There's going to be a lot of humble pie being eaten around here next season regarding Thiago.
Maybe, maybe not
Depends if we continue mis-using him (IMO) as an 8, which he doesn't seem to have the legs for
He was starring for Bayern as a 6 and us signing him when we already had Fabinho shows what happens when you've got a starstruck Director of Football who says "oo yes we'll get him in" and then the manager has to try to work out where he's going to play him
I don't think you can really play them both in the same side and the idea of playing both of those two and Henderson (who is as much a 6 as an
is not appealing in the slightest. You've almost got three 6s in a midfield that should have one 6 and two 8s. I mean it might be effective, God knows our greatest ever pointsrackerupper midfield of Fab, Henderson and Gini was effective over aesthetic, but I'd prefer to see Thiago played as a 6 in a lot of games, he likes to see what's in front of him and move the ball around. Fab's much more a get-it-and-give-it no-frills sort of 6. Simple passes. Thiago is a playmaker. Fab just isn't.
Thiago for me was signed to improve our chances of winning Big Ears again, rather than the domestic stuff, which makes our likely relegation to the Eurotrash next season even more catastrophic. Thiago's signing almost becomes pointless.
I barely noticed Bissouma when we've played Brighton. Dunno if he missed a game or two or he was just anonymous or I concentrate so much on our lads that I don't pay as much attention to the oppo (defo a bit of that). But he sounds a bit Momo-like, his best asset is his ability to get about the pitch. Again suggests effective over aesthetic so I'm kind of hoping we look elsewhere. This type of player isn't hard to find for a quarter of the price outside the Premier League, where buying clubs get taken to the cleaners time and again. Didn't Leicester pick up Kante for about £300k from the French 2nd div? What happened to having a scouting network rather than just lashing £40m at it?
I shouldn't grumble about having an effective midfield, none of us should, and I love Gini to bits and will be gutted if he does actually go (still not convinced he will), but having grown up on a diet of Souness (quite gristly) I'd love to see us get an 8 who can pass the ball a bit. And put his foot in. And score double figures a season. And grow a great big tache. I sense Yves Bissouma is not that man. And nor is Thiago.
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