Frenkie de Jong

[Tekkers]

i'm not talking about final passes. i'm talking about
the momentum of the pass. Passing the ball with the right speed at the right time. De Jong has no passing skills.
I don't expect him to have a final pass.
Modric dribbles but follows up with a pass.
Even Modric give a lot of cross passes to the wingers or upcoming back to switch the play and create space.
Frenkie de Jong doesn't have view for more than 5 meter.
Modric off the ball movement is also a lot better.
He doesnt always moves to the ball like de Jong and has more positiong awareness.
I disagree with you about a DM player.
The most important thing of a defensive midfield player is his passing skills.
The speed and quality of passing.
Modric dribbles out when pressured for contra attack.
But if opponents don't pressure he passes the ball to Toni Kroos who dictates the passing.
Frenkie de Jong on DM is great when opponents pressure and he can dribble out of the pressure to give Barcelona air.
But when he has time and space he has no clue what to do with the ball.
Al lot of times he loses the ball when he gets man marked and pressured. that's because his brain is not fast enough.
His first thought is dribbling and his second thought is passing. That's a bad thing for a midfield player. The dribble should be the last option to create space for a CM.
You guys don't understand the difference in view and thinking of de Jong and Busquets.
People overrate de Jong because he has excellent ball control, dribbling skills and rotation with the ball.
The most important thing in football is what you do with the ball. That aspect is very poor with de Jong.
.

I'm a big fan of FdJ but I have to commend you for your analysis. I have no idea why these guys are calling you a troll just because you have a different opinion

 

[Hamzah]

Agreed. We need to sign a box to box midfielder who would contribute in attack while not being terrible in defense either. De Jong will be playing deeper, without too much attacking input.

Main strong points of that player would be: athleticism, power, shooting ability, stamina, creativity in the final 3rd.

Absolutely agree with this

 

[DonAndres]

If we're not going to drop Busquets then we should just play a 4-2-3-1. Frenkie gets to be deeper and he's actually familiar with that system at least. Vidal doesn't stay in midfield anyway, already plays like a CAM/SS almost. The only change necessary is to push FDJ back.

He's being forced to receive the ball high up with his back to goal which is pretty much the exact opposite of the role he played when he was excelling for Ajax and Holland.

I remember early season FDJ looked like a monster with a mobile midfield of Aleña/Roberto in front of him at pivot. We should buy a player like Donny who has similarities to Vidal, and play Arthur/VDB in front of FDJ.

 

[serghei]

That version of 4-3-3 we played vs Leganes would work well, with two hard working wingers like Fati, Griezmann who all come with their man and help the fullbacks defensively. If Busi is not dropped, and he probably won't be since Setien loves him, De Jong will have to adapt playing as a CM-AM.

He can play much better than he is doing now. He seems off form for me and sluggish for a reason, leaving aside his position. This isn't anywhere near De Jong's best game at CM. He can play much much better.

 

[MrBombastic]

I'm a big fan of FdJ but I have to commend you for your analysis. I have no idea why these guys are calling you a troll just because you have a different opinion

i'm a huge Barcelona fan and I want the best for
Barcelona.
I've watched Ajax a lot and I was against the buying
of de Jong.
I really like him as a personality and he is very likeable
guy. That's why people get so emotional when criticizing
de Jong. They like him as a personality and if you criticize him they feel as if they are personal being attacked because they identify so much with him.
I'm not like that. I care about Barcelona.
I don't want Barcelona to buy players who are not quick
thinkers. I want a Barcelona player to have a solution before he has the ball. If the opponent kills that solution by reading it a Barcelona player should have in his mind
a second, third and forth option. A player thst can immidiately switch to a 2nd, 3rd and 4th option when pressured. That's what you should
expect from a Barcelona player.
We have declined because we forgot what Barcelona is about.
Pass move, pass move, opponents pressures, barca midfield player holds the ball and wait till the opponent almost arrive and then immidiate pass it and move. That's how Barcelona creates and rips teams apart.
the timing and speed of passing which is the decisive factor how Messi plays. If we don't have that Messi drops too far because he has the timing and speed of passing at the right moment.
The build up play because of a lack of quality passing is why we play slow. Therefore it's very easy for opponents to man mark Messi and that's why he drops a lot more.
I'm not talking about dropping in the final third in between the lines.
No he drops next to Busquets if he loses patience.

 

[te amo barca]

Not really impressive. Not a player to be in the attacking third for now. His future is at the DM position I think.

 

[mc_lovin]

I think he did very well today. His transitions were beautiful, but yeah, his output in the attacking third is rather limited.

 

[FinBarcelonafan]

Put him with ManC and he would look awesome.

 

[JPM85]

We lack everything that looks like a balanced team right now.

Midfield we play with 3 even profile players that want to have the ball to dictate pace but not give the final through ball
Attack we have 2 players that are not strikers but no wingers as well (Messi / Griezmann), they want to free roam on the space our midfielders want to dicatate the play.
Problem is, we dictate our built up play through the CV's as Pique and Lenglet are building up the play and our midfield is only there to move a 5 yard pass to Messi.

No player will be accomodated to play in our midfield or attack (if you're not a pure winger) as long as we don't solve the balance in our team.
If we continue like this, we can write of FDJ, Griezmann, Arthur together with Coutinho because they loose their rythm and/or development.

 

[boixos]

Frenkie, as expected, looks out of place as a central midfielder. Playing him at CB would do us more good than seeing him continue in that position.

 

[Andresito]

He went from LW with Valverde to a AM/RM hybrid with Setién. He definitely looks confused at times but his work rate and enthusiasm makes up for it. I still believe his best position is DM, mostly because his shooting is very tame.

You can tell he's getting into positions he's not used to. Looking at him with the ball in the box you see him improvising, he doesn't have the lethality in his instincts.

 

[Riordon]

From all I saw with Ajax and his games for Holland, his best position is between a DM and advanced midfielder. He is not a pure DM and even his defensive qualities doesn’t suit that position since he is very aggressive and likes to press.

He needs defensive projection like he got in Holland and Ajax in a double pivot but he also needs an AM in front of him.

His best position is as he said himself the Xavi/Pirlo role

 

[MrBombastic]

He went from LW with Valverde to a AM/RM hybrid with Setién. He definitely looks confused at times but his work rate and enthusiasm makes up for it. I still believe his best position is DM, mostly because his shooting is very tame.

You can tell he's getting into positions he's not used to. Looking at him with the ball in the box you see him improvising, he doesn't have the lethality in his instincts.

lol. De Jong played his whole life as a 10.
Only the last 1,5 years at Ajax he played as DM.
How can he not be used to it if that was hus first nature where he played his whole life?
He just doesn't have it. He doesn't have the speed of thinking and having solutions to be a succesfull passer.

 

[Andrew M]

From all I saw with Ajax and his games for Holland, his best position is between a DM and advanced midfielder. He is not a pure DM and even his defensive qualities doesn’t suit that position since he is very aggressive and likes to press.

He needs defensive projection like he got in Holland and Ajax in a double pivot but he also needs an AM in front of him.

His best position is as he said himself the Xavi/Pirlo role

The Pirlo role had no defensive responsibilities at all. To be a Pirlo you pretty much have to a midfield genius to get away with it.

 

[Andresito]

lol. De Jong played his whole life as a 10.
Only the last 1,5 years at Ajax he played as DM.
How can he not be used to it if that was hus first nature where he played his whole life?
He just doesn't have it. He doesn't have the speed of thinking and having solutions to be a succesfull passer.

You tell me if he's looking natural when shooting in the box, he's like Busquets, it's awkward.

Regarding his passing I don't have doubts about him.

His biggest weaknesses today are his shooting and decision making in the opposition box. Why do I think this? Because it looks unnatural the way he does it, not that he is a shit player but because he needs adaptation.