Manchester United needs to understand one thing: Cristiano Ronaldo is an accelerator who has a great skill on executing and finishing a playbook; but he is never an incubator. He outperforms in teams with great incubators (people who stimulate chances from midfield). He is one of the greatest, if not the GOAT, on accelerating and finishing chances.
But outside the ball, he has relative inaction, now, when he is not with the ball. Also, his pressing coverage is relatively below average, now. What happens is this: if there is no Xabi or Iniesta-like in his team, who incubates as great midfielders, team chemistry breaks because expectations crash. CR can still score goals (he is a genius on that) but in general his team underperforms.
Check Juventus: he can finish well (no argument there) but he can only do that if the opportunity is incubated. He is like Lionel Messi; Messi’s career punted when Iniesta left because the accelerator has no incubator in the midfield.
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I watch a lot of football games. Manchester United is falling CR because it seems they do not know how to build around him!
I am never a good footballer but in secondary school, my nickname was Sausa, the football strategist and analyst. I have maintained that CR coming to ManU will not work out because “ManU lacks consistency in structure in the midfield” and CR will not change that. That position has not changed.
Comment on Reference to Messi’s Career Being Punted Post Iniesta
On the Messi reference of Messi’ career being punted. This is a general response. The first full season after Iniesta left Barcelona, Barcelona won nothing. This is very rare in a Messi’s team. Sure, Messi scored 25 goals (down close to 40 he usually does); Iniesta’s absence was statistically significant. So, my point that Messi’s career was punted is statistically supported as his team won nothing and his goals dropped by more than 10.
I extend that by saying that CR’s career punted in Juve in his last season there despite the fact that he scored many goals but if you check, his team finished 4th in Serie A (a team that won the awards many times in a row). CR and Messi are not built for teams that win nothing.
Show me data which shows that Messi improved goal scoring, etc post Iniesta. This is not to say that Messi is CR but I was making a point on the impact of midfielders for ManU.
Besides Number of Goals
Lots of comments on my position that Messi’s career “punted” post Iniesta and that Cristiano Ronaldo will not transform ManU until they improve the midfield. Members are dropping the number of goals scored by these legends to counter my point.
Sure, we see it differently. I make these notes:
– Number of goals scored by ace players is not the only metric. CR scored many goals and his team finished 4th in Juve; he was the highest goal scorer. He won the battle but lost the war. It is key you look at the whole team performance as most of CR goals were against bottom teams (from individual skill) but he struggled against top 10 teams.
– Post full- Iniesta, Messi goals/season against top 10 dropped and he ended with a season where they won nothing.
– CR can score many goals this season in ManU but his team could still underperform. Why?More than 80% of his goals will be against poor teams where he uses his individual brilliance to pack goals. But with GREAT teams, his team fades. To win medals, you need to be competitive against those good teams. ManU lost 5-0 to Liverpool, 2-0 to MC but next week or so CR can put 5 behind Norwich City. If that happens, next year, some will argue that he scored many goals this year without examining the distribution of those goals.As a football analyst, I look at goals scored against top 4 teams; CR has underperformed there for ManU. That is very key to winning medals.
-For CR to do well in ManU, the midfield will improve so that they can compete against good teams and he can score against good teams.
– Messi has scored many goals post-Iniesta but his numbers dropped. In decent teams, he struggled but he piled goals on yoyo teams. My point was that Iniesta made him GREAT against good teams which typically demolish average teams with GOAT-like players.
-In general, I am not one of those analysts who use goals without considering the positions of teams to assess players. Break the goals into three: against top 3, bottom 10, and the rest; if 60% is against bottom 10 (adjusting for number of games, etc), that is a bad season.
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