[ROFLUTION]

he does seem to give the team an aura of strength compared to maguires nervousness.

It’s hard to put a finger on what’s so different but I think he’s been playing with so much tension/nervous energy it spreads through out the team. Nobody could take him seriously as the captain like that either.

To me it’s just energy and passion. no need to categorize it as tension/nervous energy imo.

italian defenders plays like this too.

 

[Steve 007]

Walking away with two man if the match awards two games in a row isn’t bad. Of course he’ll cost the odd goal when out jumped on a cross but most defenders do. He’s tenacious and intelligent.

 

[hmchan]

Came across? Their was litteraly one yard between Varane and Adams when the ball where at it heighest. Varane «dropped off» (as he should have), while Martinez «attacked the ball». Varane was right behind Adams when the ball hit his chest. However, Varane was very passive and allowed Adams to turn and take a shot. In that situation, it was Varanes job to prevent Adams from being able to turn around and take a shot.

It is not a big thing, but if it where the other way around, I’m sure people would say that Martinez lack of physical presence was why he did not defend more aggressive in the back of Adams.

And why are we pretending that Martinez being pushed in the back is something that could not have happened to a bigger CB? It seem so obvious that quite a few in here has made up there mind and are looking for situation to prove the narrative they have devided to believe in. This situation is a great example.

Very little talk about Varane letting Aribo having a free header from 12 yards in 65th minute. Would have been quite different if it was Martinez.

Martinez "tried to" attack the long ball and he failed. It was another discussion whether this was due to a lack of height or misjudgement. My point was the complete aerial dominance suggested by the "5/5 aerial duels" stat had been flawed and delusive. There were also moments where he backed off and allowed Adams to control long balls comfortably, which again not counted as duels and easily overlooked.

As in many discussions on this forum, people start to twist your words and drag more subjects after pages of discussion. I can't emphasize enough Martinez was solid overall apart from this apparent weakness. I also don't think Varane had a good game at all. So are we going to talk about the rest of the players on the pitch one by one (including the Saints CB pair who actually deserved MOM), or just stick to the topic of this thread?

I guess Hasenhüttl is one of those who "has made up his mind and looked for situation to prove the narrative", which explains why almost every long ball from Bazunu was heading towards Martinez's direction. Why are we pretending that this is not a weakness in our team and opponents are exploiting it? No one is perfect, especially after all those CBs we have tried over the years, we just need to find a way to complement his weakness.

 

[andersj]

Martinez "tried to" attack the long ball and he failed. It was another discussion whether this was due to a lack of height or misjudgement. My point was the complete aerial dominance suggested by the "5/5 aerial duels" stat had been flawed and delusive. There were also moments where he backed off and allowed Adams to control long balls comfortably, which again not counted as duels and easily overlooked.

As in many discussions on this forum, people start to twist your words and drag more subjects after pages of discussion. I can't emphasize enough Martinez was solid overall apart from this apparent weakness. I also don't think Varane had a good game at all. So are we going to talk about the rest of the players on the pitch one by one (including the Saints CB pair who actually deserved MOM), or just stick to the topic of this thread?

I guess Hasenhüttl is one of those who "has made up his mind and looked for situation to prove the narrative", which explains why almost every long ball from Bazunu was heading towards Martinez's direction. Why are we pretending that this is not a weakness in our team and opponents are exploiting it? No one is perfect, especially after all those CBs we have tried over the years, we just need to find a way to complement his weakness.

I dont disagree. But the reason he was so aggressive in a situation where that risk was always likely was his trust in Varane. Who was right there, but chose to be very passive. I think that is quite relevant information in a team game. If you are EtH you are alot more likely to ask Varane what happened their, than Martinez. But we are still discussing this in the Martinez-thread.

I’m not a fan of aerial stats either. The stats of players like Roy Keane, Cannavaro, Ayala would be inferior to for instance Chris Smalling. But «winning» an aerial challenge against Roy Keane did not give you a good chance of scoring as he would put you out of balance while heading.

I’m sure teams will continue to target Martinez with long balls. So far, three teams have tried without succeeding to hurt us with that approach.

 

[RC89]

Immense. 24 years old.

We might actually have robbed Ajax

It may be that Ajax understood better than our resident experts just how good he was. It's early days but if this is his level 8/10 games then the £57m will look very good value given his age.

 

[roonster09]

This

How dare an opposition striker win even 1 or plays. Mind you, the same folks will crucify our attackers for NOT coming out on top for the same.

It's hilarious, few have made up their mind before the ball was even kicked, then they confirmed their bias when pundits spouted nonsense after first two games. Now they are moaning about minor details.

 

[florisW]

It's hilarious, few have made up their mind before the ball was even kicked, then they confirmed their bias when pundits spouted nonsense after first two games. Now they are moaning about minor details.

No one likes to be wrong, especially not the media. They try to take things out of context and sell it as if they have a monopoly on the truth. Cause who would believe them if they are consistently wrong?

 

[Bestietom]

He done his job well and deserved MOM award, He is a warrior and a leader and we need more like him.

 

[DJ_21]

We owe LVG an apology… he warned us of timber so we could get the better CB instead. Thanks LVG for telling timber not to join us because now we have a warrior in defence!

 

[Red the Bear]

We owe LVG an apology… he warned us of timber so we could get the better CB instead. Thanks LVG for telling timber not to join us because now we have a warrior in defence!

Definitely, I felt relieved when we gone for this lad instead.

I have no idea why Eric was so set on snatching up timber.

 

[JJ12]

Probably already my favourite player, love the way he plays the game.

 

[Kill 'em all]

I have more confidence in Martinez winning any kind of defensive duel than a 6 ft 4 Maguire.

 

[Ekeke]

I don't see how this post is relevant to the argument that I made??

I never said being tall was the important thing, being good in the air and able to win aerial duels is the important thing. Varane is good at this as is Maguire (defensively, not talking about attacking headers). Lindelof and Bailly are not, and Martinez is certainly not up to Maguire or Varane's level either. We don't need to pretend otherwise. Anyone who watched the Brighton and Brentford matches could tell you he may struggle at times with physical hold up strikers in a way some of our other defenders might not.

Lisandro won the ball more in the air than Varane yesterday. He took responsibility of that. So yes, in that match he was better at it

 

[Ekeke]

A lot have been saying both. Trust me mate, you're not unique in that view that he is someone that doesn't like to engage/defend. Check any old performance threads.



If it was Lindelof, trust me the comments would be different. Criticising Martinez for being slow on the ball? Madness. If Lindelof had this game, his Swede counterparts would be raving all over like he's the second coming.

Their forwards were pressing and blocking any central lanes, our CMs were marked and they were baiting us to pass out high and wide to our full backs. Holding onto the ball wasn't due to being slow, it's as you said, there wasn't any obvious or good risk-to-reward passes.

So now you're moving the goalposts. I quoted myself, and now you're changing it to "engage"

 

[tenpoless]

You can tell he is very strong because players with 1.5 times the size of him just falls over whenever he challenges them.

 

[Tiki-Taka]

To me it’s just energy and passion. no need to categorize it as tension/nervous energy imo.

italian defenders plays like this too.

I think he was describing Maguire being tense and nervous.

 

[A-man]

It's hilarious, few have made up their mind before the ball was even kicked, then they confirmed their bias when pundits spouted nonsense after first two games. Now they are moaning about minor details.

This reminds of AWB’s first season. I wrote a post that because of his tackles and hard style, people didn’t see his flaws (positioning, awareness, ball handling). People told me I was wrong and that he was the best full back in Europe.

Martinez does many good things, but his flaws are not just minor details imo.

 

[UnrelatedPsuedo]

He wasn't as good as Varane yesterday. People are going overboard in their hype, I thought Adams had his number for most of the game.

Adams did not have his number.

 

[roonster09]

This reminds of AWB’s first season. I wrote a post that because of his tackles and hard style, people didn’t see his flaws (positioning, awareness, ball handling). People told me I was wrong and that he was the best full back in Europe.

Martinez does many good things, but his flaws are not just minor details imo.

Dude you argue as if Lindelof is some Maldini, calm down.

 

[DJ_21]

Definitely, I felt relieved when we gone for this lad instead.

I have no idea why Eric was so set on snatching up timber.

A bit of a weird one… I always thought martinez was the better defender. Maybe he seen timber as a better prospect as he’s a few years younger. Glad we have this guy now though.

 

[andersj]

This reminds of AWB’s first season. I wrote a post that because of his tackles and hard style, people didn’t see his flaws (positioning, awareness, ball handling). People told me I was wrong and that he was the best full back in Europe.

Martinez does many good things, but his flaws are not just minor details imo.

The difference is that Martinez, in terms of positioning, awareness and ability on the ball, is by a distance our best defender. A bit too small and lightweight, but a minor issue compared to some of the flaws of the other CBs.

 

[DJ_21]

Probably already my favourite player, love the way he plays the game.

He’s a typical argentine defender, there aggressive, rojo was the same but he was more unreliable, whenever he went in for a challenge there was a chance it would be a red

 

[Desert Eagle]

Not sure it matters much. He’s been doing very well, but people can watch him get pushed about all month and if at the end, the ‘arial duel’ stat says 100%, that will be all that matters. Again, he’s done fantastically well, but if Opta didn’t exist, people would have been concerned about how he was easily nudged aside by Adams to enable him to get a shot off. Turns out, it didn’t count as an arial duel and seemingly doesn’t fit into any metric, so can be deleted and overlooked completely.

No matter which way anyone wants to look at it, it cannot be dismissed as a disadvantage that an opponent is taller and stronger than him, especially when considering arial attacks. Thankfully, he has several other qualities, and the average PL centre forward is probably the same height as him anyway these days. That said, I wouldn’t get too caught up on the arial duel thing. If any tweet produces a number which suggests he’s been 100% dominant with the ball above the ground, anyone who has watched the games can tell that is obviously misleading to a degree. It would be better if he were 6ft, let’s not pretend that it wouldn’t be. It’s unlikely Ben Mee scores against us if he were Maguire, for instance.

With Martinez, I think the more we progress as a team, the less relevant his physical limitations will be. We need to play in the right areas more often, in the opponent’s half, away from out goal and predominantly in possession. Then you will really see the best of him. Barcelona in their prime would not have suffered against Stoke because Stoke would only get near their box 3 times a game. Their arial advantage is almost irrelevant on the halfway line, as they would struggle to engineer any second ball into a foray into the box from there. The whole team has a responsibility to protect the defence, and it starts with how we keep the ball ourselves. Height isn’t THAT important, not because it is irrelevant whether or not defenders are smaller than opponents, but because most of the defending that needs to be done doesn’t rely upon those gifts. But on the occasions they do, it can of course become a problem. People are talking as if there is no difference between Martinez and Maguire in the air because some tweets say the right things though, which is of course untrue if you watch a game of football.

Good post in this quagmire of a thread( at least the last page or two) .
I like Martinez a lot but lets not pretend he doesn't have flaws. Made a huge mistake yesterday that could have cost us as well.

 

[Red the Bear]

A bit of a weird one… I always thought martinez was the better defender. Maybe he seen timber as a better prospect as he’s a few years younger. Glad we have this guy now though.

Perhaps he was planning to shift timber to midfield and he's generally more versatile but other than that he doesn't have much going for him compared to lisandro.

Very happy how this turned out.

 

[ForeverRed1]

He has exactly the kind of grit and steel this team has needed for so long. Hoping Casemiro will be cut from the same cloth as we need more of this in the squad.

with players like Bruno and hopefully Antony coming (wind up merchants) it will make us unpleasant to play against for any opposition.

we have been too easy for too long.

love him.

 

[Teja]

He wasn't as good as Varane yesterday. People are going overboard in their hype, I thought Adams had his number for most of the game.

Adams was generally bullying everybody in tje backline. Their go-to ball was direct to RW where they had Adams v Malacia and Martinez.

We won the second ball a few times but he kept possession quite a bit too.

 

[phelans shorts]

He’s a typical argentine defender, there aggressive, rojo was the same but he was more unreliable, whenever he went in for a challenge there was a chance it would be a red

Fun fact, in 76 premier league appearances Marcos Rojo received a grand total of 0 red cards.

I don’t have the European/Cup stats available to hand but I think he only got 1 in his entire time here. The perception was wildly out.

 

[little.triangles]

This reminds of AWB’s first season. I wrote a post that because of his tackles and hard style, people didn’t see his flaws (positioning, awareness, ball handling). People told me I was wrong and that he was the best full back in Europe.

Martinez does many good things, but his flaws are not just minor details imo.

Challenge you to find one post on Redcafe that called AWB the best full back in Europe.

Comparing Martinez to AWB is ridiculous . Have you ever seen AWB play a quick forward pass the way Martinez did to Elanga to set up the first goal against Liverpool?

 

[abailey123]

I love his energy. It’s infectious for the remainder of the team and his passion when one of the other defenders makes a clearance or De Gea makes a save, the defenders in the space of a week have gone from looking like they’ve never played together in their lives to looking like a unit and collectively celebrating blocks, saves and clearances.

Martinez is everything you’d want in a modern day centre half, he’s aggressive, competitive and his ball playing ability is outstanding, he splits lines with his passes.

With every game it’s looking like we’ve got a bargain here.

 

[Bossi]

We owe LVG an apology… he warned us of timber so we could get the better CB instead. Thanks LVG for telling timber not to join us because now we have a warrior in defence!

Both Timber and Martinez are incredible. But with Varane healthy a Varane - Martinez partnership is far superior than a Timber - Maguire one.

I'm happy to see you rate him, he was our player of the year for a reason. But so far his best ability has yet to be unlocked because you do not play out from the back (yet).

A strong proactive goalkeeper should be a huge upgrade for your backline. A goalkeeper that commands his box which means you can lose aerial battles that pose little threat and the ones that are expected to more dangerous will now be sweeped up by the keeper. Onana was excellent for us in this. Also a goalkeeper that can pass out will help for obvious reasons so Martinez can pass more between the lines which is his strongest ability (not at Daley Blind levels but still excellent).

But until then he is going to be fine and will do a job but I expect him to level up once your team starts to take more shape.

Also aerial stats are a bit useless without context. Would need to see aerial duels won/lost that lead to expected chances.

No problem to lose an aerial duel that leads to nowhere for the 'winner' of the duel. But if you don't contest or lose the ones that do lead to direct danger it is a suboptimal strategy.

So you can win 90% of non dangerous aerial duels but lose the 10% that count or lose 90% non dangerous aerial duels and win the 10% that count. You still prefer the latter even though the official stats are much worse.

This is more in general since height and aeriel stats are suddenly such a hot topic. Not to mention 'aeriel' is very annoying to spell so can't wait for this little saga to end.

 

[Adam-Utd]

To me it’s just energy and passion. no need to categorize it as tension/nervous energy imo.

italian defenders plays like this too.

I meant maguire has the tension/nerves. recently he plays with a ghost like look on his face. It’s difficult as I know he can be a good player but his form has been a disaster lately. ETH is doing the right thing keeping him out of the side for a while.

 

[hmchan]

He’s a typical argentine defender, there aggressive, rojo was the same but he was more unreliable, whenever he went in for a challenge there was a chance it would be a red

Rojo, Funes-Mori, Romero...Argentine defenders lose their head easily, but not Martinez.

 

[ROFLUTION]

I meant maguire has the tension/nerves. recently he plays with a ghost like look on his face. It’s difficult as I know he can be a good player but his form has been a disaster lately. ETH is doing the right thing keeping him out of the side for a while.

Ah! Yeah the difference in their body language is quite big. Maguire seems resignated and completely without confidence in that aspect. You can really tell the defence has needed a (vocal) leader.

 

[Red_Mancunia]

What a player.
Tenacity, physicality, passing, positioning, reading and understanding the game.
An offensive defender. We surely missed a player like him.
Already a fan.

 

[Red-17]

Lisandro won the ball more in the air than Varane yesterday. He took responsibility of that. So yes, in that match he was better at it

I don't think counting type stats over one match are a great way of evaluating something like aerial ability. If you want to think that Martinez is better aerially then Varane, then fine, I'm not going to try and argue with you.

 

[Red-17]

The difference is that Martinez, in terms of positioning, awareness and ability on the ball, is by a distance our best defender. A bit too small and lightweight, but a minor issue compared to some of the flaws of the other CBs.

He made an error yesterday in terms of "awareness" when he let the ball run through when the striker was always getting there before De Gea, and it could have cost us a goal. I just don't think we need to over exaggerate how good our new players are as seems to be tradition. Not at all saying he is going to be a flop, but so many of these same things have been ignored with the likes of Darmian, Wan Bissaka, Maguire, Bailly and plenty of others only for people to start to realize them the more they watch them.

It is just a fact that teams have directed long balls almost entirely toward our left side so far this season, and we don't really know how much success there will be for them doing that, but he is certainly weaker in that area than the average center back.

 

[Ekeke]

I don't think counting type stats over one match are a great way of evaluating something like aerial ability. If you want to think that Martinez is better aerially then Varane, then fine, I'm not going to try and argue with you.

I think it is, especially when we're a team that conceeded too many set piece goals in Varane's time here (and before) and with Maguire in that backline since he signed. Its simply a fact that we were too weak defensively and we did better for this one match in isolation, where Lisandro was in and won the joint most headers (5) on the pitch alongside the impressive Balla-Kotchap. If you cant see that having 5 aerials and 7 clearances out of the backline, the most of any defender on the pitch and 2nd only to McTom with 8, means that Lisandro took on the challenge of of dealing with most of the aerial balls and had plenty of success then you dont know what you're talking about.

Vidic used to do the same thing next to Rio, he would go for balls that Rio could have gone for but he was an aggressive CB who wanted the challenge of winning the ball in the air so he did it while his CB partner took up a position covering behind. Thats what Varane did this game.

 

[Red-17]

I think it is, especially when we're a team that conceeded too many set piece goals in Varane's time here (and before) and with Maguire in that backline since he signed. Its simply a fact that we were too weak defensively and we did better for this one match in isolation, where Lisandro was in and won the joint most headers (5) on the pitch alongside the impressive Balla-Kotchap. If you cant see that having 5 aerials and 7 clearances out of the backline, the most of any defender on the pitch and 2nd only to McTom with 8, means that Lisandro took on the challenge of of dealing with most of the aerial balls and had plenty of success then you dont know what you're talking about.

Vidic used to do the same thing next to Rio, he would go for balls that Rio could have gone for but he was an aggressive CB who wanted the challenge of winning the ball in the air so he did it while his CB partner took up a position covering behind. Thats what Varane did this game.

I think you are mis-remembering last season. We were 4th best in the league only conceeding 6 set piece goals last season. only Chelsea, City, and Wolves were better. The season before was when we were disasterous. The addition of Varane in place of Lindelof for when he was available was a clear upgrade, and the addition of Ronaldo also likely helped. We also hired a set piece coach who may have contributed too.

I think it is also kind of silly given that the one set piece goal we conceded against Brentford was at least partly the fault of Martinez not winning a duel against Ben Mee.

 

[Ekeke]

I think you are mis-remembering last season. We were 4th best in the league only conceeding 6 set piece goals last season. only Chelsea, City, and Wolves were better. The season before was when we were disasterous. The addition of Varane in place of Lindelof for when he was available was a clear upgrade, and the addition of Ronaldo also likely helped. We also hired a set piece coach who may have contributed too.

I think it is also kind of silly given that the one set piece goal we conceded against Brentford was at least partly the fault of Martinez not winning a duel against Ben Mee.

I'm comparing to the teams we want to compete with. City conceeded 1 and Chelsea 4, with us at 6.

I'd argue that 6 from Liverpool out of 20 goals is high as well. But you're right it was worse the seasons before, before Varane came in

The most goals conceeded by set pieces in 20/21 was West Ham and Southampton with 7 each. Thats 1 more than we had last season. Its just that teams in general conceeded more from set pieces last season so 6 doesnt look too bad compared to the 10+ of most teams last season.

 

[BeforeKeanetherewasRobson]

Picture on the right did make me chuckle .. though with Agbonlahar, that is probably what he sees.