I'm furious this kid has waltzed straight into the team, displacing both youth and experience in Gooch, Khazri and Lens. His dead balls are shocking. His work-rate without the ball is poor. His physical presence is non-existent. Granted the kids got talent but he's not what we need. Moyes has dropped a bollock by signing him imo, especially if he's obliged to start Jan-ooze-eye. He won't be the sole reason we go down this year but he'll be a big (non) contributor.
Decent enough going forward, absolute ****e when he doesn't have the ball, too lazy for me and we just don't have that luxury of being able to accommodate lazy players.
Absolutely - If we'd won 3 or 4 of our first 6 and were sitting mid table, he'd be an asset - but sitting bottom with 0 wins he's a liability! That said - he possesses something we are lacking from most others - the ability to beat a man and create something with a bit of brilliance! Not sure who else we've got who could do that
Last seasons Khazri! No idea what's happened to him but it's like he doesn;t give a **** anymore. I'm gutted cos I loved the bloke last season. Hopefully he pulls it around but I honestly think that, in the current climiate, neither of those two would be any good for us as a team
This is how I feel about these two, but how do we set up without them ? could we move our fullbacks forward and play three at the back,, with two defensive midfielders in a 3/2/3/2 formation, we just don't have any in form wide men.
Its a bit of a chicken and egg situation. Do we play these mercurial attackers who, on their day, can hurt teams but offer little defensively? Or, do we pack the team with (comparatively) less talented workhorses who might give us more defensive rigidity but are less likely to create scoring opportunities? For me one of these players has to be accommodated on the basis that he may play his way into form and starts creating the chances we need. And I'd prefer it to be Khazri as he's our player. As far as formations/tactics go, I think once we inevitably give the ball away, we invite teams on to us too quickly. I think we need to be playing one defensive midfielder with two ahead of him who can support the attack and try to retain or win back the ball higher up the field. When we're posession, this defensive midfield can sit on half way with the centre backs and allow the full backs to attack too. For me, Moyes sets up too light in the final third and that's exacerbated by the inability of our forward players to hang on to the ball. Edit: or rather, Moyes sets us up with too much emphasis on defence in midfield. Which, ironically, makes it harder to defend.
Khazri is capable of it - just not showing it. I know for certain he can do it as I saw it last season. Maybe start him on Saturday.
