http://www.espnstar.com/football/premier-league/news/detail/item640090/"Berbatov-ha I hope this is true. Whilst Berbatov may not always fit Man Utd's style of play he is an excellent player and gives the team more options, being very different to Rooney and Hernandez.
but he also rarely scores of performs against them either. only one "big game" i can remember him scoring in and that was against liverpool at home. there was a stat released, that of his 20 odd goals last season, 18 or 19 had come in just 6 or 7 games. he'd be more useful to us scoring 1's and 2's more regularly than 3, 4 and 5's once or twice a season and scoring sporadically in between he also hasnt scored for united in europe in 18 or 19 games now. that is truly shocking.
He was left out of a lot of matches, especially after Christmas, and it is hard to keep up form when you are playing irregularly. He is a top class player who offers more than just goals. People criticise Hernandez for lacking control and passing despite his goals, while conversely they criticise Berbatov for his lack of goals despite his excellent control and passing.
i've never been able to understand people criticizing hernandez for his apparent lack of control, passing etc when hes a striker, is paid to score goals and does a ****ing fine job of it. he's no messi..but if you'd seen his goal against blackpool away last season, the ball was pinged into him at a pace by giggs and he controlled it and set himself up for the finish with one touch. that doesnt strike me as a player lacking ball control. as for berba, he doesnt do it enough in the big games, and doesnt do it enough in europe. you say he was left out a lot after christmas, but it wasnt until march, when berbatov put in yet anot, and hernandez came off the bench and restored some respectability to the score that he was consistently shelved.
This isn't a criticism of Hernandez but doing it once or a few times does mean you have that attribute. As with many players, people don't understand the role that they play in the team. It's not much of a coincidence that when Berbatov plays with another striker, we often play the best attacking football. Just like when Anderson plays with Carrick in midfield, he is often a lot more influential. Berbatov doesn't always produce and he should be doing a lot more but that is because we know the talent of the man, he will pluck the ball out of the air, see a pass with a flick that noone else can but it works both ways, Berba should be doing more, but it doesn't help when at times he is played in a ridiculous way like against City in the FA Cup semi-final.
Good news! Keep him on and we have 3 incredibly different strikers to choose from, who could all start.
Berba may not be a starter anymore but if he can accept that then by all means keep him, he's useful to have around. One problem is that Berba only has a year left on his contract. We can't afford to lose a valuable player for nothing so either he signs a new deal or we flog him off now. If he's willing to stay then he needs to put his money where his mouth is.
I copuld write an essay defending Berbatov here but it wont matter. Some people just dont like some players and will find fault no matter what. For me Berbatov is a fantastic player, loves the club, full of respect great player and especially last season he showed up and got us out of some real trouble at times. Hes consistantly been criticised for a range of things yet everytime he steps up and proves his doubters wrong he gets more grief. Only once in football history has a player ever got stick for scoring 20+ goals a season. Only once would someone find a problem with scoring 3 hatricks in a season. For the record berbatov has and always will be a 1 in 3 striker. He scores in over 10 games a season for United ( games where he scores ) and starts around 30-35 games which of course. He prefers the second striker role and his style of play suits it but can play up top as part of a front 2. He doesnt like being the lone striker, its a role for someone who likes to run around alot with little gain from it ( Hernandez doesnt like the role so much either, both prefer to have rooney just behind ) where he is more a calm and collected sort of player.
To be fair Berb scored decisive goals in five matches last season and got the important opening goal in a further five matches that we went on to win. Without his goals we would have been ten points worse off last season. The Blackburn and Birmingham matches were the only ones where he scored a load of goals that we didn't really need him to score, but you can hardly ask him to stop scoring just to save them up for another match! And I don't think any Utd fan will complain about the hat trick vs Liverpool...
dont forget the one against bolton at old trafford! ive got nothing against him, he does it against the lesser teams and will therefore be very handy
I'm glab Berbatov is staying, he gives a completely different look than Hernandez and Rooney. If he's content with being a 3rd striker when everyone is fit, which i believe he is, then I'd rather we keep him then sign another top striker. He's about 30 but doesn't rely on pace so will be able to play at the top of his game for a few more years. Giving the youngsters like Welbeck, Macheda, Josh King, and Will Keane time to develop and hopefully get some chances in the first team in the coming years. I don't think they'll get a chance if we brought in another younger top striker.
30 is hardly old and for his type of game it won't really matter. Berbatov is a class player and should still be our number 2 and we have a clause where we can extend his deal by an extra year which seems likely. I hope he can retire here as he is such a great player to watch. Football is also about pleasure from the viewing and Berbatov offers that. He loves the club and wants to stay and even though he has been left out of so many big games, he has continued to show his loyalty and not gone off on one and slaged the manager off like Tevez did. We should keep him for many more years.
i agree. his game doesnt rely on pace, he'll have that sublime touch and technique until the day he retires, very much like bergkamp did. he'll always have a soft spot in my heart for refusing to meet with city on the last day of the transfer window when he joined us
I wonder if the same people that give Berbatov grief for being lazy and not scoring enough goals, did the same with Teddy Sherringham? Both not blessed with blistering pace, but with a great touch and vision, and the ability to do something different on the pitch. Just a thought.
I don't give Berbatov grief for being lazy. I give him grief for receiving the ball, holding it up for 5 or 6 seconds before laying it off to the nearest teammate. He slows down our play quite dramatically. I also think he's a bottler and when it comes to the big occasion, he freezes. Sir Alex must feel the same way, hence the omission from the CL final squad. Just to get this out of the way, yes I'm aware that he scored that hattrick against Liverpool but his record in big games, in terms of both goals and contribution is dreadful aside from that. He hasn't scored a goal in the CL in nearly 3 years. And all the withering looks in the world fired at teammates won't take away from his own flaws. I don't want him to be sold, unless we sign a good replacement. However, if such a replacement could be brought in, I wouldn't shed any tears upon the sale of Berbatov.
I think it's better for Berbatov to stay. Let's not rebuild the parts of the team that don't need rebuilding.
