What went wrong this season?

by futbol_bill Thu May 03, 2018 11:22 pm

Season is all but finished and I put forward this thread for discussion of errors the club made this season.

As to final games I assume we win CL which all but makes up for the disasterous first half of season. I know several of you are not as optimistic as I re the Liverpool final, but I have confidence in this team and Zidane to prevail. I jumped back on the band wagon once they won that first game against PSG. I haven’t regretted that decision. I know most of you have put down Ziadane and several players for their play in each of the 2nd legs of last two rounds. I disagree. Zidane is accused of no tactics yet it is very clear to me he was basically playing old school Italian team defense with counter attacks tactics. The players you are criticising were attempting to follow Zidane’s tactics even though they struggle with what is being asked of them. You have to agree that the tactics have worked, no matter how tense it got for us fans.

And if you look at the posts from Barca fans, you’ll see that they are not happy at all with only la liga win and the lowly Copa. It seems all of them want coach out! And yet they all go on and on and on, (actually I’ll include Hans in this as well) that we only won CL that liga is much more important, that we have refs on our side, that we have incredible luck on our side, etc, etc. Reality is jealousy! And if you examine entire season, we have (or will have) won 4 trophies, not just the one, truly emphasising we are the Best club in world, not just Europe and as Nick says, one of the top clubs (this current crop) of all time.

But back to theme of this thread,

We can pin blame for the problems on Zidane and a couple of players, but I say the problems point back to last summer’s market, and for this I hold both Flo and Zidane accountable.

1. We have discussed at length the issues of striker. Mistake was not retaining either Morata or Mariano or not signing a competent striker in their place. I know they wanted Mbappe and selling Morata was part of that plan. But they didn’t have to sell both Morata and Mariano before and obviously never had a secondary target in mind.

2. Second problem was signing too many youngsters and not getting proven bench players instead. In today’s game, you need a full squad of experienced proven players to be able to compete in all three competitions. You can’t do that with so many unproven kids. You need a B team to fill in when A team is not getting job done, for rotations and for Copa games. This year’s B team was simply not ready.

I have said all along that the promotions (Achraf and Majoral) were big mistakes. Point one was about the striker and re RB, they should have gone after a Danilo replacement.

Pepe should have been resigned for another year and left Vallejo out on loan.

And Ceballos should have been left at Betis. It is very obvious to me that this kid has the talent, but there is no way that Zidane could give him much time when he is behind Modric, Kroos, Casemiro, Kovacic, Isco and Asensio.

That then would have left only Theo and Llorente. Although Llorente hasn’t worked out, it might have been different if he had more opportunities. In any case, I won’t fault club for misjudging his development at Alaves as he sure looked a lot better there. My point being that with only 2 kids on squad, they could have the necessary amount of playing time for development, while overall the B team would have been strong enough for three competitions.

by VanDeezNuts Thu May 03, 2018 11:41 pm

The over arcing issue is complacency combined with poor tactics and bad man management. All the individual issues come from my previous sentence IMO.

by halamadrid2 Fri May 04, 2018 12:13 am

1) We retained some youngsters that weren't given a chance in the first place. Only Achraf got a chance who was the least ready out of the bunch. Ceballos, Llorente, Vallejo who all did well in their previous clubs were left out of squads every week instead of being integrated slowly. Look at how Barca are integrating Semedo who was a starter in his team. Never ever put him in pressure like we did with Vallejo. Then when we were struggling in the league and nearly 10 points behind in the league these kids got a few mins here and there for the team who were already low on confidence. Varane had best defender in the world Pepe ahead of him for 5 seasons who he could learn from. Theo has lazy Marcelo, he started off good and is now finishing the season as lazy as Marcelo

2) The forwards, need I say more. Benz who 3 goals before Christmas was supposed to be the guy to lean on while Ronaldo was in his slump but who are we kidding. Bale never available and when he was spends all his time in an offside position. Selling Morata without buying a replacement. Look I am all for Castilla youngsters getting a chance with us but even I could see that Mayoral was not it. Poor planning by the club

3) complacency from alot of reliable players particularly Carvajal who never puts a foot wrong has been a disaster for the most part of this season. Casemiro dwelling on the ball left and right and Kroos not giving a feck. Modric should not be absolved of any criticism either who himself has gone through his ups and downs. Not to mention Isco. Funnily enough the most reliable player we've had this season has been Ramos who has played at a consistently high level throughout. He is usually the guy we bang our heads on the table about because his continuous brainfarts. I am proud of him, he's been a true captain this season

4) The coach not holding the players accountable when they have shit games. He didn't start benching Benz until we were literally a loss from having nothing to play for already in March. Also comparing how Marcelo defends for Brazil and how he defends for us is like night and day. Not even Bayern could get him to work hard. He defended great last season against the very same team so I have no idea whats hapoened this season other than linking it with the upcoming WC. Kroos needs to be benched for the horror show we witnessed last Tuesday but due to point 1 we cant bench him for anyone

5) changing formations every 2 games. We need a formation and get every player to buy into it. The best one is 433 but due to our shit forwards that formation is a no go. They need to leave, we need to acquire great replacements and go back to that formation. We have to switch players like for like Kovacic is NOT a DM, I admire his workrate but he is a noob compared to Casemiro. They need to trust Llorente to compete with Casemiro he is a very good DM and shows it everytime he plays. Isco needs to play in midfield not in attack, we need someone with his ball playing skills in midfield not in attack. And I am starting to think that him in a free role is doing us more harm than good in the defensive phase

Solution: be done with WC and get 2 world class attackers that are fast and can score. Wouldn't mind a RB either unless Nacho is the go to replacement until Achraf matures. Integrate the youngsters better. These kids got no chances in nearly the whole 1st half of season when I could count om one hand the players who were playing like they deserved to wear the RM jersey

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