I think so as well, but how in that case how can this be used as an excuse for Antony?
The bit about Lindelof is quite funny, this whole team at the moment is catch 22.
21
Season Average Rating
- Appearances
- 38
- Goals
- 3
- Assists
- 2
- Yellow cards
- 6
- Status
The bit about Lindelof is quite funny, this whole team at the moment is catch 22.
He is no different for Brazil, don't make it sound like he is outstanding for them. He is still a hard working winger who does not contribute enough in attack.
As it stands the only way he ever gets good enough is if his curling shot improves 10 fold.
I would put his underperformance in both these categories down to the same thing - the pace of the game and the amount of time he has to execute because he's not comfortable with the space he has to operate in. His piffling shots and weak crosses are often hurried affairs where he barely has his balance, let alone good shape to strike the ball - if you look at his feet, there's a distinct difference in his technique when he plants and shoots/crosses to when he does his stumble routine and barely gets a connection on the ball. By now, we all know his trademark: cut inside and meekly side-foot the ball along the floor into the waiting keeper's arms, or the inevitable mishit where he doesn't even get his foot around the ball to attempt the shaped shot he's aiming for. His crosses often follow a similar tact - he rarely works that considered space to be able to do what he actually wants to with a ball.
Coincidentally, with the Beckham documentary being fresh in the memory, there's a lot of footage of Beckham having all the time in the world to look up, plant his standing leg and hit the ball as sweet as you like. Why? Because his overlapper knows exactly what to do to provide him with the optimum amount of space/time by placing himself exactly where the opponent(s) pressing the ball can't neglect their duties, lest they have a man completely free to run behind them who can be easily played in by Beckham. Antony is no Beckham, but the principle is the exact same, and we're absolutely dire at something he has had in abundance in his career up until coming here with some of the best overlappers in football flanking him and giving him as much space as possible to do whatever he is going to do.
The bottom line with Antony is that he may well not be good enough even with optimum conditions, but what is definitive is that without them, he doesn't have a prayer because he isn't able to compensate with raw individualism and/or athleticism. He's basically a sitting duck, and everyone knows it, except the manager, apparently. Honestly, it's the oddest state of affairs that the one person who should know better than anyone else how to get the best out of his personally selected purchase has done nothing to facilitate his game.
And re. Dalot, the quoted post says enough, but in addendum, Dalot is erratic and unpredictable in all his actions. He is not a true overlapper; he doesn't have chemistry with anyone on the pitch, let alone his flanker; he cannot be relied upon to "go" in that automaton way any good overlapper does. At Ajax, Antony didn't even have to look up; his flanker would already be bombing up and beyond him, and suddenly, all that hold up play of his has a very real purpose and in turn, this frail and meek player doesn't have to worry himself with individual contests against better athletes than he is.
The failing in the instance where we don't provide him with that doesn't lay with him - he is what he is, and we either cater to it, or simply take him out of the team. Nothing is going to change as he's not going to suddenly develop the strength and pace of your default PL winger.
Compare that with Sancho. If Sancho played for us exactly like he did for Dortmund he would be the ultimate success. If Antony plays for us exactly like he did for Ajax at 80m he would still be a flop. This transfer makes even less sense when our current manager is his former boss.
And this is everywhere on the pitch. Not something which affects Antony in isolation.
We have two major wingers in
We have a kamikaze high-risk high-reward low retention no.10 who would excels in front of two anchor holding midfielders who know how to retain the ball, but he's traditionally paired with a defensive midfielder who wants to roam forward and is equally wasteful on the ball as he is, and/or another no.10 who excels in half-spaces and not actually dictating play.
We have a goalkeeper who is elite at build-up but a defence and midfield base that aren't particularly adept at playing out from deep.
Our entire side is filled with players who range from average to very good, but very few of them actually complement the skillset of their teammates.
My biggest "red flag" about Ten Hag is how none of his signings look cohesive and remedy this point. If anything, they've exacerbated this (Mount especially).
I can predict exactly how Antony’s game will go without even watching the match.
He's a guaranteed 6/10 with hard work and decent interplay but zero threat in the final third. Add in a couple of weak curled efforts and that's Antony's game summed up.
The only variable in his game is one in about 12 performances a shot will go in, other than that it's consistent mediocrity.
He's a guaranteed 6/10 with hard work and decent interplay but zero threat in the final third. Add in a couple of weak curled efforts and that's Antony's game summed up.
The only variable in his game is one in about 12 performances a shot will go in, other than that it's consistent mediocrity.
Why would he? His valuation was much lower than that, it is not his fault United waited until last moment where they had to pay a lot over the actual price. The only price tag elephant is created by fans not using common sense.
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I don't dispute that he's far from the finished article. He's young and he makes mistakes, on top of the prerequisites needed to perform to his optimum. I think you can see how playing a game he's not comfortable with can erode confidence, and I wouldn't hesitate to say his is shot. As an attacking unit, they're all feeling the pressure and I think the fallout from that manifests differently for each individual. There's a feeling I have that the PL is really daunting for him, or better to say, being in a team where he can't play his game is; some players thrive in an open, back and forth, where others need their team to be oppressive to shine, and I believe Antony is the latter. He's crap on the counter because he can't do things at pace, and he's paranoid when breaking free that he'll be caught up (which he often is, I'd refute that his top speed is anywhere near good enough), but I'll bet if we do one day become a team that camps in the opposition half, we'll see a marked improvement in his game and decision making.
What must be irksome for others waiting for their turn at RW is Antony being afforded all the minutes no matter what transpires. Is he worth persevering with in lieu of giving others their shot? If he can't work with the fullbacks we have here, why didn't we either bring one in or treat him accordingly? Sancho has had his temper tantrum and burned bridges, but it's not hard to imagine backs are up in camp that this player gets all the playing time in the world where others are hooked at the first instance.
With players like him as starters, it's no wonder we can't score enough goals in the PL. Very limited player, I'll be very shocked if Amad doesn't displace him. He's had enough chances already, this is who he is. We're going nowhere with him as our main RW
Of course he is different for Brazil. That doesn't mean he's outstanding, either. The best representation of his game is from his former club where he had exceptional flankers doing all the heavy lifting for him athletically and in terms of foraging for space that in turn acted as a catalyst for him to do his thing to the best of his ability. That simply doesn't exist here.
Oh yeah he was really tearing up the Dutch league with his single figure returns in goals and assists.
Yes, I'd concur. Antony also needs a #10 who is mindful of him and his game... nothing goes together in the team and it really is a clash of styles and mindsets all over the pitch, which is why we are often so staccato and reliant on moments rather than fluidity and synergy.
Do you insist on being obtuse every time this discussion comes round? Wasn't this exact thing already addressed? Should I drag that run of posts up?
The other thing about this that strikes me as somewhat ironic is lots of posters profess to wanting us to move towards a possession based style and become less dependent on counter attacking, yet when we see the steps being taken towards this; Onana, Antony, Mount as an 8 we basically expect it to happen without any issues and have already seemingly given up on these players. For all the bile being spewed we're 6 points off 1st and 4 points off the CL place, that's with a truly awful injury crisis (the only comparable club in this regard is Chelsea who we're above) and this tactical change. We've played like crap but then most of the team has been in and out or just injured the whole time.
People like to point to Pep as a reference point but as soon as Rodri is out they are genuinely standard top 4 PL quality. Their win rate with him is 74.3% whereas without him it's 60% (for reference that is lower than ETH has, Ole and Mou also had seasons above that), the setup we want to move towards of the DM with two 8s is so dependent on that sitting player, and yet people are slating Antony for not skinning his man, that's really not his game. He has all the qualities to be a good player in a possession heavy system but because of the injuries we're just playing very direct again now which basically only suits rapid limited players (and as you can see with Rashford that hardly guarantees success) but because he's still the best option there - even with his limitations - there's no understanding of that and he's just getting slated.
You people that have convinced yourselves that Antony is like some second coming of David Silva or something are just...I dont know what to say.
Stop talking about football styles, possession vs counter etc. In very basic simple terms. Antony is an attacking player with poor attributes. He cant create or score enough for his position.
'Stop talking about football styles'
A logical and and reasonable way to discuss players on a football forum.
Several ridiculous points in here, you make it sound like pep has just got lucky with signing rodri like he never had any success before then.
Also neither mount nor Antony are good players in a possession based system. Mount is best in transitions and Antony isn't particularly good at anything
Explain the ridiculous points...
I have provided an opinion - that the sitting DM is crucial to the style and provided some proof in the cast win rate %.
Apologies, What I meant to say is, go back to basics. you can see a players quality regardless of the footballing style. the style then either maximises his attributes or minimises them.
I guess my main gripe is you are seeing qualities that are to me clearly not there.
Absolutely. It's also kind of weird, if you have a closer look, that, more often than not, at the start of a play in the attacking half the positioning is quite decent. There are possibilities for numerical overloads, runs in-behind, one-twos etc. Then, everybody starts doing his own thing... Anyway, nice posts in the last couple of pages, informative and knowledgable. I really enjoyed them, but it doesn't surprise me that people on here believe that your goal is to defend Antony or absolve him of criticism. You'd struggle to find another fanbase using the term "system player" in such a derogatory way and to such a degree.
I see a player with great workrate, good technical skills and some woeful decision making. He's not out and out rapid, that's not a huge issue as you can see from many other teams/wide players who do just fine without being that fast, but it is an issue if you play like we do. In an ideal world you have two rapid wide men but it's so rare, Mane-Salah is the last elite pair I can think of who were both genuine speedsters. There aren't that many players these days who can play the RW in the way people seem to want, full backs in modern football are much more athletic than they used to be.
If we transition to how it looks like ETH thinks we can play I like the balance of Rashford and Antony. Hojlund is raw but shows promise but the midfield behind them is (and in my mind has always been) the issue. You simply can't have Bruno operating as he does without a sitting DM who is good on the ball and the experiment of bedding Mount in, we're too easy to play through and just going direct is so easy to defend against. You brought up D Silva, clearly a better player than Antony, but imagine how crap he'd be ahead of this midfield. It's telling for that Eriksen in his 20-30mins of fitness transforms how we play - he just makes good decisions on the ball and understands how to build play/advance the ball without just whacking it long.
None of this is to suggest Antony should not be improving his end product, he absolutely should and now with Hojlund I would like to see more crosses and attempts to play him in but there is a real mish mash of a midfield behind him.
Thats the other thing I see a lot on player threads on this forum, Player X cant play well without Player Y doing Z.
Lets take City; Haaland clearly suffers with KDB out, but he still has 9 league goals in 9 games. But you can tell he is not firing on all cylinders as he would if KDB was there. Likewise, 2 years ago Haaland wasnt there, KDB still looked good without a proper number 9 to work with. What I am saying is, good players are good players without other good players but become great when combined with other good players. Yet somehow at United its always another players fault why a player isn't doing well.
No matter whats going on around Antony, I should still see enough from him individually.
Tbf it was also their fault that they did not recommend better target.
With that money, there should be a long list but we heard virtually no noise that summer.
It was De jong, antony or burst. Summed up United's transfer strategy.
To think our right wing still useless after spending 200m on Pellestri, Sancho, Antony...
But you are holding up 2 world class players to me and saying, 'look, these guys can do it', that seems a bit unrealistic.
Let's be more accurate, based off last year and similar teams, someone like Antony is probably comparable to Almiron or March. You might immediately say 'hey, that's not where a United level winger should be' but then both of them proved last season that when you find a system that suits a player (in Newcastle's case, packing the midfield, having Tripper behind him and being a transition team & for Brighton, well everyone can't stop speaking about De Zerbi) you hit good numbers 11G, 2A for Almiron and 7G, 7A for March. That is with them also being very good out of possession which is essential in today's game, probably more so for us given how Rashford and Bruno play.
The truth is you look around the top teams and there aren't that many wide attacking players that teams 'accommodate' anymore - Salah is one off the top of my head - these days wingers/wide attackers tend to have to be incredibly hard working off the ball and then will post more modest goals and assists (look at Diaz at Pool, he's the foil to Salah and playing in a very offensive team and he has 2 goals in 9 games and 0 assists). We accommodate Rashford and last season it paid off but what we are seeing now is the flaw in being so reliant on a single player with a history of up and down seasons and, being fair, a lot of injures and personal off field issues with different players. Again I like Rashford and Antony as a pair but there are big issues with this team and both of these players right now.
Going back to the Almiron/March comparison, both of those players are 29, around their physical peak - no one would ever say they are 'great' players but they are important parts of their respective teams. I'd call them solid PL right wingers. Antony is only 23 which is why I still have hope for him because when you strip back the problems he has, I don't think the big issue is a lack of pace, it is his decision making in attacking positions. When to cross, when to pass, when to shoot, all these things take experience and he's only started 5 games this season as well. Forget the price tag, just accept that is what we paid and think of how he fits (or doesn't) into this system.
Until we sort out the midfield 3 nothing will change, we'll drop silly points and get dominated by a lot of teams.
Read an interview today with Ruud Gullit about how we are not creating chances for Hojlund and it made me think how would Van Nistelrooy react everytime Antony did something dumb instead of crossing or passing.
He would be throwing fits on the pitch and with good reason.
We used to have players that wouldn't put up with this on this pitch.
I remember Cantona world always make it known if a team mate messed up.
Roy Keane pushing Fletcher away from joining in a goal celebration because Fletcher made an error during the build up to the goal.
That's why we were winners now we have a bunch of players who don't care about team work and instead just want to look good themselves
He would be throwing fits on the pitch and with good reason.
We used to have players that wouldn't put up with this on this pitch.
I remember Cantona world always make it known if a team mate messed up.
Roy Keane pushing Fletcher away from joining in a goal celebration because Fletcher made an error during the build up to the goal.
That's why we were winners now we have a bunch of players who don't care about team work and instead just want to look good themselves
Well, for starters, van Nistelrooy, being the hungry goalscoring machine that he was in his playing days and someone who would put his body on the line to get the job done, would provide an option for a pass in the right half-space that now seems mostly unoccupied when Antony carries the ball down the flank. That would be a good start since all of them (Martial, Rashford included) seem allergic to doing the simple stuff. Also, being Dutch (and we know how irritably obsessive these feckers usually are with triangles and rondos), he would be yelling equally at Antony for his decision-making, AWB/Dalot for being unable to create synergies with their teammates and, last but not least, at our wondrous #10 for playing the game in hero mode and expecting the others to adjust accordingly.
So fed up with him. Please play a youngster on the right...
Exactly. There was at least excitement with the likes of Sancho, Di Maria, Pogba, Sanchez ect….they all didnt work out unfortunately but with Antony serious questions marks were raised before he joined, and the fact that our own scouting team raised concerns about the exact same things we are currently seeing and Ten Hag chose to ignore them makes it that more frustrating.
I wish I didn’t know this. If that’s true we aren’t getting rid of him, people in this club really have no idea what they are doing.
Things like this is so unnecessary. He really wanted to come here as well, so he'd probably be happy with 100k. It makes it so much more difficult to move players on if they don't succeed.
I don't understand the money spent on wingers who are incapable of beating a man. It's that simple. 100 million and defenders usually get the better of him. Poor finisher too, predictable shots. Yet another waste of money, I'd rather see Garnacho start
Go on then.
I have some time to entertain your inane ramblings on why we should build a team around a winger who has no threat in the form of goals or assists.
Watching the match yesterday my 7 year old young lad said "he just does the same thing every time".
Thats a bit worrying.
Thats a bit worrying.
Clearly has talent, but that's useless as he apparently has 0 football iq
Probably should just sell him next summer. Nothing against the lad. Could garnacho play on the right?
Probably should just sell him next summer. Nothing against the lad. Could garnacho play on the right?
85 million on him and 73 on Sancho...
I'd take about 15 wingers ahead of the them, even the likes of Willian, Adingra, Gordon, Mbeumo, Palmer not to mention the the givens.
No cap.
I'd take about 15 wingers ahead of the them, even the likes of Willian, Adingra, Gordon, Mbeumo, Palmer not to mention the the givens.
No cap.
Sancho won’t get anymore time to prove himself (as long as EtH is the manager)
Antony will get more time to prove himself (as long as EtH is the manager)
The fate of two crap wingers.
I would bin both of them off! if someone was stupid enough to make an approach.
Antony will get more time to prove himself (as long as EtH is the manager)
The fate of two crap wingers.
I would bin both of them off! if someone was stupid enough to make an approach.
Our only hope in that RW position is Amad
Confusing post, Antony's ball retention and ability to retain the ball in tight spaces is probably his best in possession attribute...
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