CSKA Moscow vs Real Madrid

Zees wrote:
This is how we lost the league last season, how about not being shit in either halves?

And won CL. i'm all for being on form all the time but right now here we are.

i said this, sportczy said this; this team is ordinary and thin. asensio benzema aren't playing too well, who do you replace them with, okay mariano maybe but who else, lv or some of these nobodys from castilla?

its not tactics, madrid does NOT need tacticians, we never did. coaches need players first, the more good players you have, the better you can get at executing things you want executed, if they fit. if lopetegui wants to stay, he needs to grow some cojones and start thinking about players who can fit (that is if flo even gives him the time for summer)

oh and going forward, the team might want to start shifting away from 4 3 3. not cos of the style, but because you might not be able to sign players to suit that, so one has to be open minded to change. but look at the freaking bench, reguilon? what the hell are we supposed to do with that?

There are two main issues:

1. We sold our main goalscorer
2. There hasn't been enough time to adapt to Lopetegui's system

If we had a solution to issue number 1, a lot of these secondary and tertiary issues would have been paved over and the conversation would be completely different.

So far this season we have had glimpses of what we could do, but this cohesive pressing/dynamic possession style breaks down if we don't have everyone on board. Certain players just aren't there yet with the tactics but that will come. I can't buy this argument that players like Modric or Kroos can only play counter-attacking. They have all of the technical ability, and tactical know-how to play Lopegetui's system. We have seen glimpses of it here, and we have seen similar type players in the Spanish squad execute it under Lopetegui.

We have all the parts (minus a goalscorer or two), it is just going to take time.

there is a third and very important issue. defense. okay we cannot replace a 40 goal season machine, and maybe i'm asking to much for the front line (benzema and bale) to give me at least 30 goals a piece (in the league ), but we can at least stifle teams on the defensive end....but apparently we cannot

a lot of the goals we've given away this season (and even last season) were goals that could be avoided, some just from something as simple as concentration. if we keep leaking goals just to focus on fancy offence, time will not be lopetegui's best friend...i was super pissed at that goal.

lopetegui needs to make some tough decisions, and in making those tough decisions, that's where we get to see his man management skills (as people like to call it)

sportsczy wrote:

Freeza wrote:Lucas cemented his place as a starter this game

That was the worse performance of the year by far and we've had some really good contenders early only. It'll be tough to beat for someone else.

Guy keeps improving, can't bench him now

Yeah, Lope, if he wants his time at Madrid to be longer than December, needs to be ridiculously brave and make some hard choices with certain players. But as Nick wrote, we'll be fine. This sort of football is gonna take a while for these men to get adjusted but it doesn't help that Lope keeps insisting (like Zidane before him) on certain players, all of sudden, get better.

And unlike Zidane, he doesn't have Ronaldo to bail out the team with goals so it's doubly difficult.

Any sensible manager would do the same i think. You walk into a locker room which carries a lot of history, you have to respect certain things. Lucas Vasquez for example, was a key sub of previous years, and even Lopetegui took him in the NT. He can't just shove him aside.

Likewise for Benzema, senior player in the squad, he has to play him. If/When it does not work then change is more acceptable.

I'm certain Vazquez is because he's close with Ramos, who's the de facto president president of Real madrid

vazquez' friendship with ramos i doubt has anything to do him playing. there's nobody else to call upon from the bench. its not like we are afforded options on the bench. unless ofcourse we want to heap all our issues on a young 18 year old. either go with vazquez or people from castilla. afterall, that's what we planned for in the summer, no?

titosantill wrote:vazquez' friendship with ramos i doubt has anything to do him playing. there's nobody else to call upon from the bench. its not like we are afforded options on the bench. unless ofcourse we want to heap all our issues on a young 18 year old. either go with vazquez or people from castilla. afterall, that's what we planned for in the summer, no?

Well, Vazquez vs Vinicius is a bit of a dilemma

Do you go with the unproven wonderkid or the proven trash.

I really don't see any light in Vazquez. A 27 year old Espanyol rotation-level player, isn't the guy we should sub in or rotate. There's no future in him, and there's no present in him either.

I personally would have gone with either Vini or Odegaard instead of Lucas. Like, I probably would have gotten the entire Madrid giving me flack for that but Lucas is too much shit for me to start. The man gives me so much hope my future unborn son has a chance in football.

I'm not even saying that we need to go back to our sit back and counter style...  but we do need to counter attack better and we also have to create space.  Every time we get the ball and have a chance to go out quickly, we end up passing the ball backwards.  That drives me crazy. As a side note, getting the ball to Asensio and asking him to make the key decisions isn't a good way to go.

When we allow a team to pack it in defensively, they just clog up the middle and dare us to use the wings and cross.  They're pretty confident of handling everyone other than Bale on crosses.

My point is that the player profiles need to drive the way we play...  as opposed to having a set style and player profiles be damned.

Do whatever you need to do in order to have the best chance to win.  That's my only ask.  I don't care what that is... pretty, ugly or neutral.

@tito.  I still can't believe we didn't sign depth and a proven scorer.  Mariano doesn't cut it.  I keep telling people that he's decent...  but not that great.  It's like Juve having Matri on their squad.  We can and must do MUCH better than that.  And is anyone surprised Bale is injured ffs.

Oh and please compensate a bit for our players who are bad defensively. Tired of the shit goals we concede for no reason. Did it last year too to be fair... but not this badly.

We don't even have a damned 4th CB worth anything so Nacho has to cover for Ramos instead of Marcelo and we're left with... Reguillon as Marcelo's backup.

Someone explain to me the squad planning. I've been stumped going on two years now. You can't blame the managers. Since the Bale purchase, we've consistently decided to invest in nobodies only that are young... hoping there's a pot of gold somewhere. Asensio seems like a dud. Ceballos is looking like a good one. But other than... nothing.

And wtf with Lucas. Asensio/Benz/Lucas. Navas had a better chance to score than those three.

Already said Lope is a beta cuck when he said he wants a team with 3 back to back CLs play with more confidence.

Freeza wrote:I'm certain Vazquez is because he's close with Ramos, who's the de facto president president of Real madrid

Good thing I was drinking water, because that line made me cough it up while giggling

ALL THIS SAID, i really like Lope's style of play. Really fun. My beef is with management... give him the tools so he has a chance. Our squad needs some overhaul. And we need to spend big on world class players... not unknown kids.

Success would be all on Lope. Failure is all on Flo. We need something near a miracle to get a major trophy this season.

sportsczy wrote:Someone explain to me the squad planning.  I've been stumped going on two years now.  You can't blame the managers.  Since the Bale purchase, we've consistently decided to invest in nobodies only that are young...  hoping there's a pot of gold somewhere.  Asensio seems like a dud.  Ceballos is looking like a good one.  But other than...  nothing.

And wtf with Lucas.  Asensio/Benz/Lucas.  Navas had a better chance to score than those three.

This.

sportsczy wrote:ALL THIS SAID, i really like Lope's style of play.  Really fun.  My beef is with management...  give him the tools so he has a chance.  Our squad needs some overhaul.  And we need to spend big on world class players...  not unknown kids.

Success would be all on Lope.  Failure is all on Flo.  We need something near a miracle to get a major trophy this season.

And this.

Even the most ardent supporters of the board should realize by now that the policy we have been following in recent years is causing more harm than good and is drastically weakening the overall quality of the squad.

We're not criticizing Madrid for fun. We don't actually get any pleasure from constantly criticizing them. Some of us are truly worried about the direction we're heading in right now, and it's not antimadridismo to acknowledge it.

Benzema is not a starter material and no longer deserves to play for Madrid. Fact.
Bale, while talented, is not good enough to have the entire team built around him nor should you look to him when the night is darkest. Fact.
Vasquez is a hard worker and had his moments where he truly contributed to us, but he no longer deserves to be playing regularly, even as a bench warmer. Fact.
Reguilon is not reliable to fill in for Marcelo when the latter gets injured. Fact.
Vallejo sucks. Fact.
The board was wrong not to invest heavily in the squad after the departures of Ronaldo, Morata, James, Kovacic, Pepe and the rest. Fact.

Lopetegui has made some serious tactical mistakes so far, but I refuse to put all the blame on him. He has been given a dysfunctional squad with a laughable attack that not even Guardiola can fix or even want to have anything to do with it.

I disagree with those who think we'll be fine. I don't think we'll be.

Moreso than Bale not being good enough to warrant building the team around him, I don't think he's reliable enough for it, considering his injury history, and the hopelessly recurring situation of him being sidelined just as he's starting to find form. This was supposed to be the season where he would be the main man, and he's gotten injured, even before getting his groove on. He shouldn't be part of any long-term plans, in my opinion. If the likes of Messi and C. Ronaldo had been as injury prone as him, they wouldn't have had the status they have today. It's consistency that makes a great player, and he doesn't have that. I feel sorry for him, but it is what it is.

The Demon of Carthage wrote:

sportsczy wrote:Someone explain to me the squad planning.  I've been stumped going on two years now.  You can't blame the managers.  Since the Bale purchase, we've consistently decided to invest in nobodies only that are young...  hoping there's a pot of gold somewhere.  Asensio seems like a dud.  Ceballos is looking like a good one.  But other than...  nothing.

And wtf with Lucas.  Asensio/Benz/Lucas.  Navas had a better chance to score than those three.

This.

sportsczy wrote:ALL THIS SAID, i really like Lope's style of play.  Really fun.  My beef is with management...  give him the tools so he has a chance.  Our squad needs some overhaul.  And we need to spend big on world class players...  not unknown kids.

Success would be all on Lope.  Failure is all on Flo.  We need something near a miracle to get a major trophy this season.

And this.

Even the most ardent supporters of the board should realize by now that the policy we have been following in recent years is causing more harm than good and is drastically weakening the overall quality of the squad.

We're not criticizing Madrid for fun. We don't actually get any pleasure from constantly criticizing them. Some of us are truly worried about the direction we're heading in right now, and it's not antimadridismo to acknowledge it.

Benzema is not a starter material and no longer deserves to play for Madrid. Fact.
Bale, while talented, is not good enough to have the entire team built around him nor should you look to him when the night is darkest. Fact.
Vasquez is a hard worker and had his moments where he truly contributed to us, but he no longer deserves to be playing regularly, even as a bench warmer. Fact.
Reguilon is not reliable to fill in for Marcelo when the latter gets injured. Fact.
Vallejo sucks. Fact.
The board was wrong not to invest heavily in the squad after the departures of Ronaldo, Morata, James, Kovacic, Pepe and the rest. Fact.

Lopetegui has made some serious tactical mistakes so far, but I refuse to put all the blame on him. He has been given a dysfunctional squad with a laughable attack that not even Guardiola can fix or even want to have anything to do with it.

I disagree with those who think we'll be fine. I don't think we'll be.

You are insane if you think this squad is worse than Man City's squad. It's not as bad as you make it out to be. We had what like 5 players in our starters that won best player right? City had how many? Guardiola is miles better than Lope.. don't compare plz.

the status of the squad is fine, you can argue that some signings should have been made, but overall, the status of the squad is fine imo. We are giving chances to young players the same way other clubs are giving chances to young players. Our kids have pedigree and it's not unreasonable to think they could become world class.

Not understanding this is a year of transition, wanted or not because CR is gone is a problem. our players have to figure out how to play together and create chance without CR. and we did create a lot of chances vs CSKA, but finishing was lacking.

Mr Nick09 wrote:the status of the squad is fine, you can argue that some signings should have been made, but overall, the status of the squad is fine imo. We are giving chances to young players the same way other clubs are giving chances to young players. Our kids have pedigree and it's not unreasonable to think they could become world class.

Not understanding this is a year of transition, wanted or not because CR is gone is a problem. our players have to figure out how to play together and create chance without CR. and we did create a lot of chances vs CSKA, but finishing was lacking.

Well stated, Couldn’t agree more.Only change I would make is ‘it’s not unreasonable to think SOME could become world class.

I do believe there is an issue with signings in both past two years and that is too many kids at same time. I would have preferred a couple of experienced bench players.

And a scorer ffs. IF we had paid for a bonafide scorer, the pressure would be far less. As it is, we need to create a perfect play to score as our strikers cannot make chances for themselves or take difficult chances.

Mr Nick09 wrote:the status of the squad is fine, you can argue that some signings should have been made, but overall, the status of the squad is fine imo. We are giving chances to young players the same way other clubs are giving chances to young players. Our kids have pedigree and it's not unreasonable to think they could become world class.

Not understanding this is a year of transition, wanted or not because CR is gone is a problem. our players have to figure out how to play together and create chance without CR. and we did create a lot of chances vs CSKA, but finishing was lacking.

Name one elite club that's taken our path.

I certainly can't name any recent club that has won 4 CLs in 5 years, we are in a category on our own, and we are on our own timeline. Not to mention, there is no example of a club losing a player as great as CR.

However, there are plenty of examples of clubs giving chances to their young player during a transition, like Liverpool or Bayern.

Your whole argument has been that we are giving chances to nobodies, but for other clubs it's ok to give chances to nobodies. It's when they become good that we use hindsight to say "but they were talented". Our players are talented as well

I agree that having an elite striker would make everything easier, of course. But who? this has been the question all along, in this market with players costing upwards of 100 mil a piece, you want to make the right signing. And from what we see on the market, there is no clear choice

Not even 4 out of 5 CL or anything like that... name one elite team (Bayern, City, PSG, Juve, Barca, etc.) that has taken the path that we have in recent memory regardless of results.