OT: I'm not saying I'm upset..

When I think of our team, when I think of defenders in particular, I cannot believe how we have for the last decade consistently made errors with the selection of our defensive players. Even now with someone as intuitive as Mou on board (with a former defender, Karanka, as his assistant) we are still making idiotic mistakes in signing and releasing defenders.

The last ten years have not been kind to Los Blancos when thinking of how we arrange our defensive 4. Names that persisted in the starting line up for years that should have not been there: Pavon, Bravo, Samuel (who admittedly only has a sh!t time in Spain), Cannavaro, Pavon 2.0 (Albiol) my gawd, the list goes on...

QFT, with regards to my past evaluation of Garay, that I didn't care about his injuries- I had a feeling he could be a good player for us one day AND I choked on my breakfast the day I heard he was sold to Benfica... yet Pavon 2.0 continues to fly under the radar.

It's not enough to say: "Now we have Varane ", he is not ready for full first team action and Carvalho's age is really starting to show now.

Rooney, currently in arguably the form of his life at the moment, was shut down by none other than Garay last night... What we considered "surplus to requirements" Either I've been taking crazy pills, or finally I am vindicated in my analysis of the fact that he should have stayed.

Well the injury he had last year really ruined his chances of becoming a choice player for mou. Even if we let him stay he will still not play so why waste his time. It was better for him to leave. He is now shining which is what he needs to get noticed again.

For the CB position we have backups but the problem still remains to be carvalho, mou won't drop him anytime soon which sucks

Madrid has no patience and Mou is known to play favorites... bad combo for guys trying to break in. I'm not all that optimistic about Varane either. I could easily see him turning into another Canales, where he doesn't play this season and then asks to leave in the summer.

sportsczy wrote:Madrid has no patience and Mou is known to play favorites... bad combo for guys trying to break in. I'm not all that optimistic about Varane either. I could easily see him turning into another Canales, where he doesn't play this season and then asks to leave in the summer.

So you agree then that the Garay sale was a bit of a faux pas? I don't believe Garay was that frustrated that he wouldn't take a bit part role for one more year, because lets face it a slot would be opening up soon, this has to be the last truly competitive year at the top for Carvalho. Playing him next season would surely only be because of favouritism.

My man management of Garay would have been: if he stays he plays all the Copa games and a couple of league cameos, I'm sure that would have been enough for him for this year. Next year he gets more chances as Carvalho drops out of the fray.

Bad man management, very bad...

Garay was a good player but he was his own worst enemy

He was either injured all the time or horribly inconsistent.

He had a good game yes but anyone who saw Garay play for us would know he could just as easily play very bad and cost us the game

Oh btw Garay wasn't that amazing, he was good did his job other than that meh.

Trademark Crimson post,

protection only to the current players. If they have been sold, "they are dead to me!"

I lol'd bro

Giovanni10 wrote:Trademark Crimson post,

protection only to the current players. If they have been sold, "they are dead to me!"

I lol'd bro

Don't know what your on about

It's obvious you didn't even watch the match the praise should go to Javi Garcia he shut down the forward runs on countless occasions so many times intercepting and closing down Man Utd's plays.

But you wouldn't know that would you?

Garay was good but by no means was he amazing and everything I said was true. Did you watch his performances for us?

Stop knee jercking ffs

I feel aggression in your rebuttal to the way I evaluated your initial response.

Peace man, was only making a funny observation I retract my comments about you being a current squad loyalist.

I tend to agree with Crim. Garay did his Job but no more than that... I will not deny that he has potential but that's not enough. While he was with us I can't really remember him having a great game, ave to good ones sure, but never that stand up and pay attention game...

tbh I disagree that our defence is as big an issue this year as people think. Pepe can lock down his spot (Yes I do agree he is a good to great defender my issue with pepe is attitude rather than ability...) and cav isn't passed it yet, he still has some in the tank and without int games it'll only help him. It isn't a Vidic - T Silva partnership but it's a good one, and making wholesale defensive changes will not help us, more than anything defenders need consistency and the unit is very important!

Albiol is not Pavon! Pavon was bad, Alby is just very very average, he's the type of squad player that a big team needs, can we do better yes, but it isn't easy to find a player good enough to thread water but also willing to take a bench role. For now he'll do. We have even have reasonable depth in Alby and Raph behind Ramos... It's really not emergency stations time.

Garay was better than Albiol every day of the week... but he's not Spanish and we need to have a certain number of Spanish players on our squad. He was going to get very limited mins this year too. So he left (understandably). We replaced him with Varane.

That's always going to be the case with signing good young talent for competition: There's a 2-year lifecycle. If they break the starting lineup, they stay of course. If they're still on the bench, the will leave after 2 years. It's normal. It's our business model.

Shamirr wrote:I tend to agree with Crim. Garay did his Job but no more than that... I will not deny that he has potential but that's not enough. While he was with us I can't really remember him having a great game, ave to good ones sure, but never that stand up and pay attention game...

tbh I disagree that our defence is as big an issue this year as people think. Pepe can lock down his spot (Yes I do agree he is a good to great defender my issue with pepe is attitude rather than ability...) and cav isn't passed it yet, he still has some in the tank and without int games it'll only help him. It isn't a Vidic - T Silva partnership but it's a good one, and making wholesale defensive changes will not help us, more than anything defenders need consistency and the unit is very important!

Albiol is not Pavon! Pavon was bad, Alby is just very very average, he's the type of squad player that a big team needs, can we do better yes, but it isn't easy to find a player good enough to thread water but also willing to take a bench role. For now he'll do. We have even have reasonable depth in Alby and Raph behind Ramos... It's really not emergency stations time.

That's part of my point, Garay was too good to be happy with a bench role much longer but not good enough to earn a starting point. Will he get good enough? Maybe, but that can only happen by playing and he wasn't gonna play...

what about a buy back then? is there that option? if not, then why not for him?

It was injuries that really hurt Garay IMO.

He was getting a lot of minutes in pre-season when Jose first came. Sadly his body is what held him back here.

Garay has a major weakness, that weaknesss is cruital for our style of play.

I already mentioned that we should have brough boateng and/or smalling this summer. The three of them with pepe would have made a perfect future, we also could have loaned Varane to a big spanish team like valancia, savillia etc to get used to laliga with caravlho gone the next summer.

Pepe/Smalling Boateng/Caravlho

but oh well.

Boateng? idk about that...

What is this major weakness? Do you mean how injury prone he is?

Real Madrid still own 50% of Garay, if he performs really really well and help Benfica reach a respectable position in the CL and possibly win the league, he could make a U turn to Madrid, but all in all I'm happy he's getting playing time at Benfica.

On the Albiol issue, I'm not sure we would find a better defender who will be willing to stay on the bench for the whole season without complaining. He's a Spanish international that and Garay's injuries are probably why Madrid chose to keep him, I can see him going out if Varane finds his feet at Real Madrid. As it stands now he's the fourth choice centre back.

1. Pepe
2. Carvalho
3. Ramos
4. Albiol
5. Varane
6. Nacho?
7. Khedira?

Never really quite understood Gio's obsession over Garay and I think I never would...

I hear what you are saying, and although i understand it, you also have to look at the situation from the player perspective and what he did in Madrid.

Garay was destroyed by injuries in his time here, and even when he got a chance during Pelle's era, he wasnt that convincing. It's one thing to have talent, but when you get the chance for solid starting position you need to do your best and perform to that potential. Under Mou, his injuries the same did stop him. Meanwhile Albiol was providing a good back up when needed.

It's true that he made that clasico mistake that shook him up but he was more than good when we needed during the season, specially wen he stepped up in copa. Those are moments that influence the coach very much. Albiol won his share of playing time back then, according to our work reward system. Garay did nothing other than being "talented", why would he play ahead of somebody that proved himself during clutch time.

The simple reality is that he lost to Albiol, fair and square, and he couldnt keep being 4th choice, not at his age. He isnt a bad player, but for his sake he needed to go.

Also, you ought to consider how much he fitted the needs of the coach. Albiol is a good player, really hard working, humble and accept his situation, something the coach valued.

i didnt watch the game, i dont know if Garay "shut out" Rooney the way you describe, and i would be mildly surprised about it. Even if he did well, which is good for him as he is a talented kid, it's not out of the ordinary for him to do well.

Another reality is that some player cant handle being top dogs, and shine when they play with unerdogs, that's just the way they are wired.

Even with a Pepe-Ramos partnership, Varane is still behind Carvalho and Albiol. I feel he can leapfrog them, but hed still be 3rd choice till Pepe gets old.

Shamirr wrote:Boateng? idk about that...

What is this major weakness? Do you mean how injury prone he is?

that and being super slow. we play with high line, and against messi, you dont need me to tell u what will happen. but he is very good defender, billion miles ahead of albiol.

Giovanni10 wrote:When I think of our team, when I think of defenders in particular, I cannot believe how we have for the last decade consistently made errors with the selection of our defensive players. Even now with someone as intuitive as Mou on board (with a former defender, Karanka, as his assistant) we are still making idiotic mistakes in signing and releasing defenders.

The last ten years have not been kind to Los Blancos when thinking of how we arrange our defensive 4. Names that persisted in the starting line up for years that should have not been there: Pavon, Bravo, Samuel (who admittedly only has a sh!t time in Spain), Cannavaro, Pavon 2.0 (Albiol) my gawd, the list goes on...

QFT, with regards to my past evaluation of Garay, that I didn't care about his injuries- I had a feeling he could be a good player for us one day AND I choked on my breakfast the day I heard he was sold to Benfica... yet Pavon 2.0 continues to fly under the radar.

It's not enough to say: "Now we have Varane ", he is not ready for full first team action and Carvalho's age is really starting to show now.

Rooney, currently in arguably the form of his life at the moment, was shut down by none other than Garay last night... What we considered "surplus to requirements" Either I've been taking crazy pills, or finally I am vindicated in my analysis of the fact that he should have stayed.

Rooney was supposed to be rested against Benfica, but he insisted on playing. If you watched the game, it was quite obvious that he wasn't giving it his all, and I wasn't really all that impressed by Garay's performance against Man United, despite the fact that Rooney was kept quiet. Garay might become a great defender sometime, for all I know. But as it is right now, he's nothing special.

St_Nick09_of_Goal wrote:I hear what you are saying, and although i understand it, you also have to look at the situation from the player perspective and what he did in Madrid.

Garay was destroyed by injuries in his time here, and even when he got a chance during Pelle's era, he wasnt that convincing. It's one thing to have talent, but when you get the chance for solid starting position you need to do your best and perform to that potential. Under Mou, his injuries the same did stop him. Meanwhile Albiol was providing a good back up when needed.

It's true that he made that clasico mistake that shook him up but he was more than good when we needed during the season, specially wen he stepped up in copa. Those are moments that influence the coach very much. Albiol won his share of playing time back then, according to our work reward system. Garay did nothing other than being "talented", why would he play ahead of somebody that proved himself during clutch time.

The simple reality is that he lost to Albiol, fair and square, and he couldnt keep being 4th choice, not at his age. He isnt a bad player, but for his sake he needed to go.

Also, you ought to consider how much he fitted the needs of the coach. Albiol is a good player, really hard working, humble and accept his situation, something the coach valued.

i didnt watch the game, i dont know if Garay "shut out" Rooney the way you describe, and i would be mildly surprised about it. Even if he did well, which is good for him as he is a talented kid, it's not out of the ordinary for him to do well.

Another reality is that some player cant handle being top dogs, and shine when they play with unerdogs, that's just the way they are wired.

Sorry, will not agree with any of that.

I'm also hearing some other comments that he wasn't good enough for the first team so it doesn't matter? Well of course not, I never insinuated that instead of being sold, he should be fast-tracked into the first team. I honestly believe however, that he is better than Albiol and only marginally worse then Carvalho (who of course has that built up experience and awareness).

I don't give a flying flap if Albiol is Spanish, that should not justify his status at Real Madrid if he is rubbish. If they were going to have a great epiphany that Garay was going to be surplus to requirements then they should have pushed Albiol out on the same boat with him and consolidated the loss with a Spaniard like Botia.




@Doc, you know me too well , but this "Garay thing" extends to more players than just him. I feel absolutely gutted when I see potential in players and our hierarchy treats them like garbage.

Giovanni10 wrote:When I think of our team, when I think of defenders in particular, I cannot believe how we have for the last decade consistently made errors with the selection of our defensive players. Even now with someone as intuitive as Mou on board (with a former defender, Karanka, as his assistant) we are still making idiotic mistakes in signing and releasing defenders.

The last ten years have not been kind to Los Blancos when thinking of how we arrange our defensive 4. Names that persisted in the starting line up for years that should have not been there: Pavon, Bravo, Samuel (who admittedly only has a sh!t time in Spain), Cannavaro, Pavon 2.0 (Albiol) my gawd, the list goes on...

QFT, with regards to my past evaluation of Garay, that I didn't care about his injuries- I had a feeling he could be a good player for us one day AND I choked on my breakfast the day I heard he was sold to Benfica... yet Pavon 2.0 continues to fly under the radar.

It's not enough to say: "Now we have Varane ", he is not ready for full first team action and Carvalho's age is really starting to show now.

Rooney, currently in arguably the form of his life at the moment, was shut down by none other than Garay last night... What we considered "surplus to requirements" Either I've been taking crazy pills, or finally I am vindicated in my analysis of the fact that he should have stayed.

wasnt rooney like rested?