Bloody hell, must be a genius. Beattie was our record signing for a while, around 1 million from WBA. He ran around a lot and scored one good goal that I remember. That was it. I think we gave him away in the end, quietly. Back to Ki, (I have never seen him play sorry), why do you all seem to think he is worth around £8 million and yet you wouldn't have him in your starting 11. Is your midfield that good. Don't mean any disrespect, I just don't know much about him. Remember this is going to be our record signing EVER and you guys don't seem to rate him. Cheers.
I don't think anyone says he's worth £9m because he is still pretty raw, he should be some player in a couple of years.
Our central midfield is the strongest part of our team, a few young and very good players who have been linked with similar big money moves - Ki probably the weakest of the 4 (Brown, Wanyama, Kayal and Ki) in that position. He is a bit more creative than the other 3 though so I might have had him as a first choice where we had a bit more freedom to go forward.
In my view, Ki Sung-Yueng is undoubtedly a talented and creative midfielder. Given space he has a great eye for a pass, spreading the field of play and devastating shot at goal. However, he is a bit of a luxury and performs well when the rest of the team are also doing so. He is not (as yet) a leader and will not pull the team out of a hole when the chips are down. In a very physical game he is a bit toothless. However, he is still young and therefore has time on his side - with the right management he might prove to be the player that we would all like to see. We certainly have a more dependable choice of midfield players at present - that is not to say he may turn out to be the better player in the long run. Good luck with him.
Weakest as in lacks strength? Yes. Weakest as in least amount of talent/potential? That would be Brown.
I was in the pub on Tuesday night and was too busy socialising to study the individual performances of our players (that's why I sometimes prefer to watch games by myself) so I can't comment on that individual performance (I did get the overall impression our midfield were lacking at times) but I think certainly in the last year Brown has been immense in the middle, never gets caught in possession and very rarely makes a bad pass - even if he is somewhat boring in his play (Neil Lennonish). I'd have him before Kayal in the pecking order and I think he is certainly more proven than Wanyama.
I agree with you on this one Mick. Our worst run of last season came when he was out injured, the 3rd season in a row where the points average has dropped when Scott Brown has been injured.
Fair play to you Mick, I know he has his fans and maybe I'm being a bit harsh but I would prefer to see better finishing touches from Brown. As for comparing him to Lennon, I'll assume you had a mad moment there, he's got nowhere near the same vision as Neil.
Lennon's vision appeared to be on the back of his head - remember the UEFA Cup Blackburn home game where he didn't make a forward pass all night and the crowd started booing him
I forgot to mention Joe Ledley - how could I forget about Joe Ledley? Damn, our central midfield is actually really strong.
Many good sensible posts about our centre midfield players. Brown definitely leads by example and maybe its not his own play but Celtic are definitely much better with him playing. In the first half of the first half on Wednesday night he made several wonderful runs to get up beside Hooper. After that as he stayed back our back four basically started to defend and really the Swedes were reduced to tossing high balls into area which Rogne etc hadn't really a problem. I am disappointed in Kayal, as I have said often he seems to be injury prone and seems to have low pain threshold. Also I don't he has improved, he hasn't the defensive abilities of any of our other centre midfields, he charges around a bit like Brown did 3 years ago but doesn't seem to process a incisive pass or a good shot. Big Victor is well on the road to a great footballer, brilliant defensive midfielder and not a bad centre half either. Ledley is a machine quietly getting forward and back helping out defence. A good player, he can go through most of the match without been noticed, and suddenly he does something great. I hate to see Ki go. I think he is possibly our most skillful midfield player, but he may just lack the work ethic and the mixing it with the rough and tumble.
Well he's signed now for the swans, thanks for the info about him and others at your club, we shall see if we have the right choice. Best wishes http://www.swanseacity.net/news/article/ki-signs-333112.aspx
Good luck to Dave. A good deal all round. I heard he was supposed to be back last week but refused. In that case no harm him going for whatever cost. Swansea play a lovely brand of football so having him as the metronome in there will be very good for him. Waste of ****in money that Korean website we just launched(that should have been up 3 years ago)
Dont be deceived by our failure to act disappointed at losing Ki, VS. We are realists most of us and we know we have to sell players, that is the system we operate, buy potential and sell it on when the time is right... and the price. I for one hope he becomes a star for your club, it gives us some comfort to know our scouting system works. Next year Wanyama, Kayal or Izzagure will probably head for pastures new. That's where we are and we know it.
Dev I understand that, we are just a small club who must face that we to will lose players. We have just lost a local lad to Liverpool, they overpaid for him which is their problem. But still we lost him, we have other players we will probably lose in January or next summer as we can't compete wage wise. Somebody mentioned we have the sky money on here, this is very true. But so do all the other clubs in the premier league, we are just the minnows there. And will lose players regardless, it's a double edged sword the sky money is, it sounds great but sometimes I prefer the championship.