Dimitar Berbatov | 2010/11 Performances

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He was very good yesterday although it was notable that he often didn't close down defenders from the front. In fact on some occasions he was ordering Anderson to do the pressing. Conserving his energy, maybe. It doesn't really suit him being so isolated.
 
McGrathsipan said:
berbatov was back to his lethargic worst last night...he had a shit game and he was crap at bolton too....why oh why cant he just find a level of consistency that most top players can???
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Nonsense. Running around like a headless chicken would have achieved nothing short of tiring him out. I'm wary of dragging Tevez into this but the way he used to run around like a mad man often hid the inefficiencies in his game because people fell over themselves to wonder at his 'work rate' (yuk) regardless of how effective it was. Berbatov isn't that player and people need to accept it.

He played a disciplined game where he didn't shine due to the lack of decent service but the odd chance he did get (or create himself) he did well with. It's silly to criticise last nights performance from him in my eyes.
 
cina said:
Do you ever post anything other than nonsense?

There was nothing wrong with his performance last night, he was secluded up top, had no service so he had to keep coming deep to get the ball. Made 2 chances for himself, the 2nd one after a glorious first touch and run, and was very unlucky Cesar made such a good safe.

Absolutely nothing wrong with him last night, just because he's not scoring a fecking hat-trick.
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eh forum?? for opinions??

and who are you anyway.....

he was poor last night and poor against bolton...thats my opinion if you dont like it tough shit...im sure there are people who agree with me

i dont expect him to score a hat-trick in every game but expect him to contribute more to the game

so what if he was up front on his own, he didnt give the valencia defence as much to do as he should have ...
 
R_Nick said:
Nonsense. Running around like a headless chicken would have achieved nothing short of tiring him out. I'm wary of dragging Tevez into this but the way he used to run around like a mad man often hid the inefficiencies in his game because people fell over themselves to wonder at his 'work rate' (yuk) regardless of how effective it was. Berbatov isn't that player and people need to accept it.

He played a disciplined game where he didn't shine due to the lack of decent service but the odd chance he did get (or create himself) he did well with. It's silly to criticise last nights performance from him in my eyes.
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understand your stance here but i thought that his dropping too deep was wrong...playing one up front for me means he should stay there and try to occupy the centre halves....

I know he is a good player , maybe he is not the one to be playing the lone front man role
 
McGrathsipan said:
eh forum?? for opinions??

and who are you anyway.....

he was poor last night and poor against bolton...thats my opinion if you dont like it tough shit...im sure there are people who agree with me

i dont expect him to score a hat-trick in every game but expect him to contribute more to the game

so what if he was up front on his own, he didnt give the valencia defence as much to do as he should have ...
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No-one was denying you your opinion, just pointing out that it is nonsense/bull shit/clueless etc etc.
 
Commadus said:
Berba movement this season has been far better he has been moving all across the front line and working the channels.

SAF played a very defensive lineup part of it forced due to injuries and part of it tactical.

Park was very poor. Carrick looked understandably rusty. Fletcher was all action. Anderson looked fat but did ok.

Nani was hit and miss.

Berba did the best out of meagre chances. As to his hysterionics it really depends on the team whether its counter productive or not. On some teams wild gesticulating got the message across on other teams I played it was not the done thing so hard to say whetehr his moaning was the right or wrong way to get the message across.
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Good post.

Jaysus, your tune has changed! ;)
 
cw1984 said:
No-one was denying you your opinion, just pointing out that it is nonsense/bull shit/clueless etc etc.
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so anyone who doesnt go along with the theme that berbatov was excellent last night is clueless?? is that it??

:rolleyes:
 
McGrathsipan said:
so anyone who doesnt go along with the theme that berbatov was excellent last night is clueless?? is that it??

:rolleyes:
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It's their opinion that you are talking nonsense and are clueless.

You can't go on about the right to have opinions in one breath then deny peope the right to have theirs in another.
 
jaysus give me a break here.....i get shot down and called clueless for thinking berbatov didnt play as well as he could/should of last night
 
Pogue Mahone said:
Good post.

Jaysus, your tune has changed! ;)
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I'm coming out of the closet!

Nah maybe I was a bit too harsh on him in the past but ask A Grade I was warming to him last season.

I think you were right when you posted he may have had a long standing knee complaint which seems to have finally been resolved.
 
zub2007 said:
I think Berbatov needs to stop or otherwise at least cut down on his constant moaning on the bench. He has started well but games like last night when you need the service but not getting it, don't take it out on team mates as whenever a ball went astray he was moaning.
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I thought Berba did good job for what little service he got but I do agree with this he did at times moan at the other players when it didnt work out.
 
Rooney1987 said:
I thought Berba did good job for what little service he got but I do agree with this he did at times moan at the other players when it didnt work out.
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The guy you named yourself after is one of the worst for that. Players get frustrated with poor service just as much as we do watching it, I have no problem with a player bemoaning poor play from a team mate unless he himself is having a mare too.
 
I know he does it and I dont like it then I don't like when any of the players do it I just think its poor.
 
McGrathsipan said:
jaysus give me a break here.....i get shot down and called clueless for thinking berbatov didnt play as well as he could/should of last night
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:lol: Well that's not quite what you said is it?

McGrathsipan said:
berbatov was back to his lethargic worst last night...he had a shit game and he was crap at bolton too....why oh why cant he just find a level of consistency that most top players can???
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You're becoming somewhat much more diplomatic in your view.
 
McGrathsipan said:
jaysus give me a break here.....i get shot down and called clueless for thinking berbatov didnt play as well as he could/should of last night
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I dont quite think you are clueless mate, I just think that most posters who watched the match last night realised that he did more then the "best" he could with the garbage he was provided with. Unless of course anyone expected him to take on their defence on his own last night. (which, incidentally he did and he would have scored aswell, barring a good save from Cesar).

If you think he was "shit", I shudder to think what you thought of half the team who were far worse.
 
Randall Flagg said:
He really wasn’t in the game last night. Not his fault, as there was no service. But I laughed at some of the ratings in the ratings thread. He is getting 7’s dished out all over the shop. How can you give someone a 7 when he barely affected the game one bit, even though it was through no fault of his own but the fact is his input deserved nowhere near a 7.

The caf is deluded at times
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I hate people like you, you don't and won't give him credit where it's due. He came very close to scoring twice after creating chances out of pretty much nothing and his ball retention was good as well, he also won a lot of balls in the air but just didn't have much support so naturally his little flicks didn't find team mates most of the time.

He had a good game but haters will hate, I won't even bother saying some supporters don't have a clue because I wouldn't consider someone like you a true supporter.
 
Pogue Mahone said:
Good post.

Jaysus, your tune has changed! ;)
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:D

Commadus said:
I'm coming out of the closet!

Nah maybe I was a bit too harsh on him in the past but ask A Grade I was warming to him last season.

I think you were right when you posted he may have had a long standing knee complaint which seems to have finally been resolved.
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True sunshine, confirmed. A lot more objective opinions on him as the season progressed, as you usually have on the rest of the players. I am glad to see that more and more people are becoming objective on His Languidness and judging him fairly on performance rather than pre-conceived opinions.
 
McGrathsipan said:
berbatov was back to his lethargic worst last night...he had a shit game and he was crap at bolton too....why oh why cant he just find a level of consistency that most top players can???
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I agree, that was Berbatov at his worst for us, pre-pool half the forum would have been at his throat and the other (intelligent) half would have been defending him for putting on a good display despite being totally starved of service and having no players breaking from midfield to support him.
 
I love some of you, as you're complete idiots. Maybe watching it on the TV doesn't allow anyone to see the whole picture. He worked his balls off last night, he was all over the show.

"lethargic worst". Right!
 
Care_de_Bobo said:
He had a good game but haters will hate, I won't even bother saying some supporters don't have a clue because I wouldn't consider someone like you a true supporter.
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Shit just got interesting.

*Goes to look for the MJ Eating popcorn gif*
 
I don't think he was that bad last night. As others have said, the service he got wasn't great and he created two good chances for himself which he was unlucky with. He was basically a lone man up front and everybody pretty much knows Berbatov thrives off having another striker alongside him.

He's been great since the start of the season, just watch him score against Sunderland this weekend :D
 
MUFCgal said:
I don't think he was that bad last night. As others have said, the service he got wasn't great and he created two good chances for himself which he was unlucky with. He was basically a lone man up front and everybody pretty much knows Berbatov thrives off having another striker alongside him.

He's been great since the start of the season, just watch him score against Sunderland this weekend :D
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same here ..

he was pretty isolated but still worked his socks off...
 
If we're judging this years form, Rooney has been shockingly poor, his passes have been off, he looks off the pace and bar his England performances in his last 2 games, he hasn't really looked like the player he was last season.

Give him a bit of time, I'm sure he'll transform into that goal grabbing Shrek which dominated games last season..

Let him sort out his family issues a bit, we have plenty of strikers who are doing a great job.
 
WeasteDevil said:
I love some of you, as you're complete idiots. Maybe watching it on the TV doesn't allow anyone to see the whole picture. He worked his balls off last night, he was all over the show.

"lethargic worst". Right!
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Yeah, but since he came here there've been stats thrown around showing that he covers a deceptively large amount of ground in a game, maybe he was at his 'lethargic worst' but peoples perceptions have changed so much that that is now finally being acknowledged as a good performance from him.
 
WeasteDevil said:
I love some of you, as you're complete idiots. Maybe watching it on the TV doesn't allow anyone to see the whole picture. He worked his balls off last night, he was all over the show.

"lethargic worst". Right!
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I can really appreciate this comment about how much different a perspective one gets watching the game live. When United were in Houston, I went to the game. Towards the end of the game there was a time when Gibson and someone else had the ball towards our box, had they looked up - they would have seen Chichartio at the half way line inside our half with no defenders covering him - 2-3 times he checked himself inside our half trying to anticipate a ball that may be played but, never happened.

I haven't had a chance to watch the game yesterday yet but, from reading the game cast - I can imagine very few balls coming into Berbatov. For anyone watching on TV as he isn't seeing the ball and his moniker of being lazy - this would almost instantly get a "he was invisible". Too often when we watch on TV, we don't see the work being done by forwards that are out of the picture, working and moving around to make space or give options. We are naturally fixated as to where the ball is - which is what the TV focuses on that we don't see the larger picture.

Anyway - hope he scores on Saturday, he's already gone 2 games without scoring - that's too long.
 
Berba's beautiful game - Manchester United Official Web Site

Berba's beautiful game
We spoke to Dimitar Berbatov just after his Liverpool hat-trick to relive his best day in Red, and find out just what makes him tick…

Dimitar, how does it feel to have written your own bit of Manchester United history?

I didn’t know before the Liverpool game that it was such a long time since any United player had scored a hat-trick against them. But afterwards I found out that no-one had done it for 64 years so I felt proud. It was a magical day for me. It’s not every day you score three goals against a team like Liverpool. But the most important thing was that we won. If the game had finished 2-2, even if I had scored two goals, it wouldn’t be pleasant. It was a great game and I hope everyone was entertained.

Everyone’s still talking about your amazing overhead kick. How was it from your point of view?

I was just in the box and I saw Nani’s cross coming. Wayne Rooney was in front of me and he was going for the ball so I was screaming for him to leave it. I think he heard me – afterwards in the dresing room he said he did and that’s why he left the ball at the last minute. I saw the ball drop and there was no other way to control it except with my thigh and I just tried to do something different. In a situation like this, you don’t have so much time to think. The first thing that came into my mind was to take it on the thigh and try to hit it like this [mimes an overhead kick]. Even when I did it, I didn’t know the ball was in. I was on the ground, turning around, and then I heard the crowd screaming. After that I knew something special had happened.

We enjoyed the third goal at Liverpool, not just because it won the game, but because it was more a classic centre-forward’s type of goal. How important is that physical presence in your game?

I don’t consider myself a classical centre-forward. I try to bring something different to the game. I depend more on my touch and my technical ability than to jump and play with my elbows. Obviously there are moments when you have to decide to rely on your technique, or to be more physical to try to score the goal. The third goal against Liverpool was also beautiful for me – it was a cross and you have just a second to think about what the defender is going to do and how you are going to outsmart him. I jumped just a second before [Jamie Carragher] to get ahead of him and that was it. You just need to be quick. It’s a simple thing. From the outside, it might look difficult, but it’s not so difficult.

Do you find it frustrating that you – and other strikers – are judged solely on goals, when you bring much more to the game?

You cannot be angry. Everybody thinks they understand football. People all around the world think they are experts. But for me a good player, a complete player, is not just about scoring goals. It’s about vision, about touch, about decision-making. I know lots of strikers who score many goals, but they don’t have the technical ability I like to see in players. I always like a player who can control the ball, who thinks two steps ahead – players like Zidane or Xavi. Or like Leo Messi, who is not a typical centre-forward. He is more of a midfield player who scores a lot of goals. For strikers, you are right, people judge on the number of goals, but for me there is more to it than that.

So do you feel it is as important to entertain as it is to score goals?

Yes. That’s my aim. You need to know when to slow it down, when to increase the tempo. Zidane was great at doing that. He knew what he could do with his touch and when a player is really sure in himself he can do great things. I know what I can do and I try to do it. I try on the training ground and when you see the goals a player scores in games, in some ways, he’s already scored that goal in training. You try to transfer skills from the training ground to the game.

Because you make football look quite easy, some people assume that you don’t work hard. But those skills take practise, don’t they?

Yes, of course. But it starts when you are just a boy. I remember when I was small I would kick the ball up high, maybe a thousand times a day just to try to stop it with my feet. I think because I did that, now I have good technique. So I knew how to control the ball and where to look, but when you become a professional player you continue to develop your skills. You need to practise and the only place to do it is the training ground. Or at home if you have a big house [laughs]. On the other hand, though, you have games where sometimes you think for a second, “What if I do that?”. You’ve never tried it before but you just try. Like the second [against Liverpool], I thought, “Well, you never know”. I already felt in that game that if I shot from the halfway line I was going to score. Honestly, you get some games like this where you feel everything is working for you and you feel powerful.

That level of confidence must be great. But what about when you’re not in such good form?

You need to stay strong. You need to believe in yourself and know what you can do. There will be periods where you don’t feel so great, but you have your team-mates and you have your manager who are always behind you.

The bond with your team-mates looks very strong, if the celebrations of your goals against Liverpool are anything to go by. Do you feel at home at United?

I do feel at home. And I know what you mean about the celebrations. I was watching the highlights and I saw that they were happy for me as well as for the goal, so that made me feel great. It shows that my team-mates have accepted me as part of the team. Sometimes you see a striker who scores goals and nobody goes to celebrate with them, but that really made me smile at home when I watched the game.

Would you ever consider moving back into midfield? You have the ball skills for it...

I keep trying to play in defence in training! But they all scream at me, “Go forward, go forward”. But I enjoy it. You never know. Many people start as strikers and then move to the midfield. My father was a striker and then he moved back to the defence. Maybe I’ll enjoy playing in the midfield when I’m 37 [mimes doddering about with a walking stick].

You’re a father yourself now – how has that changed your outlook on life?

Can you believe it? We have two kids in the house now – me and my daughter [one-year-old Dea]. I’m still learning. Sometimes I don’t know what I’m doing but at least I try. I’m having a great time. The crying’s a bit irritating sometimes, but we’ve all been there. I’ve got no complaints. As long as we all stay healthy as a family, I’m happy.

You do a lot of charity work for kids back in Bulgaria. How did you get involved in that?

I set up a foundation in my name and we work exclusively in Bulgaria. Here you have lots of famous faces, so you don’t need me. But Bulgaria is a small country and I try to use my name and whatever I can do to help. Especially for gifted kids – kids with special talents – because we have a lot of foundations for, say, sick kids, but I try to focus on those with talents, because in our country nobody is trying to help them succeed. I know how many people helped me to get where I am. It doesn’t matter if it’s sports or physics or acting, I try to help them.

Looking forward, what targets have you set yourself for the rest of the season?

My first target is to stay clear of injury. I think that’s the first target for everybody. So I work hard on our injury-prevention sessions with the coaches. And then you think about what you want to do in the season. Obviously, you‚d like to win everything, but it’s not easy, so you think about how you can help the team – score goals, make assists, as much as possible.

Finally, we all love your skills on the football pitch, but tell us something you’re rubbish at...

[laughs] Ha! Tennis! And golf! Everybody seems to love golf around here, but me? I stay away. I can’t hit the ball. I’m terrible!
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Good interview. I highlighted the parts I find interesting
I think Berba would be great in a midfield of 3. If he could keep up, even in a 2 man. I personally, would love to see him behind the strikers
 
I hope Berba's got broad shoulders, he'll have plenty of pressure on them in the next few months.
 
I've got a feeling he'll flourish further. He'll be a crowd favourite now Rooney has pissed in his pot. He'll thrive off the confidence.
 
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