Raphaël Varane - Summer 2019

Walters_19_MuFc said:
Remember Rio saying he was the 'best defender on the planet' this time last year.

Not watched him at all this season, but judging by the comments he's not been great.
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Real Madrid have been a joke defensively this season. A comedy of errors. But Ramos has been slightly better than Varane. Neither have been good enough
 
100m for a player they have probably given up on. Right, good luck. Phil Jones 40m then.
 
Ekeke said:
Real Madrid have been a joke defensively this season. A comedy of errors. But Ramos has been slightly better than Varane. Neither have been good enough
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Football is about the team as a unit. No defender can be great if they lack that protection from their midfield. Now, as I said, I haven't watched Madrid this season, but I've been hearing playershaven't been great and their whole unit as a team have been pretty poor.

You look at someone like Van Dijk. Whilst he's a fantastic centre back - arguably the best in the world, he has the protection of a solid midfield unit that covers every blade of grass.
 
Walters_19_MuFc said:
Football is about the team as a unit. No defender can be great if they lack that protection from their midfield. Now, as I said, I haven't watched Madrid this season, but I've been hearing playershaven't been great and their whole unit as a team have been pretty poor.

You look at someone like Van Dijk. Whilst he's a fantastic centre back - arguably the best in the world, he has the protection of a solid midfield unit that covers every blade of grass.
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I'd like our defenders to be judged the same way.
 
Walters_19_MuFc said:
Football is about the team as a unit. No defender can be great if they lack that protection from their midfield. Now, as I said, I haven't watched Madrid this season, but I've been hearing playershaven't been great and their whole unit as a team have been pretty poor.

You look at someone like Van Dijk. Whilst he's a fantastic centre back - arguably the best in the world, he has the protection of a solid midfield unit that covers every blade of grass.
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Yep. I’m far more interested in the coaching of a defensive unit with a capable defensive midfielder than I am another centre back to solve it all.
 
We should be very cautious overpaying for players who are in bad form. Sanchez should be our lesson learned.
 
We need to stop getting player who are not good enough for top teams.
 
El-Manos said:
We should be very cautious overpaying for players who are in bad form. Sanchez should be our lesson learned.
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Depends on the age of the player. Varane just turned 26 and has easily another 5+ years at the top. On Sanchez, given his age and the amount of football he played since breaking through as a teenager, he was arguably already on the decline by the time we signed him.
 
Ekeke said:
I think he had a couple of good games at the WC in the final stages yeah. But for all we know "what he has accomplished" was also his peak. At 26 and on current form we might be getting the worst version of him, which is what this season would suggest.

Now in general I'm not against taking that chance. But £100 million isnt a chance. Thats money for a sure bet. Half of that would be taking a chance on Varane.
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What player would be a sure bet? I don't think that exists.
Transfers are always a bit of a gamble.
 
I can only see this as the usual ploy to get a better contract on higher wages.

I cant see this happening and would be surprised if Woodward sanctions anywhere near 100m for a single player in this window.

It'll be the usual 30-40m for players with potential and 'higher resale value' who we can't sell if they flop because we over paid on wages.
 
Hammondo said:
We need to stop getting player who are not good enough for top teams.
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Oh dear. This has nothing to do with him not being good enough. This is because he seemingly doesn't want to renew his deal and perhaps is looking for a change.

Personally, I think he will stay there anyway and is just trying to squeeze some cash out of them.
 
MikeKing said:
100m for a player they have probably given up on. Right, good luck. Phil Jones 40m then.
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is he out of favour?

they did also manage to sell Morata for a fortune given how spotty his goalscoring had been previously

Varane is or was at least a top defender at one stage
 
He still is a top defender, just had a prolonged post-WC funk where he looked bad by pub league standards. He's more or less been back to himself in 2019.

Still not a patch on Van Dijk or Koulibaly though
 
Gordon S said:
What player would be a sure bet? I don't think that exists.
Transfers are always a bit of a gamble.
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Anyone who has had a good season, or multiple good seasons in a row is what you want for £100 million. Thats a huge amount of money.

You dont pay that for someone who has had a bad season and hasnt looked up to top club level
 
buckooo1978 said:
is he out of favour?

they did also manage to sell Morata for a fortune given how spotty his goalscoring had been previously

Varane is or was at least a top defender at one stage
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I mean, he's playing but they did sign a new defender so he might not next season
 
Mcking said:
I'd like our defenders to be judged the same way.
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Smalling and Jones have been shite for 5+ years, I dont reckon you can be any more lenient than that. Varane has had one bad season and many exceptional seasons, winning pretty much every trophy.
 
Ekeke said:
Anyone who has had a good season, or multiple good seasons in a row is what you want for £100 million. Thats a huge amount of money.

You dont pay that for someone who has had a bad season and hasnt looked up to top club level
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Kouilabaly would cost the same and between the two I'd choose Varane every time. Any other CB would be a step down imo. To be the best you have to buy the every best. The experience he would bring is priceless.
 
Another in a line of mistakes IMO.

He relies on his pace too much, and with his injury record he won't stay rapid forever. I'd prefer to sign a defender that can defend properly without relying on his pace to back him up.
 
So as it stands:

Rice, Varane, Meunier, Icardi - ‘not good enough for Manchester United’. Have I missed any?
 
I don't know given his injury history and the price, he's better suited to partnering Lindelof than Alderweireld but not as ideal a fit as Koulibaly or de Ligt, all of them however would add another CB that is comfortable with the ball at his feet, something we need more of as we cannot pay out from the back and it's part of why we are so disjointed as a team, our CB's lack of quality on the ball effects De Gea and means the midfield gets strung out as someone always has to come and get the ball.
 
OleGunnar20 said:
Lozano, Werner, Partey & Fernandes.

Koulibaly too old obviously.
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I strongly suspect, in fact - recall, that Sadio Mane, Salah, Robertson and others would have been on that list once upon a time. The players who have later appeared on rant lists that we have ‘missed out’ on.
 
Suv666 said:
Smalling and Jones have been shite for 5+ years, I dont reckon you can be any more lenient than that. Varane has had one bad season and many exceptional seasons, winning pretty much every trophy.
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Would be nice to be able to judge them on the amount of protection they receive though. They barely receive any from our midfield and next to none from our 'goalkeeper'.
 
Mcking said:
Would be nice to be able to judge them on the amount of protection they receive though. They barely receive any from our midfield and next to none from our 'goalkeeper'.
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Protection from midfield? More like midfield don't receive enough protection from defence and GK when they were overturned and being pressed out of hell. They cannot keep possession when CB and GK can't play out from the back. Smalling, De Gea and Jones haven't shown any desire to make themselves available for passes and will boot balls so far.

If we had City GK & defence, they will help midfielder under high pressure, we won't lose possession if we pass back to them and give midfield stability and control to dominate the midfield.
 
Mcking said:
Would be nice to be able to judge them on the amount of protection they receive though. They barely receive any from our midfield and next to none from our 'goalkeeper'.
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Bullshit. De Gea has bailed out our shite leaky defence for so long. A few bad games and suddenly he's the weak link and not the Chuckle brothers. We played so deep and defensive when Mou was the manager you cant possibly claim they didnt recieve any support from the midfield. All our CB's bar Lindeloff should be binned asap.
 
Suv666 said:
Bullshit. De Gea has bailed out our shite leaky defence for so long. A few bad games and suddenly he's the weak link and not the Chuckle brothers. We played so deep and defensive when Mou was the manager you cant possibly claim they didnt recieve any support from the midfield. All our CB's bar Lindeloff should be binned asap.
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Nonsense. He's had a very average season. And our CBs had to work extremely hard last season but De Gea was a class above them
 
Ekeke said:
Nonsense. He's had a very average season. And our CBs had to work extremely hard last season but De Gea was a class above them
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De Gea has been crap this season. Our CB's have been crap since Fergie left bar one season where we played ultra defensively and finished 2nd. How can anyone possibly use De Gea's crap form as a defence for our CB's. They were shite when De Gea was playing insanely good, they are shite now when DDG has been mediocre.
 
Suv666 said:
De Gea has been crap this season. Our CB's have been crap since Fergie left bar one season where we played ultra defensively and finished 2nd. How can anyone possibly use De Gea's crap form as a defence for our CB's. They were shite when De Gea was playing insanely good, they are shite now when DDG has been mediocre.
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They werent shite. They were very good last season. Not as good as De Gea but still very good.
 
deafepl said:
Protection from midfield? More like midfield don't receive enough protection from defence and GK when they were overturned and being pressed out of hell. They cannot keep possession when CB and GK can't play out from the back. Smalling, De Gea and Jones haven't shown any desire to make themselves available for passes and will boot balls so far.

If we had City GK & defence, they will help midfielder under high pressure, we won't lose possession if we pass back to them and give midfield stability and control to dominate the midfield.
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Did I mention anything about possession and buildup? What about the ease with which opponents are repeatedly able to play through our midfield and pressure our defence?
 
Ekeke said:
They werent shite. They were very good last season. Not as good as De Gea but still very good.
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1 decent season in 5 years in a season where we played defensive football. Is that good enough for you?
 
Suv666 said:
Smalling and Jones have been shite for 5+ years, I dont reckon you can be any more lenient than that. Varane has had one bad season and many exceptional seasons, winning pretty much every trophy.
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Smalling has been nowhere near ‘shite for 5 years’.
 
Suv666 said:
Bullshit. De Gea has bailed out our shite leaky defence for so long. A few bad games and suddenly he's the weak link and not the Chuckle brothers. We played so deep and defensive when Mou was the manager you cant possibly claim they didnt recieve any support from the midfield. All our CB's bar Lindeloff should be binned asap.
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De gea has always been the constant in any leaky defence we've ever had in the past 6 years. Obviously he saves plently of shots, but we concede a lot of those shots partly because he refuses to command his box and help out his defenders. Other teams defend with defenders and a goalkeeper, we defend with only defenders and then wonder why we concede so many chances.
 
Suv666 said:
1 decent season in 5 years in a season where we played defensive football. Is that good enough for you?
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We didnt play defensive football. We were just shit going forward. We werent very organized and well set up to defend. Our CBs had to scramble and make some good defensive contributions and De Gea needed to make some great saves
 
Mcking said:
De gea has always been the constant in any leaky defence we've ever had in the past 6 years. Obviously he saves plently of shots, but we concede a lot of those shots partly because he refuses to command his box and help out his defenders. Other teams defend with defenders and a goalkeeper, we defend with only defenders and then wonder why we concede so many chances.
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Wow
Yeah you're right De Gea has been the problem. Smalling and Jones are world class.
 
Mcking said:
Did I mention anything about possession and buildup? What about the ease with which opponents are repeatedly able to play through our midfield and pressure our defence?
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if we start CB who is not good on balls, even with GK's awful distribution, we'd be ripping apart because they'll get more time on the ball, they'd be pressing us so hard due to us not good playing out from back, and the fact it helps them to attack smoothly when many of their players already were in our third final with De Gea gifting them easily possession due to his awful distribution.

Enough good to play out from the back to help midfield in possession and buildup so opponents won't have a lot of times on balls, we can keep them so far away from our goalpost so we don't have to do more defensive work if we can play out from the back. A team like West Ham, Everton, Watford, Southampton will never press our backline if they knew we can play out from the back because that would mean they'd be leaving massive space for us to bypass and exploit space, that's why they didn't do the same thing against City and Liverpool. We don't have enough players in backline who can play from back comfortably.


If we can't play out from the back, we'll have to do more defensive work rate because we can't keep possession. If we do more defensive work, more likely we'll make mistake in defensive. Less defensive work rate, less mistake we make. Defence and GK put more pressure on midfield than midfield put pressure on the defence.
 
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