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Raphael Varane France flag

2021-22 Performances

View full 2021-22 profile

5.8 Season Average Rating
Appearances
29
Clean sheets
6
Goals
1
Assists
1
Yellow cards
1
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Our defence only plays against counters now anyway. Ironically Bailly may be our best tool against that
 
arthurka said:
Don't know what player you have been watching but Bailly is just an awful defender. He strikes fear into the heart of every defender he plays with. Jones is a very decent CB when he is available.
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There's this myth that injuries are the only thing that stood between Jones and his Duncan Edwards moniker. He just didn't live up to his early promise and now he's an average defender who is guaranteed to make game changing mistakes on a regular basis. I don't know why we get our hopes up that this time will be any different.

Bailly is just as mistake prone but at least he can be a cracking defender when he's in the right mood.
 
11101 said:
Nah, Bailly is twice the defender Jones is, even with the hair brained moments.

Lots of responsibility on Lindelof's shoulders this next few weeks.
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Lindelof is a fantastic third choice CB for us and I'm sure acquit himself well, or at least as well as can be expected.

But the Jones v Bailly question is a hard to one to call. On the one hand Jones hasn't even put on a pair of boots for two seasons. On the other hand, when he was fit and in some kind of rhythm he was actually pretty decent. True, he never lived up to the early "Duncan Edwards" hype but he was more than serviceable on his day. Bailly was IMO borderline world class for a 6-8 month spell during his early days under Jose, but as we all know he's been one kluster after another for the better part of four seasons now. Apart from reasonable skepticism that Jones has anything left in him it's a flip of the coin between the two of them.
 
Frustrating as feck. International teams should pay a fine to the players club if they get injured. :o:mad:
 
arthurka said:
Don't know what player you have been watching but Bailly is just an awful defender. He strikes fear into the heart of every defender he plays with. Jones is a very decent CB when he is available.
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That's just not true really. He does some wild things every now and again but defensively he can be very solid. It just depends if he's got his head screwed on or not.

Against Leicester/Vardy having his speed could be vital. Jones will get ruined.
 
Do we ever say these things as a lie? To kind of put the opposition off?

Anyway, is Maguire definitely out aswell? Any chance the guy is back after the break?
 
SER19 said:
If both are out we either 352/532 or all guns blazing attack
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I wouldn't mind Shaw at LCB and give telles a chance a LB to be honest.

Shaw has been whack and for me alot of the goals come from his side.
 
Are we the most unlucky team in the league, just when we have Rashford coming back to give us a boost, we have our two main characters being out for this difficult fixture list. This annoys me so much, by the time out team would be back at full strength, other teams would probably be ahead of us by then
 
Think 5 at the back with Shaw as a centre back alongside Lindelof and whoever else could work against Leicester.
 
Last thing we need given Maguire is also out and we are going to have to play one of the crash test dummies with Lindelof.
 
I was so happy that I finally didn't have to watch Lindelof anymore. I want to see him build a good partnership with Maguire. Any news on when he's back? We need him badly.
 
The very annoying thing is he didn't even get injured playing for United
So frustrating
 
He was papering over the cracks in our defence, 11 goals in 3 games since his injury.
 
kouroux said:
Indeed. It cannot be a fecking coincidence is it ?
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The biggest factor is he played against weaker teams. There were many chances conceded also in those matches but our opponents couldn’t take advantage of the gifts in the way Leicester and Liverpool could. And most goals have been conceded on the left flank between Shaw and Maguire so don’t think he would have meant any big difference as he would be playing instead of Lindelof to the right.
 
A-man said:
The biggest factor is he played against weaker teams. There were many chances conceded also in those matches but our opponents couldn’t take advantage of the gifts in the way Leicester and Liverpool could. And most goals have been conceded on the left flank between Shaw and Maguire so don’t think he would have meant any big difference as he would be playing instead of Lindelof to the right.
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A backline isn't 4 separate entity whose presence doesn't affect positively or negatively the rest. The clean sheets and chances conceded were a massive problem before for sure but I still think we are missing his presence
 
kouroux said:
A backline isn't 4 separate entity whose presence doesn't affect positively or negatively the rest. The clean sheets and chances conceded were a massive problem before for sure but I still think we are missing his presence
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It’s not that I don’t rate him. I think he's our best CB. It’s just that Shaw and Maguire play so poorly atm, that I’m afraid Varane's presence wouldn’t have changed much. And as I wrote, the same problems were there before with Varane on the pitch, but the opposition did not have the players to fully take advantage of it. Sure, it has gotten worse, but that's mainly beacsue Maguire has been even worse after his injury.

I thought Lindelof and Varane looked good together, and believe they would look even better with some more game time together, but assume Ole will continue with Maguire.
 
A-man said:
It’s not that I don’t rate him. I think he's our best CB. It’s just that Shaw and Maguire play so poorly atm, that I’m afraid Varane's presence wouldn’t have changed much. And as I wrote, the same problems were there before with Varane on the pitch, but the opposition did not have the players to fully take advantage of it. Sure, it has gotten worse, but that's mainly beacsue Maguire has been even worse after his injury.

I thought Lindelof and Varane looked good together, and believe they would look even better with some more game time together, but assume Ole will continue with Maguire.
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Varane's looked good whoever he's played with, even Maguire looked good next to him briefly. The cold reality is that neither Maguire or Lindelof have been good this season, Lindelof's won 3 out of the 10 games he's played and Maguire's making mistakes like it's going out of fashion. The bigger question is why 2 very competent centre halves suddenly look like pub players.
 
Said it before that him not in the team would be catastrophic and its proven to be that way. What's wrong with him? When is he back? Pressing with the likes of Maguire at the back is a crime against the sport.
 
Raphael’s return will be most welcome. Whatever has caused it, Harry has become a dumpster fire of a central defender. He’s mad mistake in him before, but nothing like the nine goals he’s helped ship in against his club in the last two PL appearances
 
I can’t wait to see him paired with Lindelof for a few games. I think it’s a very promising pairing at the back, but we’ll see.
 
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