Of course you did, you are just the worst, I have no idea why I am even responding to you, same thing happened last time we were discussing Smalling.
12
Season Average Rating
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In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik (@Rood) and Jamie (@Vault Dweller) get the depressing job of reviewing United's 3-0 loss at Old Trafford to Liverpool. They discuss what went wrong, Casemiro's day to forget, and the pressure now on Erik Ten Hag. They also take some time to give McTominay a proper farewell, and give their overall thoughts on the Summer Transfer Window.
Of course you did, you are just the worst, I have no idea why I am even responding to you, same thing happened last time we were discussing Smalling.
What same thing?
Just because I have a differing opinion to you I am "just the worst"? Smalling seems to be highly rated on the Caf, outside of it, not so much. It was only last season that many on here wanted rid of him, now he seems to be the saviour, one even said he had a better 18 months than Hummels FFS
He's a good defender, who gets injured alot, he's been dropped for the last two Premiership games and for me I don't think he is in LVGs short term let alone long term plans.
People see what they want to see, thats very evident in the case of Smalling.
No, because that wasn't an opinion, it was just your average lazy post on Smalling's distribution which isn't true for yesterday's game because his distribution was very good. As I proved with facts, he was far from bad with the ball, and didn't lose the ball too much as you said he did. But go on, keep talking about Smalling's future and whatnot, as long as you keep ignoring the things you said.
Not much I disagree with here. However, that's a massive tangent to the original point. You said Smalling was sloppy in posession yesterday, Amar showed you a stat to say he had the joint second best completion in the game, which points to your observation being wrong.
Totally take on board stats don't show everything (a pass blasted at someone's face would be sucessful for example) but at least argue the point instead of making it about something else.
Not his biggest fan but thought he did fine last night. He didn't really have a lot to do defensively, but when he was given the ball he pushed it forward and looked for a useful pass, which I think made the game much less frustrating to watch than the last Cambridge encounter.
Facts
His passing may have got to the intended target on most occasions but he has a terrible habbit of over or under hitting the ball, unfortunatley (or fortunatley in Smallings case) stats dno't show that.
As I said he was our worst defensive player, and he was. McNair, Rojo and Evans all played better than him.
Yeah this always makes me laugh. It is clearly something that is being worked on though. Fair play to him for trying to implement it on the field though.
Its good to see our players being coached to improve. Its been missing for a while now, since Quiroz leaving perhaps. I havent seen individual improvement (De Gea aside) since Ronaldo.
Smalling is behind anyway in this type of development not ocming through a professional club background. Then knocked further back with injury and Fergie / Moyes playing him right back.
I like Smalling and I think LVG likes Smalling. I still hold out hope that LVG can make Smalling into the player we need.
Thought he was excellent last night.
A few brain farts but it was his first start since returning from injury iirc.
A few brain farts but it was his first start since returning from injury iirc.
Very good performance, should start ahead of Jones, imo.
Agree. I think he has more composure than Jones. I think he is better when he has Rojo next to him.
Only just watched the match and thought he was good. Obviously had the one error but he should be ahead of Jones atm. Smaling/Rojo is still my best CB pairing.
It's amazing how this sort of statement would be worded differently by many others if it was Jones.
Yep. Smalling was our worst defensive player on Tuesday night. He wasnt bad but he wasn't great either. As I said previously, he seems to be rated far higher on the caf than outside of it.
Jones does seem to get shorter shrift, for some reason. His error against Leicester was under far more pressure than Smalling's colossal boo boo against Cambridge but seems to have rewritten his whole performance as being poor on redcafe, when he was actually fairly solid. In contrast, Smalling's error is being glossed over as one of those things.
I will add some balance. Don't like Smalling. Not good enough.
Although I agree that he's our best defender, its stupid mistakes like that, that's going to hold him back (alongside the injuries obviously).
Him and Jones need to cut this sort of nonsense out.
From James Wilson interview:
I always thought that Smalling is one of our fastest players, but I'm more surprised that ADM is not on it (he at least is one of the fastest with the ball though) and even more surprised that Shaw is mentioned
I remember earlier in this thread a few months ago arguing with someone about Smalling, who claimed he was one of the slowest players in the squad.
Here it is, back on page 5. Ah memories.
Pretty unpopular opinion, but to each their own.
Do you rate our other CBs over him or do you think they're all useless?
I think Smalling is comfortably the most well-rounded CB we have and is easily the most consistent. Can't say the same about Jones or Evans this season. Though McNair has been pretty solid in the games he's played, I think.
Smalling's overall athleticism is brilliant, in my opinion.
It's one of the reasons he's playing at such a high level considering he had next to no youth development in contrast to his peers.
It's one of the reasons he's playing at such a high level considering he had next to no youth development in contrast to his peers.
Wouldn't surprise me. When Rojo made that mistake against Chelsea, Smalling tracked back on Willian incredibly quickly.
He's a bit of a freak really. Someone of his size really doesn't have any right to have his acceleration/speed.
Personally I think more people rate Jones, he's the no nonsense, hard tackling defender and that style is generally appreciated by all. Only recently have people began to rate Smalling more on here.
They're both excellent defenders and I hope we don't sell either, but I think Smalling's reading of the game is better, and his physicality is very impressive also.
Not particularly. When I watch him he never inspires me with much confidence. Although most of our defenders make me feel like a mistake can happy at any instant I often see Smalling inviting unnecessary pressure on himself (through his own play) and also bring pressure onto the team (liable to giving away cheap freekicks as he often will put his hands into the back of an opponent or by grabbing their shirt).
Oh yes, he's a fantastic athlete. I still have very high hopes for him.
That was me.
You can only judge what you see, over the last 18 months i have seen chris smalling put in better performances at centre half than i have Matts Hummels.
I stand by that statement. Everytime i have seen Hummels he's been average at best. Smalling has had some average games, some poor games. But he's also had some very good games and that combined with his height, pace and age give me hope that LVG can develop him and allow him to fullfill his potential.
If your the Hummels expert........tell me half a dozen games in the last 18 months where Hummels has looked good? I'll watch em
The world cup ??
our lass could have played centre half for germany and they'd have won it. He never had a good game at the world cup. When asked to defend he was ran ragged.
On the contrary though, Jones has been hyped a lot more than Smalling, so I think if you don't rate Jones, it's very easy to disregard anything good he's doing in the game and focus on the one mistake he may have made. I think even if someone doesn't rate Smalling, their opinions towards him are less extreme, and are probably more welcoming to any encouraging signs in his performance.
Anyway, I think it's a common misconception that Jones reads the game poorly. There's a method to his madness, and he wins an extraordinary amount of balls by getting tight to his man and intercepting. His "the balls is going to go there" is fine. It's more his decision making; "am I going to get to the ball in time" that is the issue. Due to his eagerness, the answer to this question in Phil Jones' mind is yes the vast majority of the time which is why he gets caught out occasionally, but it's the trait of a 22 year old centre half.
He's also extremely good at covering his centre back partner and sweeping up, and his positioning in our own box is exceptional. The one weakness I see with Jones is his awareness of runs in behind when the opposition attacks down our right hand side. He struggles to pick up runners that make diagonal runs in behind his left shoulder, and he needs to learn to drop and receiver the striker, rather than relying on his CB partner to cover everything behind him.
In regards to Smalling, I've been happy with his contributions since the City game. I think he had a poor year for most of the last calendar year, partly down to injuries and the pressure of being picked for the World Cup, but he's been putting in encouraging performances ever since the Arsenal game.
Smalling was largely good under Moyes. In fact he's had a very decent 17 or so months barring injury problems.
So Hummels in a good system can work out ? He played very well in the World Cup. He was great in the quarter final and the final.
Hummels in a better team than Dortmund will be fantastic again.
By the same logic, put Smalling in the current Dortmund defense and I'm willing to bet he is not going to play well.
We will have to agree to disagree on that.
The other thing about Hummels which is a major worry for me, Jonny Evans is more robust!!! Hummels is your stereotypical glass back.
The type of centre half we need is a John Terry type defender. Organiser, brave, experianced and will throw himself infront of a bus. Hummels appears like he's frightened to mess his hair up never mind get his shorts dirty.
In summary. I am not impressed / convinced hummels would improve our team
I can see where you are coming from, even if we don't agree.
Out of curiosity, what do you think of Jones ? I think he suits the Terry role you talk about, apart from the experience part obviously.
I think there was no reason to drop Smalling after his recent outstanding performances. Van Gaal once confirmed he had a knock so hopefully it's the case because for me he would start any day ahead of any of our center backs, just make Smalling and Rojo the main center back pair and rotate Jones with Rojo or here and there Smalling. His pace is amazing still remember how he deleted Willian trying to break on goal on the halfway line. Chris the rocket came and end of chance for Chelsea and Willian. That was so good..
Did the same to Welbeck as well against Arsenal.
He's actually one of the few defenders I enjoy watching defend because of how good he is in those situations. Iirc he's only ever given away penalty so far in his utd career which was in his first season and one sending off, which was extremely uncharacteristic. Plus the fact that he is such a clean tackler when he commits, makes him a favourite against most players in those situations.
You missed out a very important few words, "in your opinion". As who was the best of the defenders is subjective. As you appear to have stated this as a fact.
For me Smalling had a good game, as he usually does. He's very consistant & gets overly criticised on here.
Isn't that what discussing players form is? It's all about opinions, I thought that was pretty obvious.
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Yup. He has been our best CB for a while now. At RB it was torture, though.