He does? He's got average pace and is seldom beaten for pace, he prefers to back off, back off, back off some more, all the way into the net.
Nikola Milenkovic
- Thread starter Adnan
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Nik (@Rood) and Imran (@Annihilate Now!) discuss United's fantastic win away against Athletic Club in the semi-final of the Europa League.
They also pick out the positives of United's 4-3 loss away at Brentford, and Nik reviews a day out at Old Trafford watching Manchester United Women qualify for the Champions League.
He does? He's got average pace and is seldom beaten for pace, he prefers to back off, back off, back off some more, all the way into the net.
Yeah that makes sense.
Maguire
Lindelof
Milenkovic
Tuanzebe
Worst case scenario, McTominay and Matic to fill in.
Has anyone actually seen him play at least a few times?
Is he better than Lindelof?
We shouldn't get him just cos he's cheap.
Is he better than Lindelof?
We shouldn't get him just cos he's cheap.
We've been linked with him for the last few seasons. Can only imagine our scouting team have seen him more than enough to make the right judgment.
Not that I even suggested that, but you wouldn't play someone slow at right back, so it's a fair point.
Does he? Not sure that's even true.
This season I have watched Fiorentina 3x. He did very well taming Ronaldo vs Juventus, but the 2nd time I watched Fiorentina they got smashes 6-0 by Napoli and the last time I watched him was the last 20 minutes against Spezia won 3-0, he didn't do much in that match but he was very good dealing with crosses in that match. It's always tough to judge centre back in 3 at the back system so those three games weren't enough to judge him but he's an aggressive centre back from what I watched, not shy to make body contact and to win the ball back before his opposition player got the chance to turn or control. He's been linked with us ages ago so the scouts should know more about him.
Wikipedia. But see MadDogg post above yours also.
He's not good enough and his ceiling isn't high enough. Jules Koundé or Raphael Varane please. Unless we can get him dirt cheap - like below £15m - can't see the point in talking about him. He's much slower than Bailly, so he's a downgrade. We need an upgrade.
Clubs, with fast forwards, like Leicester, must be loving your post. Wait a minute, that's all clubs - they all seem to have at least one fast forward now. Will certainly be worst case scenario
Do you have any examples of Milenkovic demonstrating his lack of speed? From what I've seen, he's not slow at all. Whilst he's not as rapid as Upamecano or Koundé (I can't recall any other CB as fast as them), he still has a decent amount of speed and can keep up with fast players.
Do you have any examples of Milenkovic playing in a 2 man central defense with DCMs in front of him who hardly know what they're doing?
he still has a decent amount of speed and can keep up with fast players.
Something similar was said about Maguire. How come every top team today who want to win anything play with at least one fast CB, and some play with a fast DCM as well?PS: News to me that slow players can keep up with fast players. If that's the case why do Maguire and Linderof panic when they encounter fast players?
If hes available for 15m euros, Id sign him and Pau Torres
Pau Torres / Lindelof /Tuanzebe
Maguire / Milenkovic
Wonder if Villarreal would be interested in a deal for Torres involving Bailly as a makeweight.
Other people may have said what they had to say about Maguire's pace, but I always viewed him as a slow defender. Same with Lindelöf. That's why both of them create a bigger gap between them and their opponent when dealing with 1-on-1 situations.
Milenkovic, however, doesn't. Whenever I've seen him defend the flanks, he would always stay beside or ahead of his opponent, and he would always keep himself close to his opponent. In the end, he wins those 1-on-1 battles more often than not, and at worst, his opponent checks back and looks to pass the ball back rather than forward/into the box.
I'd still like to see where his lack of pace was apparent because I haven't noticed this at all.
This guy is fast, don't know what you guys are on about.
Haha, probably going on his FIFA stats which is:
Acceleration - 64
Sprint Speed - 62
Those are disgraceful ratings
Yeah, that's probably the case. PES stats on the net in the fan group are easily a better source for that type thing as Fifa underrates values of unknown players all the time.
I've only seen him once which this past weekend against Atalanta which is the best team to judge players against in Serie A because they don't play the outdated football the other sides play.
His speed was obvious from the start, he was 4 yards behind Muriel who has good pace and caught up to him like it was nothing. Athletically he looks like Verane, tall, slender, and fast. He also has great agility which is great for defenders. He's very good on the ball.
He's also more of a stopper than a cover guy which means here he'd compete with Maguire as opposed to playing with him if we're doing things right.
They conceded 3 times and still managed to look good while his mates were running around acting the fool. I'll obviously have to watch more of him to get a better feel for his defense instincts. What I didn't like is for a stopper he didn't look decisive enough in his work. He looked to hold off attackers as opposed to dispossessing them as Vida used to do when he stepped out. Interesting prospect though, certainly has potential.
I'd say he was the best of the back 3, but even then, he's performed better than this. One part was because he was throwing his foot in and getting beaten a bit too easily by Muriel on a few occasions, so he started throwing his foot in less as the match went on. Since others couldn't keep up with Atalanta's movement, Milenkovic also sort of struggled with getting in sync with the rest, and that culminated in him failing the offside trap for Zapata's 2nd goal.
Still, he looked way better than he did against Portugal, and he's showing way more awareness of his surroundings than before. There were so many occasions where he'd look over his shoulders for other threats, and whenever he had to deal with a full-speed runner or dribbler, he'd do a great job with keeping up with them. He'll certainly get better as a defender.
Tooo slow
Since he had the shocker against Portugal I have read virtually nothing on this guy. Surely he would be a shrewd move for us given his age, physicality and contract situation.
I read @Adnan saying last night he could probably be got for under £20 million. Could prove to be a very shrewed bit of buinsess at those prices.
Speed aside, does he have the other qualities that'd make you play him at RB rather than CB? Dribbling? Crossing? Passing? Offensive movement? Because if he doesn't, we shouldn't.
It doesn't look like he will extend his contract and it's reported he will be available for under €20m. Juventus seem to be interesting according to some reports and will either offer players in a potential deal or snap him up on a free for the following season.
too slow
He's not slow at all. He's actually surprisingly quick for a big guy.
Juve will probably end up with Milenkovic and Locatelli for around €50 million. That’s some Munich BDL level shopping. Most likely two who’ll become starters for their next big team and their value will rise. We need to get our head out of the likes of the Rice while he’s at max value and locked into a long deal and look around Europe at players who are actually for sale and entering their prime. It may still take them a season or two to settle but we have a big enough squad to blood in the right players and not drop off.
Agreed. We also have a bunch of young players with very high potential that need to be introduced into the team. The likes of Garner and Mejbri might be of value if we showed faith in their ability.
But I'd personally be happy if we signed Sancho, Brozovic and Milenkovic. That would still leave room for one more signing at RB and it would bring a better balance to the team.
I would love Sancho and Varane and then someone with more composure on the ball to play in beside Fred. I don’t buy this Rice unlocking Pogba thing. It’ll just be another Matic/Pogba but more basic on the ball. Bruno needs fast ball into him and someone almost instantly covering when he loses it. That not and will never be pogba. He’s just not a PL box to box week in week out. He is when he fancies it which is about half the time. It’s a real pity. It seems like he has all the tools apart from the mental ones. I would obviously be interested in Camavinga but I understand he’s probably going to need a few seasons to master the speed and physicality of the league and our need is probably more instant. I’m pretty stumped over the instant box to box remedy beyond locatelli to be honest. I’m pretty sure he’d pick Juve over us if we both went in.
Edit: apologies for the tangent. I think Milenkovic is definitely still on our radar. He’d be an interesting one to develop.
This guy seems to be the new Gaitan. All smoke no fire, linked to him every summer without there being any real substance to the claims.
Surely the question with Garner and Mejbri isn't if we show faith in their ability, but rather if they currently have the ability. Ultimately only the coaching staff can really judge that, but even if they do, it seems implausible that they'd bring much more than depth and occasional appearances.
Not really covinced Milenkovic could be expected to be a clear upgrade on Lindelof either.
We either need to take that risk with Hannibal and Garner or else just loan them out again. There’s no use in having a season like Williams just gone.
What it comes down to is courage and faith when it comes to young players. Louis Van Gaal for example showed courage and faith when he gave chances to teenagers at Ajax who went onto form a key part of his all conquering Ajax team. He did the same at United when he plucked a 18 year old Rashford straight from the u18s straight into the first team. Fergie did the same when he let go of Ince, Hughes and Kanchelkis in the mid 90s.
Milenkovic for me has the potential to better Lindelof in a deeper defensive line and also in a higher defensive line in isolation in 1v1 situations. He will need time to settle but his attributes are made for the EPL IMO.
You think LvG just thought "You know what, I really don't know if these guys are good enough to play but I'm gonna take the risk", and then turned out to be lucky with Marcus Rashford? Or that SAF thought "Dammit, I'm gonna have some faith here and ship out all these key players, and just take the risk that these youngsters can play. Because I'm fecking Braveheart." ? 
Just because we aren't in a position to make a judgment whether they're really ready to play or not, that doesn't mean the coaching staff is in a similarly disadvantaged position. There may not be any guarantees, but they should know, as far as anyone can. So I think I'm going to trust in that rather than argue that they should just show faith and take the risk.
Just because we aren't in a position to make a judgment whether they're really ready to play or not, that doesn't mean the coaching staff is in a similarly disadvantaged position. There may not be any guarantees, but they should know, as far as anyone can. So I think I'm going to trust in that rather than argue that they should just show faith and take the risk.
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No Van Gaal didn't say what you're insinuating because he had a good idea after watching Rashford playing. He also had no reservations when he gave 16 year old Clarence Seedof his debut for Ajax.
And again nobody is saying the coaching staff aren't in a better position to make a judgement, but that shouldn't mean we can't speculate ourselves after watching every minute of the player in question.
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Well then, in that case we agree it's a question of making the right assessment of the player, not about being brave or taking a risk. And sure we can speculate, but that seems to me to be something different than calling for playing time for the players because that's just the sort of risk you have to take.
Theoretically, we could sign him on a pre-contract in January couldn't we?
I feel like we'll loan Tuanzebe out for the season, give Bailly the season to prove himself, if he doesn't then he'll be sold next summer.
I do believe certain managers are far more braver than others when it comes to giving young players a chance. Some managers stick with the safer option of going with the more experienced players due to the pressure the job entails.
I think there'll be a long list of Italian clubs waiting for him to become a free agent, with Juve probably heading that queue.