (some do, others don't). I think we will buy Ederson. He's a solid box to box player - very physical and will probably also be able to deputize as a WB.
 
Gandalf said:
I don't think we have any intention of signing a CM. Amorim only requires 2 for his system and we currently have Bruno, Casemiro, Ugarte, Mainoo and Collyer with none of them seemingly leaving. We may sign a keeper but only as a replacement for Altay as they have already briefed that Onana is going nowhere. It has been mentioned that we are looking at a few windows to fix the squad and it looks very much like this window is focusing on the attack so Cunha, Mbuemo and a striker would be a nice start. Next summer Casemiro is out of contract and that will free up the salary and squad space to add 1 or 2 serious upgrades for CM.
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Surely we need a cm, we've got numbers in there but not enough quality. Bruno and Mainoo don't really suit the position anyway.
 
2 man midfield said:
Surely we need a cm, we've got numbers in there but not enough quality. Bruno and Mainoo don't really suit the position anyway.
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If we go into the season with Bruno, Casemiro and Ugarte as our CM choices, Amorim might as well get ready to leave pretty soon into the season, it’s a glaring weakness and every combination he tried failed.
 
Raoul said:
Our current CMs don't necessarily fit Amorim's ideal profile of intensity and physicality (some do, others don't). I think we will buy Ederson. He's a solid box to box player - very physical and will probably also be able to deputize as a WB.
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2 man midfield said:
Surely we need a cm, we've got numbers in there but not enough quality. Bruno and Mainoo don't really suit the position anyway.
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I don't mean that we don't need to upgrade but that we cannot fix every problem in our squad in one single window and there won't be funds available to buy the type of player we want if we sign Cunha, Mbuemo and a striker. This is a position that may need to wait another year. Ederson might be an upgrade but according to reports Al Hilal are after him now that Bruno has turned them down.

We really need a player like Wharton or Baleba but thanks to Chelsea fecking the market for the position by paying 100M+ for Caicedo and Enzo they are going to be way beyond our means this year.
 
redNATION said:
If we go into the season with Bruno, Casemiro and Ugarte as our CM choices, Amorim might as well get ready to leave pretty soon into the season, it’s a glaring weakness and every combination he tried failed.
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Yeah I agree. Casemiro isn't even good enough really, in spite of his late season form in Europe. Ugarte the jury is still out on.
 
Gandalf said:
I don't mean that we don't need to upgrade but that we cannot fix every problem in our squad in one single window and there won't be funds available to buy the type of player we want if we sign Cunha, Mbuemo and a striker. This is a position that may need to wait another year. Ederson might be an upgrade but according to reports Al Hilal are after him now that Bruno has turned them down.

We really need a player like Wharton or Baleba but thanks to Chelsea fecking the market for the position by paying 100M+ for Caicedo and Enzo they are going to be way beyond our means this year.
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You can't neglect the engine room, Amorim knows this. I don't see the window closing without some kind of CM coming in. Even if it means we start the season with Onana in net.
 
Take it we ain’t signing a proper passing midfielder then who can control the game and dictate tempo. If Bruno is to be in one of the CM positions then we need him to have a proper partner. The front 3 are going to need progressive passers behind them. Suppose it will help when we get Martinez back.
 
2 man midfield said:
You can't neglect the engine room, Amorim knows this. I don't see the window closing without some kind of CM coming in. Even if it means we start the season with Onana in net.
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In that case we need to be prepared to suck it up and sell Mainoo.

Cunha, Mbuemo and for arguments sake Gyokeres will be a net spend of around 170M. We had 100M in the budget before sales which means we need to raise the other 70M just to fix the attack, if we want to address midfield as well then we are going to need to raise another 50M on top of that at a bare minimum.

How do we raise 120M? We have to sell players for a profit. You can count out Antony, Hojlund, Sancho etc. in this bracket, we need to sell academy graduates or players that are fully amoritized, this is where selling Bruno would have turbo charged the rebuild.

We are obviously going to be selling Garnacho but after that who else do we have that will raise significant funds? Rashford won't generate much, he seems as disinterested in lowering his salary as Sancho and nobody is going to match his United wages plus the only concrete link for him is Barcelona who only want him on loan. Dalot could be sacrificed and I would argue he should be, he would have a strong market and as a fairly orthodox full back he is not a great fit in this system. Not sure where else we turn to raise funds in this window.
 
DJ_21 said:
Take it we ain’t signing a proper passing midfielder then who can control the game and dictate tempo. If Bruno is to be in one of the CM positions then we need him to have a proper partner. The front 3 are going to need progressive passers behind them. Suppose it will help when we get Martinez back.
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Yoro is a good passer and ball carrier too, haven’t seen much of Heaven yet but hopefully he’s comfortable with the ball.
 
windycityfan said:
Not that I advocate for this as the solution, or even expect it to happen, but maybe, just maybe, with better dribblers (Cunha, Mbeumo and Amad coming down to receive the ball deeper), Bruno and Ugarte reinvent themselves into more restrictive positional alignment. Their framework of operation may have been impacted by frontline deficiencies and lack of scoring.

One can hope.
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Amorim hinted at this earlier in the year saying that Bruno goes a bit gung ho and needs to trust the players in front of him more so he stays in position, that could change with a more competent front line and wing backs contributing.
 
To be honest if Amorim is that stubborn and continues to play Bruno in center midfield he will be sacked after 10 games next season. Bruno be alright in a midfield three like with Portugal but a midfield two not a hope.
 
If we are looking for someone to come in straight away as a starter then the available obvious options are Ederson and Lamine Camara. I’d love Wharton or Baleba but I think both would be too expensive this summer, and tbh I would like to see Wharton have a more injury clear year before we commit the amount of money CP would demand.

My preference would be Lamine Camara out of the two as he seems to have become more of a DLP / B2B hybrid, more similar to Wharton, whereas Ederson is more all action B2B.



Amadou Kone as @BenitoSTARR mentioned before is the other prospect I’d be most keen on who is supposedly available for less than 20m. He’s not played a tonne of minutes, but similar to Baleba before Brighton got him, and has a statistically and physically interesting profile.

If we were able to get our act together and shift on Casemiro as well as the usual suspects that don’t need to be named, then we could even try for one of Ederson/Camara and Amadou Kone.
 
Any midfielder we sign needs to be fast, strong and athletic. I like Onana a lot but the last time I saw Villa he kept vacating the midfield at bad times. Not sure if this was just an instruction in this game.

Either way probably out of our price range.

I feel like our scouts should be all over the French league. Seems a hotbed for promising modern midfielders.
 
DJ_21 said:
Take it we ain’t signing a proper passing midfielder then who can control the game and dictate tempo. If Bruno is to be in one of the CM positions then we need him to have a proper partner. The front 3 are going to need progressive passers behind them. Suppose it will help when we get Martinez back.
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We are so fecked with him in the midfield regardless of who his partner is. We also dont play 3 midfielders where he could get the luxury to roam around while the other two maintain shape and add balance.

Another season where I will witness a club of this stature ignore building a solid and athletic midfield that dominates the league.
 
ayushreddevil9 said:
We are so fecked with him in the midfield regardless of who his partner is. We also dont play 3 midfielders where he could get the luxury to roam around while the other two maintain shape and add balance.

Another season where I will witness a club of this stature ignore building a solid and athletic midfield that dominates the league.
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Ye we’ve no proper physicality and other than Bruno we don’t really have a good passer but more sloppy passers. I mean what’s ugartes role? He seems better off the ball than on it and for a team looking to play possession football surely we need players better on the ball
 
Fernandes in a midfield two is a recipe for disaster long term. If we are continuing to play a midfield two and if we sign Mbuemo, then it feels like case where the pieces don't fit. A Man Utd special.
 
As much as I like Bruno this discussion shows we would have been better off with getting the money and letting him go. He is not quick and mobile enough for playing as a 10 in the system. And in a midfield 2 he will get into trouble. Part of why we had such an awful season was that Amorim tried to use players in positions where they don’t fit which led to awful errors. Now with Bruno staying and keeping the armband he will continue being a starter with the team built around him instead of sticking to the best players on each position.

For me the best combination based on the players we got as of today is Ugarte and Casemiro behind Cunha and Amad (or maybe Mount if he improves).
 
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