Declan Rice

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If he didn't have his best mate at Chelsea and the family weren't big supporters then wouldn't feel so worried by their interest
 
Didn’t think he stood out at all when both teams were full strength. Must have missed more of the game than I thought because I rarely saw him play a forward ball. Just passing sideways against a 10 man team. Think we can do better.
 
Thought he was overrated, still kind of do but we desperately need a player like him so I’d be happy if we went in for him
 
Again, no links and people just talking. So many threads like this right now.
 
Rice would be absolutely perfect for us, in my opinion. That said, it won’t happen…at least not this season. I suspect that United feel like they made a shrewd move by waiting until this summer to buy Sancho. That’s debatable, but I can easily see them taking the same approach with Rice. We desperately need a player like him now, but the club will wait in hopes of saving 20M or so.
 
Some people watch the England version of Rice and believe that's how he plays for West Ham.

Also, I occasionally read the west ham forum - the way they talk about Rice is like their crown jewel, routinely saying that he is the best midfielder alot of them have ever seen. Not sure how right that is, but still a positive to hear.
 
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Bebestation said:
Some people watch the England version of Rice and believe that's how he plays for West Ham.

Also, I occasionally read the west ham forum - the way they talk about Rice is like their crown jewel, routinely saying that he is the best midfielder alot of them have ever seen. Not sure how right that is, but still a positive to hear.
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Presume that's you saying the West Ham one could sit nicely in front of Harry and Rapha
 
croadyman said:
Presume that's you saying the West Ham one could sit nicely in front of Harry and Rapha
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In front of Harry and Raphael Varane and behind Pogba and Bruno (or VDB)

I have loved watching the way Bruno and Pogba interchange in their slightly more free roles in the two matches this season and I want to see more of it.

Varane - Maguire
Rice
Bruno - Pogba
VDB
Greenwood - Rashford
​
This is one option I'd like to see (maybe Bruno and VDB needs swapping of positions depending on who is the best false 9 or Shadow striker respectively).

Or the more strikers option (potentially Haaland as our Number 9 by January)

Varane - Maguire
Rice
Bruno - Pogba
Sancho - Greenwood - Rashford
​
Personally, I can see why people have some doubts about him (more how he plays a bit slowly for England than West ham) - but I kind of really want to stop seeing the 4231 and see more 433 which enables us an extra attacker in our first 11.

The defensive player than enables to do that and has the ability to hold players like Pogba, VDB and Bruno by themselves has got to be a certain type and style of CDM in my opinion (casemiro, Fernandinho, Fabinho, Busquets, rodri etc) and I can't think much more that is available and suitable than Rice.

Can you imagine opposition having to get past AWB, Varane, Rice, Maguire and Shaw? Or opposition defenders having to deal with combinations of Pogba, Bruno, VDB, Sancho, Rashford, Greenwood, Cavani, AWB, Shaw with an element of attacking freedom given by players like Rice, Varane and Maguire?
 
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Even if we buy prime Makelele we should not put Pogba in a midfield 2. Let alone Declan Rice. People realise we shouldnt put Bruno in a midfield 2 with Rice/Ndidi because he is an attacking player, and dont realise its the same with Pogba. Odd.

McT/Fred--Rice

If we buy Rice this would be our midfield. Now we have to decide if thats worth 80-100M.
 
I actually think he's vastly overrated. He's a centre-back coached into playing the holding role. You can clearly determine this by his range of passing which is generally mostly short and sideways. If Ole is allegedly trying to follow the Sir Alex model then United have rarely played with a defensive midfielder.

Anyway, I think McTominay is on par with Rice and could easily be told/coached to be more defensive and just go for the safer options with his passing range similar to that of Rice. There is better out there if the club wants a player sitting just in front of the defence to replace the ageing Matic. Ives Bissouma and Ndidi just to name two who are both better and would cost less. I am sure there will be more options on the continent of similar quality or better to that of Rice.
 
Sultan said:
I actually think he's vastly overrated. He's a centre-back coached into playing the holding role. You can clearly determine this by his range of passing which is generally mostly short and sideways. If Ole is allegedly trying to follow the Sir Alex model then United have rarely played with a defensive midfielder.
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Roy Keane?
 
Sultan said:
I actually think he's vastly overrated. He's a centre-back coached into playing the holding role. You can clearly determine this by his range of passing which is generally mostly short and sideways. If Ole is allegedly trying to follow the Sir Alex model then United have rarely played with a defensive midfielder.

Anyway, I think McTominay is on par with Rice and could easily be told/coached to be more defensive and just go for the safer options with his passing range similar to that of Rice. There is better out there if the club wants a player sitting just in front of the defence to replace the ageing Matic. Ives Bissouma and Ndidi just to name two who are both better and would cost less. I am sure there will be more options on the continent of similar quality or better to that of Rice.
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See I'm a fan of Rice but I can't exactly disagree with this.

The only thing I wonder is - have all these amazing CDM had really good passing ability before? Can you use the passing ability of a player to dictate the value of a CDM player?

I'm about to get some wrong here but who out of Gattuso, Kante, Casemiro, Fernandinho, Makelele, Javi Martinez and Busquets were known to be valued by their passing ability over their defensive ability?
 
Bebestation said:
Some people watch the England version of Rice and believe that's how he plays for West Ham.

Also, I occasionally read the west ham forum - the way they talk about Rice is like their crown jewel, routinely saying that he is the best midfielder alot of them have ever seen. Not sure how right that is, but still a positive to hear.
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They also thought Noble and Nolan
should be England regulars.

I watch the West Ham version and see a player do less with the ball than any of our current midfielders.
 
This thread is like the Bissouma thread, when they have a decent game, everyone pipes up how he would transform us.
 
if he wasnt english he'd be much higher rated.

i think opinion is still split...
 
Bebestation said:
See I'm a fan of Rice but I can't exactly disagree with this.

The only thing I wonder is - have all these amazing CDM had really good passing ability before? Can you use the passing ability of a player to dictate the value of a CDM player?

I'm about to get some wrong here but who out of Gattuso, Kante, Casemiro, Fernandinho, Makelele, Javi Martinez and Busquets were known to be valued by their passing ability over their defensive ability?
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The problem here is, although all those players might be call defensive midfielders, the way in which they play/played the game was so polaric, you could form complementary pairings from a number of combinations listed.

Gattusso was a very basic runner and presser of the opposition. His job could not have been simpler: run, harrass, get the ball, immediately give it to far superior ball users, but most importantly, get it to another player on his team to do something with. Gattuso had zero expectation placed upon him to do anything creative or proactive with the ball.

Kante is a halfway house between Gattuso and the players in italics, as they are all able to move with the ball, make space to receive it back and be progressive.

The bolded, however, are instrumental in progressive passes between the lines to another team mate and are key components in massive retention states during a game. You can go as far as to state: you shut those players down and their sides lose a lot of what makes them so dangerous. Javi Martinez came up as a really impressive user of the ball and little by little, he relinquished this at Bayern, but certainly in Spain, he was a player we could do with a carbon copy of right now.

We definitely shouldn't be looking at a Gattuso type, and if we're lucky, we manage to get a player from the bolded archetype as they control games with effortlessly subtle and consistently damaging passes.
 
Sultan said:
Roy Keane was never a purely defensive holding player.
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He was very clearly a defensive midfielder. Yes, a DM meant something slightly different to today's game, since a midfield 2 meant fewer specialist players in the middle and everyone doing a bit of everything. But everyone considered Roy Keane our "enforcer" back then, without question.
 
largelyworried said:
He was very clearly a defensive midfielder. Yes, a DM meant something slightly different to today's game, since a midfield 2 meant fewer specialist players in the middle and everyone doing a bit of everything. But everyone considered Roy Keane our "enforcer" back then, without question.
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Roy Keane was seen as a 2-way central midfielder, until his hip went; DM’s of Roy’s era were players like Dunga, Deschamps, and in the more elegant and creative form, Redondo. Being an enforcer is not synonymous with being a DM. Duncan Ferguson was an enforcer, yet he was a striker.
 
largelyworried said:
He was very clearly a defensive midfielder. Yes, a DM meant something slightly different to today's game, since a midfield 2 meant fewer specialist players in the middle and everyone doing a bit of everything. But everyone considered Roy Keane our "enforcer" back then, without question.
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Roy Keane was your typical box to box player. He scored a number of very important goals timing his runs into the penalty area from the midfield. I can't ever remember the so-called defensive midfielder such as Rice ever run into the penalty area these days. You are likely right the DM is defined differently these days since the advent of Makelele who specialised and brought in a new concept to that role.
 
Sultan said:
Roy Keane was your typical box to box player. He scored a number of very important goals timing his runs into the penalty area from the midfield. I can't ever remember the so-called defensive midfielder such as Rice ever run into the penalty area these days. You are likely right the DM is defined differently these days since the advent of Makelele who specialised and brought in a new concept to that role.
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What can I say? I was around throughout Keane's career and we all used the phrase defensive midfielder back then. Keane was the defensive midfielder, Scholes was the attacking midfielder. If you want to retcon that term based on today's football, cool, but that doesn't change the basis on which he was played at the time.
 
largelyworried said:
What can I say? I was around throughout Keane's career and we all used the phrase defensive midfielder back then. Keane was the defensive midfielder, Scholes was the attacking midfielder. If you want to retcon that term based on today's football, cool, but that doesn't change the basis on which he was played at the time.
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Thats not true. Scholes was basically a 10 for most of Keanes career and Roy had Butt as a midfield partner for a long time. Scholes didn’t become a midfielder until late into Roys career. Roy was box to box and it’s silly to argue otherwise
 
I have to say one thing that really stands out for me almost every time I’ve watched Rice is his doggedness and dutifulness to the task of being a DM first and foremost. He has very high levels of concentration and focus, which is something that might not even be considered by most when thinking of attributes, but it’s a trait that goes hand in hand with being a DM for me.

For a lot of players who can maybe sit and hold for a while, it’s taking great amounts of concentration to not follow their instincts which are encouraging them to break rank and go after the ball, or get up the pitch and momentarily abandon their position, but for a studious DM, they’ll only do such a thing once all threats are considered or where they can follow in as an anchor still being the last man in their defensive line.

This attribute doesn’t justify West Ham’s valuation, but strikes me every time for how rigid (in a good way for that role) Rice is. He’s the least talented on the ball of the players I’ve seen us linked to, but the one I think would be the most dependable in sticking to job briefs with no doubt he’ll attempt to perform said task to the very best of his ability.

When I first saw, and was watching, Camavinga, he was a DM, and since then he’s been moved forward into the CM roles, which comes as no surprise with the ability he has and the natural, instinctive way in which he can drive straight through a midfield and affect the game directly. I very much doubt Rice will ever have such an issue to concern himself with, but that mightn’t be a bad thing as he’s about as pure a DM as you’re likely to get, which, if you intend to play in a system where it’s vital you have someone you can depend upon to be in that area of the pitch all game, makes him worth more than more talented players who you can’t depend upon to follow simple job briefs to the letter.

He’s some way down on my list of preferences, but he’s definitely got some merits he’s a higher percentile in than the more talented players I favour who may let you down once in a while with their concentration lapses or even the over ambitious nature of what their ability tells them they can attempt in risky scenarios.
 
Roy Keane was immense, Rice has probably one third of his game. not saying I wouldn't want Rice at United though for a fair price.
 
Sultan said:
You can clearly determine this by his range of passing which is generally mostly short and sideways.
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On average, every pass he made in the PL last year moved 19,2 yards and 4,6 yards forward.

The same stat for Rodri was 20,1 yards and 4,12 yards forward.

Fabinho (19/20 since he played CB a lot last year): 20,28 yards and 4,00 yards.

In other words, compared to two of the best DMs in the league, he moves the ball a 0,8-1,0 yard shorter on average. But he is actually more progressive than both of them with the average pass. Despite playing for a poor team. He also moves the ball further than players like Jorginho, Kante and Ndidi.

In his first two games Rice has moved the ball, on average, 22,2 yards with each pass of the ball and 6,16 yards forward. Can his range improve with age and in a better team? Probably! He does not look like a hopless case at all.
 
People don't watch him play at all and come here to spout absolute dross about how he is overrated and how he is not what we need, we have Fred or absolute shit like that. He would instantly improve our core and it will be Rice + 1 for the 2 spots. The fee will obviously more than he is worth but stop downplaying his actual ability. The guy is good enough to start for us.
 
andersj said:
On average, every pass he made in the PL last year moved 19,2 yards and 4,6 yards forward.

The same stat for Rodri was 20,1 yards and 4,12 yards forward.

Fabinho (19/20 since he played CB a lot last year): 20,28 yards and 4,00 yards.

In other words, compared to two of the best DMs in the league, he moves the ball a 0,8-1,0 yard shorter on average. But he is actually more progressive than both of them with the average pass. Despite playing for a poor team. He also moves the ball further than players like Jorginho, Kante and Ndidi.

In his first two games Rice has moved the ball, on average, 22,2 yards with each pass of the ball and 6,16 yards forward. Can his range improve with age and in a better team? Probably! He does not look like a hopless case at all.
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Thanks, appreciate your effort in posting those stats.

It's quite obvious we are just fans or having played football at just amateur level we are very likely to miss a lot of the nuances needed to evaluate a player.
 
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largelyworried said:
What can I say? I was around throughout Keane's career and we all used the phrase defensive midfielder back then. Keane was the defensive midfielder, Scholes was the attacking midfielder. If you want to retcon that term based on today's football, cool, but that doesn't change the basis on which he was played at the time.
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What i found interesting is that Rice himself said a few days ago that people aren’t seeing everything that he can do; this season he would take more chances and be more progressive; show more of his skills. Seems like the euro criticism has filtered its way through to him and he doesn’t like being labled as a CB playing midfield who can’t pass
Time will tell. Any team that buys him must surely know what he’s capable off
 
The recent Zouma to west ham make me confident - sounds like they are coming into some cash when previously broke
 
He is miles ahead of Fred/McTominay/Matić. Of course we should take him if we can.
 
Fortitude said:
This attribute doesn’t justify West Ham’s valuation, but strikes me every time for how rigid (in a good way for that role) Rice is. He’s the least talented on the ball of the players I’ve seen us linked to, but the one I think would be the most dependable in sticking to job briefs with no doubt he’ll attempt to perform said task to the very best of his ability.
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Certainly has its pluses, but does he offer anything creatively or moving the play any quicker in midfield than what we were doing against Southampton, for instance? Whilst having an actual no.6 would improve us defensively a lot with some positional assurance, I worry that the lack of ability on the ball is like a one step forward two step back move.
 
Sultan said:
Thanks, appreciate your effort in posting those stats.

It's quite obvious we are just fans and having played football at just amateur level we are very likely to miss a lot of the nuances needed to evaluate a player.
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It is so surprising to get such a «factual» and polite respons. Anyway, my pleasure.

I think it is difficult for anyone to be honest, and that is probably why we made mistakes on the transfer front even with the best manager in history at the helm. The best teams makes few mistakes nowadays, but they rely heavily on statistic. That is a huge benefit for the modern coach/manager compared to 10-15 years ago; they get better players.
 
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