Ya they were playing Albania though
Declan Rice
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In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik @Rood and Imran @Annihilate Now! start with the good news by celebrating Manchester United Women's emphatic FA Cup win over Spurs at Wembley and the future of manager Marc Skinner.
Then it's the bad news and the ever worsening form of our Men with losses to Arsenal and Palace.
Finally the main debate - ETH Out now or keep him until the end of the season - if not longer. Are you Team Nik or Team Imran?
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For sure. The price is the issue though. Sir Alex loved picking up those players, but it was also a time where the smaller teams didn't have so much power at resisting big clubs. Now it's almost impossible to pry good players from other premier league teams. Especially any regular top half team, but even bottom half sides now. Whether its Kane, Rice, Grealish, Ndidi, Phillips, Zaha, etc, all clubs outside the 4 biggest clubs can demand 80m+ fees for any of their players and not give a feck if the bigger clubs don't stump up the cash. Now I have no idea if he would focus outside of the prem for far more reasonable prices rather than 80m being the starting point at a highly rated player at any premier league club.
I think Ndidi is the better player but it's close. W. Ham will not sell Rice on the cheap though but I do think he's worth the money.
‘He’s not world class, no guarantee he’ll step up’, fair point but Fred has just turned 28 with nothing world class about him & McT at 24 is becoming the next Lingard in terms of promising youngster lark.
He already does the job we’d like those 2 to do at a better standard with potential to get even better; if we can utilise a revitalised Lingard as a makeweight then we should pursue as a matter of urgency.
He already does the job we’d like those 2 to do at a better standard with potential to get even better; if we can utilise a revitalised Lingard as a makeweight then we should pursue as a matter of urgency.
granted he had an aversion to buying midfielders got a decade.
more the profile of the player, rather than his actual position.
fair point.
I wonder how much ambition the likes of Grealish, Kane and Zaha have?
whilst I agree clubs have far more money now, and don’t need to sell. Some players, knowing this are signing 5 year contracts, which mean they realistically are untransferable.
ive no idea on Rice’s contract. But the three above have knowingly made their bed, and are playing out their best years at (with all due respect) at smaller clubs. It’s why I question their ambition.
What I like about Rice is that he seems very static as a CDM.
He invites the opposition to attack him around the centre of the pitch.
He adds a pure shape to the team because he seems to be defensively dictating the pitch, he is in the right space at the right time and that right area always seem central.
I'm not saying he is as good as him because he really isn't especially when it comes to being able to beat the press- but the player he reminds me most of is Busquets when he had xavi and Iniesta and he had a very defensive role in the team.
I hardly saw Busquets running to RB or LB before running around to CAM as a way of imposing his defensive ability- he kind of always seems to be in the centre of the pitch +/- 25%.
When I look at Ndidi - he seems very different to someone like Rice. He reminds of the player we thought a CDM version of Fred would be. He is running around the pitch, you will see him with ultimate stamina pressing and trying to stop the ball getting to the defenders by running directly at the ball, you will see him at RB LB CAM and CB all within 5 minutes.
Ndidi is directly trying to defend by focusing and following the ball. Rice doesn't seem to do that to me, he always seems to be in one position and waits for the players to come at him centrally whilst he has the whole of the defensive line behind him.
He invites the opposition to attack him around the centre of the pitch.
He adds a pure shape to the team because he seems to be defensively dictating the pitch, he is in the right space at the right time and that right area always seem central.
I'm not saying he is as good as him because he really isn't especially when it comes to being able to beat the press- but the player he reminds me most of is Busquets when he had xavi and Iniesta and he had a very defensive role in the team.
I hardly saw Busquets running to RB or LB before running around to CAM as a way of imposing his defensive ability- he kind of always seems to be in the centre of the pitch +/- 25%.
When I look at Ndidi - he seems very different to someone like Rice. He reminds of the player we thought a CDM version of Fred would be. He is running around the pitch, you will see him with ultimate stamina pressing and trying to stop the ball getting to the defenders by running directly at the ball, you will see him at RB LB CAM and CB all within 5 minutes.
Ndidi is directly trying to defend by focusing and following the ball. Rice doesn't seem to do that to me, he always seems to be in one position and waits for the players to come at him centrally whilst he has the whole of the defensive line behind him.
Maybe a trade for Lingard + Fred ?
Corona time deal.
More like Lingard+Matic
Now I do like the sound of the bolded. It’s exactly what I’m hoping for in a CDM.
What worries me is that I just don’t seem to think he’s as good as many of you feel he is.
I’m starting to think I’m missing something that others are seeing. He just doesn’t strike me as particularly outstanding at any one thing, just decent at the basics.
Now that could still be an upgrade on what we have but for the money I’m worried he’s massively overpriced.
No one will take Matic in the EPL, lets be real, maybe Serie A.
Its still West Ham. If they'll take Lingard, they'll be open to Matic.
Matic also fits the perfect criteria for a Moyes player.
He wouldn't and rightly so. Our center defense and right wing are far bigger priority problems
Personally I feel he does the job already. He and Fred are constantly wrongly judged for the imbalance and compatibility issue we have at center defence. That forces us to play 2 decisiveness oriented players at the heart of our midfield more often than we should, papering over the defensive cracks rather than sealing them.
We should be all over this if the price is reasonable and the player wants to come.
22 year old, established PL defensive midfielder.
But I can't see us spending much this Summer. If the priority is to buy a CB then I can't see this happening as well.
22 year old, established PL defensive midfielder.
But I can't see us spending much this Summer. If the priority is to buy a CB then I can't see this happening as well.
You aren't, it's all built on hype.
He's a good player but nothing special at all. Put him in a United midfield and people will start saying he's the new Schneiderlin. You have to do more than just throw yourself around a bit and make a few tackles here and there. I honestly think if you put Mctominay in West Ham he'd be getting the same plaudits if not more.
Overall though I'm not totally convinced he'll take us up another level, which should be the requirement in our next few signings.
He's definitely overpriced. So was Maguire though and probably Wan Bissaka. Both have been excellent signings and have become 2 of our most reliable week to week performers. I think Rice would be like that. He's not as good as Ndidi, but he could reach that level.
As a defensive mid I think he's roughly at the level that Fred is as the box to box type role he plays (or similar to McTominay, but again, McTominay is a box to box).. but Rice only recently turned 22, so is very young, while his attributes are much more suited to our needs with potential to be refined into a top player. He's a proper defensive mid who is safe on the ball and probably more reliable to not have really sloppy give aways like Fred occasionally does, and then the added big bonus of his physical strength, size and huge plus at both ends with set pieces. You can actually play Pogba in a 2 with him and Bruno in front, or if Pogba is gone someone like Pogba. You can't do that with anyone we have now. So that position is huge for us to sort out if we want to take the next step as a team, even if he himself isn't Ndidi level of being a truly top defensive mid.
Yep, Lingard is the prime example of this
Exactly. It's a very different style of playing with a lot less pressure.
Rice sits in front of the back 4 in a very tight unit. If we want to play a counter attacking style then he'd suit well, but if you want us to dominate possession and push up the field against a parked bus is he really going to be better than what we have? not for me. He MIGHT be able to adjust to that style, but we'd be spending 50m+ on another player who doesn't improve us.
He 100% would improve us. We don't have a defensive mid, he is one that just turned 22 and is a high level already. He isn't world class, far from it, but he is very young in a position that people develop fully later usually. Having someone like him means we can actually play Pogba next to him without it being unbalanced. We can't play Pogba next to McTominay or Fred, they're all box to box mids essentially. We need a DM. Rice would he a guy who locks it down for the best part of the next 10 years and grows in the position too, so even if he's not a top player now, he'd be a huge step up because his position is one we lack and would enable us to play Pogba and Bruno together in a midfield 3, bringing us up multiple levels compared to Fred and McTominay and dropping an attacker for Pogba.
Rice doesn't play as a CDM in a 3 man midfield. He'd be no better than Fred or Mctominay in the 4-2-3-1 role IMO.
Ole doesn't even want to play a 4-3-3 unfortunately, but if he did there's a lot better people for the job than Rice.
There's an agenda on the RedCafe against Declan Rice for some reason, i think it largely comes from the Irish Manchester United fans in that he choose England over Ireland as this thread was largely positive about him when he was wearing an Ireland shirt.
People on here seem to pull down his talent just because of that, when deep down it's not really about his talent, it's to do with nationalism.
People on here seem to pull down his talent just because of that, when deep down it's not really about his talent, it's to do with nationalism.
He does for England.
Yes he's played it before and not pulled up any trees. England themselves haven't played it in ages.
They used a 4-2-3-1 last night with Rice and Philips and Mount ahead. Southgate seems to prefer 3 at the back or a 4-2-3-1 now.
We play a 4-2-3-1 as well so maybe he fits us even better than you think?
There probably are better options out there for us, especially at the price West Ham will want, but he would improve us solely due to actually being a defensive midfield player.A 4231 is just another form of a 3 man midfield. That's not the point. The point is that Rice next to Pogba would be much more balanced in a 2, behind Bruno as the 10, than Fred or McTominay next to Pogba. Fred and McTominay are box to box players with poor defensive positioning. Rice is an actual defensive mid. Even if McTominay had no change in quality but was by trade a defensive mid instead of a box to box mid, he'd be fine. But he isn't, so we need a defensive mid. We can't turn someone into something they aren't. Pogba will never work in midfield unless we buy a defensive mid to be next to him. Even if Pogba goes. We still need a defensive mid, we'll just also need the creative mid.
Which is the original point, he's no better than what we already have.We play a 4-2-3-1 as well so maybe he fits us even better than you think?
From what I've seen I don't think Rice is good enough on the ball and defensively it's a lot harder to play higher up the pitch than sitting in front of your back 4 in tighter spaces.
Anyway, we can argue about it all day but I don't think we will sign him. Too expensive and not really an upgrade.
Im starting to have an issue with these type of players who are hugely overpriced. We are building an extremely expensive squad without the quality justifying the outlay. It's really not necessary for us to keep breaking records on these good but not world class English players for world class money when the teams we poach them from just replace them with comparable but much cheaper continental versions, basically the player we should have actually bought in the first place. We can do this occasionally but it get tiring when we spend so much money and not have the world class team to show for it.
i dont think rice is the answer really. Hes decent but hes not several notches above mctominay or fred or matic either, so would it be worth the outlay?
another name i saw mooted was Zakaria, but a statistical comparison shows Rice has much better stats in a much tougher league which sort of speaks volumes about that one too
Rice is a potentially excellent player. But he wont strengthen our side where it is weak. We are weak at center back and right wing. Midfield and goal keeper are by far our strongest and grossly underrated departments.
Defensive midfield badly needs strengthening in my opinion. Rice, Grealish and Haaland should be our 3 targets, with Henderson and Tuanzebe coming in for the rest of the season to see if they can fill those holes.
I'm a bit suprised that people is that sceptical with regards to his ability on the ball. Whenever I watch him play, he looks good. It is fair that people have different views, and I'm not saying that anyone is wrong. But since it was a very different view than my own, I decided to dig a bit into the number to try to make an objective/neutruel unbiased assesment. I compared him to Fabinho (19/20) and Rodri since these are the two players in the PL he reminds me of, and since they are kind of a benchmark. For Fabinho, I used the 19/20 season since he has played central defender a lot this season. I also threw in Ndidi, I actually think they are quite different players, but since a lot of people compare the two, I thought it might be of interest.
I think the biggest difference between them is related to the amount of passes they make. And in my opinion, this has more to do with the team they play for. Rice also has the lowest completion rate. But considering the difference in style between West Ham and the other teams, you would expect that. While West Ham has a completion rate of 77 %, Leicester is at 81,8 %, City at 89,1 % and Liverpool at 84,3 %. In other words, Rice has the best completion rate compared to his team mates out of this four players. On average, per pass, he moves the ball a bit less than Fabinho and Rodri in terms of yards. But he is also the most progressive player (20 % more progressive than Fabinho and 10 % more than Rodri). He also completes a similar amount of passes/crosses into the penalty area as Fabinho, and significantly more than Rodri (Ndidi is not even close). I think those numbers are impressive considering how much less West Ham have the ball in that area of the pitch compared to Liverpool/Man City.
With regards to possession, I think the story is similar. He has the highest success rate in terms of dribbles (also dribbles more than the rest). Rodri is the only player who moves the ball forward more than Rice on average. However, remember, Rodri gets to have the ball alot more at Man City than Rice. You could make the case that Rice would be a lot more progressive than all of them if he had the ball the same amount of time.
On top of that, Rodri is three years older than Rice. Fabinho is five years older. Ndidi two.
All the numbers are collected from fbref (statsbomb).
| Stats per 90 min | Season | Completed | Attempted | Cmp% | Distance of each pass | Progressive distance of each pass | Passes into the penalty box | Crosses into the penalty box | |
| Declan Rice | 20/21 | 40 | 47 | 85.8 | 19,50 | 4,80 | 0,66 | 0,31 | |
| Fabinho | 19/20 | 58 | 66 | 87.3 | 20,31 | 4,01 | 0,91 | 0,09 | |
| Rodri | 20/21 | 81 | 89 | 91.0 | 20,22 | 4,30 | 0,62 | 0,04 | |
| Wilfred Ndidi | 20/21 | 50 | 57 | 88.7 | 19,45 | 4,17 | 0,06 | 0 |
I think the biggest difference between them is related to the amount of passes they make. And in my opinion, this has more to do with the team they play for. Rice also has the lowest completion rate. But considering the difference in style between West Ham and the other teams, you would expect that. While West Ham has a completion rate of 77 %, Leicester is at 81,8 %, City at 89,1 % and Liverpool at 84,3 %. In other words, Rice has the best completion rate compared to his team mates out of this four players. On average, per pass, he moves the ball a bit less than Fabinho and Rodri in terms of yards. But he is also the most progressive player (20 % more progressive than Fabinho and 10 % more than Rodri). He also completes a similar amount of passes/crosses into the penalty area as Fabinho, and significantly more than Rodri (Ndidi is not even close). I think those numbers are impressive considering how much less West Ham have the ball in that area of the pitch compared to Liverpool/Man City.
| Stats per 90 min | Season | Succ, dribbles | Att, dribbles | Succ% | Distance, carries | Prg distance, carries | |
| Declan Rice | 20/21 | 0,97 | 1,1 | 88 % | 249,5 | 130,9 | |
| Fabinho | 19/20 | 0,43 | 0,52 | 83 % | 214,9 | 96,8 | |
| Rodri | 20/21 | 0,83 | 1,08 | 77 % | 329,9 | 166,9 | |
| Wilfred Ndidi | 20/21 | 0,45 | 0,83 | 54 % | 203,4 | 79,4 |
With regards to possession, I think the story is similar. He has the highest success rate in terms of dribbles (also dribbles more than the rest). Rodri is the only player who moves the ball forward more than Rice on average. However, remember, Rodri gets to have the ball alot more at Man City than Rice. You could make the case that Rice would be a lot more progressive than all of them if he had the ball the same amount of time.
On top of that, Rodri is three years older than Rice. Fabinho is five years older. Ndidi two.
All the numbers are collected from fbref (statsbomb).
Harsh on Mctominay who I think is developing very nicely.
Do you not reckon? I think he’s better than both Fred and McTominay. They’d probably both perform better next to Rice than they would together too imo.
You'll obviously never know for sure until he plays in our side, but I don't see anything he does that would be better.
Whenever I see West Ham they always depend deep, the space between the back 4 and Rice/Soucek is minimal most of the time. Yes he's good at intercepting the ball, he's strong in the tackle and he's good in the air we know that.
But at United he's going to have to be playing much higher up and be involved with the attacking play a lot more. West Ham rarely have a lot of possession and often play counter attack getting the ball up to Antonio or the wide men who run into space, it's just a very different way of playing.
I've spent more time watching him for England and he just doesn't stand out to me, not enough to spend 50m+. Would I take him as a squad player? sure he'd do a better job than Matic, but only if he came cheaper.
I'd rather look elsewhere at players like Aurélien Tchouaméni who we should be able to get for half the price. He reminds me of Ndidi, I bet that's who Leicester would get if they sold 1 of theirs.
I agree that I don't think we should buy him, he'll be far too expensive. I do think hes a bit better than not being an upgrade on what we have though. I think if Fred or McTominay were English, they wouldn't be picked to do the role he does for England.
I agree. I’m not sure that static is the word, but Rice, like Rodri and Fabinho, is a player that is very disciplined in terms of positioning. In my opinion, Fred, McTominay and Ndidi are more reactive in style. Hence, they chase more. Rice is more about protecting space. That, in my opinion, makes him very interesting. Carrick was the same. Players like that provide balance.
I like him. I don't like the fee he will cost though. I think he is an upgrade too and is more discipline positionally that our midfielders.
I'd want him, if he cost 40m.
I'd want him, if he cost 40m.
not sure what nationality has to do about it tbh.
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