The one that got away - M. llorente

Have any of you seen him play lately? He has been played as DM, CM, winger or SS and now Luis Enrique has been playing him as RB. And he has excelled at all positions. Boy did Zidane ever misjudge him.

He's looked very good on the few occasions that I've watched them. I don't know if Nick's still around, but I hope he doesn't think I've forgotten how confidently he ruled Llorente off as not good enough, presumably because Zidane let him go prematurely.

Kovacic is another player that has excelled for Chelsea on several occasions. Hakimi looks like he might transfer away from Inter, and likely for a greater fee than what we got for him. I suppose that sale can be explained by us needing funds for Hazard.

Odegaard is another one that Nick has spewed nonsense about. Reports says he wants to come back (and I hope he does), but if I was advising him, I would say stay away from Zidane until you’re at least 30!

I’m also sure Nick would say re Llorente who would he replace? The answer would be any of the RW currently with club, Odiozola, Isco, and easily as good a backup as Valverde. It’s his flexibility that’s the biggest surprise along with his offensive capabilities.

I suspect that one was just to instigate me. I remember Nick kept telling me to "let it go" when I was updating the Ødegaard thread in our section, around the time when he left on loan to the Netherlands. I still don't know why he kept saying that, as if updating the Ødegaard thread meant that I had some kind of hopeless faith in him. Thought that was a bit odd, random and uncalled for

Nobody other than Simeone and maybe Pep would have played a holding mid/DM such as Llorente as a forward.  Just wouldn't happen.

The failure is more on Real Madrid's youth system for putting him in the wrong role.

Simeone deserves the credit.  If Llorente had played anywhere else (again except maybe Pep at City), this would have been impossible.

I might be mistaken, but wasn't Zidane in charge of Castilla when Marcos Llorente was there? Either way, we can only look forward. It looks like this transitional period will be a long one. Especially, considering we won the league last season, and might still win it this season.

sportsczy wrote:Nobody other than Simeone and maybe Pep would have played a holding mid/DM such as Llorente as a forward.  Just wouldn't happen.

The failure is more on Real Madrid's youth system for putting him in the wrong role.

Simeone deserves the credit.  If Llorente had played anywhere else (again except maybe Pep at City), this would have been impossible.

I guess that sort of explains why Zidane, has played Nacho at all 4 defensive positions, or Lucas at 3 different spots on right, or Rodrygo at wing on either side as well as at CM, or Vinicius and Asensio on either side, or Isco at who knows how many different positions or Ramos as a striker!

The point is this kid had all this talent and yet noone seemed to observe it.

Thimmy wrote:I might be mistaken, but wasn't Zidane in charge of Castilla when Marcos Llorente was there? Either way, we can only look forward. It looks like this transitional period will be a long one. Especially, considering we won the league last season, and might still win it this season.

Youth positions start at age 10-12.  By the time he got to Castilla, he was set into his role... unless there was a need.  With the likes of Odegaard, Medran, Burgui, Mariano and Raul de Thomas..  there was no reason for Madrid to experiment with players at forward positions.

Also, Llorente was 19-20 when he joined Castilla...  not 15-16.  That makes a difference.

futbol_bill wrote:

sportsczy wrote:Nobody other than Simeone and maybe Pep would have played a holding mid/DM such as Llorente as a forward.  Just wouldn't happen.

The failure is more on Real Madrid's youth system for putting him in the wrong role.

Simeone deserves the credit.  If Llorente had played anywhere else (again except maybe Pep at City), this would have been impossible.

I guess that sort of explains why Zidane, has played Nacho at all 4 defensive positions, or Lucas at 3 different spots on right, or Rodrygo at wing on either side as well as at CM, or Vinicius and Asensio on either side, or Isco at who knows how many different positions or Ramos as a striker!

The point is this kid had all this talent and yet noone seemed to observe it.

Same lines.

We can't lose something when he would never have had the opportunity at Real Madrid or 99.9% of the other clubs.

Give credit to Simeone.  He's the only reason Llorente has become this player.  No matter who the manager, he would never have gotten the opportunity at Madrid.

Forget Zidane...  both Rafa Benitez and Lopotegui played him as a DM backup too.  Forward was never ever in the cards here.

He came to Real Madrid academy in 2008, when he was 13! Maybe he wasn’t initially with Zidane, but coaches normally see talent in practices and for sure someone at Madrid didn’t do a lot of observing in this case. In particular, for the kids on squad, coaches are normally looking at their talent and their flexibility to give them minutes. These statements by Sports are more of his trying to deflect! Clearly, Zidane missed this opportunity.

How about Lopotegui (especially him) and Rafa Benitez?  How about Spain youth NTs? They played him as a backup DM as well.  Never as a forward.

I hardly remember anything from Lopetegui and Benitez' time with us. I recall Isco being largely poor under Lopetegui, which was the opposite of what I had expected, Benzema being in great form for about a month under Benitez. I don't remember how long Benitez stayed with us for, but it wasn't very long.

sportsczy wrote:How about Lopotegui (especially him) and Rafa Benitez?  How about Spain youth NTs?  They played him as a backup DM as well.  Never as a forward.

Under youth NT and Lopetequi he did get some action as a CM in addition to his time at DM. I don't recall him getting any action under Benitez, actually I try not to remember anything under him!

You are making this all about as a forward. He has played maybe 4 games at Atletico in that position. Mostly he is being used as a CM with Koke usually the DM. Plus you are ignoring his recent NT experiment. L. Enrique was missing his number 1 and 2 RBs (Carvajal and Navas) and threw Marcos in and he excelled once again.

Obviously the blame for this isn't solely on Zidane as it's also obvious that a whole lot of people didn't see his talent, but it was Zidane who told him he wouldn't make it at Real and let the outright sale go ahead.

Hey Sports, I just looked up stats!,

Under Benitez - Llorente wasn’t even on team, was at Castilla.

Under Lopetequi @ R. Madrid - ONE game in September, played 79 minutes as a DM.

Under Solari (who you didn’t mention) - he played 12 games all competitions (2 games in CL, 2 games in World club championship, 5 games in copa and 4 games in liga; 7 of these games he played full game and was subbed in other 5, all appearances as DM.

And under Zidane in that same season, he played, 3 games, all as DM with 2 of them full game.

So once again, you are pulling at strings putting blame on Benitez who didn’t even coach him and Lopetequi who played him one game!

Thimmy wrote:I hardly remember anything from Lopetegui and Benitez' time with us. I recall Isco being largely poor under Lopetegui, which was the opposite of what I had expected, Benzema being in great form for about a month under Benitez. I don't remember how long Benitez stayed with us for, but it wasn't very long.

Actually Thimmy, just to clarify, Benitez came in after Ancelotti and lasted to December, being replaced by Zidane promoted from Castilla.

Lopetequi started in 2018 and was let go in October (I.e. shorter timeframe than Benitez). Isco in that timeframe was mostly out with appendicitis and came back too early).

Solari replaced Lope and was let go for return of Zidane in March.

futbol_bill wrote:Have any of you seen him play lately? He has been played as DM, CM, winger or SS and now Luis Enrique has been playing him as RB. And he has excelled at all positions. Boy did Zidane ever misjudge him.

So in which position should he have played at Madrid? Winger? Second striker? That's laughable.

Jack of all trades, master of none

He would be better than 14 currently on squad!

Simeone plays him in attack because Simeone has become a hopeless, negative loser that is obsessed with parking the bus so he plays a defensive midfielder like Llorente as attacker, on top of all the other defensive players, while ruining the careers of his actual,  wonderful attackers like Joao Felix

Of course Llorente shouldn't play winger ar attacker for Real Madrid

And quite apparently in his actual position, defensive midfield, he's not good enought to secure a starting spot anywhere.

You think he should be starting over Casemiro?

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Ok, yeah probably.

But it doesn't matter what players you have as long as you have the single worst coach working in the top 5 leagues messing everything up

Hapless_Hans wrote:

But it doesn't matter what players you have as long as you have the single worst coach working in the top 5 leagues messing everything up

Winning at least one trophy every season = messing everything up?

Messing everything up is getting dumped out of the champions league by Rudi Garcia (the actual worst coach in the top 5 leagues) after you have spent over $1 billion on transfers.

Oh right, Lyon beat City last year, forgot about that...

futbol_bill wrote:He would be better than 14 currently on squad!

Llorente will never ever be better than casemiro, just being spanish doesn't make you better, didn't you also say ceballos was better than kroos? You only care about these players because their Spanish nothing more, if come and suck your just gonna blame the none spanish players instead and ignore them, seen it with isco and asensio.

Llorente is good player no doubting it but he can't displace players in his natural position which is cdm, if he can't do that for a team like atletico then what more proof you need? I bet money casemiro walks into that starting lineup as cdm right now.

Doc wrote:Oh right, Lyon beat City last year, forgot about that...

Sterling beat City to be exact...

I feel i’m being misunderstood in this thread. I say Madrid or rather Zidane let a productive player get away. He told him directly he was not good enough for Madrid.

Now Llorente is just as valuable to Atleti as Lucas is to Real. I agree he probably doesn’t have a starting role with the current squad, but neither should Lucas. You guys seem to think a spot on team is only the starting 11!

Llorente has demonstrated more flexibility than Lucas and no it isn’t just Simone. Luis Enrique picked him up for NT and he has played two different CM roles and in last two games he was a more than capable RB. At this point his prime position is not DM, but a CM.

I’m not crying over spilled milk here, I am saying we shouldn’t have let him go. It would have been better with a loan or a sale with a buyback.