how many 15 yr old english players have you been watching?
Max Dowman | Nominated for PFA YPOY award (yes really)
- Thread starter trevor newnham
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A) I am perfectly calm, but I appreciate your concern. I certainly wasn't trying to impress anybody, I'm unsure what's lead you to believe that, or do you always resort to attacking a strawman when conversing?
B) You're agreeing with the claim that Dowman has the potential to be best talent ever produced in the nation. So while it isn't your direct claim, you are defending it and evoking the same opinion.
The description I gave of his 30min cameo perfectly sums up his performance on said game. The same 30min cameo that you and one other are using to claim that he has the potential to be the best talent to have ever been produced in the nation. I certainly can appreciate the little things a player can pull off, who are you to judge what is good and what isn't? Your perceived level of identifying incredible levels of football talent is only relevant to yourself. You are just another fan, as I and everybody else is. What is complete and utter drivel though, is the claims that he's already on track to be better than Charlton, Moore, Beckham, Rooney, Shearer & Banks. Three of those players won the World Cup. One of them is the current PL all time goal scorer. The other two have won every single domestic trophy in the PL, multiple UCL's and played for teams (United obviously) such as Madrid, PSG & AC Milan.
No one has refuted the claims or statements that he's special or that he is certainly exciting. What people are doing though, is refuting the complete and utter nonsense proclamation that he has the potential to be better than your aforementioned list, despite being 15yrs old and having 30mins of mens football under his belt.
Also, if you are to respond to my comments or any others for that matter, it would be a lot more impactful if you didn't feel the need to attack a strawman when trying to make a point.
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I know it has. I'm not a football historian like some are on here. I'm going to speak about players who I have extensive knowledge about and use them as a reference, hence why I avoided discussing players like Charlton etc.
Again, I disagree, as do many in regards to Rooney not having a strong case to be the best player of the era in comparison to Henry yet even if they don't think he's better than Henry, the thread on here recently had Rooney, Henry and Salah as a comfortable top 3 best PL players.
I don't think so, I think it's just being conscious of how that 'potential' is being judged. He has played the overwhelming majority of football in his life so far in youth competitions which are vastly different to senior competitive football. It's more appropriate to assess that potential when he has more senior competitive football under his belt to make such strong claims.
Hes a fantastic player who we're going to hate for a long long time.
Far more deserving of the hype than any of the pretenders who came before him.
Far more deserving of the hype than any of the pretenders who came before him.
He's 15 and 6foot, I think we can safely say that he'll gain a couple of inches. So the biggest challenge for him would be to maintain his level of agility with a 6'2+ frame.
What happened to the kid Patino that was massively hyped?
I actually think you make a fair point, devoid of emotion and clear eyed, unlike some other people on this thread. The level of competition matters, of course it does. What I'm talking about is what I see in the player and his specific ability.
I don't think it will be any great surprise to anyone in this thread if Dowman performs very well when he does get more senior minutes, due to the fact that he clearly has the tools. No one knows what will happen, but I'm confident that he'll be different. I have the same feeling about him that I had about Yamal, long before he came to international prominence.
It could well be, I don't want it to come across like I don't think he looks fantastic, he does. I'd just like to see him a bit more at senior level, and once he has grown a bit more to see if he is able to apply himself in the same way like you have referenced Yamal doing.
Agreed
Yeah, definitely not calm.
I honestly thought his cameo was just okay
I’d love to know what kind of comments were flying around after Jack wilshere pre season game v Real Madrid.
Nwaneri made his full senior debut at 15, for example. I really rate Nwaneri, he's a terrific young player. But this kid has something different.
Like who?
Some of the names hyped in terms of English players recently are Foden, Palmer, Bellingham etc. All deserved the hype and have delivered to be perfectly honest. Palmer has torn the PL up.
Dowman has potential to eventually be one of the next guys similar to those. There’s nothing wrong in believing that. Where a line has to be drawn is with outlandish claims such as he has potential to be the greatest English player ever and downplaying some of the greatest players ever. It’s way too early with nothing what so ever to back it up to make a claim on that level. Players like Palmer have succeeded on an incredible level so far in the premier league yet you wouldn’t even make a claim like that about somebody like him. It’s crazy that this is even a conversation.
He’s a young kid with real potential to break through and become a name. That’s realistically where it should sit right now.
I dunno, this doesn’t seem very respectful given you can say ‘is any of them Pele?’ For 99% of football player existence. Charlton is one of the unique archetypes with very few who can match his skillset like for like. He’s generally rated as England’s greatest player because of his game and ability (over goals) and I think only Rooney has come along since Charlton with the game and ability to potentially surpass him, so throwing that out willy nilly, is going to get backs up.Hyperbole would be 'he's gonna be the greatest player ever'
Being the greatest English player ever is not that high a bar, to be honest. The other gent mentioned Charlton, Moore, Rooney, Shearer, Banks and Beckham.
Utmost respect for Moore, Charlton and Banks, as world cup winners and icons of the game, but is any of them Pele? No. Maybe not even Banks as a goalkeeper
Shearer and Beckham are horribly overrated as footballers to me, though I accept they both made their marks in the game.
And then there's Rooney. A great player, but we're talking about a forward who scored one goal in the World Cup in his entire career. He didn't quite become what I thought he would be when he first appeared (they called him Roonaldo and the white Pele, etc.), but he still had a great career.
I understand that Dowman has to have a million things go his way to reach the level of these guys in terms of achievements, but if you ask me if he's potentially a better player than them, I'd be more likely to say yes than no, from what I've seen of him. If you ask me if he's potentially a better player than Maradona, I'd say 'are you crazy?!?!' That's the difference.
Dowman would have to have an extraordinary career to get to Charlton and unless he’s the second coming, is set up to fail, when all is said and done because that bar is likely unassailable.
Oh yeah, I was commenting solely on it not being particularly out there when talking about kids already having attributes that outdo adults.
As a newbie, what are others' thoughts? I cannot start a new thread currently but value your thoughts
Well if you read my post, I did say Charlton, Moore and Banks are icons of the game and I have respect for them. My point is that saying that someone has the potential to be the greatest ever English player is not the same as saying that someone has the potential to be the greatest ever Brazilian player or the greatest ever Argentine player.
I would consider someone like Glenn Hoddle to be more gifted than any of the England greats that we are discussing, but he probably didn't have as good a career as most of them, for a number of reasons. But he's still maybe the best English player I ever saw.
Arsenal have had a long list of overhyped kids.
Dowman is better than them all.
He's a remarkable talent and seemingly hates United so going to be annoying
People with such awful takes re older English players like Charlton are not really in a position to comment on a conversation re the greatest English players imo, particularly when concerning a 15 year old (who looks a fantastic player by the way).
You're arguing against someone else.
If you can't think of any hyped Arsenal kids, i don't know what to say...
I went to the Emirates Cup game Vs Rangers in 2009 when a 17 year old Wilshere scored twice vs Rangers and got MOTM in both games that weekend.
Unfortunately another player that injuries ruined.
Sounds crazy but we should be all over him, convince the player then pay whatever the price is. He's that good. I genuinely think he's a generational talent in the same bracket as Yamal.
If there's a time when this can be done is right now, as soon as he breaks into Arsenal's squad he'll be untouchable if he's not already.
If there's a time when this can be done is right now, as soon as he breaks into Arsenal's squad he'll be untouchable if he's not already.
Agree with this. Even if someone thinks Dowman is potentially England's greatest ever player, it is very, very, very unlikely that he will actually surpass Bobby Charlton either in ability or achievement. I would be happy if Dowman did as it about time we won another world cup.
I agree that it is unlikely, because as I said before, a million things have to go right for Dowman to become a great player. But, if we take it as a situation where we assume that everything does go right for him, the talent is definitely there.
Well done he's 15.
It's very easy to get a bit giddy when a talent like this emerges - and by this I mean a player with such an eye-catching, refined technique. Keep in mind you never see Mr Mujac and his likes coming up with posts like yours - and him/they have seen more talents than rest of us combined.
For Arsenal I remember watching a young Jack Wilshere absolutely bossing it at his age. Now he eventually showed that he belonged at the highest level, but injuries/off-field issues really prevented him from cementing his status and really fulfill his insane promise from his youth days.
Also funnily enough, you also references Ødegaard. I was fortunate enough to watch a lot of his breakthrough season - also at the age of 15. They are eerily similar in terms of showcasing a similar talent/style and toying with senior players at the same age. You could argue doing it in England is more impressive than the top league in Norway, but we saw the same in the NT too (I was fortunate to watch his debut live). Dowman might now look like a bonafide Ballon d'Or player, but both he and Arsenal should be very happy if he ends up having the same impact as their captain (if he can get back to his previous level for Arsenal).
Genuine question, as someone who watched a young Odegaard, he's obviously developed more as a playmaker, but did a young Odegaard dribble and ghost past players like Dowman does?
I think that's Dowman's best quality, I'd almost liken him to Kaka the way he can drift past players, perhaps not quite having the top speed or power of Kaka yet. I wouldn't want to see that coached out of him.
I think Bowman is better at gliding past players (recency bias perhaps?) but the similarity between both when it comes to, if it makes sense, nudging the ball to the left just in time to evade the opposing player, is uncanny. But like I said, they look very similar in terms of style and technique. The most impressive thing about Ødegaard back then, apart from said technique, was his passing and vision was already top notch. Weight of pass and trajectory was extremely impressive. I also found him more of a dribbler back then, but I think that is because it's harder to translate superior dribbling skills to the highest level and he probably focused on fine-tuning his playmaking skills instead rather than it being "coached out of him". Think there's a compilation of his debut season on YouTube, even though it doesn't show enough of his early talent.
Regarding Ødegaard's playmaking skills. Back then it was well-known that his father (an ex-pro and top league coach) spent countless hours coaching his son outside of club training. One of the exercises he used to improve peripheral vision has been "adopted" by many youth coaches I know for one-on-one and small group sessions.
I understand Arsenal fans' giddiness. For their sake I hope he is awarded patience, as in not expecting a linear trajectory and time to let his body fully grow, because he sure looks a very exciting talent. And he also needs to learn the model pro mindset from his captain if he's to hit higher heights than him.
Several times when Dowman ran into the box, I actually thought it was Odegaard. Their running style is almost identical.
Do you think that is through being played in adult matches too often too soon or just unfortunate.
When you look at Ansu fati / the amount of games yamal played last year and now struggling - surely there has to be a cap on how many senior games young players are allowed to play.
No 15 year old really should be playing at the intensity and physicality of an adult, no matter what the talent
How is he that good at 15? Insane
Ousmane Dembele and Martial also had that. It’s one skill among many that make up potential.
He’s potentially England’s greatest as was Greenwood and many others. Fans are blinkered as they think a few matches are enough to judge something as complex as potential because someone has a naturally brilliant strike or dribbling technique. It means little and there’s a lot more to talent than one or two qualities.
“Generational waffle” was a pretty good line though.
Wilshere? I think it was his 1st main injury that he felt he never really came back fully from, a good wee video from a couple years back on the Ben Foster podcast where they discuss it.
Maybe I’m exaggerating. The point is that at 15, the potential range of outcomes is so broad it’s really is impossible to say what will happen. Therefore it’s not that farfetched to say he has the potential to be that level of player, which is far removed from saying he will be.
Our own Ravel Morrison is a good example of a player who had the potential, but fell apart completely.
Should be fine as long as they don't force him to pack on a load of muscle. Isak is pretty Agile and Woltemade too. They're all that sort of gangly build at 6ft 3/4, but enough muscle to still be strong on the ball with balance.
Watching Ødegaard come up in the Norwegian top-tier I would actually say his style was in fact fairly similar to Dowman’s. The impressive thing which both of them possessed at a young age is the innate understanding of space, and ability to judge where and when spaces would open up. The top tier of talent just have that ability to «see things» before they happen, and then have the technical ability to execute on the vision. I’d say Ødegaard maybe had a better weight of pass than Dowman, but both seem to have skill-sets that complement their mental image of the pitch.
No they didn't. And don't.