Juan Mata

Juan Mata visits Old Trafford Museum

The man can do no wrong right now. I respect him for doing that.

"You see the World Cup getting further away and you want to play. That's very important. But a decision like this is not a six-month decision, it's a four-year decision. For both teams and for me it was the right moment, but it was a long-term move, not just six months."

I think this is very important, we might not have CL football but a contract is for four years not one. I've seen his decision to come here labelled as a mistake, based on 6 months, which is unfair. Also shows that he didn't join us solely to make the WC squad. Herrera probably followed a similar longsighted outlook when joining us.  

The rest of the interview is also pretty good (a few months old though)

http://www.theguardian.com/football/2014/may/09/juan-mata-manchester-united-chelsea-transfer

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From 4 years ago, after we played Valencia

Now then, Juan, Small Talks hears that you were doubly disappointed after Manchester United won at Mestalla. Not only had Valencia lost, but you missed out on a chance to get Ryan Giggs's shirt … Yes, that's true. I've liked him a lot since I was little. I think he's one of the best wingers I have ever seen. It was a real shame that he couldn't play in the first leg. Hopefully he'll play against us at Old Trafford. Let's see if I can get his shirt off him this time round.

You supported Real Oviedo. But does this mean you also supported Man United as a kid? No. But I liked Giggs. I watched a lot of English football. United, Chelsea … I remember liking Arsenal with Dennis Bergkamp. That was a great team. I have played at Old Trafford before in a pre-season friendly and it's a wonderful stadium. It'll be even better on a European night I'm sure. I'm looking forward to it. I'd love to win there.

Who stands out in the United side? I like Nani a lot, Chicharito, who I have played against with Spain. Dimitar Berbatov has a lot of class. Like Giggs, Paul Scholes is one of the greats of Man United's history. He is very complete: he can push up and play behind the strikers scoring a lot of goals, he has a great shot; he can sit deeper and play, he has superb technique and vision and passes brilliantly. I like him a lot. He's one of the best there has been.

http://www.theguardian.com/sport/2010/dec/07/juan-mata-small-talk

He likes Scholes, he loves Giggs

Anyone else feel underwhelmed by him since he joined us, or is that only me?

We all saw what he could do for Chelsea, but he hasn't had the same affect for us.

I used to love him at Chelsea, I think he's one of the best players in his position in fact, but yeah, he's been underwhelming for us.

This team is built in Fergie's in image, by that I mean, he bought players for his specific system to play at great pace, Mata is generally slow, not just running but he takes too many touches for example, and takes long to release the ball and it's exaggerated in our team. I was making excuses for him at the start, it's Moyes, he's playing on the wing, let him settle etc. but sometimes the player is not playing well, today unlike Swansea, he got the ball in dangerous areas and got many touches but still nothing. It was like this in pre-season too, with Herrera playing with him all I remember is the Roma goal, no real good performances. I fear for him, because if van Gaal switches to a wing-based system, it's likely he'll be dropped before Rooney or RvP are. He also plays the 10 role like an SS, but we don't need that when the type of strikers we have are Rooney and RvP.

Should not have been dropped today.

One of RVP or Falcao should have made way for Rooney to partner one of them, as both are not match fit atm and need to be eased in before they can play for over 60mins.

Hindsight I know, but I think we would have looked even better had Mata started.

The problem was not the attack though today. He was also partly at fault for one of the goals. Rooney has problems with his back to goal, but he had a good 60 mins, after the penalty his performance dropped but so did everyone else.

I think with RvP and Falcao it's a bit too much because they're not going to get involved in the build-up too much, but we did score 3 goals. Perhaps in the future it will a cause a problem, but today it didn't.

Don't mind me, I'm just imagining the what ifs atm

Dissecting The Flaws Of Juan Mata As No.10

http://livelifeunited.com/misunderstood-juan-mata/

I think this article makes a good point. Mourinho used Ozil and now Fabregas, but why not Mata? They're both not defensively great either. It's obvious it's his attacking play which no one wants to admit too.  

I think van Gaal had his reasons dropping Mata after the QPR game, after reading this. More so than he wanted to keep his Dutch mate in the line-up.  The reason it looks like our strikers are not making runs for Mata is because they have to drop deep to occupy the space he should be in.

The other problem is, as the article says, Rooney is also not the long-term solution to the #10 position either.

and then LvG went on and sold Shinji. Imagine Kagawa in this system behind 2 strikers. It would have been a treat. really.
And now a scenario has arisen that probably after a year or so Van Gaal will be searching for no.10s in the transfer market.

What about Januzaj. Does he have the treaits to occupy compact spaces ?? He too havent really played as a 10 for us to really tell that I guess.

And also I kinda knew Herrera was the best option in this squad to fill that role, better than rooney that is.

So it ideally should be according to this article
CAM role to herrera,
one CF role to mata and the other CF role to one among rooney, falcao and van persie of which falcao i guess will get the lot for Mata to eventually succeed in this setup Am I right??

Yeah, the problem is made worse with 2 strikers because there is even less space in the middle. Rooney is not ideal, but would have Mata even been in position to make the pass to Di Maria vs Leicester? It doesn't seem so.

I was wondering why Mata was so uncreative for us. he's only created 4 chances compared to Fabregas who has created 18. Even Ozil has created 9 and he's been shoved out wide occasionally and had no pre-season. Rooney has created 5 chances, and he's played 4 games as CF.

Januzaj is the long-term solution, but he's only ever played as a #10 for us in the league cup and the 1st half vs Swansea in the league. I guess the answer is we'll have to see.

Short-term, I think we should drop a striker play Rooney up front with Falcao/RvP, play Herrera as the #10 and play Carrick. This will also help us defensively a lot because we'll have two players sitting in Blind and Carrick, and Herrera works really hard as the #10. Replace Carrick with Strootman eventually. This can be the solution short-term until Januzaj is ready.

And, yeah, selling Kagawa was a mistake, he strives in those situations.

Spoiler:

So what was everyone's verdict on him today?

For me, I thought he didn't have any influence on the match. Played far too up front too, and when he did on rare occasions track back, he looked weak in the tackle and slow in general.

He needs to occupy that CAM position more effectively and try to feed Falcao and RVP, rather than going into their spaces in hopes of scoring.

He did get an assist, so credit where it's due, but he needs to do more to cement his place in the team under LVG.

When I watch him play all I think is this

Sir Alex Ferguson wrote:“Sometimes you look in a field and you see a cow and you think it’s a better cow than the one you’ve got in the field. It’s a fact, right, and it never really works out that way. It’s probably the same cow and it’s not as good as your own cow."

He is not able to control games and dictate the tempo like Silva or anything.  He disappears for 89 minutes gets an assist or a goal but does nothing else. His best games came when he played with Kagawa. At Valencia he played with Silva and at Chelsea Oscar. He had others to dictate the game, so his inability of controlling the game was not highlighted as much. I'm guessing that's how it was at Chelsea and Valencia, I didn't watch him week in week out. First season, there was no Oscar, but he played out wide.

Del Bosque, Mourinho and now van Gaal.

Honestly, I think we bought an overrated player.

it's ok adnan will be in that role in the next few years

a great human being, a role model,
wanted him desperately to succeed here, But it seems thats not going to be the case unfortunately. Its pretty evident from what we have seen he is not a trequartista/playmaker who can link up play and create. Also in the postition he could actually play effectively, we have players stacked up.

Now honestly the best thing as far as his career is concerned is a move back to Spain. Atleti or Valencia. eventhough we are surely going to suffer heavy loss in any possible deal.
The fact we paid close to 40m for him. what a steal that was.

Busby Babe wrote:When I watch him play all I think is this

Sir Alex Ferguson wrote:“Sometimes you look in a field and you see a cow and you think it’s a better cow than the one you’ve got in the field. It’s a fact, right, and it never really works out that way. It’s probably the same cow and it’s not as good as your own cow."

He is not able to control games and dictate the tempo like Silva or anything.  He disappears for 89 minutes gets an assist or a goal but does nothing else. His best games came when he played with Kagawa. At Valencia he played with Silva and at Chelsea Oscar. He had others to dictate the game, so his inability of controlling the game was not highlighted as much. I'm guessing that's how it was at Chelsea and Valencia, I didn't watch him week in week out. First season, there was no Oscar, but he played out wide.

Del Bosque, Mourinho and now van Gaal.

Honestly, I think we bought an overrated player.

I actually don't know what it is.

Oscar never dictates the play for us, it was always Mata doing so. He was always at his best when interchanging with Oscar though, often able to find space in deeper positions or cut in from the right.

He was our main AM until Jose showed up, From what I've seen of Mata at Utd, he is playing way too high up the pitch and is almost playing like a SS rather than an AM. It seems tactical to me, but I think he's probably lacking confidence too. I don't think it helps that he isn't a guaranteed starter and isn't playing with other AM's who can interchange (due to the 2 CFs)

He's battling for his spot with Rooney and Mata's best asset is his productivity, but Rooney can be just as productive if not more + adds more defensive stability and that's where Mata falls short. Of course that's not only what he adds that Rooney doesn't, but I don't think it's enough to push Rooney out. I think if he was being more creative (for us) it would make up for where he falls short defensively. To credit him though, it's not because he's lazy he does try defensively.

I know van Persie is the same, does largely nothing for most of the match but scores, and I have criticised his performances, but there is just generally more leeway for a striker that does little than an AM that does little.

i think the biggest problem is the 2 striker system. If it was a 4-3-3 with wingers, then even if mata wandered up the field as an ss, it wouldnt have hurt the team much as in that case an extra body would then be available for defensive duties. Here in this formation, positional discipline is key. If you fail to stick by it, you will get easily noticed and thats what is happening here.

So keeping that in mind this scenario can actually change and mata can indeed get minutes. In the near future its expected we would be shifting permanently to a 4-3-3.
van persie is looking way past it and this might be his last as a starter.

Falcao will be our first striker and rooney the no.10. So if we get a good left winger and strotman, Van Gaal might use januzaj as the right winger paving way for a 4-3-3. So in that case, mata will be very much part of the plan as he will be the back up to rooney and more importantly might be more effective as well as a SS.

Yeah...I stick by it. Overrated dross

shocked to see him playing so pathetically. I mean wtf seriously. Is he really this level. or is this a horrendous spell of form. Simply cant understand.

Woeful.

If there is any inclination of truth that Juve are willing to swap Vidal for him, snatch their frigging hands off.

Had a decent game today. But still not the level which was expected of him. (That one pass he gave di maria which latter shot wayward, it was mata of the old.) He showed little bit more effort and desire from last 2 games, perhaps because it was against chavski, but his form is really wretched at the moment isnt it ?! That free kick otherwise would have been in the back of the net.

So rooney back on from next match onwards for sure. What should we do with mata ? Got 3 games to prove and he hasnt delivered simply. Should we sell him. What you guys think?
or should we keep him hoping for his form to return?

Tbh, after reading Fussball's and Betty's post on Mata in the GS, the way we describe him now is how they described him in January. Seems like he's just not as good as we thought. He'll get benched by Rooney now and deservedly so, I think he'll want to leave and he's entitled to that.

If we buy Strootman, it'll push him further down the pecking order, because it will allow Herrera to play more often as a #10, we'll have Rooney, Januzaj, Herrera, Fellaini and even Young. They're not all better than him obviously, but a position we're stacked in.

He's either too far up the pitch, or too deep, never in between the lines, which is pretty much the definition of a #10.

Annonymous yet again. Just doesn't do enough, doesn't impose himself on the game. Everything is played safe with him, shirks responsibility time and time again. reeks of low confidence issues.

Time and time again today whenever he had the ball I was yelling at the screen for him to attempt a creative pass, play a dangerous ball, and time and time again he would rather play it sideways.

A glorified Cleverely atm.

Rooney's back next week, so Mata will warm the bench. He failed to capitalize on his chance

JUAN wrote:Beating Liverpool at Anfield, being lucky to score two nice goals and feeling your gratitude is something I will never forget. But we must be cautious: these are just three points in the race to our goal.

Many of you are asking me about the second goal and the truth is I don’t know very well how to explain it. It’s something you just don’t think… It’s more a resource you use when you understand it’s better to shoot the ball as it comes rather than trying to control it and keep the play. Angel’s pass invited to do so. It’s one of the best goals of my career for sure, among other things because it happened in such a massive game. And it helped us win.

i am a tad embarrassed to say this after criticizing him in the past, but there was never a question regarding his character and humbleness.
He is one of the nicest chaps to have ever played the game.

That blog, those words once again underline his class as a human being. What a man.

Going to mata the player, yep this is his best position in the team. I remember Busby babe and me in the past in this thread talking something along those lines. He correctly pointed out when playing as a no.10 mata wont get the space if the opposition play narrow making the hole congested for mata to work his magic. Now, Lvg has put him thanks to the blessing in disguise called di maria suspension firstly away from the middle so that he can find the space and secondly and most importantly alongside his pal with whom he has got a telepathic connection. And there we go, thats the mata we wanted to see right from when he moved here. The presence of herrera is as crucial as his own football as both of them can lay it off for each other and do the sexy with ease. Not much as herrera, but fellaini playing in the hole is also helping mata, as the former will make way by shoving players aside for mata to run into thus creating that space he want. If theres space mata is as good as anybody in football.
Plus, his defensive game has improved it seems as well. He is working hard, tracking back and shielding the ball lately very nicely.  Again, that has to go in the credit list of lvg. The old man is not boasting when he says he can make every player better, aint it.

Keep up the good work man. That right side, make it your own. Its the best for the team if 'marrera' play side by side.

The more I see that second Mata goal the more I look at Oscar and Willian... and despair.

From shed end.