A great man once said "from now on, I will select my best players". He got sacked shortly after. I think the old age debate about best team/players have a lot of variables that decide. Club stature comes in to it. Real Madrids fans wouldn't dare approve if a manager came in and talked about no more galacticos, "I want a team of pavons and Michael carricks". He'd be gone by October. For a team such as ourselves, I think it's about the squad than better players. It's the demands of the fans- no matter what happens we often talk about just wanting to see a team who fights and shows passion. I think CP was beating to the same drum when he returned. I'd rather have 11 players who fight for one another (but also capable of kicking a ball), than a side built with the foundations of having a couple players being thrown money and sacrifices being made elsewhere to subsidize them.
I can't explain this either but it is clearly a conundrum. There is no doubt whatsoever that Stephens is a more technically gifted, astute and accomplished footballer than Bradley Pritchard, yet without Dale tweaking his wotsits the other night would we have played so well? Dunno Guv. We played our best football last season with Paul Hayes and Andy Hughes in the team. Neither can touch Yann or Stephens for ability, but there you go. A lot of it is just about people being on the same wavelength. Wiggins and Jacko had that last season and I'm hopefull that Solly and Wilson can develop it. A lot too about having a decent system. Look at Barcelona. The operate in packs of three all over the pitch. Would Xavi or Iniesta or, perhaps more to the point, Busquets look as good in, say, the Man U or Liverpool sides as they do in the Barca side with its perfected system? Doubt it. On a more mundane level, regardles of our best players, so long as we persist in playing our central midfielders too deep, we could have Iniesta and Xavi and we'd still be poor (well we'd be a bit better but you see where I'm coming from). I'm in the best side rather than the best players camp I think.
BWP is one of our best players as well, but how do you fit him in to a 4-5-1? Maybe advanced midfield, if the others can stop hitting long balls for him to chase. By all accounts our midfield worked much harder at getting into the box on Tuesday, and maybe BWP can do a Jason Euell and become a scoring midfielder. Goodness knows we could do with one or two.
When I think of best team/best players, i'm drawn to the Gerrard/Lampard argument. Poor together, but when played alongside Parker, Carrick or Barry, they seemed to play much better.
