Read the thread. No one said that. My brain hurts.
Mats Hummels
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Youngest ever player to reach 100 caps
To be honest only watched him once for Udinese and once for Roma and played well both times. I didn't get the impression he had great pace or distributed the ball that well (when we're talking about a world class level). I'm sure he's a very good player, but would you say he's better than Ramos?
It's not just this season though. This season he has been exceptional and 1 goal in 630 minutes is a great start, but he was probably one of the if not the best CB in Serie A last season as well. Extremely consistent and reliable.
We are talking about current form and last season at a stretch, then definitely Barzagli and Benatia have been better than Ramos. Ramos while physically great and good on the ball, is not proactive enough.
Yes and no one's saying he's a poor defender, however Spain's primary defense comes through their possession, they will not concede much with most defenders playing in that team, for them being good on the ball is more important than primary defensive aspects, for example aerial prowess or physical ability, for example so Ramos would always get the nod. Ramos' tendency to lose his marker is something that is a bit of a downer in a lot of games.
Because they are.
Ramos isn't even close to the defensive level of Chiellini or the importance of what he is to club and country. Barzagli is a better center back too.
If Ramos had a better mind he would be the best in the world. He's quicker than most center backs, he's one of the best ball playing defenders and has one of the best technique. Highly dangerous in the air. That silly head of his, that which makes him act rashly and cuntishly, really holds him back from being one of the best. I wouldn't be surprised if he'd be the best in 2-3 years.
Fair enough, I just don't see it. I pretty much agree with Snow, other than I think people underrate him because of the occasional moments of stupidity. A lot of the time he's world class, and when he's on his game he does things his contemporary competitors can't do.
Good player but makes too many mistakes to be tagged world class at this stage for me.
Poor positioning in the first half on two occasions, but it was overall a very good performance. Hopefully, he has a better season than 11/12.
Only very recently. Before that, he could do no wrong for the majority of the media, no matter how abysmal his performances were. Other CBs like (especially) Boateng get crucified for one mistake per game, Hummels used to get away with a couple of them and still received praise (see Euro 2012 where he had one very good game against Portugal and two or three mediocre to very bad ones, yet emerged as everyones hero). Of course, Boateng has a tendency to make his mistakes rather spectacular
, and Hummels' play looks much more elegant, but i expect "football experts" to look beyond that. Defense is a lot about keeping position and *then* doing the intelligent thing, and quite often not the guy landing the decisive tackle or dispossession was the architect of the move, but the man who shielded a potential pass receiver or guarded a certain space was.What I noticed with Hummels is that he has a tendency to "not trust" his teammates doing their job, especially when his team is struggling, and tries to do that on top of his own. Often, he manages to succeed because of his quality (which no one denies he has), sometimes he doesn't.
See Cassano G-I 2012 for the most spectacular example of this - Cassano was already pressed by no less than two defenders, yet Hummels gave up his own job, which was guarding the near box, to "help" them with a downright brainless charge that left his teammates confused, himself in no mans land and the ball in the own net. There were other examples of this, although not as clear-cut, in last season, and quite a few.
Agree with this, and I think the same applies with Pepe. Although I'd say on their best days Ramos is the better player. But it was in WC 2010 when both Ramos and Pepe cut out their cnutish ways for their national teams' and were arguably the best defenders at the tournament.
Wait, what? I can see, that Hummels used to get less flack than other defenders because of his play style, eloquence and as superficial as it sounds appearance. He also got praise for the first four games at the Euro, because they were actually really good (Portugal/Greece) or at least really solid (Netherlands/Denmark). However, the medial opinion changed rapidly after his mistake vs. Italy. Mehmet Scholl, the "expert" of the German television called his mistake a "death blow" for the German team (how a 0-1 at the fecking 20th minute can be considered a death blow I will never know), Löw made him the offcial scapecoat of the loss to save his own skin (he hides behind his players frequently, which is something I absolutely despise about him) and the whole press, be it "BILD", "WELT", "WAZ", "Der Westen" or "Spiegel" jumped on that train. Even the "kicker", the most respected football magazine in Germany created a huge headline about it.
It dragged on for so long that Klopp was asked about it one month later at his first press conference of the season, which he used to take a stand for his players. He exposed Löw´s complete reasoning so easily in three or four sharp sentences that I did not know if I should laugh about the national coach or feel sorry for him.
So, you need to explain to me, how this can be considered as being "everybodys hero".
Yeah, no. He sometimes gets too much involved in the offensive, but of course he trusts his teammates. You can not defend that high and with that much movement as Dortmund and have not utmost faith in your teammates. His involvement in the offensive is his form of steping up, because he sees himself as a lead player, which he obviously is at Dortmund (third and most likely future captain, member of the player council). Not to mention that this is encouraged by Klopp and communicated with the team (which is why in pretty much any of these situations Bender drops in the last line to replace him for the time being)
Are we talking about the same scene, the one that leads to Ballotelli´s header for the 0-1? If so, then where is the second player to press Cassano? Khedira, who stands seven or eight meters away? The scene is pretty obvious in my eyes:
Chiellini gets a long ball on the left flank, passes it past Boateng (RB in that game) to Cassano, Hummels moves towards him to cut off the Italian´s path into the box, manages that at first, which gives Boateng time to catch up, effectively doubling him together with Hummels. Then the latter tries to elegantly snatch the ball away, fails at that which gives Cassano the needed room to get the cross/assist towards Balotelli. There is nothing confusing about this scene, except for people who find doubling a offensive player with a CB and FB on the edge of the box confusing (this would however explain a lot in the German national team ^^).
Hummels makes a big mistake in this scene, but it was not the decision to confront Cassano at all. This was the right behaviour in that situation, because otherwise Cassano is free to move inside the box. His mistake was the frankly arrogant manner in which he tried to get the ball, which gave Cassano the opening he needed. He should have either cleared the ball over the sideline/towards a corner or simply block the cross path with his body. He chose the way more complicated solution and payed for it.
Most of the defensive mistakes in the nationalteam are because of a lack of cohesion. More often than not it looks like everyone is playing the style they play in their club (which really was quite different at Bayern, Dortmund and Arsenal/Bremen) instead of all playing one that is teached by Löw. It's really weird. You could see similar problems again in the last game in Sweden, when Boateng did his usual moving into midfield, Lahm reacted by moving forward as well and tried to play an offside trap like Bayern usually do while Hummels dropped deep to cover his man like Löw expects them to, then the player Lahm should cover can make a run without being offside and without anyone being close enough to prevent the goal. I really don't know if the players are stupid or if Löw doesn't take enough time for implementing a well working defensive concept in which everyone knows what to do.
Hummels struggled adapting, that was obvious, he often moved out of his position to double up with the expectation that his centerback partner covers for him like it's happening all the time at Dortmund. At times it looked like he was playing like Dortmund despite everyone else was playing differently and some of his comments after games made it look like he's convinced that his style is better and therefore he's not at fault, which was quite annoying. But Boateng and Badstuber had similar problems, maybe less often, but still clear to see and I think it's mainly Löw's fault. Hopefully they'll sort it out ahead of the world cup.
Hummels struggled adapting, that was obvious, he often moved out of his position to double up with the expectation that his centerback partner covers for him like it's happening all the time at Dortmund. At times it looked like he was playing like Dortmund despite everyone else was playing differently and some of his comments after games made it look like he's convinced that his style is better and therefore he's not at fault, which was quite annoying. But Boateng and Badstuber had similar problems, maybe less often, but still clear to see and I think it's mainly Löw's fault. Hopefully they'll sort it out ahead of the world cup.
There is a whole lot of truth in that post, Balu. I agree that the clash of styles caused us problems in the defence in quite frankly it is the job of the national coach to make the different styles click together.
Pretty much all of our defenders show great football intelligence. Mertesacker has enourmous experience, Lahm has that aswell on top of his intelligence. Hummels, Badstuber and Höwedes all IMO excell in that area and while I don´t rate Boateng in that department as high and see him more in the role of the fast and physical strong "side kick" he is far from dumb either.
If anything the whole defensive fiasco shows Löw´s limitations as coach. He does not even have it as hard as most other national coaches, because the national team basically consists of three core groups (Bayern/Dortmund/Arsenal+rest). Two of these cores even now play a collective pressing system, which are slightly different from each other, but it should still be possible to find a common ground.
Let's see. He was brilliant against Portugal, didn't really have much to da against greece. He had a decent second half against Netherlands, but if you watch the game again you'll notice that van Persie slipped away from him in his back in the first 30min quite a few times, and it was down to luck than anything else that Germany weren't trailing 0-3 by then.
Kicker gave him a 1 against Portugal, a 2 against Denmark, a 3, a 3.5 and a 5 for Italy.
"Zidane schwärmt von Mats Hummels" (MoPo, 22.6.12)
"2012: Mats Hummels leads the way for Germany's humble generation" (Guardian, 27.6.12)
"Euro 2012: Mats Hummels, le nouveau Kaiser de l'Allemagne" (20minutes.fr, 21.6.12)
"The Guardian names Mats Hummels as the player of the Euro 2012 group stage" (101greatgoals, 21.6.2012)
and so on.
And now please find me such head lines after the semi final vs. Italy (28.06.2012). I already acknowledged that he got praise for the first four games. It was the huge backlash he received after his mistake in the semis I was talking about.
If we can lure him this guy is my pick for Vidic's replacement. Shouldn't cost a fortune either given Klopp would jump at the chance to have Kagawa back.
Makes too many mitsakes for me.
I haven't really paid much attention when I've watched Dortmund in the past - I know he's decent though. But it seems the word "slow" comes up constantly when Hummels is discussed.
couldnt we just sign klopp instead?
If by "not a fortune" you mean a potentially record transfer fee, then yeah. I don´t see Hummels going anywhere in the summer. From the club´s perspective out of all star players Hummels has the most comfortable contract situation (until 2017, no clause). After losing Lewandowski and potentially Gündogan the only way they would let him go would be a immoral offer way above his normal worth.
Given the potential losses in the Summer and the losses of last, Klopp would jump at the chance to have Kagawa back. Using him as a sweetner would significantly reduce the fee.
Im not a fan myself either. Every time I've watched him hes made mistakes. When I saw live him against Ireland I thought he looked a bit slow as well.
He always strikes me as a footballer rather than a defender, daft as that might sound.
So for getting an offensive midfielder for a position, where they spend their record transfer fee (Mkhitaryan), they are letting the leader of the defense, second most important build up player and future captain (according to most people close to the club) go?
I think you are either overestimating how much Klopp would want Kagawa back or underestimate Hummels´ role in the team. Maybe a bit of both.
At his best, he was both, looked like a brilliant package for a while.
How is he doing for Dortmund this season? A couple of years back he was already being held as one of the best CBs in the world, but it's gone awfully quiet about him nowadays.
Isn't he out for another two weeks due to some injury ?
Isn't he injured like, a lot ?
Isn't he injured like, a lot ?
I also have the same impression. Would be fantastic bringing the ball out from defence. I think a schemer role would be perfect, or played in a 3 man defence with solid defenders. The premiership can be very physical for centre halves and as good as he is on the ball I'm not sure about his physical attributes.
Unitl his injury in November he was in the process of reclaiming his top form of 2011/2012 after having an overall poor last season due to a lack of consistency. In terms of won challenges he was the best in the league at the beginning of the season. Was also in the top bracket in terms of interceptions, touches and long balls. The difference for Dortmund in having him on the pitch or not was very plain to see.
No better at defending than Evans. His positioning can be erratic and he's still a work in progress. I'd sooner see us allow Smalling and Jones the same luxuries of game time with which he has already been afforded. Whack the pair of them in the Bundesliga and we'd be mighty impressed.
Vidic hasn't always exactly been the quickest defender either.
We'l need to clone Kagawa seeing as we're offering him in swap deals for Reus and Gundgan already
He has a great technique, but he is too slow. A classy player but maybe Subotic in some way would be better.
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