Mate even after his performance against Charlton people like me spent two days defending him on this forum. We had even big games like the Arsenal 1-0 loss at OT in which he played out of position on the right and was actually the best United player that day and he still got worse stick than anyone. I'm not making things up when I say Fletcher was still no regardly highly by most in 2006/2007. It' only that Roma performance that forced poepl to take up and ntocie that eh was actually a talented player. Yet even after that folks tried to shift the blame of our exist to Milan onto him. Despite him being in a 2 man holding midfield partnership with Carrick who was dreadful in both legs.
You can argue that now. Back in 2006 you would have been laughed off here for thinking that. Which is my point. If Fletcher had been playing as little as Gibson has been doing he'd have taken just as long to mature. I say its bullshit to claim that Fletcher was more talented. He really wasn't. Fletcher had the advantage of trying to break through when our midfield had basically died. So he got to play so much more and now takes on this impression that he was such a key player. When hardly anyone apart from Fletcher die hards like myself viewed him as such. Just like Gibson right now he was viewed as an inconvenience on the first team squad sheet. To the extent that when we added Hargreaves and Anderson to the ranks th following season, I was laughed at and scorned when I suggested that the new recruits would even help Fletcher get to play more because they'd be more players to be rotated with, and he was getting to that age when midfielders start to spark into maturity. .
Gibson greatest disadvantage in comparison to Fletcher is he will ever get as much playing time as Fletcher to fix the problems in his game. To make it worse, he isn't as robust. So his trajectory to maturity is bound to take longer, because its hard to fix mainly finesse based play with little practice.
That is why I keep saying this, if Gibson was truly a no hopper as so many on here have claimed, SAF would never have trusted him enough to use him in a key title run in game like he did v Everton. He never did that with the likes of Richardson for they to keep being brought up as examples. We could have used O'shea in his role instead. The mere fact SAF trusts Gibson when the masses don't should take some think twice. I mean , he did the same with Fletcher and made many look silly. Why are many all too willing to bet against SAF getting the same results again? It surely wouldn't kill anyone to wait and see. The fate of our first team young players in recent years should tell people that.
Fair enough.
Chief after seeing some of the Messi vs Ronaldo threads I have long resolved not to get into a multi quote argument with anyone on here but we have three points which I will try and deal with.
Fletcher started 06/07 well and did his job well. Without going through all the Fletcher threads on the CAF, it's difficult to know how much praise or criticism he was getting. I don't doubt there would be a plenty who would still be saying he was not good enough, as I have posted on enough football forums to know once an opinion is formed by posters it's difficult to get them to alter their mind. However, I was posting on other forums at the time and their was plenty who were prepared to admit Fletcher was playing well enough to be a squad player for a title challenging side that season.
You have to remember he was also turning in some very good international performances during this period Chief and his stock was steadily rising with anyone who was actually monitoring his development, which included the one nil win over France at home.
The Roma performance was easily his best but it was not an isolated one, his form that season was generally good and he was next in line if Scholes and Carrick got an injury. I thought Fletcher played well in the second half of the home leg against Milan as well but was obviously poor in the away leg as most of the team were.
Main problem for him 07/08 was the fact that we signed two very good midfielders and he slipped down the pecking order abit. It did not stop him playing well when called upon and still be a consistent dependable player.
As for the issue on whether Fletcher was more talented than Gibson. Well, I heard about Darren Fletcher a good three years before he started playing for United due to Fergie wanting to play him when he was only 16. Fergie also flaunted him as a big prospect for the future. He came into the side covering for Ronaldo after Ole's injury in 03/04 and of course played out of position he was abit underwhelming as he was being played out of position. However, Fletcher delivered a magnificent performance in centre midfield against Arsenal in the cup semi which we won 1-0 when he was only young which was a good indication of his all round game.
Fletcher had a disappointing 05/06 and for me that's were most of the criticism of him came from. Some people went so far with it that they had nailed their colours to the mast and would take a very long time to change their opinion. But the likes of Fergie, Walter Smith, Tim Howard, Roy Keane and others were vouching for Fletcher during this period and it was obvious he could be a top player. I spent a good deal of the summer of 2006 reading articles on Fletcher as I had a feeling Carrick was going to be our only summer signing and all of these had Fletcher down as a future top player. Walter Smith was on record as saying he would eventually be United's Keane.
With respect to Gibson he does not come from the same pedigree despite the fact he has talent. Ole has vouched for Gibson's talent and Fergie has put him forward as a potential goal scoring midfielder but that's not the same esteem or level of talent Fletcher was held in.
Gibson could make it with United still and I have agreed with before than some of his performance since the turn of the year have been under-rated but I think Fergie might decide to let him go this summer for the the good of his own development as approaching mid twenties he's going to need regular football very soon. I don't think he's a no-hoper at all but he is someone who has not kicked on as much as I would have hoped. I got no issues with him getting a further year, as like I said, I trust Fergie's judgment but it would not be a surprise if he left this summer.
We are in agreement with the third point on the soundness of the theory so no further comment there.
