Dinamo Zagreb vs. Real Madrid

u can blame it all on the midfield if u want but benz, ron and maria did fine anyways

Di Maria started out fine, the went back into his passing black hole. He just creates zero from the right side and makes our offense very unbalanced. Goal aside, he was pretty meh overall. Less meh than the previous games, but still meh.

CR7 and Benz were fine, but they couldn't attack the box as much because they had to help the midfield creatively, especially benz. One poor finish by Benz... a couple for CR7. Should have had a goal between them.

Ozil was just off again. He was playing more CM than AM and he just doesn't know how. Lacks the workrate offensively and defensively. Had no impact on the game.

Marcelo was his usually... some mistakes here and there. But good overall. needs to be smarter out there, especially with a yellow.

Midfield was atrocious. But what do you expect with a Xabi-Coentrao pairing.

Pepe was very good.

Carvalho was fine.

Ramos was fine.

Typical CL away game. More physical than La Liga by a lot. Refs don't call games as closely as we're used to. Our midfield injuries are a problem... need Khedira back and carrying the load until Sahin joins him.

Di Maria was utter craaaap... Marcelo was meh too, but had his flashes of good play too. That red was stupid. Ozil was quiet, Cristiano and Benz were good, Coentrao was pretty bad. That midfield partnership is no good. Mou better wake up and fix stuff up becuase we're not going to win much playing like this.

tbh marcelo was only meh defensively, when he attacked he did good... kept making mistakes at defense

my rattings:

Casillas: 6.5
Ramos: 6.5
Pepe: 7
Caravlho: 6.5
Marcelo: 6.5
Contrao: 6
Alonso: 6
Ozil: 5
DiMaria: 6.5
Ronaldo: 6
Benzema: 6.5

i think i did fair to everybody,

Zagreb were beasts physically IMO. Usually we are the better athletes but it wasn't the case tonight.

Zealous wrote:Zagreb were beasts physically IMO. Usually we are the better athletes but it wasn't the case tonight.

Spot on. Looked much more agile and more physically prepared than Madrid. Ended up running a total of 8km's more than Madrid.

Which, as I assumed would happen, a bore-fest. Its not often I fall asleep during my team's game but the last 15 minutes were so painful I just passed out.

I will maintain from an earlier post in this thread, I hate our group draw, its going to make for some bland viewing (possibly barring the Lyon matches)

Bottom line: we're forced to play a 4-2-3-1 with a Xabi-Coentrao midfield. No need to look further than that.

sportsczy wrote:Bottom line: we're forced to play a 4-2-3-1 with a Xabi-Coentrao midfield. No need to look further than that.

We still have the problem of last year Khedira or Sahin have over take some playmaking. Our opponents double mark either Ozil or Alonso or both of them together Marcelo can't help them on his own and Benz is needed in CF position as well. C'mon guys, recover faster...

Coentrao should be the LB. Not Marcelo.

Arbeloa on the right.

Khedira is the most under rated player in R.M.

Seppuku wrote:Coentrao should be the LB. Not Marcelo.

Arbeloa on the right.

Khedira is the most under rated player in R.M.

Why?

Marcelo is clearly the better player

babun1024 wrote:

sportsczy wrote:Bottom line: we're forced to play a 4-2-3-1 with a Xabi-Coentrao midfield. No need to look further than that.

We still have the problem of last year Khedira or Sahin have over take some playmaking. Our opponents double mark either Ozil or Alonso or both of them together Marcelo can't help them on his own and Benz is needed in CF position as well. C'mon guys, recover faster...

Yeah. Benz and even CR7 are moving further and further away to help with buildup. The weird thing was that Ozil and Di Maria were pushing forward lol... but neither can finish worth a damn. They randomly score here and there. I saw at least 3 passes attempted to Ozil and Di Maria where they were breaking towards goal as if they were the CF. Unbelievable. It would be nice if Ozil and Di Maria did their job as opposed to forcing Benz and CR7 to become creators too far from the scoring zone.

sportsczy wrote:

babun1024 wrote:

sportsczy wrote:Bottom line: we're forced to play a 4-2-3-1 with a Xabi-Coentrao midfield. No need to look further than that.

We still have the problem of last year Khedira or Sahin have over take some playmaking. Our opponents double mark either Ozil or Alonso or both of them together Marcelo can't help them on his own and Benz is needed in CF position as well. C'mon guys, recover faster...

Yeah. Benz and even CR7 are moving further and further away to help with buildup. The weird thing was that Ozil and Di Maria were pushing forward lol... but neither can finish worth a damn. They randomly score here and there. I saw at least 3 passes attempted to Ozil and Di Maria where they were breaking towards goal as if they were the CF. Unbelievable. It would be nice if Ozil and Di Maria did their job as opposed to forcing Benz and CR7 to become creators too far from the scoring zone.

Ozil was double marked this time, Alonso wasn't= more possession in our rangs but worse in final third. We shifted the playmaking to other guys who were free. What does Ozil has to do, just watch? He made runs into CF obviously because when Benz isn't there, who is supposed to score? Di maria really sucked this time but popped up with a goal Their coach had a game plan
In the Getafe game, Alonso was the marked one...

babun1024 wrote:

sportsczy wrote:

babun1024 wrote:

sportsczy wrote:Bottom line: we're forced to play a 4-2-3-1 with a Xabi-Coentrao midfield. No need to look further than that.

We still have the problem of last year Khedira or Sahin have over take some playmaking. Our opponents double mark either Ozil or Alonso or both of them together Marcelo can't help them on his own and Benz is needed in CF position as well. C'mon guys, recover faster...

Yeah. Benz and even CR7 are moving further and further away to help with buildup. The weird thing was that Ozil and Di Maria were pushing forward lol... but neither can finish worth a damn. They randomly score here and there. I saw at least 3 passes attempted to Ozil and Di Maria where they were breaking towards goal as if they were the CF. Unbelievable. It would be nice if Ozil and Di Maria did their job as opposed to forcing Benz and CR7 to become creators too far from the scoring zone.

Ozil was double marked this time, Alonso wasn't= More possession in our rangs but worse in final third. We shifted the playmaking to other guys who were free. What does Ozil has to do, just watch? He made runs into CF obviously because when Benz isn't there, who is supposed to score? Di maria really sucked this time but popped up with a goal Their coach had a game plan
In the Getafe game, Alonso was the marked one...

Actually, Ozil's job was to be the CM, which involves running towards the person with ball and creating passing lanes to receive the ball. Most of the time he just stood there tbh or faded into the last 1/3. It's not his thing, i know... but he had no idea how to play CM. Even if he was getting marked tightly, it would at least take the defenders towards the ball and create space behind them. As it stood, Ozil was easily erased and he wasn't smart enough with his movements to create space for others as a result of the way he was being played.

They used to try this all the time with Zidane and he would just take players with him to areas that allowed the rest of the team to have a lot of space. Teams would eventually have to drop their tight marking of him because it would create so much instability in the rest of the pitch.

Ozil needs to learn the CM role. He really does, even if it's just offensively. We have two injury-prone guys in Khedira and Sahin... we don't need an AM who can play striker. We need a AM who can play CM. Besides, his finishing is not good enough to play striker right now. If i'm a defender, i would love to to take Benz or CR7 away from the box and take my chances with Ozil.

sportsczy wrote:

babun1024 wrote:

sportsczy wrote:

babun1024 wrote:

sportsczy wrote:Bottom line: we're forced to play a 4-2-3-1 with a Xabi-Coentrao midfield. No need to look further than that.

We still have the problem of last year Khedira or Sahin have over take some playmaking. Our opponents double mark either Ozil or Alonso or both of them together Marcelo can't help them on his own and Benz is needed in CF position as well. C'mon guys, recover faster...

Yeah. Benz and even CR7 are moving further and further away to help with buildup. The weird thing was that Ozil and Di Maria were pushing forward lol... but neither can finish worth a damn. They randomly score here and there. I saw at least 3 passes attempted to Ozil and Di Maria where they were breaking towards goal as if they were the CF. Unbelievable. It would be nice if Ozil and Di Maria did their job as opposed to forcing Benz and CR7 to become creators too far from the scoring zone.

Ozil was double marked this time, Alonso wasn't= More possession in our rangs but worse in final third. We shifted the playmaking to other guys who were free. What does Ozil has to do, just watch? He made runs into CF obviously because when Benz isn't there, who is supposed to score? Di maria really sucked this time but popped up with a goal Their coach had a game plan
In the Getafe game, Alonso was the marked one...

Actually, Ozil's job was to be the CM, which involves running towards the person with ball and creating passing lanes to receive the ball. Most of the time he just stood there tbh or faded into the last 1/3. It's not his thing, i know... but he had no idea how to play CM. Even if he was getting marked tightly, it would at least take the defenders towards the ball and create space behind them. As it stood, Ozil was easily erased and he wasn't smart enough with his movements to create space for others as a result of the way he was being played.

They used to try this all the time with Zidane and he would just take players with him to areas that allowed the rest of the team to have a lot of space. Teams would eventually have to drop their tight marking of him because it would create so much instability in the rest of the pitch.

Ozil needs to learn the CM role. He really does, even if it's just offensively. We have two injury-prone guys in Khedira and Sahin... we don't need an AM who can play striker. We need a AM who can play CM. Besides, his finishing is not good enough to play striker right now. If i'm a defender, i would love to to take Benz or CR7 away from the box and take my chances with Ozil.

It won't happen over night and Zidane had R. Carlos overlapping

babun1024 wrote:

sportsczy wrote:

babun1024 wrote:

sportsczy wrote:

babun1024 wrote:

sportsczy wrote:Bottom line: we're forced to play a 4-2-3-1 with a Xabi-Coentrao midfield. No need to look further than that.

We still have the problem of last year Khedira or Sahin have over take some playmaking. Our opponents double mark either Ozil or Alonso or both of them together Marcelo can't help them on his own and Benz is needed in CF position as well. C'mon guys, recover faster...

Yeah. Benz and even CR7 are moving further and further away to help with buildup. The weird thing was that Ozil and Di Maria were pushing forward lol... but neither can finish worth a damn. They randomly score here and there. I saw at least 3 passes attempted to Ozil and Di Maria where they were breaking towards goal as if they were the CF. Unbelievable. It would be nice if Ozil and Di Maria did their job as opposed to forcing Benz and CR7 to become creators too far from the scoring zone.

Ozil was double marked this time, Alonso wasn't= More possession in our rangs but worse in final third. We shifted the playmaking to other guys who were free. What does Ozil has to do, just watch? He made runs into CF obviously because when Benz isn't there, who is supposed to score? Di maria really sucked this time but popped up with a goal Their coach had a game plan
In the Getafe game, Alonso was the marked one...

Actually, Ozil's job was to be the CM, which involves running towards the person with ball and creating passing lanes to receive the ball. Most of the time he just stood there tbh or faded into the last 1/3. It's not his thing, i know... but he had no idea how to play CM. Even if he was getting marked tightly, it would at least take the defenders towards the ball and create space behind them. As it stood, Ozil was easily erased and he wasn't smart enough with his movements to create space for others as a result of the way he was being played.

They used to try this all the time with Zidane and he would just take players with him to areas that allowed the rest of the team to have a lot of space. Teams would eventually have to drop their tight marking of him because it would create so much instability in the rest of the pitch.

Ozil needs to learn the CM role. He really does, even if it's just offensively. We have two injury-prone guys in Khedira and Sahin... we don't need an AM who can play striker. We need a AM who can play CM. Besides, his finishing is not good enough to play striker right now. If i'm a defender, i would love to to take Benz or CR7 away from the box and take my chances with Ozil.

It won't happen over night and Zidane had R. Carlos overlapping

This has nothing to do with overlapping at its core. It's a lack of fundamentals. It's Ozil positioning, work rate and movement. Sure, overlapping would make it easier for Ozil. But he's still getting erased too easily when he's at CM because he's not doing the basics.

Btw, Zidane did the same thing at Cannes, Bordeaux and Juve. Not saying Ozil can become the CM Zidane was... he won't even get close. But he can learn the movements. That's something that can be learned.

mmmmmm

We've blown a lot of goals so far. This can't happen in the next matchs especially that we gonna play 2 games away. We have to kill the match from the first opportunity and manage it to get the 3 pts.
The conclusion from yesterday game is that Alonso-Coentrao duo is a bullsh!t.

Otherwise, CR is not among the best players in the world to be protected as Platini said ? His ankle was bleeding and master referee, who was 2 meters close, didn't see anything, while Pepe tackle on Alves was a red card ...