Troy Deeney - honestly outspoken or liability?

Love him or hate him, Troy Deeney has, in recent weeks, pulled himself together and given himself a talking to, and started looking like the player we saw under Zola. Aside from the fact that he has admitted what some of us already knew, that he cheated us out of 2 years by not really being interested in football and therefore not giving his best, he has given his all this season, and it's been good to watch him on the pitch again.

So, why then, as soon as things start going well for him, and therefore the team, does he have to start talkng?! Last season it was Arsenal, the cahones speech which was the Arsenal team talk for the return fixture. Now it's Zaha, and admitting that when we played Palace, they targetted Zaha, 'taking turns to kick him' so that no-one was given a card, and almost worse than that, with his big head firmly in place, trying to make out that he can influence referees before the game by telling them what to look out for with the opposition.

I have not been Deeney's biggest fan i admit and i know that puts me in the minority. But when he's on his game, i'll sing his chants along with the rest, but yesterday's published interview got me frustrated and angry with him all over again. He seems to have an agenda. One step forward, two backwards.

Why can't he keep his mouth shut, and when he opens it and jeopordises the good work done by management and team alike, how is he beyond punishment? Personally, i'd drop him this week and play Success in his place. He has to learn he can't just shoot his mouth off, there is a fine line between honesty and saying way too much in my opinion!

/rant!

 

Not very helpful as people from other teams will remind officials of any tactics we might use now and well we cannot really complain if another set of players target one of our own.

Personally I don't think Gracia would set out each game to foul the opposition's best players as that isn't his style but we do have an average discipline record not helped by certain players including Deeney.

I suspect as you say its probably another comment the PR/media team have got their heads in hands at!

 

Spot on. Do your talking on the pitch Troy, you are in danger of spoiling your reputation. There is plenty of time to pursue a media career later.

 

It may be that he is being honest on this, and a lot of other teams may well be thinking 'We do that to', but that is not the point. I expect any player who wears our shirt to be an ambassador for the club, and to have our interests at heart at all times, and this includes time spent on the media. Not helpfull at all.

 

Although he admits to effectively wasting 2 seasons, he hasn't been helped by coaches who have played a lone striker, which him and most of our other strikers have not been suited to. He may be a big influence in the dressing room, but I don't think that strikers or goalkeepers should be captain (I'm aware that there have been teams that have won World Cups with keepers as captain), so I've never liked Deeney as captain and Gomes as vice-captain. Maybe Deeney feels that being captain gives him more of a platform to speak, especially with a head coach having English as a second language, but now he's fully fit I would give the armband to Cathcart as he seems to be the calming influence and when interviewed comes across as intelligent and well-spoken and would be a credit to the club. Deeney being stripped of the captaincy would likely work in one of 2 ways - he'll either focus on his football or sulk but I think that would get the message across more than a fine or being dropped.

 

Not the values that I share or that of a 'family club' ... but yes he is simply stating what a lot do anyway...

However he has had issues and a need to be valued so i can understand the downside of that...

 

As you say Yorkie, a lot do this. Some teams do go out to either neutralize or frighten the opposition's best player - we saw Real Madrid do this with great effect on Mo Salah, and Sergio Ramos go unpunished, and were largely critical of this practice when others do it. It happens. But at the same time young players can have their careers prematurely ended by this practice - how many young strikers have done a Michael Owen and become crocks within a few years ? My worry is that TD's comments do nothing for the image of our club, and nothing to enhance our reputation with referees.

 

Dissenting opinion time: he was joking. Or not. Whatever I don't care. Zaha? Like Dele Alli... let your feet do the talking by staying on them. Sooner TD9 in the team I love than those two scheisters.

 

You may have inadvertently gone back to the original spelling here Fez. It has been claimed that the word 'Shyster' (English spelling) is anti Semitic - ''Talking about Jewish lawyers who in their minds are no different from the scheming devious Shylock''. Other linguists claim it is formed from the German word Scheisse = excrement, with Scheisser becoming shyster in modern English. I somehow suspect that if Jeremy Corbyn ever inadvertently used this word the media would make something big of it I'll just say that Zaha is a play acting prat and hope there are not linguists who find some vague association with that word which is not pc.

 

Reminds me of the old cry

'Play up. play up and play the game!!!'

Gone on throughout history

 

Is buttock pc if you call someone that?

 

It will come as no surprise to anyone that I couldn't agree more with this comment. Troy is hot property with the media right now and clearly loves the attention. He'll drop the odd clanger now and again but it's all good as far as I'm concerned.

 

I'm speechless! I've only ever spelt the word that way. And I've always had a little bit of sympathy for Shylock though he's very much the architect of his own downfall. Love Shakespeare, me.

 

What Deeney has done is make future refs go against him on 50/50 tackles, like yesterday when he was booked. He has not helped himself or the team so rather he kept controversial comments off air. When he retires he can say what he likes.

 

I don't really agree with that tbh- we got away with a lot yesterday as did Arsenal. The ref was poor. Absolutely nothing to do with Troy's comments. More to the point when does he ever get anything out of refs? Very rarely in my opinion.

 

Where would we be without him?

END OF DEBATE.

 

top 5 in the hall of fame.

 

Nice edit - If Troy's comments wind up the opposing team, fans and the refs to WFC's detriment, it is not a good tactic. I know he is nurturing a reputation as a refreshingly honest pundit who is much more interesting to listen too than most but this comes at a cost to the team.

I have met Troy several times and am one of his greatest fans but he needs to think before he speaks.

 

I do like Troy and what he has done for the club but comments like these bring unwanted attention to the club! Sure pretty much every club does this and targets the 'star' player. Zaha does get it a bit, Hazard gets it loads and even Richarlison got it for us last season - albeit he would also go down easily

Troy's honesty is sometimes good but save stuff like this until you are retired (or not with us). The problem is that it will play on ref's minds. The next time there is a challenge like Capoue's on Zaha, the ref won't think maybe it was an accident but it was targeted.

Also the harassing of ref's - it feels like we get more than our share of yellows for dissent - this isn't going to help that either.

 

I think that most referees know this anyway Kev. Some players, normally the best players, are singled out for 'special treatment', and this is not new. Everybody knows that it is an advantage to have your opposite number going away from the first 50/50 ball hurting a bit. However, if it comes down to an open admission that players are taking it in turns to get a kick in at somebody then the whole thing has gone too far. None of us like play acting on the field, diving, feigning injury, reeling around in agony etc. and when Neymar did it in the World Cup it was revolting. But then I remembered what had happened to him in the previous World Cup - ie. a tackle (if you can call it that) which left him with a fractured vertabra in the spine, and which could have led to paralysis. So maybe Neymar has decided to react early enough in future. The fact is that if everyone is taking it in turns to kick at one of their players then, sooner or later, one of those kicks is going to cause more than the obligatory bruise. Some of these gifted and fast strikers know that at any time they could sustain an injury which ends their career (which is short as a striker anyway) and so over reaction on their part may just be a call for better protection.