Where would Blaise Matuidi fit in?

Matuidi will fit in Like this.

_______________Krul_______________
________________1_________________
Simpson___Saylor___Coloccini___Enrique
__12_______27________2________3___
________Matuidi___Tiote(C)__________
___________4_______5______________
N'Zogbia______Ben Arfa_________Menez (all 3 swap postions during match)
___14__________10______________7__
____________Sturridge_______________
_______________9__________________

Subs: Forster 13, Williamson 6, Gosling 15, Abeid 18, Marveaux 26, Cabaye 8, Ba 19.

 

That happens a lot, you get used to it

 

Nah, you misunderstood what i said. I meant, if he was going to be bought, he'd not be bought as a replacement for Barton, as they're not the same type of player, however, he is the same sort of player as Tiote, so it would make sense that if we bought Matuidi, he would be a replacement for him, not Barton. However, i never said we couldn't play Blaze and Cheik together.

Sorry for the misunderstanding.

 

Tiote captain? It's not really a good example to the players on your team if you get booked 14 times, and are the most booked player in a PL season. Tiote needs to sort himself out, and stop thinking he needs to win every ball and make stupid trips on players.

 

If Barton had that many yellows you'd be applauding him for getting stuck in.

And as bgd says, why would you not want him to think he needs to win every ball? It's his tackling at times that needs slight work.

 

What? Of course we want him to win every ball. I don't want him just standing there watching like most of our other players do. I like that he gets stuck in.

 

have fun telling him that...

 

Soo many things i want to disagree with that i can't put them in one answer

 

I like how he gets stuck in, but i don't like how he gets suspended and misses a quarter of the season. Most of his bookings i can understand but quite a few are them are necessary.

He could have had a total of 4 suspensions in one season last season.

He can still play his style but he needs to keep his head at times. I remember away at Stoke when we were 3-0 down and 10 minutes to go, he made a sliding challenge on a player from behind just outside the box. What was the point in that?

I can't believe he stayed on the pitch that day.

No i'm sorry, but there's a difference between getting stuck in, and what he does sometimes. 14 bookings and a sending off tells you all you need to know.

 

he'll improve on that naturally, no need to forc it on him

 

Yeah he was lucky that day and he shouldn't have lost his head, but the point is he rarely loses his head. I can't recall another time when he's done anything like that. He wants to get the ball, and he tackles very well. 20 years ago, he wouldn't get booked for half the things he does. He isn't by any means a dirty player. I'd rather see him get booked now and again than adapt to the modern game and go soft.

 

I never said he was a dirty player, he gets bookings which could have been avoided. He hasn't just done something stupid like that once, he's done it a number of times. You don't get 14 bookings by accident or bad luck mate. Most of the time it's just a fair booking because he's doing his job, but he could have cut the number of bookings down to around 9/10 by learning to keep calm at times.

He trips people and pushes them over sometimes when it's totally unnecessary. The player has no where to go. Yeah if he did something like Nolan did against Wolves when he got booked, like taking one for the team, i'd understand, but there's times when there's basically no point and he goes flying in or sticks a leg out.

Tiote is still one of my favourites and i love the bloke, and he's got very little to criticize about him, but we need him ready to play atleast 33/34 games next season, we can't afford to lose him as many times as we did last season.

 

I'd argue with proper refereeing he should have only had 9 or 10 bookings last season. In the latter half of the season he was picking up phantom yellows based on reputation. Don't get me wrong, I agree he needs to show a little more restraint, but I don't think its fair to suggest it wasn't a little bit of bad luck that led to him picking up as many as he did.

 

I'll be honest and say I don't know because I've not seen much of him.

I do want us to sign him though because I've written a poem for him:

He's not beige is Blaise,
He plays in black n white.
He's better than Guthrie,
Because Guthrie is ****e

 

Barton probably has the ****test reputation in the premier league, yet he was only booked half as many times and picked up a few very unfair ones. If Barton can do it, so can Tiote. I know Tiote has a more physical role, but getting double the amount is unacceptable. Barton went in for quite a few tackles last season, but almost all were sensible challenges whilst he was tracking back.

If Barton can do it, so can Tiote. Your rep isn't excuse when it reaches to a ridiculous amount like Tiote's last season.

Barton 7 yellows
Tiote 14 yellows and a red card.

Barton was treat much, much worse than Tiote by the referees and opposition players.

 

I'd like to see stats of how many tackles were made by both. If Tiote has double the amount of tackles then your point is flawed, if he doesn't then I will agree that you are right.

 

The ref at Stevenage was a joke, Tiote made a good challenge and won the ball. How the ref saw it as otherwise I don't know.

 

One of the reasons why Tiote picked up so many yellows was because he had a heavier worlkload than normal becuase of Nolan going missing in large parts of games, with Cabaye you won't get that, adds more balance.

 

A more realistic version:

-----------Krul-----------
Simmo--Saylor-Collo--Jose
----Matuidi----Tiote-----
---------Cabaye--------
HBA--------------Jonas
-------Erdinc/Ba--------

I'd take that, especially if we can sign a couple of youth/squad players to give a strength-in-depth we lacked this season.

 

Already been said, but just to add my agreement. As one of two DM's in a 4-2-3-1 or 4-3-3 formation. Or as one DM allowing for the fact that Tiote and himself may well pick up cards and get suspended from time to time.

In any case we need more than one accomplished DM and he is also able to play as a more forward minded CM if required.

Too good a player to pass on if we can get him to the club. Sign him up I say!