Bebe | 2010/11 Performances

[Galactic]

I'm repeating myself from the Reserves forum here.

From Eurosports: Premier League - Bebe can't make reserve team

Sir Alex Ferguson's new £7m signing Bebe has made so little an impact in training at Manchester United he was not even considered for a reserve team match.

Having failed to impress at the club's Carrington base, the new £7 million summer signing was omitted from the reserves' line-up against neighbours Manchester City on Tuesday.

The 20-year-old, whose signing for United was hailed as a fairytale two weeks ago, was a virtual unknown before Ferguson took a punt on him.

Ferguson later admitted he had not even seen Bebe play - nor watched a video of him - but was still willing to take a chance on him after the recommendations of United scouts and his former assistant at Old Trafford Carlos Queiroz.

A deal was pushed through quickly with clubs such as Real Madrid and Benfica also circling with intent, and Ferguson later claimed that "sometimes you just have to go with instinct".

But it appears the Portuguese forward is taking longer to settle in Manchester than expected, with his touch and control reportedly way off the standards United demand, leading reserve team boss Ole Gunnar Solksjaer to overlook him for the match in Hyde.

Bebe's rise to prominence has been nothing short of spectacular. An undistinguished spell at Portuguese third tier club Estrala da Amadora was followed by a free transfer to Guimaraes before United picked him up for £7.4m.

While Bebe was absent from Solksjaer's squad of 16, the match saw the return of midfielder Anderson, who has not played since damaging his cruciate ligament six months ago.

Gary Neville, Wes Brown and Michael Carrick also featured in the 3-1 win Ewen Fields hitting one Federico Macheda grabbing a brace.

..........

BS, I know. Has anyone actually seen him play in real? Bad touch and control?

 

[Cutch]

Sack Fergie. Sell Bebe

Seriously but, it'll take a lot longer than 2 weeks for him to settle in, considering the staggering rise he's made in the last few months. I'm sure we'd rather get a good look at him in training, and work on the elements of his game that are sure to be raw at this stage, before we give him any football, even if it is only for the reserves.

 

[championo]

All this is being done by one man and people go around and say it is the guardian, it is the IrishPress, it is eurosports etc...
It is just Daniel Taylor who just has set his mind on trying to just be the first to say I told you Bebe was shit. He alone is getting scopes about what the coaches were trying to see from Bebe at practice.
It is about time we stopped posting articles from certain papers and website but rather posted the author of the articles and you will soon find a common trend.
This Daniel Taylor is a city guy is like Ben Hibbs is to United.
This is just stupid. I am done

 

[JayWalker]

We'll piss ourselves laughing at this article some day in the future.

 

[mswiss]

probably just not fit enough yet, looks like most of the squad was first teamers still working on there fitness for the new season

 

[Solius]

I'm reserving any judgment on him til I see him play. I did find it odd that Fergie signed him without ever watching him though. Very out of the ordinary.

 

[Galactic]

All this is being done by one man and people go around and say it is the guardian, it is the IrishPress, it is eurosports etc...
It is just Daniel Taylor who just has set his mind on trying to just be the first to say I told you Bebe was shit. He alone is getting scopes about what the coaches were trying to see from Bebe at practice.
It is about time we stopped posting articles from certain papers and website but rather posted the author of the articles and you will soon find a common trend.
This Daniel Taylor is a city guy is like Ben Hibbs is to United.
This is just stupid. I am done

Interesting.

 

[datura]

The same article rewritten by some other numpty with absolutely no substance, hence the previous thread in the Mains was locked as there is nothing of any worth to add until he actually plays a game for us.

 

[Neutral]

Is his 1st touch atm worse than what Rooney showed at the WC?

Poor Daniel Taylor, all his ITK information turned out to be B.S to he decides to go negative.

 

[Richter]

The guy is a street kid that has just signed with one of the biggest clubs in the world. Putting him into the limelight so shortly after signing would be overwhelming for most with that background. Even training with the first team squad must be overwhelming for him right now. Fergie is obviously trying to keep him away from attention atm and rightly so.

 

[England1966]

It is too early to say anything.

 

[Pexbo]

To be "omitted" from a line up, you have to be in the line up to start with.

Ferguson has said he is a player for the future and he want's to take his time incorporating him into the team. His fitness is no where near and the "confidence" they speak of is the fact he doesn't speak a word of English.

He's not just going to jump into a training session and starting barking at everyone in Portugese. As he has just joined us I expect he is being put on a fitness regime and will have been given a minder in the form of Anderson, the Twins or Nani (most likely Nani, I would guess as his English is the best) who will make him more comfortable around Carrington and teach him the way things work around the place.

He'll be given time to adjust to the pace of the football by joining in the odd training match but does anyone really expect him to suddenly jump into a reserve team derby?!

 

[devilish]

Its too early to judge him

 

[OneUnited24]

Hes been here 2 weeks if that and we are shocked at his fitness? Excuse me but i thought we had a player who has a lot of raw potential and we were hoping to shape him into a great player, you're telling me after 2 weeks with the lad the coaching staff has writen him off? Jesus, we should sack the staff we have not and get the ones that left in the summer - you know the ones who took the time to help develop the likes of Nani and not write players off after a week

 

[Arruda]

It's not too early to say that this sounds a very weird signing from a Portuguese point of view. Either your unnamed scouts know a lot more about Portuguese football than Portuguese clubs themselves, or this sounds like a random move precipitated by the cover of local newspaper...

 

[Pogue Mahone]

It's not too early to say that this sounds a very weird signing from a Portuguese point of view. Either your unnamed scouts know a lot more about Portuguese football than Portuguese clubs themselves, or this sounds like a random move precipitated by the cover of local newspaper...

He's just got picked for the Portugese U-21 team so it's not just the United scouts who think he's one of Portugal's best young talents.

 

[Garethw]

If this was a £1-2 million signing then we wouldn't be having this conversation. The fact that we paid such a ludicrously high fee for such an unproven player is what has put so much unfair expectation on the lads shoulders.

Sir Alex should not have admitted to the media that he'd never seen him play or even seen a video of the lad. That kind of comment just gives cnut journalists ammunition.

 

[Pogue Mahone]

If this was a £1-2 million signing then we wouldn't be having this conversation. The fact that we paid such a ludicrously high fee for such an unproven player is what has put so much unfair expectation on the lads shoulders.

Sir Alex should not have admitted to the media that he'd never seen him play or even seen a video of the lad. That kind of comment just gives cnut journalists ammunition.

Yes.

 

[kundalini]

All this is being done by one man and people go around and say it is the guardian, it is the IrishPress, it is eurosports etc...
It is just Daniel Taylor who just has set his mind on trying to just be the first to say I told you Bebe was shit. He alone is getting scopes about what the coaches were trying to see from Bebe at practice.
It is about time we stopped posting articles from certain papers and website but rather posted the author of the articles and you will soon find a common trend.
This Daniel Taylor is a city guy is like Ben Hibbs is to United.
This is just stupid. I am done

Daniel Taylor is a perfectly good journalist for the Guardian who covers the Manchester clubs. He is a forest fan as is clear from his Twitter account. Having covered United for many years, and written a book on Sir Alex, I imagine he will have plenty of decent sources, which is not to say that his predictions will come true, as numerous accounts of Vidic being unhappy resulted in a new contract, rather than a move abroad.

As for Bebe, he is clearly not shit. There is enough talent on display in those Youtube clips to merit taking a chance on him. However, it is natural that his strengths and weaknesses will not be what United's coaching staff are used to seeing, so it shouldn't come as much of a surprise if they are underwhelmed by Bebe at this stage. He is a long term project on around £50K a month (according to portuguese sources), rather than a week. Two years in the reserves then a year out on loan then time to show what he can do in the first team, would be a reasonable time-line.

 

[204Red]

United: Amos; Neville, Smalling, Brown, Rafael (Dudgeon 60); Gibson, Carrick (Gill 73), Anderson (W Keane 60); Eikrem, Cleverley; Macheda.
Subs not used: Devlin, Norwood.

So the kid can't get into a line up featuring 6-7 Full international players... having been at the club for 2 weeks?

 

[EvilChuck]

2 weeks into his career here and he's already a failure? He needs time to settle, the coaches need to time to see where he is at technically and the fitness coaches need time to get his fitness levels up to a suitable requrement. There is obviously something about him that is worth the risk, otherwise Real Madrid and Benfica wouldnt have been sniffing around him aswell.

 

[x42bn6]

United: Amos; Neville, Smalling, Brown, Rafael (Dudgeon 60); Gibson, Carrick (Gill 73), Anderson (W Keane 60); Eikrem, Cleverley; Macheda.
Subs not used: Devlin, Norwood.

So the kid can't get into a line up featuring 6-7 Full international players... having been at the club for 2 weeks?

That was my first thought too... Essentially a near-Carling Cup side out there, with several of our best-performing Reserves/Youth players last season in the squad. I mean, Corry Evans didn't make the squad...

 

[didsbury1982]

That's a shocking article isn't it!

 

[Arruda]

He's just got picked for the Portugese U-21 team so it's not just the United scouts who think he's one of Portugal's best young talents.

"Just" as in now, or before you hire him? He had played in the U-19's if I'm not sure, but that doesn't say much, those teams have a huge level of rotation and basically any Portuguese player from our league has at some point played there.

It was 9 million euros for a player that never played first-league football. That's the highest ever transfer in Portugal from a player not from one of the 3 big teams. Even from the big teams any player around that value was certainly an accomplished footballer. Compare it with Nani and CR and the ages when they were hired and the talent they had already exhibited in big matches.

You didn't try to negotiate, bid lower? Just splashed the clause amount right there, on the day after a suspicious report from our newspapers saying that Spanish clubs had "an eye" on him. By suspicious I mean that our newspapers have a clear agenda with clubs to promote players, and it would be weird for a club of the dimension of United to fall for it.

If this guy had a decent first season on professional football, he would probably end up sold to one of the big ones from here by 2-4 million euros, United just splashed 9 without even watching him play.

I may be wrong but it looks like somebody saw the cover of that newspaper and said "Who's this guy, let's buy him before Real does" - which they would never do of course, looking at similar past occurrences.

 

[rednev]

He needs to bulk up.

 

[x42bn6]

"Just" as in now, or before you hire him? He had played in the U-19's if I'm not sure, but that doesn't say much, those teams have a huge level of rotation and basically any Portuguese player from our league has at some point played there.

It was 9 million euros for a player that never played first-league football. That's the highest ever transfer in Portugal from a player not from one of the 3 big teams. Even from the big teams any player around that value was certainly an accomplished footballer. Compare it with Nani and CR and the ages when they were hired and the talent they had already exhibited in big matches.

You didn't try to negotiate, bid lower? Just splashed the clause amount right there, on the day after a suspicious report from our newspapers saying that Spanish clubs had "an eye" on him. By suspicious I mean that our newspapers have a clear agenda with clubs to promote players, and it would be weird for a club of the dimension of United to fall for it.

If this guy had a decent first season on professional football, he would probably end up sold to one of the big ones from here by 2-4 million euros, United just splashed 9 without even watching him play.

I may be wrong but it looks like somebody saw the cover of that newspaper and said "Who's this guy, let's buy him before Real does" - which they would never do of course, looking at similar past occurrences.

I think we have better sources than newspapers when figuring out who's bid for who! Agents talk all the time...

We clearly didn't want to lose him for whatever reason to other clubs. Odd, yes...

 

[prateik]

no one has seen him play
him not being in the reserve squad could be down to many reasons other than his ability to play at that level

this whole debate is pointless .. it will be pointless even after a few reserve games as they dont mean that much , but writing him off before he even does that is idiotic

9m euros isnt confirmed . that was his buyout clause .. nothing to confirm we had to pay that much

 

[Pogue Mahone]

"Just" as in now, or before you hire him? He had played in the U-19's if I'm not sure, but that doesn't say much, those teams have a huge level of rotation and basically any Portuguese player from our league has at some point played there.

It was 9 million euros for a player that never played first-league football. That's the highest ever transfer in Portugal from a player not from one of the 3 big teams. Even from the big teams any player around that value was certainly an accomplished footballer. Compare it with Nani and CR and the ages when they were hired and the talent they had already exhibited in big matches.

You didn't try to negotiate, bid lower? Just splashed the clause amount right there, on the day after a suspicious report from our newspapers saying that Spanish clubs had "an eye" on him. By suspicious I mean that our newspapers have a clear agenda with clubs to promote players, and it would be weird for a club of the dimension of United to fall for it.

If this guy had a decent first season on professional football, he would probably end up sold to one of the big ones from here by 2-4 million euros, United just splashed 9 without even watching him play.

I may be wrong but it looks like somebody saw the cover of that newspaper and said "Who's this guy, let's buy him before Real does" - which they would never do of course, looking at similar past occurrences.

Is Marca a Portugese paper?

Besides, I seriously doubt anyone would ever sanction spending several million quid on the basis of the front page of a local paper. I mean, come on...

 

[Richter]

Is Marca a Portugese paper?

Besides, I seriously doubt anyone would ever sanction spending several million quid on the basis of the front page of a local paper. I mean, come on...

Especially not a club like United that doesn't exactly have cash to burn at will.

 

[Arruda]

Is Marca a Portugese paper?

Besides, I seriously doubt anyone would ever sanction spending several million quid on the basis of the front page of a local paper. I mean, come on...

I doubt it as well, it's just my conspiracy theory, I still think it was a totally unjustifiable bid considering Portuguese football usual transfer values...

And regarding Marca I thought they had taken the report from our papers, now that you mention it it may have been the other way around, I'll look into it.

EDIT: Correct, Marca talked about him and Real first.

 

[pillory]

So the kid can't get into a line up featuring 6-7 Full international players... having been at the club for 2 weeks?

Closer to one week. His medical was on the 16th or something.

 

[Scholesy]

He hasn't even kicked a ball for United yet and already some people are writing him off.

 

[Pogue Mahone]

I doubt it as well, it's just my conspiracy theory, I still think it was a totally unjustifiable bid considering Portuguese football usual transfer values...

And regarding Marca I thought they had taken the report from our papers, now that you mention it it may have been the other way around, I'll look into it.

I've only seen the Marca front cover tbh, so you could be right. Would be interesting to see what order they were published in.

I still doubt that a local paper headline would have been enough for us to sign the kid. At worst, it might have misled us into thinking Real were interested but that wouldn't have been reason enough, by itself, to sign him up. I'm sure dozens of young footballers, all round Europe, are linked with Madrid every week.

 

[Arruda]

I've only seen the Marca front cover tbh, so you could be right. Would be interesting to see what order they were published in.

No, Marca got it first indeed, first time he was mentioned in Portuguese papers was because of that.

It's just that I saw the "2nd" time only and then I didn't notice the mention of Marca, but on the day before they had already talked about him, I saw it now on the paper's archives.

 

[Richter]

I've only seen the Marca front cover tbh, so you could be right. Would be interesting to see what order they were published in.

I still doubt that a local paper headline would have been enough for us to sign the kid. At worst, it might have misled us into thinking Real were interested but that wouldn't have been reason enough, by itself, to sign him up. I'm sure dozens of young footballers, all round Europe, are linked with Madrid every week.

United got around 15 pro scouts. They are on the move around the world constantly to check on talent. Fergie said that our guy in Portugal had seen Bebe and told United to sign him asap before someone else did. I'm 100% sure newspaper stories have nothing to do with whether United would sign him or not.

 

[McLovin]

Yong & lernin'

 

[Escobar]

People should forget about Bebe and judge him at the start of the next season. He needs a lot of time to get used to being at a top club. Its like you are working as a cashier at Tesco's and the next day you are the CEO of HSBC

 

[decorativeed]

This thread only illustrates the pointlessness of locking the other one.

 

[blythy]

To cast judgement on a 20 year old player who signed two weeks ago for a club in a foreign country where he cannot speak the language is absurd and quite frankly lazy journalism.

The daggers are out in the media and they can't wait to knock Bebe.

 

[Ubik]

Wasn't the last thread locked for a (good) reason? I don't want to give the "ITKs" like Taylor, Ladyman and co the reaction to their hyperbolic, cretinous conjecture about a player who's never played for us or in any major league, and his supposed impact in the couple of weeks after his surprise signing, that they seem to crave and revel in. He's raw - we know. It might take him a while to adapt to us - we know. Let's wait until he's actually kicked a ball in anger for us to form any solid opinions on him, not lap up and perpetuate the "inside info" that Daniel Taylor got from a Carrington tea lady.