Is Altintop the one flawed transfer we made this summer?

at times i tried to reason his transfer, and there were positives signs attached to him. attitude, experience, work rate, versatility, he was coming in to fill in the roster.

now the guy is out for at least half the season, if not more, as he wont be in top shape at the start of the second half of the season. The kind of football he plays is all about athleticism and running, so his physical condition might diminished his impact.

I dont think i would be posting this if he was fit, but he isnt. still brings back the question about us missing that back issue he had in medical... at least he came for free.

but here is the thing, khedira is always getting those little knocks that put him out for couple of days, not extensive periods as gago, but it does happen, and Lass provided good cover for him last season. we might dislike him, but he has baggage behind him, and wasnt a liability on the pitch.

we can cover the DM position using Varane or Pepe, but wouldnt it have been better to invest in a better cover for Khedira than Altintop, to make up for lass and gago leaving?

im sure altintop is a good player, but even with bayern he wasnt used in a defensive role very often, altho im sure he will be more than welcome to do the dirty work.

Mourinho was willing to keep lass, so obviously he had room for him, but now he isnt trying to replace him. I guess the plan is to use Pepe, but if he saw the need to try to renew lass just to keep him, why isnt he acting on it?

I was myself riding the Pepe bangwagon, but seeing how our crop can get knock out so easily, and with pepe himself an injury artist, the closer i look at it, the more worrisome i get.

I have a feeling that Coentrao is going to be that midfield cover for now defensively. He's more than capable of being a destroyer while being a good asset for the offense. Not a huge problem at this time.

If both Khedira and Sahin are down at the same time, you have Granero as an emergency.

Pretty flexible team right now and very deep.

If Coentrao starts to flop in the midfield as the season approaches, then we have a real problem.

I was against signing him but apparently Mourinho wanted to have more "Hardworking" player in the team.
Still i think he will be useless for us next season. we could've promoted someone from Castilla, they works hard for the team too.

Nope, I mean we didint spend a single penny on him and he was already brought to Madrid even if he had that longterm injury. Altintop is versatile, hardworking, expirenced and reasonably a very technical one so Mou will put him to good use sooner or later. I reckon he will be an CM backup or somewhere in the defensive line.

im still wondering if mou will stick with the 4-2-3-1 or with the 4-3-3,and who will be the midfielders.

sportsczy wrote:I have a feeling that Coentrao is going to be that midfield cover for now defensively. He's more than capable of being a destroyer while being a good asset for the offense. Not a huge problem at this time.

If both Khedira and Sahin are down at the same time, you have Granero as an emergency.

Pretty flexible team right now and very deep.

If Coentrao starts to flop in the midfield as the season approaches, then we have a real problem.

I like how COentrao can fit in almost everywhere, but nothing beat a cultured midfielder for me, defensively oriented at that.

as good as Coentrao can provide of a back up, im not sure he can boss the game from deep like i have seen Khedira, or even lass at some occasion. Can you imagine him bossing the midfield the way a player like Mvila did for france? Im not sure. Im convinced he will have some very energetic showing, but it's still a game of finesse when it comes to playing in that area imo.

Ganso wrote:im still wondering if mou will stick with the 4-2-3-1 or with the 4-3-3,and who will be the midfielders.

it will be the 433 on few occasions, but mainly the 4231 since we are investing so much on attacking, we will have to play 4 attackers most of the times, to accommodate them all.

Ganso wrote:im still wondering if mou will stick with the 4-2-3-1 or with the 4-3-3,and who will be the midfielders.

What about 4-1-2-3?

We have Pepe, Alonso, Sahin, Granero, Khedira, Altintop (and Gago) to cover these positions. I'd hardly worry about depth.

For sure it's thin in the midfield.... Very thin IMO in terms of true defensive mids (not converting a CB). That's why I think we'll play both the 4-2-3-1 often and 4-3-3 very seldomly. Our depth is at forward, especially on the wings, and AM. we'll play to that.

I'll add that having athletic and technically gifted CBs is very important to us in a 4-2-3-1, as they need to help support the mids. Carvalho is getting a bit old for that.

If Varane shocks us and becomes dominant, watch out everyone. We'll destroy people with a Pepe/Varane partnership. They can both cover a lot of ground and move up e pitch with the ball.

I still think Coentrao will start along with marcelo, that kid can play RB, that kid can play RB im sure, and even if it's marcelo, same thing. He will turn into a super sub for other areas of course, and allow us to bring in defensive players and such. So Ramos x Pepe in the middle is still very much viable.

please dont bring your "lass is better than khedira" talk here, not the point.

I do think DM is one of the most covered positions. IMO, almost all positions are very covered.

DM/B2B - Coentrao, Khedira, Sahin, Xabi, Varane, Pepe.

I count Xabi and Sahin as DMs becouse they do defend alot (according to statistics) and Xabi has pretty much been known as a defensive midfielder in Real Madrid.

sportsczy wrote:For sure it's thin in the midfield.... Very thin IMO in terms of true defensive mids (not converting a CB). That's why I think we'll play both the 4-2-3-1 often and 4-3-3 very seldomly. Our depth is at forward, especially on the wings, and AM. we'll play to that.

that's the thing, in terms of DM, it's thin. We can count Pepe, but if he has to play there often, we will also see his limits very often. He did a good job marking messi, but he didnt do much else, and i never felt like he could do something good when he was in possession.

Coentrao has shown versatility but it's preseason, not competition. Even joselu looks like he belongs, but we know he doesnt.

St_Nick09_of_Goal wrote:I still think Coentrao will start along with marcelo, that kid can play RB, that kid can play RB im sure, and even if it's marcelo, same thing. He will turn into a super sub for other areas of course, and allow us to bring in defensive players and such. So Ramos x Pepe in the middle is still very much viable.

Coentrao can't play right back, the only thing he can do with his right foot is to run with it. Against LA Galaxy, he always chose to play with his left even when it was more appropriate to use the right, Marcelo was easily better with the right foot by comparison, he had two right footed shots that almost resulted in goals in the first half.

But I don't think either will be playing right back ahead of Ramos and Arbeloa, If Altintop proves to be a flop there are still Alonso, Pepe, Sahin, Granero, Khedira, Coentrao and Varane to compete for two slots in the midfield. The 7 players + Altintop and probably Alex from Castilla are more than enough cover. Altintop was ruled out for 3 months so he'll probably just miss out on a month and a half of the regular season, we'll see what happens from then on.

like i said, let's not use that first game like a blueprint of everything we will do next season.

A bit offtopic but nice skill by Marcelo.

we have another match to watch tonight lets not start assuming coentrao is going to be our new CM, we have a lot of preseason stil ahead of us.

and imo we need more cover in the CM/DM position if lass does leave. here is why:

CM/DM: xabi, sahin(currently injured), khedira(injured+injury prone), altintop(injured-long term), granero(no one rates this kid), gago(one big injury), lass(suspected to be transferred)

so the only ones i can truly count on is xabi and sahin. this is not nearly defensive enough to play in europe.

im sure we can get by with a 4-2-3-1 (xabi + sahin) in la liga but we will not last in the latter stages of CL, mark my words.

Altintop came with no cost, so I don't think his transfer as a flaw, or at least not major flaw. But I also wonder how they didn't find his problem during medical test, or perhaps they found it but decided that was acceptable?

If Lass & Gago out, we still have Alonso, Khedira, Sahin, Granero, Altintop, Coentrao (still need to see him more though), Pepe, & Varane (if not loaned) to fill 2 to 3 slots in midfield, definitely not thin on paper if all healthy. I think the midfield seems thin only because right now Sahin & Khedira & Altintop are injured at the same time.

Another purchase for CM/DM cover will be nice to anticipate such extreme situation when some of them injured at the same time prior to the game againts Barca/ though CL game for example. If all are healthy then such purchase could be a waste, especially most of the time we will only have 2 slots in the midfield to fill.

It's depend on how much you believe we likely to suffer having some of them injured at the same time in critical situation. I do have concern on both Khedira & Sahin being a bit injury prone due to their recent injury history. So I wouldn't mind additional cover for CM/DM role, preferably not the high profile one.

Most good DMs convert to CB when they get older. Same goes for RB and LB... but rarely have i seen a CB move to DM and be wc at it. In our case, it's especially hard since we expect our mids to go B2B.

So to me, Ramos and Pepe are very poor options to play midfield. Coentrao looks like he could, mainly because he's always been good offensively, he has good speed, good tactical awareness and a huge work rate. A lot of tools there. Varane... i can't really say since i've seen him only once play DM.

So it really comes down to Khedira, Granero, Alonso, Sahin and perhaps Coentrao. These are the only guys that have enough skill offensively and defensively to play the B2B role. That's fine if you're playing a 4-2-3-1... but too thin in a 4-3-3, even if there's a more traditional DM role available. In today's game, even the DM needs good passing and tactical skills in the midfield.

Nick has a valid concern. But i think we will just stick to the 4-2-3-1 in 90% of our games.