None of those have the technical ability that Ribery had. Musiala is the only player I would consider potentially close to Ribery. Ribery's close range dribbling was amazing.
I just think the team's overall ability on the ball (including Spielverständnis) has clearly declined since then. Which doesn't mean some individual players aren't excellent. Disagree about the line on Coman/Davies vs. Robbery, though. (Also Guerreiro in that specific comparison, but I do think he's very neat in possession).
2014 Mandzukic was the #9
I said under Flick. Not comparing the 2012-13 squad to now, but rather was trying to say that the team was playing better under Flick even though there are many of the same players right now.
Tuchel's agenda. For him speed is the most important factor for anybody but Kane - and I still think he is of the opinion that we can win anything with hero football. I do not see any mechanisms or trained running patterns. And we even cannot get Kane into the game as a real no. 9 like this. Sure, he functions as a midfielder to send the fast guys on counter - but before the first goals rarely has touches in the box.
Thanks for the write up. I completely agree. I was so excited for the Kane and Muller combo and they barely play together. Tuchel’s been a bit of a letdown so far.
I think that's what it looks like when you have to force a too thin squad through three competitions. The fact that Tuchel at times had only 15 players available is crazy.
Yep, absolutely. They messed up their deadline day in the summer (3 players they „almost“ signed…) and are now being hit hard with injuries. Gnabry is close to returning but Coman looked bad and I hope Pavlovic is okay.
I think that Leverkusen looked better against Augsburg than Bayern did despite needing a late goal to win.
Bayern continue to look underwhelming. Yeah, a lot of players missing, but the lineups being fielded are still very strong and should be playing better.
On a different note, what a game in Stuttgart
I feel that they are not getting as much attention as they should due to what Bayer are doing. They have no right being as good as they are. And this was without Guirassy - they were playing well last season and almost got relegated but it somehow all fell into place for them now.
Stuttgart were already really good in the second half of last season. Hoeness seems to be a really good coach with a clear idea. They simply underperformed under Labbadia (what a shock, I know) who should never ever be hired again by anyone.I think that Leverkusen looked better against Augsburg than Bayern did despite needing a late goal to win.
Bayern continue to look underwhelming. Yeah, a lot of players missing, but the lineups being fielded are still very strong and should be playing better.
On a different note, what a game in Stuttgart
I feel that they are not getting as much attention as they should due to what Bayer are doing. They have no right being as good as they are. And this was without Guirassy - they were playing well last season and almost got relegated but it somehow all fell into place for them now.
The infamous inventor of the term 'comfort zone' that's haunting us until today
Yeah, that's what I said. They were playing well in the second half but were not really getting the results.
Yeah, sorry mate. I actually wanted to emphasize your point but it came across as a bit know-it-all.
Stuttgart are doing well is one half of the truth, but the other half is that Dortmund and Leipzig are having bad seasons. I don't have to go into detail about Dortmund, with them loaning players from midtable teams and hiring what looks like their designated interim coach, because the one in charge was declared dead by the press around Christmas. And if Leipzig were a real club we would be reading quite a bit of negative stuff about them as well.
Obviously it is not „a miracle“, and no one termed it that way, but it is a big, traditional club playing attractive and successful football. That is a strong positive in my book no matter the circumstances of Dortmund and Leipzig sucking badly.
Stuttgart is on track to a 65+ point season and are even better in terms of xPts. And they're doing it playing a system which many people thought would only be playable with player quality only Bayern can afford. It is still early days but assuming they continue like this, it was one of the most impressive managerial displays in terms of "having a team punch above its weight" in the last 20 years
Always with the selective application of xG. If you want to go by xPts you should also look at last season, where they underperformed that stat to the tune of 14 points, even before Hoeneß took over and they had all that negative momentum.
It is not selective and I know that they severely underperformed their xPts last season again. Half my Kickbase squad consists of Stuttgart players for that reason. I was a fan of them already under Matarazzo and thought Mislintat did a great job. It is still exceptional how Hoeneß has them playing. Results, xPts, eyetest, it doesn't matter - they leave a whlostically great expression.
Should be up by like 5-0
So about this... looks like it's just going to be one of those days.
Yea, he's consistently terrible.
Aytekin/VAR is definitely not blameless. That was a clear shirt pull on Wirtz there.
Yeah admittedly the ref was very poor. But Frimpong alone should have had two goals. Just one of those games.
Gladbach doing this shit for many years against Bayern.
Bayern plays Gladbach next…
What's funnier is that he gave a free kick seconds later for a similar arm pull by Wirtz
Makes sense against Bayern given the disparity between the two teams, to do it against Leverkusen is a new low for them. Don't remember them deploying similar tactics against Dortmund.
I think the Gladbach curse is over after Sommer left.
Gladbach giveth, Gladbach taketh away.
