ThwiX
Best midfielder around
Old friendship.
Gerard Piqué
- Thread starter Barcaman
- Start date
impeh
Hi, its me..
hellsangel1
New member
He's slow on the turn and pretty poor in 1v1 situations. People kept excusing our CB's by saying that the Barca forwards and midfield aren't pressing and winning the ball back the way they used to but in this game really showed. He's an overrated defender, good in the air generally and on set-pieces but pretty sluggish on the ground. Even against a very young,inexperienced and depleted Milan frontline, our defenders looked pretty jittery and vulnerable (especially Mascherano, Pique and Alba). I've been saying for quite some time now that we need a proper CB and more defensively sound LB otherwise we will be in trouble against the big sides who've got a lot of quality wingers and attackers. Against Milan we got away with it but against the likes of Bayern , Madrid , Dortmund or Juventus it's going to be much harder to stop them from scoring. Our midfielders and frontline have to press like maniacs in order to protect our defenders.
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DavidVillano1
New member
For me Pique was the best defender in the world a couple of years back, but he's totally declined and I've no idea why as he's only 26 so it can't be a pace issue. Ramos has overtook him as well.
Hopefully he sorts himself out defensively.
Hopefully he sorts himself out defensively.
Indignado
New member
and Pedro
F
Flavia
Guest
Pique, Milan and Shakira, after the game: https://mobile.twitter.com/3gerardpique/status/311656264658714624/photo/1
abual3bed1
New member
He was good, not great. He almost gave Shaarawy a penalty but the youngster kept going and took a weak shot.
Barca8
New member
Pique 2 years ago had my vote for best defender in the world. He was a brilliant hybrid defender. While he is still one of my favorite defenders he is lacking a lot of the things that made him great. His positioning is good, but he is really bad in 1v1s. He almost always fouls, goes to ground, or gets beat. The few chances Milan had yesterday could have been avoided if Pique just kept running and pushing the attackers wide instead of letting them go past him and shoot.
Pep played Pique very little last season and had to turn Mascherano into a CB. I also have a better understanding of why we like to have Holding midfielders play as CBs... they have good engines, good pace, and are technically sound with the ball (though Yaya & Busquets make a lot less mistakes than Mascherano).
I hope Pique can fix these small flaws he has picked up and would like to see Bartra & Muniesa play alongside him a lot more.
Pep played Pique very little last season and had to turn Mascherano into a CB. I also have a better understanding of why we like to have Holding midfielders play as CBs... they have good engines, good pace, and are technically sound with the ball (though Yaya & Busquets make a lot less mistakes than Mascherano).
I hope Pique can fix these small flaws he has picked up and would like to see Bartra & Muniesa play alongside him a lot more.
kresearch
New member
Unf, it doesn't seem like Pique cares much about it. I think it's more of an attitude thing than it's physical. Him and Valdes seem to share a similar bug. They know they suck lately but they seem to be fine with it and do not do anything about it. That's not fair to the team and also makes them look like total flops.
hellsangel1
New member
It's not something that he's 'picked' up overnight. I've seen him make mistakes before but he usually had a younger and healthier Puyol to bail him out at times. Pique's best years were the times when he played alongside the more tactically, positionally and defensively aware LB Abidal and when Dani was an absolute beast every game, we also had Toure earlier to provide cover.
Look at Pique's marking of Rooney for United's goal in the Champions League final a couple years back, he's caught ball-watching and doesn't cover or isn't aware of Rooney's run into the box. He was at fault for the goal that United scored in the CL final a couple years back. So it's not like this guy didn't make mistakes. It's just that he had better players or defenders around him who were in better form at the time when Pique was doing well. Abidal has had his health problems and Dani is still great but not quite the beast that he used to be week-in-week-out. The team as a whole doesn't press with the same consistency as it used to and so therefore Pique is being exposed more. His so-called greatness was more a product of the environment and situation around him which allowed his flaws to be hidden mostly. Which doesn't mean that Pique is a bad defender or he was a bad defender, it's just that I never considered him to be quite as good as some people made him out to be. Put him in a team like United or some lesser side which doesn't have the ball as much and people would've had a much more different opinion of him and his career.
Look at Pique's marking of Rooney for United's goal in the Champions League final a couple years back, he's caught ball-watching and doesn't cover or isn't aware of Rooney's run into the box. He was at fault for the goal that United scored in the CL final a couple years back. So it's not like this guy didn't make mistakes. It's just that he had better players or defenders around him who were in better form at the time when Pique was doing well. Abidal has had his health problems and Dani is still great but not quite the beast that he used to be week-in-week-out. The team as a whole doesn't press with the same consistency as it used to and so therefore Pique is being exposed more. His so-called greatness was more a product of the environment and situation around him which allowed his flaws to be hidden mostly. Which doesn't mean that Pique is a bad defender or he was a bad defender, it's just that I never considered him to be quite as good as some people made him out to be. Put him in a team like United or some lesser side which doesn't have the ball as much and people would've had a much more different opinion of him and his career.
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