VF Draft SF: Harms vs Mickey7

[Edgar Allan Pillow]

vs
................................................. TEAM HARMS .............................................................................................................. TEAM MICKEY7 ..................................................


TEAM HARMS


It looks like this is going to be 4-2-3-1 vs 4-2-3-1 and at this stage it's hardly a surprise that the teams will be incredibly hard to separate quality-wise. Still, I do believe that I have a slight edge in terms of the personnel — or, at least, I have more of my own personal favourites. There's also the historical precedent of Franco Baresi facing Romário at the peak of his powers and stopping him, producing one of all-time greatest individual defensive performances (in a World Cup final no less!) — it's important not to dwell into those real games too much but I simply can't not mention it, given a chance:


Overall I believe that my team isn't that hard to visualise.

• Rinat Dasayev stands in goal — he's one of those marginal difference that I believe bring my team closer to victory. Chilavert was a great keeper but I'd take Dasayev over him any day — he was as complete as they come & ridiculously consistent.
• Paul McGrath is a perfect counterpart to Franco Baresi with his God-like athleticism and outstanding defensive nous.
• Ahead of them there's the perfect no-nonsense midfield of the late 90's — Roy Keane & Edgar Davids (with the latter covering Marcelo's wide left channel).
• My fullbacks are from an era when their roles became one of the most important in football — and both were absolutely crucial in their teams winning countless trophies (Marcelo is the most decorated player in history of Real Madrid, ahead of Di Stéfano, Gento, Puskás, Raúl & Cristiano; for Brazil he, surprisingly, got into 2 World Cup's TotT, although I'd say that his inclusion in 2014' is a bit dubious; Philipp Lahm had won everything there was to win on the club level and was absolutely immense in different roles for West Germany — twice getting into Euros TotT, twice into World Cup's TotT, obviously winning it in 2014). A lot of creativity is going to come from them.
• Luis Suárez is going to shine in his Barça role once again — and while I do rate Platini a bit higher it's important to note that Suárez is absolutely an all-time great player on his own, capable of standing up to the likes of Di Stéfano & Puskás during his time in blaugrana's shirt.
• My front trio is absolutely electric and, which is important, hard-working as well as, well, genius. The interplay between Denis Law & Oleg Blokhin is really something that I'm looking forward to and Tom Finney should be a nice addition to those two, playing a more classic wing role that Oleg on the left. It coincides well with their respective fullback partners — Marcelo will bomb forward & overlap like he did with Cristiano while Lahm will probably be a bit more focused on the build-up & playmaking (although his occasional overlaps will be a great secondary threat).

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TEAM MICKEY7

My team will be playing a 4-2-3-1 formation. As my players are all well known the area's that I feel are particularly strong/that I have an advantage in for this match are as follows:

• The proven combination of Platini, Boniek and Tardelli
• My left hand flank of Czibor and Nilton Santos has an advantage over the opponent's right hand flank of Lahm and either Finney or Blokhin
• My SF reinforcement CB pairing of Ferdinand and Cannavaro

 

[Edgar Allan Pillow]

@harms @Michaelf7777777 All the best!

 

[harms]

• My left hand flank of Czibor and Nilton Santos has an advantage over the opponent's right hand flank of Lahm and either Finney or Blokhin

In what way? Not sure if there's some tactical advantage that I'm missing but in terms of the players level... I'd rank them about the same so it's not about one player being significantly better than another but I know that I'd take Lahm & Finney if I were to pick 2 players out of those 4.

Also, any excuse to post this Bessonov does have the engine to run up & down the wing for the whole game but I'd still count on Blokhin to came out on top in their duel.

 

[harms]

Thoughts, anyone?

 

[Physiocrat]

Thoughts, anyone?

You have excellent cover for Marcelo here. You might want more of a traditional DM alongside Davids than Keane although having watched the latter more recently he was not as attacking as I had remembered. I'm not the biggest fan of Law as a striker although in a fluid front three it works. I think Michael might want a more attacking LB behind Czibor. From watching the Hungarian side the Czibor was more a free roaming forward and I can't remember who provided most of the width on the left - Budai was a trad right-winger on the other side.

Overall this is pretty even.

 

[Himannv]

Thoughts, anyone?

You need someone who is a more natural DM I reckon. Generally these look like evenly matched teams and it’s the same formation, which is unfortunate. I prefer your fullbacks, but he has Platini and Romario.

 

[harms]

You need someone who is a more natural DM I reckon. Generally these look like evenly matched teams and it’s the same formation, which is unfortunate. I prefer your fullbacks, but he has Platini and Romario.

That’s a bit of a weird take to be honest, considering how Keane & Davids used to play and who they have behind them.

Especially since it’s Platini, who spends most of the time deeper than your usual number 10.

 

[harms]

@Himannv just to illustrate my point with a classic Keano game against another all-time great number 10 (and, actually, a number 10 that spent more time further forward) — Butt wasn't a natural defensive midfielder, in fact he was often more attacking than Keane in that 1998/1999 season. Keane, regardless of however he was playing alongside Butt, Scholes or even Beckham, was always the more reserved one.

I have a water-tight defense behind them, quite an illustrious number 10 in front of them and a perfect midfield dynamo in Davids. There's really nothing that a more dedicated DM can add to this team if it's not stretched vertically due to weird tactical instructions (it's not).

Davids in a midfield 2 with Wim Jonk facing the all-mighty Brazil. Jonk wasn't a defensive midfielder, more of a midfield playmaker if anything and Davids was responsible for most of the defensive stuff. You can see how often he appears in Ronaldo's way to stop him

 

[Michaelf7777777]

In what way? Not sure if there's some tactical advantage that I'm missing but in terms of the players level... I'd rank them about the same so it's not about one player being significantly better than another but I know that I'd take Lahm & Finney if I were to pick 2 players out of those 4.

Nothing tactical, I just rate Lahm lower than the other players in the comparison.

There's also the historical precedent of Franco Baresi facing Romário at the peak of his powers and stopping him, producing one of all-time greatest individual defensive performances (in a World Cup final no less!) — it's important not to dwell into those real games too much but I simply can't not mention it, given a chance:

Particularly given Romario scored in their only other competitive meeting for a PSV side that had a lot less star quality than Baresi's AC Milan.

 

[Himannv]

@Himannv just to illustrate my point with a classic Keano game against another all-time great number 10 (and, actually, a number 10 that spent more time further forward) — Butt wasn't a natural defensive midfielder, in fact he was often more attacking than Keane in that 1998/1999 season. Keane, regardless of however he was playing alongside Butt, Scholes or even Beckham, was always the more reserved one.

I have a water-tight defense behind them, quite an illustrious number 10 in front of them and a perfect midfield dynamo in Davids. There's really nothing that a more dedicated DM can add to this team if it's not stretched vertically due to weird tactical instructions (it's not).

Davids in a midfield 2 with Wim Jonk facing the all-mighty Brazil. Jonk wasn't a defensive midfielder, more of a midfield playmaker if anything and Davids was responsible for most of the defensive stuff. You can see how often he appears in Ronaldo's way to stop him

Hmm, I felt Butt was always the more defensive of the two. Same story with Jonk, who I felt was in the Aron Winter mould. I'm not saying Keane or particularly Davids can't play that DM anchor type role, but it's probably not the perfect use of them. It's anyway a very minor thing to bring up, but we're talking fine margins here anyway.

 

[Pat_Mustard]

Hmm, I felt Butt was always the more defensive of the two. Same story with Jonk, who I felt was in the Aron Winter mould. I'm not saying Keane or particularly Davids can't play that DM anchor type role, but it's probably not the perfect use of them. It's anyway a very minor thing to bring up, but we're talking fine margins here anyway.

It probably varied from match to match but overall I'm with Harms here. I remember getting annoyed at times that it was Butt advancing rather than Keane when they played as a duo as I felt Keane had more in his locker creatively and as a goal threat.

Got to say that looks as good a set up as I've seen for Marcelo in drafts, certainly in a back four. First-rate covering from Baresi and Davids, not to mention the extremely hard-working Blokhin ahead of him, and a real obligation on him to orchestrate the build-up down that flank that he should relish. Not much in it overall, but between that and my giddiness every time I see the Baresi/McGrath partnership I'm giving this to Harms.

 

[GodShaveTheQueen]

Have usually not been a fan of 2 B2B combinations, but Keane-Davids is perfectly fine here. Keane was more than capable of playing the more reserved or holding role.

 

[GodShaveTheQueen]

Rating Micheal's teams so far -

QF > SF > R1

Rating Harms' teams so far -

R1 > SF > QF

Neither have peaked at the business end interestingly (in my eyes)