Dimitar Berbatov | 2010/11 Performances

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Dude, no, if he's still here, a guy named EZee will be a very very close affiliate with Ekeke. Excuse me for speaking like that about a guy who's not around, but he's one of the Berba-haters that irritates me the most.
 
The Berbathon continues.

Berbatov hasn't magically gotten better "to prove the doubters wrong". He hasn't made some personal Oprah mental breakthrough the way Nani did. He's not suddenly putting in an increased amount of effort. He's the same player. Same touch. Same awareness. Same vision. Same workrate. He's just being allowed/asked to play further up the pitch. That is the only difference.

The increased degree of involvement, the apparent increase in effort, all stem from that one instruction: Play further up the pitch. He looks more involved because he's in positions where he's a viable threat option, hence he's getting passed to in places that get your blood pumping. In the same vein, he looks like he's trying harder because he's in forward positions where the midfielders are going to try and use him as an outlet, which they do, which means he has to work to get on the end of those passes.

Berba's journey(?) has been all about fitting into an attack that was for various reasons figureheaded by a single individual. It's rather like the way people calling Park a 'defensive winger' have suddenly and magically dropped off the face of the earth. Park's attacking skill set was ALWAYS this good. It's just that while Ronaldo was here he needed to play a different role for tactical and also team harmony reasons.

Same exact thing with Berba. First season it was painfully obvious he was asked to drop deep so as to stay out of Ronaldo's way. Don't clog up the box. On the team sheet, Ronnie's a winger. In practice, he's our entire attack, so don't mess it up. Feed him, get the hell out of the way, and once in a while take your scraps that fall from his table.

Season two - last season - was more of the same thing, except this time it was all about giving Rooney his due after three years of playing second-fiddle. Yeah, everyone and their grandma knew Rooney isn't the type of spotlight-enjoying player. But it had to be done to excise those media demons, and once again, Berba got sold short for the sake of team growth.

So if you want to go the touchy-feely route, you could say that Berba is finally being allowed to feel like a more important part of the attack. That may be part of the big picture, but in pure footballing spatial terms it's really just a matter of him being asked to get the hell out of the midfield and into the final third. Sort of a: "Go on now, enjoy yourself. You've earned it," from the coaching/managerial staff.
 
hungrywing said:
The Berbathon continues.

Berbatov hasn't magically gotten better "to prove the doubters wrong". He hasn't made some personal Oprah mental breakthrough the way Nani did. He's not suddenly putting in an increased amount of effort. He's the same player. Same touch. Same awareness. Same vision. Same workrate. He's just being allowed/asked to play further up the pitch. That is the only difference.

The increased degree of involvement, the apparent increase in effort, all stem from that one instruction: Play further up the pitch. He looks more involved because he's in positions where he's a viable threat option, hence he's getting passed to in places that get your blood pumping. In the same vein, he looks like he's trying harder because he's in forward positions where the midfielders are going to try and use him as an outlet, which they do, which means he has to work to get on the end of those passes.

Berba's journey(?) has been all about fitting into an attack that was for various reasons figureheaded by a single individual. It's rather like the way people calling Park a 'defensive winger' have suddenly and magically dropped off the face of the earth. Park's attacking skill set was ALWAYS this good. It's just that while Ronaldo was here he needed to play a different role for tactical and also team harmony reasons.

Same exact thing with Berba. First season it was painfully obvious he was asked to drop deep so as to stay out of Ronaldo's way. Don't clog up the box. On the team sheet, Ronnie's a winger. In practice, he's our entire attack, so don't mess it up. Feed him, get the hell out of the way, and once in a while take your scraps that fall from his table.

Season two - last season - was more of the same thing, except this time it was all about giving Rooney his due after three years of playing second-fiddle. Yeah, everyone and their grandma knew Rooney isn't the type of spotlight-enjoying player. But it had to be done to excise those media demons, and once again, Berba got sold short for the sake of team growth.

So if you want to go the touchy-feely route, you could say that Berba is finally being allowed to feel like a more important part of the attack. That may be part of the big picture, but in pure footballing spatial terms it's really just a matter of him being asked to get the hell out of the midfield and into the final third. Sort of a: "Go on now, enjoy yourself. You've earned it," from the coaching/managerial staff.
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I too don't think that suddenly Berbatov has become a different player. He's just being played a lot more on his strengths...
 
Ekeke said:
So you'd sign a contract to be put in a situation you arent comfortable with? Lets see where that gets you in life.

No of course he isnt that dumb, he will have realised that by doing the deal to become our most expensive player he would have to be playing brilliantly week in week out.

He could have told Spurs he would only sign for us. Plenty of other players have done that and gone for lesser fees. Particularly as that would knock City's bid out of the running. Didnt happen though, instead he travelled to have a medical with City. Its clear he wanted to join us instead but he didnt push it through like others have.

He could have waited one more season where Spurs would have less to barter with given the contract has a year less on it. Again lots of players do this to give themselves more power in determining their transfer and the money that comes with it.

In the end he had plenty of power to affect his transfer fee like most players. He chose not to take the specific actions to do so.

Contrast this with Rooney's recent incident. He told us he wanted to leave, at a time when his contract situation wasnt healthy and we didnt have much time to look for a replacement. Had Berbatov let himself get to a similar situation at Spurs his fee would have been a fair bit less and he'd have had more options
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So the fact that he didn't hold his previous club to ransom to get his way means it's his fault?
 
Yeah the whole 'he's only being used better' argument is half baked.

We mostly play with two strikers. And most of the time noone is being sacrificed for the teams growth. Those are just excuses. And poor ones. Rooney is playing deeper out of gte two these days but he's regularly getting chances only to miss them.

Same case with Berbatov last year. He was playing deeper but he was also a lot less clinical. Think the game against valencia and that was Berbatov in the past fairly regularly.

He has gotten better. His understanding with his teammates has improved immensely and hes been much more clinical player.
 
hungrywing said:
The Berbathon continues.

Berbatov hasn't magically gotten better "to prove the doubters wrong". He hasn't made some personal Oprah mental breakthrough the way Nani did. He's not suddenly putting in an increased amount of effort. He's the same player. Same touch. Same awareness. Same vision. Same workrate. He's just being allowed/asked to play further up the pitch. That is the only difference.
Click to expand...
Largely true, but you don't seem to have made any mention of confidence. He obviously is more confident and just generally happier about how things are going, and that extra confidence is making him perform better on the pitch.
 
hungrywing said:
The Berbathon continues.

Berbatov hasn't magically gotten better "to prove the doubters wrong". He hasn't made some personal Oprah mental breakthrough the way Nani did. He's not suddenly putting in an increased amount of effort. He's the same player. Same touch. Same awareness. Same vision. Same workrate. He's just being allowed/asked to play further up the pitch. That is the only difference.

.
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and that's what many here asked for.
 
amolbhatia100 said:
Yeah the whole 'he's only being used better' argument is half baked.

We mostly play with two strikers. And most of the time noone is being sacrificed for the teams growth. Those are just excuses. And poor ones. Rooney is playing deeper out of gte two these days but he's regularly getting chances only to miss them.

Same case with Berbatov last year. He was playing deeper but he was also a lot less clinical. Think the game against valencia and that was Berbatov in the past fairly regularly.

He has gotten better. His understanding with his teammates has improved immensely and hes been much more clinical player.
Click to expand...
It used to be that he plays really deep. He does gets chances, but it's like what Rooney is going through now. Berba right now is simply being played further ahead. He still miss chances, but the amount of chances he's gotten now is higher so he converts them a bit more than in the past.
 
A major change in him is playing without injury for the first time in a while. Same thing with Carrick. It's hard to imagine how playing through a knock will effect you, Evans, Carrick and Berba didn't look the same when they were carrying knocks.
 
Ekeke said:
Berbatov: "Eh I do that touch every day in training... I saw John O'Shea do it this morning... Why are they posting the dribbly face? Its almost as if they've never seen a professional footballer have a good touch before"
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I think you misunderstand the human personality here, not to mention the fact that, well, none of us get to see any of them in training.

Given the stick that Berbatov has got over the last two years, it's ludicrous to suggest he wouldn't want praise that is (debatably) over the top.

Not that this matters, mind. I just thought it was a fairly amusing point.
 
Ekeke said:
So you'd sign a contract to be put in a situation you arent comfortable with? Lets see where that gets you in life.

No of course he isnt that dumb, he will have realised that by doing the deal to become our most expensive player he would have to be playing brilliantly week in week out.

He could have told Spurs he would only sign for us. Plenty of other players have done that and gone for lesser fees. Particularly as that would knock City's bid out of the running. Didnt happen though, instead he travelled to have a medical with City. Its clear he wanted to join us instead but he didnt push it through like others have.

He could have waited one more season where Spurs would have less to barter with given the contract has a year less on it. Again lots of players do this to give themselves more power in determining their transfer and the money that comes with it.

In the end he had plenty of power to affect his transfer fee like most players. He chose not to take the specific actions to do so.

Contrast this with Rooney's recent incident. He told us he wanted to leave, at a time when his contract situation wasnt healthy and we didnt have much time to look for a replacement. Had Berbatov let himself get to a similar situation at Spurs his fee would have been a fair bit less and he'd have had more options
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Just because we were forced to pay £30m for Berbatov, that's nothing to do with him. He clearly wanted to join us ASAP, he wanted a chance to win things so once he got the chance, he was away. His price-tag is nothing to do with him whatsoever. To suggest otherwise is very silly.
 
hungrywing said:
The Berbathon continues.

Berbatov hasn't magically gotten better "to prove the doubters wrong". He hasn't made some personal Oprah mental breakthrough the way Nani did. He's not suddenly putting in an increased amount of effort. He's the same player. Same touch. Same awareness. Same vision. Same workrate. He's just being allowed/asked to play further up the pitch. That is the only difference.

The increased degree of involvement, the apparent increase in effort, all stem from that one instruction: Play further up the pitch. He looks more involved because he's in positions where he's a viable threat option, hence he's getting passed to in places that get your blood pumping. In the same vein, he looks like he's trying harder because he's in forward positions where the midfielders are going to try and use him as an outlet, which they do, which means he has to work to get on the end of those passes.

Berba's journey(?) has been all about fitting into an attack that was for various reasons figureheaded by a single individual. It's rather like the way people calling Park a 'defensive winger' have suddenly and magically dropped off the face of the earth. Park's attacking skill set was ALWAYS this good. It's just that while Ronaldo was here he needed to play a different role for tactical and also team harmony reasons.

Same exact thing with Berba. First season it was painfully obvious he was asked to drop deep so as to stay out of Ronaldo's way. Don't clog up the box. On the team sheet, Ronnie's a winger. In practice, he's our entire attack, so don't mess it up. Feed him, get the hell out of the way, and once in a while take your scraps that fall from his table.

Season two - last season - was more of the same thing, except this time it was all about giving Rooney his due after three years of playing second-fiddle. Yeah, everyone and their grandma knew Rooney isn't the type of spotlight-enjoying player. But it had to be done to excise those media demons, and once again, Berba got sold short for the sake of team growth.

So if you want to go the touchy-feely route, you could say that Berba is finally being allowed to feel like a more important part of the attack. That may be part of the big picture, but in pure footballing spatial terms it's really just a matter of him being asked to get the hell out of the midfield and into the final third. Sort of a: "Go on now, enjoy yourself. You've earned it," from the coaching/managerial staff.
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you sir are spot on
 
Wan said:
It used to be that he plays really deep. He does gets chances, but it's like what Rooney is going through now. Berba right now is simply being played further ahead. He still miss chances, but the amount of chances he's gotten now is higher so he converts them a bit more than in the past.
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Rooney is going through poor form in front of goal, not the misfortune of being played in a position that doesn't allow him to score. It help both of them score more goals playing further up (of course) but they're good enough to be quality players playing as the second striker, which Berbatov didn't do before.
 
Sky Sports | Manchester United News | Football | Premier League | Evra lauds Berba factor

I am very happy with Dimitar," Evra told the Daily Star. "He is working hard. He is a good guy and is different class."

Evra feels his training ground banter with the frontman is only strengthening his form, adding: "We argued a bit in training when he was missing a goal, but he said, 'Don't worry, I will score in the game' - and he showed me that.

"I am kidding when I say argue with him, but I keep moaning at him when he doesn't score and he moans at me when I miss a cross, or something like that.

"It is a joke between me and him."
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Can't hurt to have a good relationship with your teammates either. Think one of the strength of our team is so many little stories like this where the squad just seems to get along. Quite different from some of the other sides that are competing at the top.
 
I find it funny how it always seems to be Evra who's the one to come out with this sort of stuff. It seems almost as if the barometer of whether a player is now in form is whether Evra comes out and states that it is so in the media.

What a God.
 
Ekeke said:
If he wasnt comfortable being a £30 million player he wouldnt have signed the contract. He took on the challenge.

In today's game there are ways a player could make sure he wouldnt be anywhere near as expensive when he moves on. Bertbatov could have waited and run down his contract a bit like many others have. But he chose to go to United as soon as Spurs were willing to talk
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Ekeke said:
So you'd sign a contract to be put in a situation you arent comfortable with? Lets see where that gets you in life.

No of course he isnt that dumb, he will have realised that by doing the deal to become our most expensive player he would have to be playing brilliantly week in week out.

He could have told Spurs he would only sign for us. Plenty of other players have done that and gone for lesser fees. Particularly as that would knock City's bid out of the running. Didnt happen though, instead he travelled to have a medical with City. Its clear he wanted to join us instead but he didnt push it through like others have.

He could have waited one more season where Spurs would have less to barter with given the contract has a year less on it. Again lots of players do this to give themselves more power in determining their transfer and the money that comes with it.

In the end he had plenty of power to affect his transfer fee like most players. He chose not to take the specific actions to do so.

Contrast this with Rooney's recent incident. He told us he wanted to leave, at a time when his contract situation wasnt healthy and we didnt have much time to look for a replacement. Had Berbatov let himself get to a similar situation at Spurs his fee would have been a fair bit less and he'd have had more options
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Firstly, he's a very good player in his late 20s who has attracted interest from one of the biggest clubs in the world - that opportunity doesn't come around very often. The first thing in his mind would probably have been along the lines of being proud because both Manchester United and Sir Alex Ferguson - one of the greatest managers in the game - are interested in him and rate his ability in his chosen profession. He has always said one of his goals in life is to play at the highest level, and going to United would help him achieve this - the price would hardly be considered. If he had rejected the United's offer because it was "too high", Spurs would have kept him, and he could've picked up a career threatening injury meaning that United look elsewhere in the upcoming transfer windows - so his dreams are dashed. To counter this point, there are rumours that we had actually made a bid for him while he was at Leverkusen, but he had decided to join Spurs instead, and that we had made a bid the following summer but were told where to go. Maybe he did have some emotional attachment to Spurs and wanted them to get some decent money? I personally believe that to be a load of shit but then I'm just offering an alternative viewpoint to what you've said which most posters are disagreeing with. He might have also seen Spurs as a stepping stone to go onto bigger and better things, and he got his chance at United and that's what would've mattered to him.

Besides, Spurs were not going to accept anything lower than the price we ended up paying, as evidenced by the drama that played out on deadline day. So if he had said "Hey guys, I'm not leaving 'til you lower the fee" he would've stayed and United may have lost interest due to numerous reasons. Also, he may actually have told Spurs that he was only going to sign for us - there were no negotiations between City and Berbatov. In any case, Spurs' main issue was meeting a certain asking price, which City may have met but because he was more interested in coming to us, there was no 'price war' to be had. Levy had a price and the team/s that met it would be allowed to negotiate with Berbatov. It was just a case of us meeting that price, Spurs were not budging in the end it was done a short while before the deadline.

The Rooney comparison doesn't quite work either because Rooney has won every single trophy at club level and may have been looking for a new challenge, or he may just have wanted more money - which he ended up getting.

Edit - Also, since when has any player ever told their current club to lower their asking price so that he can play at his next club under less pressure. I mean, just think about how absurd that sounds! Levy would've laughed his bollocks off.
 
Eriku said:
Good goal but I don't know if it was worth 30 million pounds.
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It was a great goal.

No single goal is worth 30 million...unless we win the league with a goal difference of *** maybe.
 
On form and full of confidence, he's a brilliant player. Just wondering why he needed 2 seasons to show that kind of form
 
Berba's feckin magic
He wears a flash cravat (probably)
And when he saw Ekeke
He said 'av that you twat
Cos Dimi scored against Brum
And now he's hit the upright
Ekeke you're a feckin Ihni binni dimi diniwiny anitaime
And Berba's a bit alright

:D
 
SmashedHombre said:
Berba's feckin magic
He wears a flash cravat (probably)
And when he saw Ekeke
He said 'av that you twat
Cos Dimi scored against Brum
And now he's hit the upright
Ekeke you're a feckin Ihni binni dimi diniwiny anitaime
And Berba's a bit alright

:D
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Class
 
Class, our best player this season alongside Nani. Shame we can't have both out strikers in top form at the same time.
 
Brilliant Berbatov, the play before he shot onto the post was fecking awesome! Where's that thread talking shite about him now?
 
Last season was the season of Rooney, this season is the season of Berbatov. Hopefully next season will be the season of both of them playing well. Berbatov really is in great form for the past few months really.
 
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