I'm glad you're in a minority - I think he's massively under-rated personally. All about opinions but yours is wrong....
Can you honestly say Cattermole lacks the quality? I'd like to know in what respect and what he needs to do to convince you otherwise? (Unless you're just in the "Catts is ****e and even if he got 50 assists this season I won't change my mind" brigade) - the only thing missing from his game is pace - he's never been a quick player. He can pass, He can tackle - that's what you need from a player in his position. His stats stack up pretty well when you look at him properly and I've watched him go from a "Pass it 5 yards" to trying and succeeding in playing some intricate and very good passes (Look at our game against Leicester 2 seasons ago - he played a through ball into a 2 foot gap perfectly for Defoe - Iniesta would've been proud of it) - I'm not saying he's that level - but he's much better quality wise than a number think he is
I like a defensive midfielder. A good one is a joy to watch but I don't think he fills the role very well. He has a tendency to back pedal if a player runs at him, he doesn't ever seem to command the 2nd quarter of the pitch like a player of that type should, and the icing on the cake for me is that he is one of the most inelegant players currently playing. His discipline has improved (although I recall arguing on here early last season that he'd picked up a silly booking for deliberately running into a player) but neither have I seen him make him a really good tackle for some time. He works hard, he cares, and he wants to win but he lacks the technical attributes that mark a good player. That's reflected in the fact that he's rarely been linked with clubs better than us in a period when clubs have been hoovering up average English players to get their home-grown quota up. Personally, I think his popularity is based on his undoubtedly good attitude and the fact that that makes him stand out slightly in an era when we've had very few stand out midfielders.
Each to their own fella - I'm not going to (seriously) tell anyone their opinion is wrong - I love the bloke and think those that don't don't understand what he brings to the team as a whole.
Fair enough! Everyone is entitled to their opinion. I can respect that people like him as a player. Personally, I think he's overrated by our fans and that many can't see beyond his ineffectual hustle and bustle
The efforts of a DM and holding players often go under the radar in football. Not all people have the attention to detail others have so Catts isn't the first DM to be under appreciated and won't be the last. I only have to go back a few season when M'Vila ad Ki were getting criticized for taking the foot off the accelerator. Depite their drop in form coincided with them carrying injury(Sothing Catts has carried for three years) They were both delivering assured quiet performances for a deep midfield position which were more than competitive, they we still getting bashed for not standing out in their performances. It will always happen as it's a position many people up and down the country just don't appreciate. Attention to detail init, like how he stopped pressing the man and started pressing space instead, this sorted his discipline right out and improved him defensively. But it also led to him staying on his feet and being involved with less tackles. A good thing really but people seeing less tackles will often say it's because he deteriorated, he's not as committed or lost his bottle, when infact he's just fine tuned his style of play to do what everyone wanted which was to stop being a liability. 100% succeeded with tham imo.
See, I completely disagree with that. I do pay attention to detail and I don't think he's got the football brain to play that role more cleverly. I've seen him backing off advancing players and trying to call players out of position and hence leaving their markers to close down the man who his responsibility. Thankfully when he's done that he's been ignored. Twice last season I recall him back pedalling, completely unaware of where his team mates and opposition players were which lead directly to space opening up from which the other teams scored winning goals (Palace and Leicester I think). I won't knock his leadership, his enthusiasm, his tenaciousness, the good role model he is as a pro, but I think his technical abilities are overblown because what he is good at makes him a popular player.
I never seen him call a player out of position without the need, I see him calling players to cover their man over most games. But they should be doing that across the back already(eg, rb is caught up pitch so each defender moves across one position to cover, turning the LB into a temporary CB and the the left wide man dropping back into the defensive LB position) Catts telling them to do it is bang on imo. Problem is they should do it without the prompt as all defenders should be switched on enough to carry out the adjustment as second nature and when they do it correctly it allows the DM to retain his position. The most important position on the pitch to hold imo. He's backing off to hold his position, he's only doing it as others has been caught out of position and we've been caught out disorganised, If he dives in he'll be done for. Disagree with you falla. I think he's bang on with his Captains instruction. You say you can't knock his leadership, but the instruction you're knocking is his leadership. So you've confused me there fella.
Being a leader is about more than telling people what to do. He is a committed player and leads by example- I can't knock him for that. In the example I'm referring to, however, he was calling the LB across, away from the opposition's right winger in order for the LB to make a tackle on the centre mid that was coming through his part of the pitch. His call in that situation was wrong. In the examples that lead to goals, he wasn't retreating to hold his position. He didn't press space sufficiently to intercept the initial pass to the player that was causing the threat and as a result was left in a one on one situation. Under those circumstances he has to put the player under pressure, to hold him to allow our defence to get in to position or to cause the player in possession to make a pass before he wants to; instead he conceded a large amount of space, leaving the opposition in possession on the edge of our box to make decisive passes/crosses. You're right, it is important for the defensive midfielder to hold his position but I don't think he does that very well.
Agreed but issuing instruction about leadership at the same time. Pointless convo as neither of us have videos to show our examples(Perhaps if football was more accessible in this country ) so lets just agree to disagree fella.
Mostly away games bud and yes the red mist is not so prevalent as it was a couple of seasons ago, when fully fit he would be in my selection.remember when oneil played him in desperation to stay up, that resulted in him missing months at the start of the following season.
I'm sure I seen a stat somewhere about points earned with and without Catts and he added 0.4 points per game or something, massive that. He is limited at a player but he's certainly got some ability, and I am always more confident that we will keep it together when he's on the park. He's a solid player and a great captain. He's actually got a lovely first touch, he's never rushed on ball and his passing has improved massively.
We must be watching different players here, his touch is so poor, and he really struggles with the ball at his feet, hence he always looks under pressure.. It was educational watching him and M'Vila playing the same role, one made it look easy, and it wasn't Catts, he is in fact the very antithesis of the player you are describing.
