It was absolutely hilarious how he panned Smalling because we were going to play free-flowing, scintillating football from the back, only to make the semi finals off the back of a bunch of penalties and corners to Maguire and Kane.
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In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik and Imran hold a long overdue conversation about United's awful league form with 1 win in 7. They discuss a disappointing draw at Bournemouth, a not so disappointing draw against Liverpool and a crushing defeat at Chelsea - Is time nearly over for Erik Ten Hag?
Then in a special second half of the pod, Nik welcomes Natalie ( https://twitter.com/natalie_17) to discuss the fortunes of Manchester United Women as they booked a place in the FA Cup Final after a historic first ever win vs. Chelsea.
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I do wonder what a Smalling/Maguire CB pairing would look like.
Van Dijk does play next to a full back who makes mistakes every game. Trent is bang average defensively if we're being kind. On the other hand his attacking output is probably the best in the world and Van Dijk is a world class defender covering for him.Well no, he got a lot of credit here because he's our player. But the others were playing quite well too. Defending is a team responsibility.
If VVD was playing next to a fullback who made mistakes and gave up goalscoring chances every game he probably wouldnt be getting as much praise as he does. He's surrounded by good players. Drop him in a team where hes the only good defender and he wont do quite as well
Despite Roma not doing as well recently, he's still one of the best CBs in Serie A this season. Its just now he isnt the clear first choice
It would be solid. Some people don't want to admit this, but Smalling established himself as a top 4 team defender. If he played alongside Maguire and our new fullbacks instead of having to babysit Darmian, Valencia, Young, Jones etc. We might not have such a hard time getting into top 4. We surely would have turned some of those losses into draws and some draws into wins.
Hope Ole sees the error of his ways and calls him back.
Southgate is an idiot, Stones over Smalling is crazy by any standard.
Southgate is an idiot, Stones over Smalling is crazy by any standard.
Van Dijk plays on the other side...
Not the first time we witnessed a player get hyped up after partnering up next to a great defender. Any decent defender would look good next to Kompany. Stones has been a mystery for me, as he was never a top prospect, imo. His abilities on the ball have failed to develop due to him having to focus on getting his defensive levels up to standard, which has been extremely hard for him to do as he is just not that talented defensively.
And never covers for Trent? Seems legit.
Also, Robertson isn't anything special defensively either, he's just better than Trent.
Watch him when you pressure him in the defensive third and he gives the ball away alot.
They have been fortunate that no one presses them high, so they look better than they are sometimes.
Ofcourse players like trent and VVD are good on the ball but are the rest all that good?
Agree, he was never a natural defender but had decent ability on the ball. But as a CB you role is first and foremost to defend and he is terrible at that.
Not saying he doesnt but Gomez did much more as did the midfield. Not sure why Van Dijk is mentioned
Look at how Adama Traore tore him to pieces several times, yet a young kid in Brandon Williams fared better.
Liverpool have always won matches because they play the game in the opponents half, and use the physique and speed or VVD to cover for any long balls that beat their press. They know they can happily press and take risks as they've got the perfect high line defender.
Once teams can actually beat their press and get at Liverpool, they look quite shaky. VVD definitely hasn't been as good recently either.
Still better than Smalling mate. I'm a Smalling fan and think he'd be a good partner for Maguire but comparisons with Van Dijk are silly.
Eh? I wasn't talking about Smalling and never said he was better than VVD
I was talking about Robertson.
Better than Maguire and Lindelof. There's very little doubt in my mind. We would be far better at first ball clearances and Maguire would be allowed to sit deeper as more of a sweeper and that would play to his strengths. We would also have another proper header of the ball which could only improve our set-piece defending. We would additionally have Lindelof and Smalling competing, which would give us three CB's would can all remain fit and do a good job.
Gives away the ball alot? There is not a single stat to back this data up.
They are not the best defenders in the world, but they are really really good defenders. And both are world class going forward.
They are two of the reasons why they are 30+ points ahead of us.
I don't agree at all. Teams could just sit off Maguire and then pressurize Smalling every time he would have the ball. The ball boys would need to double their salaries to cope with all the extra work they would be doing.
Also, DeGea would have to hoof it long every time (which might not be that bad considering his recent endeavors).
We already have Tuanzebe and Bailly as back up, so we have 4 centre-backs that can do a good job. I am not counting Jones.
What would the point of that? Surely, you want your CB who's actually the recovery pace to be the one chasing back.
It would allow us to push our backline up though and play this fabled 'high pressing' football that Ole was on about all of last season, for which he desperately needed pre-season to work more fitness into the squad.
And it was around the time he binned Smalling that he was calling up that clogger from Burnley whose name I can't remember, and has since been selecting Tyrone Mings who is a battering ram of a person with the touch of a blacksmith.It was absolutely hilarious how he panned Smalling because we were going to play free-flowing, scintillating football from the back, only to make the semi finals off the back of a bunch of penalties and corners to Maguire and Kane.
I like Southgate, but his bias against Smalling was nonsense.
If Maguire is allowed to sit deeper, he would be doing far lesser chasing and can play as a sweeper/quarter back type role. Long balls would hardly ever reach him because Smalling is an absolute beast at clearing them. When we are in possession of the ball and attacking, Maguire can always be allowed to push up while Smalling is the insurance at the back. Smalling could be the primary ball winner while Maguire could be the primary ball recycler. Two defenders who can both be allowed to play to their strengths, in theory anyway.
At the time it was understandable that he would prefer Stones in the starting line-up since he did have a style he wanted to play which Stones would, in theory at least, be better for. Stones was in decent form at the time.
The stupid thing was not taking Smalling in the squad at all. He was quite obviously the best actual defender that England had, and he would give a different option when they were playing stronger teams (or even just had to tighten things up against weaker teams).
This season Stones has dropped right off. On the other hand Tyrone Mings started the season very well and could perhaps have taken that position instead, but I think his form has dropped off quite significantly the last few months (I've barely watched Villa lately so could be wrong). He's the interesting one though - if he could maintain that early season form he's probably the second best option that England has defensively, while being better on the ball than Smalling. He does play on the left though so either he or Maguire would have to move over to the right.
A bit harsh, at least based on his early season form. As I said above I haven't really watched him for the last few months, but he started the season in excellent form and fully deserved the call-up at the time.
The quicker centerback is usually the one you want staying back though, because he's your line of defence in a chase. It's why Vidic was always the one attacking the first ball, and Rio would be the one ready for a chase back to the keeper. If Maguire's your deepest CB, you're constantly dropping your line back to make up for his lack of pace. You want to be able to hold your line as high up as possible, while at the same time not being worried about your line being killed in a chase in the space behind.
They'd probably take turns stepping up, depending on which side of the field the ball was. Both Smalling and Maguire are physical beasts who are at their best when they are playing aggressively. It probably would cost us occasionally when Smalling steps up and Maguire doesn't have the pace to fully cover him, but the benefit of it should comfortably outweigh the occasional fault. Especially as AWB would be next to Smalling and could help cover at those times.
I could very well be wrong but Vidic attacked the first ball as he was indeed the better defender of long balls while Rio stayed back because he was a better passer of the ball. Vidic was always the first line of defense because usually the ball never crossed that line of defense.
Yes, but when you press these players they too give the ball away. Teams give Liverpool too much respect and space.
Did I at any point say they are not class players? What I am saying is press them and even they too struggle sometimes.
Seriously? MY God man. Maguire is just better all round.
He's better than Lindelöf though, no doubt in anyone's mind.
Very wrong here mate, plenty are fooled into thinking so though as Rio was such a classy defender. Rio attacked and won an insane amount of long balls.
Of course. I don't disagree with that. Rio and Vidic didn't really have obvious weaknesses but I guess they had their strengths maybe relative to each other.
For instance Vidic was a very underrated passer of the ball but Rio was better at it. Similarly Rio was a great header of the ball but Vidic was just relatively better.
Hopefully we can agree a permanent deal with Roma before he drops any more performances like today. At fault for both goals in a 2-0 loss.
Strange bump this, given that he's meant to have had a really good season so far.
It's almost as if you couldn't wait to highlight his mistakes.
It's almost as if you couldn't wait to highlight his mistakes.
Yeah you're right. Because he's having a good season we shouldn't discuss his bad performances in his performance thread. My bad mate.
It's a Chris Smalling performance thread, nothing wrong with posting highlights of what he did.
The second one was purely his fault, mistimed his tackle.
But the first one was not down to only him, look at the other players' position as well, it was a clusterfeck from the back four.
But the first one was not down to only him, look at the other players' position as well, it was a clusterfeck from the back four.
Meh. I still think he'd be a decent partner for Maguire.
Just watched the clips - he's not really at fault for the first goal. Other defenders were more at fault, including the guy who gives the ball away. Ridiculous.
Ha ha, Smalling gonna Smalling. Thank feck, he ain't coming back.
Of course we should discuss, but you seem to be using this bad performance as reason why we shouldn't bring him back.
That's fair, but it'd be also nice to highlight when he's done something good. However, looking at your posts in here regards Smalling, it seems to be all negative.
He's only at fault for the second goal.
Second goal was clearly his fault but blaming him for the first goal in that mess
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