Kevin De Bruyne

abdo99 said:
He is everything I hoped Mkhitaryan would be. It's amazing the way he lays the ball on a plate for Sane, Jesus and co. A strikers dream.
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Incredible really. The pass yesterday was about as flawless as it can get. Too much forward and Sane struggles to get in on his stride and too "inside" and the chance isn't half as good. The weight and the timing was ridiculous. The best thing about his passing is that he chooses the best option for his teammate, he could have played a lofted ball but on the ground is easier for Sane to control and go face the keeper.
 
When you have a player like that, he's worth 1.5 players simply because of his passing. It changes everything when the runner is able to trap a ball in full stride without adjusting. And he does it every time, he makes life easy for his partners, even makes above-average players shine. Only other player that comes close in the league in terms of passing is Ozil and Pogba on a very good day. He is far more consistent though.

Part of the 2 outfield players in this league that would walk into any team and improve it. Him and Kante.
 
Such passes must be nice for Sane, he hardly has to change pace or whatever, the weight on those balls is so fecking accurate.
 
DWelbz19 said:
He didn't 'carry' either titles. Costa was just as important in both, for instance.
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Costa went missing for half the season in both title runs, so if we’re going to pin that title on someone, Hazard would be ahead of Costa.

cyberman said:
Didn't KDB down tools at Chelsea when he couldn't get a game?
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Not at all

M18CTID said:
That's news to me. As far as I know, he spent the vast majority of his Chelsea career out on loan, and only ever made 3 appearances for them - one of them was a man of the match display against Hull on the opening day of the 2013-14 season. He was eventually sold to Wolfsburg in the January 2014 transfer window.

On a separate note, this may come as a surprise to some but I don't think Mourinho deserves too much criticism for letting him go. He was signed by Chelsea long before he returned as manager, farmed out on loan to Werder Bremen for a year before he even played a game for Chelsea, and Mourinho was the only manager who gave him any game time there plus he was sold on for a decent profit.
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Mourinho absolutely deserves all of the criticism. He made KDB the scapegoat after a MoTM performance at OT (I believe a boring draw, but still played similar to how he does today). He dropped him from the team when we needed his skill set desperately and then went on to publicly criticize his training acumen some time later. Most Chelsea fans, including myself, were very upset with how he handled him and Mata because they should’ve been playing ahead of Oscar and fecking Ramires/Andre Schurrle.
 
Feels like i come here every few days to say he is the best player in the league. Will win POTY quite comfortably. He is now for City what he was for Wolfsburg
 
Money well spent by City. They've spent lots of money on the right players. We've spent lots of money on the wrong players.
 
Bubz27 said:
Money well spent by City. They've spent lots of money on the right players. We've spent lots of money on the wrong players.
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I wouldn't say it is that black and white however it is rather odd why United didn't address the LB position.
 
Last weekend I kept reading about how amazing a couple of his passes were in setting up goals in City's 7-2 win. Yesterday there was a lot of internet wanking about his pass to Sane.

I then watched MOTD and saw them, and don't get me wrong, they were very good passes, but not really worthy of a massive wankathon. I guess the best compliment I can give him is that he does the obvious things very well. If he's in a good crossing position, he'll deliver a good ball in. If there's a gap to play a through ball, like yesterday's pass to Sane, he'll make it (though I thought that pass could have been cut out by the defender, it went right next to him). The dude has a good passing range, and at the moment seems consistent. I'd expect the likes of Mata and Herrera to be able to pass similarly, and for example Herrera's through ball to Rashford in the home game against Chelsea last season was more eye of a needle stuff than the de Bruyne pass.

In no way am I suggesting he's not a very good player, and I'm not for one minute suggesting Mata or Herrera are better than him, obviously right now they are playing quite a few levels below. But don't we all see these kinds of passes fairly regularly?

Good player, but a little less hyperbole needed.
 
VorZakone said:
I wouldn't say it is that black and white however it is rather odd why United didn't address the LB position.
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I genuinely do. This isn't the thread for it, but we go and spend £90m on Di Maria and Memphis, they spend it on Sane and De Bruyne.

They've spent money better than us. They have issues at fullback and go and buy the best available for premium prices while we convert wingers to fullbacks, and rotate Blind and Darmian there.
They have a problem with their GK, they rectify it the next summer, whilst Luke Shaw is here for his 4th season still waiting.

Their transfer strategy and execution is a hell of a lot better than ours. And they're reaping the benefits now.
 
Bubz27 said:
Money well spent by City. They've spent lots of money on the right players. We've spent lots of money on the wrong players.
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Yep.

If only we'd signed Hazard and De Bryne when they were available, instead of wasting millions on the likes of Kagawa, Mata, Falcao, Di Maria, Depay, Schweinsteiger, Schneidelin, Mhkitariyan etc.

SAF to blame as much an anyone for bottling it when Hazard was up for sale.
 
Bubz27 said:
Money well spent by City. They've spent lots of money on the right players. We've spent lots of money on the wrong players.
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Hmmm.

Nolito, bravo, Fernando, bony, mangala, Maicon , Sinclair, rodwell - of the complete mistakes in the last 5 years.

So not many, but enough. And plenty of so-so stuff.

It's more to do with motivating and energising the resources you have at your disposal.
E.g. Stones, Sterling, otamendi.

Can't say I've seen anything of United other than highlights, but the change in the playing ability of just the 3 players mentioned above is great - but it doesn't make the highlights reel.

So generally people still lump, say, Stones, with the highlights reels of last year and compare him with lindelof! Completely different player now.

KDB was never 'bad' he just went under the radar (as Silva has done for many years - to many).
This year his game has ticked up another notch, from a high starting point, so has become the media's bees knees.
 
djdhrubs said:
Last weekend I kept reading about how amazing a couple of his passes were in setting up goals in City's 7-2 win. Yesterday there was a lot of internet wanking about his pass to Sane.

I then watched MOTD and saw them, and don't get me wrong, they were very good passes, but not really worthy of a massive wankathon. I guess the best compliment I can give him is that he does the obvious things very well. If he's in a good crossing position, he'll deliver a good ball in. If there's a gap to play a through ball, like yesterday's pass to Sane, he'll make it (though I thought that pass could have been cut out by the defender, it went right next to him). The dude has a good passing range, and at the moment seems consistent. I'd expect the likes of Mata and Herrera to be able to pass similarly, and for example Herrera's through ball to Rashford in the home game against Chelsea last season was more eye of a needle stuff than the de Bruyne pass.

In no way am I suggesting he's not a very good player, and I'm not for one minute suggesting Mata or Herrera are better than him, obviously right now they are playing quite a few levels below. But don't we all see these kinds of passes fairly regularly?

Good player, but a little less hyperbole needed.
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Firstly, his pass last week to Sane was absolutely phenomenal. One of the best through balls I've ever seen. Reminded me of Kaka's to Crespo in that final. But better.

Secondly, Mata and Mikhi should be able to make those passes, but aren't. And Herrera's last year was a very good pass but I think anyone watching could see that pass. Few could actually pull it off, granted, but it was the clear pass on. De Bruyne's last week, I don't think the average viewer even saw that pass was on. He did, and then pulled it off.
 
JASR said:
Hmmm.

Nolito, bravo, Fernando, bony, mangala, Maicon , Sinclair, rodwell - of the complete mistakes in the last 5 years.

So not many, but enough. And plenty of so-so stuff.

It's more to do with motivating and energising the resources you have at your disposal.
E.g. Stones, Sterling, otamendi.

Can't say I've seen anything of United other than highlights, but the change in the playing ability of just the 3 players mentioned above is great - but it doesn't make the highlights reel.

So generally people still lump, say, Stones, with the highlights reels of last year and compare him with lindelof! Completely different player now.

KDB was never 'bad' he just went under the radar (as Silva has done for many years - to many).
This year his game has ticked up another notch, from a high starting point, so has become the media's bees knees.
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How many of those transfers were years and years ago?

Nolito and Bravo were recent mistakes, are either there now? Nope. Both issues rectified pretty quickly. That's props.

I agree though, since City have had their influx of money on the whole, they haven't spent well. But over the last 12-24 months they have, and they are reaping the benefits right now.

Fwiw, I still think they're an injury to Fernandinho away from being in trouble, but their attacking players might just overwhelm the majority of teams they face anyway.
 
sammsky1 said:
Yep.

If only we'd signed Hazard and De Bryne when they were available, instead of wasting millions on the likes of Kagawa, Mata, Falcao, Di Maria, Depay, Schweinsteiger, Schneidelin, Mhkitariyan etc.

SAF to blame as much an anyone for bottling it when Hazard was up for sale.
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I understand you cant sign all the players. But there's been many that have been obvious and we seemingly haven't even been interested.

We need a clearer vision of where we want to go and execute it.
 
Bubz27 said:
Firstly, his pass last week to Sane was absolutely phenomenal. One of the best through balls I've ever seen. Reminded me of Kaka's to Crespo in that final. But better.

Secondly, Mata and Mikhi should be able to make those passes, but aren't. And Herrera's last year was a very good pass but I think anyone watching could see that pass. Few could actually pull it off, granted, but it was the clear pass on. De Bruyne's last week, I don't think the average viewer even saw that pass was on. He did, and then pulled it off.
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I saw it, and expected it, before he played it. Good pass, but I've seen many passes like that. It was just a well disguised ball when you shape to shoot but pass it instead. Hell, I've seen Rooney play similar balls, I'm thinking of one through to Van Nistelrooy which didn't lead to a goal.

The Herrera one last season took me by surprise because of the speed of it. The ball had just broken to him in the middle of the park, a couple of seconds later it was played through the eye of a needle perfectly weighted, nice goal. I'm not even suggesting that through ball was worthy of massive wanking. It was a good incisive pass, that's it.

I'm probably being a bit harsh having lived through and seen our 90's era when we had several players capable of those kinds of passes, and so have higher expectations than most people. I kept reading words like 'sensational, unreal, astonishing' when reading about his pass last week. I'm sorry but I wasn't blown away when I saw it.
 
djdhrubs said:
I saw it, and expected it, before he played it. Good pass, but I've seen many passes like that. It was just a well disguised ball when you shape to shoot but pass it instead. Hell, I've seen Rooney play similar balls, I'm thinking of one through to Van Nistelrooy which didn't lead to a goal.

The Herrera one last season took me by surprise because of the speed of it. The ball had just broken to him in the middle of the park, a couple of seconds later it was played through the eye of a needle perfectly weighted, nice goal. I'm not even suggesting that through ball was worthy of massive wanking. It was a good incisive pass, that's it.

I'm probably being a bit harsh having lived through and seen our 90's era when we had several players capable of those kinds of passes, and so have higher expectations than most people. I kept reading words like 'sensational, unreal, astonishing' when reading about his pass last week. I'm sorry but I wasn't blown away when I saw it.
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I think you're in the minority then, which kind of proves the point.

However, I agree with your general point. Things are a bit OTT regarding him and them. They're doing the business but it's so early yet.
 
Bubz27 said:
They've spent money better than us. They have issues at fullback and go and buy the best available for premium prices while we convert wingers to fullbacks, and rotate Blind and Darmian there.
They have a problem with their GK, they rectify it the next summer, whilst Luke Shaw is here for his 4th season still waiting.

Their transfer strategy and execution is a hell of a lot better than ours. And they're reaping the benefits now.
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Their transfer strategy is different to ours as they are run a different way. If club A says they want £50 Million for a player they pay it straight away. We on the other hand are run as a business so everything is negotiated. Many clubs are insulted by our stance in negotiations. They see us sold out every game & posting record revenues, yet we quibble over £10 Million here or there.


sammsky1 said:
Yep.

If only we'd signed Hazard and De Bryne when they were available, instead of wasting millions on the likes of Kagawa, Mata, Falcao, Di Maria, Depay, Schweinsteiger, Schneidelin, Mhkitariyan etc.

SAF to blame as much an anyone for bottling it when Hazard was up for sale.
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Think SAF sunk the Hazard deal due to not wanting to pay agent fees. You have to respect the man for this. We could have gone down the City route & paid highly inflated fees for every player that crossed our path. This would have distorted the market for every other club.
 
Dept3942 said:
Their transfer strategy is different to ours as they are run a different way. If club A says they want £50 Million for a player they pay it straight away. We on the other hand are run as a business so everything is negotiated. Many clubs are insulted by our stance in negotiations. They see us sold out every game & posting record revenues, yet we quibble over £10 Million here or there.




Think SAF sunk the Hazard deal due to not wanting to pay agent fees. You have to respect the man for this. We could have gone down the City route & paid highly inflated fees for every player that crossed our path. This would have distorted the market for every other club.
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Us being run as a business may hinder our performance as a football club at some point.
 
Dept3942 said:
We on the other hand are run as a business so everything is negotiated.

We could have gone down the City route & paid highly inflated fees for every player that crossed our path. This would have distorted the market for every other club.
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Still believing that City aren't a business. Heyho.

Still believing City are to blame for distorting the market.
In the years that City got Jesus for 22m and united got pogba for 98m. Heyho again.
 
JASR said:
Still believing that City aren't a business. Heyho.

Still believing City are to blame for distorting the market.
In the years that City got Jesus for 22m and united got pogba for 98m. Heyho again.
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The only people who believe City are a sustainable business is City fans. This should tell you everything you need to know.

Your figures on Jesus are wrong as the figure is £31 Million. Signing 1 bargain doesn't absolve you though. Spending nearly £150 Million on CB's like Ottamendi, Mangala & Stones means that Lindelof commands £31 Million. A total distortion of the market. You are only £5 Million out on the Pogba fee so i'll let it slide. It's not distorting the market if you are paying for quality though. I'm also pretty certain City were waiting in the wings driving up the price.
 
Dept3942 said:
Their transfer strategy is different to ours as they are run a different way. If club A says they want £50 Million for a player they pay it straight away. We on the other hand are run as a business so everything is negotiated. Many clubs are insulted by our stance in negotiations. They see us sold out every game & posting record revenues, yet we quibble over £10 Million here or there.
.
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That's just blatantly rubbish, if that was the case we'd have signed Evans and Sanchez without any problems, we'd have probably been in for pogba but he was too expensive for us. The deals for Walker and Mendy took an age with all the quibbling over a million new and there
 
Dept3942 said:
The only people who believe City are a sustainable business is City fans. This should tell you everything you need to know.

Your figures on Jesus are wrong as the figure is £31 Million. Signing 1 bargain doesn't absolve you though. Spending nearly £150 Million on CB's like Ottamendi, Mangala & Stones means that Lindelof commands £31 Million. A total distortion of the market. You are only £5 Million out on the Pogba fee so i'll let it slide. It's not distorting the market if you are paying for quality though. I'm also pretty certain City were waiting in the wings driving up the price.
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And, City's accountants and Uefa's FFP auditors who monitor City's accounts. Not to mention City's owners and the Chinese consortium who bought 13% of City recently. Plus anyone who writes for a serious publication that comments on football finances. The question you should be asking is: 'who doesn't believe City are a sustainable business?'
 
Dept3942 said:
The only people who believe City are a sustainable business is City fans. This should tell you everything you need to know.

Your figures on Jesus are wrong as the figure is £31 Million. Signing 1 bargain doesn't absolve you though. Spending nearly £150 Million on CB's like Ottamendi, Mangala & Stones means that Lindelof commands £31 Million. A total distortion of the market. You are only £5 Million out on the Pogba fee so i'll let it slide. It's not distorting the market if you are paying for quality though. I'm also pretty certain City were waiting in the wings driving up the price.
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Ok.

Jesus is 28m on TM.
I couldnt remember if 22 or 26 when I originally wrote. My bad.

Pogba is 94.5m on TM. Fine, my memory is out by half a jizzjazz.

I'll give you Mangala, as I've already mentioned him in another reply.
You've clearly not seen Stones and Ottamendi other than a highlights reel from last year.

You can't complain about an inflated Lindelof when Bailly only cost 4m more.

You really can't complain about others inflating prices, when a defender was bought for 34m 15 years ago, before the staggering amount of money washing around from TV has increased by so much.

I'm unsure what business acumen you have, but generally posting a profit is a good sign (2 years and counting).
Again, I'll give you the early years of the ADUG investment, as a long term strategy which clearly couldn't involve making money in the beginning, due to starting with a vehicle a month away from administration/bankruptcy.
Clearly they saw the longterm profit potential, being realized now.


Dragging it back slightly OT:
KDB was initially a shock at the price, despite the plaudits from Wolfsburg. his 1st year was a bit stop/start, lacking confidence and also City in general had become distracted by the future Pep arrival/pellegrini departure.
Last year things started to settle, but Pep played umpteen different formations after the initial unbelievable start, so again he was unsettled in his positions.
This year, the formations have been generally static, with KDB deeper and roaming a bit.

Seems to be working.
 
JASR said:
Ok.

Jesus is 28m on TM.
I couldnt remember if 22 or 26 when I originally wrote. My bad.

Pogba is 94.5m on TM. Fine, my memory is out by half a jizzjazz.

I'll give you Mangala, as I've already mentioned him in another reply.
You've clearly not seen Stones and Ottamendi other than a highlights reel from last year.

You can't complain about an inflated Lindelof when Bailly only cost 4m more.

You really can't complain about others inflating prices, when a defender was bought for 34m 15 years ago, before the staggering amount of money washing around from TV has increased by so much.

I'm unsure what business acumen you have, but generally posting a profit is a good sign (2 years and counting).
Again, I'll give you the early years of the ADUG investment, as a long term strategy which clearly couldn't involve making money in the beginning, due to starting with a vehicle a month away from administration/bankruptcy.
Clearly they saw the longterm profit potential, being realized now.


Dragging it back slightly OT:
KDB was initially a shock at the price, despite the plaudits from Wolfsburg. his 1st year was a bit stop/start, lacking confidence and also City in general had become distracted by the future Pep arrival/pellegrini departure.
Last year things started to settle, but Pep played umpteen different formations after the initial unbelievable start, so again he was unsettled in his positions.
This year, the formations have been generally static, with KDB deeper and roaming a bit.

Seems to be working.
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This is such nonsense. How do you know De Bruyne was lacking confidence? Why do you assume this? He's just had a fantastic 14/15 season at Wolfsburg and deserved a big transfer. His first season was decent to good (some vital goals in the CL too), no need to make up reasons why he didn't have the form he has now. It's normal to improve form in consecutive seasons.
 
Pete Dahh Sneak said:
Costa went missing for half the season in both title runs, so if we’re going to pin that title on someone, Hazard would be ahead of Costa.



Not at all



Mourinho absolutely deserves all of the criticism. He made KDB the scapegoat after a MoTM performance at OT (I believe a boring draw, but still played similar to how he does today). He dropped him from the team when we needed his skill set desperately and then went on to publicly criticize his training acumen some time later. Most Chelsea fans, including myself, were very upset with how he handled him and Mata because they should’ve been playing ahead of Oscar and fecking Ramires/Andre Schurrle.
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Cheers for clarifying mate. I wasn't aware that he played in that early season game at Old Trafford and wrongly assumed his 3 appearances were spread over the first few months of that season prior to being sold.
 
VorZakone said:
This is such nonsense. How do you know De Bruyne was lacking confidence? Why do you assume this? He's just had a fantastic 14/15 season at Wolfsburg and deserved a big transfer. His first season was decent to good (some vital goals in the CL too), no need to make up reasons why he didn't have the form he has now. It's normal to improve form in consecutive seasons.
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This.

The historical revisionism sometimes is incredible. He came from an absolutely outstanding Wolfsburg season, scoring and assisting at a high rate. What City paid, even back then, was very reasonable for the quality he would bring to the team immediately.

To those stating that other people could make passes like De Bruyne does. If they could, they would. Since they don't, we'll have to assume they can't, at least on any consistent level.
De Bruyne is doing it time and time and time again. The right angle, right choice, and most importantly the right weight. Someone likened his passing to Laudrup and that would a very good comparison indeed.
 
This guy still not injured?

The difference with him playing and not playing will soon be very apparent to everyone.
 
Almost forgot it was Mourinho who sold him to Wolfsburgh. In highsight that was the best thing that could happen to his career but also serves as an indictment of how difficult it is for creative players to flourish under Mourinho.
 
Jagga7 said:
Almost forgot it was Mourinho who sold him to Wolfsburgh. In highsight that was the best thing that could happen to his career but also serves as an indictment of how difficult it is for creative players to flourish under Mourinho.
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Fairly sure Mourinho wanted the club to take a lesser fee but install a buyback clause into his contract. Mourinho wanted him to stay/loan, KDB wanted a move, club wanted big money (Which they got).

It's the same with Lakuku. Lakuku genuinely wanted to move for footballing reasons but Jose wanted him to stay. Yet with people keep mentioning Jose selling both as if he was a mad man and didn't see they had talent.
 
Trizy said:
Fairly sure Mourinho wanted the club to take a lesser fee but install a buyback clause into his contract. Mourinho wanted him to stay/loan, KDB wanted a move, club wanted big money (Which they got).

It's the same with Lakuku. Lakuku genuinely wanted to move for footballing reasons but Jose wanted him to stay. Yet with people keep mentioning Jose selling both as if he was a mad man and didn't see they had talent.
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It's not about being a 'madman', but it's easy for Mourinho to say he wants such players to stay. Every coach wants players available for him to pick and choose.

The fact is, both Lukaku and De Bruyne decided to leave a Mourinho-managed club because they realized Mourinho wasn't prepared to give them enough playing time. They made the right decision, too, and that such absolute top players were lost to their club is on Mourinho. He did Chelsea FC a disservice in both cases.

I might also add that in both cases, Mourinho played the "they were not willing to compete, and thus not mentally up to a top club" card in order to save face, questioning both their professional attitudes.
You might have heard that from him also in his recent time at Man United with some players.
 
Trizy said:
Fairly sure Mourinho wanted the club to take a lesser fee but install a buyback clause into his contract. Mourinho wanted him to stay/loan, KDB wanted a move, club wanted big money (Which they got).

It's the same with Lakuku. Lakuku genuinely wanted to move for footballing reasons but Jose wanted him to stay. Yet with people keep mentioning Jose selling both as if he was a mad man and didn't see they had talent.
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Mourinho would have sold KDB was he was 23-24, if he thought KDB was good enough he would have played him. I just think it shows its difficult for players similar to KDB to flourish under Mourinho.
 
Jagga7 said:
Almost forgot it was Mourinho who sold him to Wolfsburgh. In highsight that was the best thing that could happen to his career but also serves as an indictment of how difficult it is for creative players to flourish under Mourinho.
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It really was a great move to get away from the control of Mourinho. It allowed his career to flourish.
 
Cristiano Lell said:
It's not about being a 'madman', but it's easy for Mourinho to say he wants such players to stay. Every coach wants players available for him to pick and choose.

The fact is, both Lukaku and De Bruyne decided to leave a Mourinho-managed club because they realized Mourinho wasn't prepared to give them enough playing time. They made the right decision, too, and that such absolute top players were lost to their club is on Mourinho. He did Chelsea FC a disservice in both cases.

I might also add that in both cases, Mourinho played the "they were not willing to compete, and thus not mentally up to a top club" card in order to save face, questioning both their professional attitudes.
You might have heard that from him also in his recent time at Man United with some players.
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All Chelsea's own fault. If you only keep your managers for 2-3 years they aren't going to take a long term view. Why should they?
 
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