2014 FIFA World Cup Brazil - Tracking Our Players

Messi and Neymar both have 4 goals at this WC. Sanchez has 1 goal, so thats 9 goals for the Barcelona players this WC.

Those 3, plus Iniesta have had pretty great WC's.

Mascherano has done reasonable, the rest somewhere between meh and below par.

funny enough Mascherano tops the passes completion rate at 89%..
pointless stat but still a bit funny considering he is one of our worst passes.
he has a total of 278 passes.

I'd be worried that my CB's arent the highest % passers if im Argentina. How are they not when 2 of the teams they have played were totally parking the bus?

ehh he plays more in the midfield for argentina and transitions to cb in defense.

but nigeria / bosnia didn't totally park the buss that was mostly iran

Pep watching Argentina V Nigeria

Some of Cruyff comments.

Regrading Argentina:

And 67-year-old Cruyff believes Alejandro Sabella's men could capitalise should Brazil succumb to the pressure of winning a home World Cup, while he has also tipped Spain, Italy and Germany to pose a threat.

"The pressure on the squad is huge," Cruyff wrote in his De Telegraaf column. "They have to watch out for Argentina. I think Spain will also be a good contender and we know that Germany and Italy can grow into the tournament."

Regrading Netherlands need to play more like Germany:

"When we analyse the two matches of the Oranje, we see two things: one is that we've qualified for the next round and that's a success,” Cruyff wrote in his column for De Telegraaf.

“But, the other thing is that the football isn't that good. That's why I am really looking forward to Netherlands-Chile.

"I liked the way that Germany kept playing in their own style – even during the moments when things weren't going well against Ghana. That's the way Netherlands should be playing as well. The results are good, now we have to start playing good football."

Spain result was a freak result:

Writing in his weekly column for 'De Telegraaf', Cruyff praised the Netherlands' "fantastic" performance against 'La Roja', but also highlighted what he called "huge blunders" on Spain's part.

"Let's be honest, Spain gifted us chances but that won't happen again", the ex-Barça and Ajax player and coach noted. He also referred to the plight of the previously all-conquering Spanish side as a cautionary tale, calling on the Dutch team not to get carried away: "It's vital that everyone keeps both feet on the ground", he stated.

What game Chile V Brazil turned out to be. I was loving Nerman, Bravo and Sanchez performance.

Nerman was completely anonymous. Think he slightly injured himself in that one challenge at the very beginning.

He had a few good chances and hit pretty good on counter, but ended up crewing them up, as well as had some nice build plays. He was constantly getting 3-4 players on him.

Sanchez MOTM    Bravo   Nerman was good first half but faded. Will cry if we sell sanchez this season

League-by-league World Cup goals*:

German Bundesliga: 26
English Premier League: 25
Spanish La Liga: 20
Italian Serie A: 10
French Ligue 1: 9
Portuguese Liga: 8
Mexican Liga MX: 5
Russian Premier League: 5
Dutch Eredivisie: 4
American MLS: 4
Brazilian Serie A: 3
Greek Super League: 2
UAE Pro League: 2
Argentinian Primera Division: 1
Belgian Pro League: 1
Croatian Prva Liga: 1
English Championship: 1
Honduran Primera Division: 1
Scottish Premiership: 1
South Korean K-League: 1
Tunisian Ligue Professionnelle: 1
Turkish Super Lig: 1

*Own goals not included: 4

Goals by club:

Bayern Munich: 12
Barcelona: 9
Manchester United: 8
Porto: 4
Real Madrid: 4
PSV Eindhoven: 3
Wolfsburg: 3
AS Monaco: 3
Marseille: 3
Pachuca: 3
Liverpool: 3
Valencia: 2
Bayer Leverkusen: 2
Atletico Madrid: 2
Chelsea: 2
Sporting CP: 2
CSKA Moscow: 2
Olympiakos: 2
AC Milan: 2
Paris Saint-Germain: 2
Mainz: 2
Seattle Sounders: 2
Manchester City: 2
Swansea City: 2
AS Roma: 2
Napoli: 2
New York Red Bulls: 2

I thought Sanchez was pretty awful tbh. Ran allot, got the ball allot, always made himself available.....but then would just eventually run into a defender or just end up passing it back or losing the ball. Had more than a few opportunities to pass the ball to open man and instead would just dribble it away. Plus he missed his PK (feel bad for him tbh, I can't imagine how much that has too hurt)

Nerman started off good then just completely got shut down by Chile. Like I literally thought he was subbed off at the half, that's how little he was involved. Then he eventually appeared but was limping around. So not sure how much was him playing through injury or him just getting shut down tactically (or both)

Bravo was pretty awesome. Had allot of great saves and stepped up in the PK shoot and did what he could

Alves was pretty much a tad bit above average as far as offense and defensively goes

Targets:

Cuardrado again showed promise on offensive, but still can't get around wrap my mine around why the club insists in getting him to play defense.

Btw, if we are going to break the bank on an attacking player...we might as well go for James Rodriguez instead of Suarez. I think he would be great in our mold

James Rodriquez to play where? He can only play one position...the same one Messi plays (10/CAM/SS).

I don't want james.. good player and all but like Dani said, we just don't need him.. now a defender in the other hand...

The Franchise wrote:James Rodriquez to play where? He can only play one position...the same one Messi plays (10/CAM/SS).

When he was at Porto he pretty much just played on the wings (right wing more so). So he can play all attacking positions good. Plus is younger than Suarez and doesn't bite people. If we are to stick with a 4-3-3, with Messi as the false 9 and Neymar on the left, then wouldn't having a player with high assist numbers and pace like James playing the right wing make more sense than a player like Suarez? Suarez, although he can also play on the wing, does most of his damage when playing down the middle and rushing forward (which he won't play with us under a 4-3-3 since that's Messi spot).

Unless Lucho plans on moving to another formation which would suit Suarez into it.

Really pretty annoying we have signed a mid/2 keepers and are linked to Suarez yet nothing concrete on the defender situation lol

windkick wrote:

The Franchise wrote:James Rodriquez to play where? He can only play one position...the same one Messi plays (10/CAM/SS).

When he was at Porto he pretty much just played on the wings (right wing more so). So he can play all attacking positions good. Plus is younger than Suarez and doesn't bite people. If we are to stick with a 4-3-3, with Messi as the false 9 and Neymar on the left, then wouldn't having a player with high assist numbers and pace like James playing the right wing make more sense than a player like Suarez? Suarez, although he can also play on the wing, does most of his damage when playing down the middle and rushing forward (which he won't play with us under a 4-3-3 since that's Messi spot).

Unless Lucho plans on moving to another formation which would suit Suarez into it.

Really pretty annoying we have signed a mid/2 keepers and are linked to Suarez yet nothing concrete on the defender situation lol

Unless Monaco want to sell/Hames forces them to, it's not going to happen. They don't need the money, and I doubt they'll want to sell after a world cup like he's been having.

Also, and I'm not an expert so I leave this to Dani...his performances on the wing for Porto weren't quite at the level that we're seeing from him currently.

As for Alexis, I thought he was quite good, but he did lose the ball a lot. He won it a couple times though and the reason why I can forgive him losing the ball a lot was the constant fouling. Whenever he tried to dribble the Brazil players were hacking at him. How many times was he fouled? I'm sure many times while dribbling he lost the ball partially because of getting kicked. He was the spark of the attack, had a goal, and was very involved for Chile, which is why I thought he was quite good. Not outstanding, but quite good.

Watched James entire Porto career. He was average on the wing and im being incredibly kind. Porto got an amazing deal considering what he was giving them...which was not much at all.

He dont have the physical tools to play on the wing like he did at Porto, dont have the speed, dont have the ability to drive past players and shrug off challenges. Dont know what you say the pace, he isnt very fast at all.


Up untill this WC, I was very down on him because of his wing position. Never seem him in this CAM role till now and its clear to me this is his position. Anywhere else and he isnt nearly the same player.

He recently said he prefers Real Madrid over Barcelona. So we should stop here.

Neymar broke a vertebra in his match vs Colombia.

Poor dude.

Also hope this breaks the clubs interest in Cuadrado

Speaking of Cuadrado, nothing performance by him. Again, I just aint seeing it.

Completely agreed dani.As I mentioned in the transfer thread too,just dont see the hype.His standard move is shaking his leg,then try to cut inside from the right,which the opponent usually easily intercepts.I have yet to see a successful dribble from him.Based on the WC,he looks an average player.Can someone who watches Serie A regularly sehd some light on why he is so highly rated?

I am sure he is and has done better than these recent WC games, maybe he is even a fine player and just struggling recently. He has made a few assists to be fair to him also. But I just aint seeing a player we should be desperate to sign.

Thing is we wanted him to replace Alves. I got a feeling he would spending all match trying to attack; just has that "I want to rush forward all match" look to him. We need a "I want to defend first and foremost" type of guy, especially with our defensive issues

It is incredibly worrying to think we see Cuadrado as the type of rightback we need.