Well said DL A well measured and honest answer as always. I cannot believe some of our fans who think he is either too old or not good enough. Deluded.
it is only a season long loan what is the problem. he knows the game and premier league inside out and would be a great signing and if we add dawson even better. all these people moaning about the fee seriously would you rather we was back in league 1 picking players up like Nick ward and Bankole. Come on people tf is not stupid and knows what to spend.
The only time age is a real issue is when your a full back, striker or winger, that's just my opinion anyway. I'm not sure you really need to rely on pace if your a CB. That's more about nurture than nature. You don't just un-learn basic defending just because you become older. More about positional sense and awareness than anything.
Spot on, and I give you Maldini switching from LB to CB and playing on to just about his forties as evidence. players like this read the game and make interceptions rather than rely on speed. The best don't even tackle that much.
In a championship winning team. Disagree...plenty of top quality teams in that league. Villarreal got relegated and they were pretty damn impressive in Europe, not to mention Valencia, Atletico Madrid, Sevilla, Bilbao and Malaga...all pretty decent sides.
As someone that follows La Liga it's not that the rest of the League are ****e it's just Barca and Real are so far ahead of the rest but that would be the case if you put them in our league as well. Athletic Bilbao (6th) beat and totally outplayed last season's defending PL Champions home and away. Valencia did reasonably well against Chelsea as well. The style of play makes defending in La Liga far more difficult. Talk to any defender and I guarantee you most would rather have the ball hoofed up to them (PL) than have ball to feet and trying to defend tiki-taka football with so much interchangeability where man marking is impossible(La Liga), most traditional defenders anyway
Decent in Europe, but not in Spain. Real Madrid and Barca have finished 20+ points above the rest for the last 3 seasons.
75% of all football fans in Spain align themselves with Barca or Real. There is no money outside those two clubs. and the latter are effectively funded by the Spanish Government. Their wage bills are nearly ten times that of the other teams in the league with the average player earning £100,000 a week. In a year, Ronaldo alone will earn as much as all players combined in around 50% of all La Liga clubs. With all due respect how could you expect them to do any better? It's effectively like asking Swansea to compete with City, Chelsea or United.
Carvalho is an excellent acquisiton for the season. And how can a loan really be a panic buy FFS ? If it doesn't work then he's gone. Panic defending is what we saw on Sat - the added experience of Carvlaho and Dawson should help that significantly. All good to me
Its so much fun being a QPR fan these days, we get to argue if Real Madrid and England players are good enough for us!
This times 100........It was much better wondering if the next non-league wonder was gonna do it for us....
RUBBISH....70 - 90% of my best friends are Chels fans, supporters and long term St holders. That view is definately not the general view in the harwood of the dray.... you are obviously a great poster district, but I'd have to question you on this one mate.. the amount of times he got skinned and was saved by JT or cashley is embarrasing. Dont care what he won in La Liga (best league in the world). prem is a totally diffrent style and pace..just ask Claudio raniri and his "little magian from ManUre"!!
Well, I do still think that when you're younger you're usually quicker and more agile, and agility is a good thing for sticking your foot in where it's needed. But yes, equally important is intelligence and experience. 34 is not too old to have agility but age does have a factor in agility. I doubt he's as good as he was previously but still will be very good. I'm all for backing older players.
