Ivan Rakitić

[Arizona Scott]

Real's midfield has been so good that we haven't see it at all this year. Must be mindgames to trick Barca into thinking they are shit. Surely they aren't actually shit, are they?

Or are you open to only those players who have good transfermarket stats?

Since you have trouble watching the matches with the slightest bit of fairness and objectivity why don't you try looking at some overall metrics of performance. Why don't you challenge yourself a bit, see if you opinions and observations match the best objective data we have. Try whoscores, try sofascore, try sqwaka. They are not based on transfer value--purely match performance based. I know you won't because you are afraid of being more exposed than you already are. It is far easier to sit back and take half sentences out of context than provide any evidence supported positions.

Real's midfield has been so good that we haven't see it at all this year. Must be mindgames to trick Barca into thinking they are shit. Surely they aren't actually shit, are they?

Yeah surely since they were good in the past they must good now as well. Wait a minute now your Raki love is making sense. You never took off your nostalgia glasses.

Why do you think Real is nearly 2nd in La Liga, only lost to Barca in the Copa semis, and has a foot in the door for the CL quarterfinals (final 8). All doing this through 3 manager in 6 months and losing their all time scorer at the last minute. Their backline has also performed really bad and they have played a lot of young players in the forward spots who have been very inconsistent. Why do think despite all this they are a top 8 team in the world?

 

[Arizona Scott]

The problem here is people, who perceive "hate" when there is none. No one gives a shit about pro millionaire sportsmen to hate them, unless they're mentally unstable and i see no evidence that there would be any such people here. Saying that someone is doing shit job at his office isn't 'hate', breh.

Ok maybe not "hate", just the absurdity of buffoons

 

[Arizona Scott]

1
Now, since I both said that I have watched a match and that I didn't watch a match.
Do you think that maybe I was using a sarcasm in one of those two cases?

Going to be well over his head as he looks for a couple lines of words, taken out of context and without sarcasm in mind, to string together some weak point he/she thinks undermines another. Offers nothing original or evidence supported on his own so this is the only tactic she/he knows.

 

[Arizona Scott]

Arizona Scott often makes random baseless claims.

Go ahead missy/sunny, seek and support your case?

 

[Cule4life]

Since you have trouble watching the matches with the slightest bit of fairness and objectivity why don't you try looking at some overall metrics of performance. Why don't you challenge yourself a bit, see if you opinions and observations match the best objective data we have. Try whoscores, try sofascore, try sqwaka. They are not based on transfer value--purely match performance based. I know you won't because you are afraid of being more exposed than you already are. It is far easier to sit back and take half sentences out of context than provide any evidence supported positions.

Yeah i don't need stats to understand football. I use my eyes. Stats can be misleading. They can at best be used as a detailed look at the proper observations you make by watching matches.

For e.g. i know by watching matches that Messi has low workrate. Then i check his stats to see how much less he runs.

I know by watching matches that majority of Raki passes are back or side passes. So his passing accuracy isn't really relevant. If someone was doing a lot of giveways we can check how many turnovers in stats.

That's how stats are supposed to be used.

Why do you think Real is nearly 2nd in La Liga, only lost to Barca in the Copa semis, and has a foot in the door for the CL quarterfinals (final 8). All doing this through 3 manager in 6 months and losing their all time scorer at the last minute. Their backline has also performed really bad and they have played a lot of young players in the forward spots who have been very inconsistent. Why do think despite all this they are a top 8 team in the world?

Real is behind freaking Atletico in the table. La liga doesn't have that many rich teams to match Real's budget still they have been outplayed by teams like Levante to be bailed out by refs and luck. Somebody who just checks results and stats wouldn't know that

CL really? Yeah they barely beat the mighty Ajax so they must be one of the best MFs in the world. Oh wait they were beaten by freaking CSKA Moscow

And Copa semis really? Yeah Leganes and Girona were big scalps.

 

[BBZ8800]

Yeah i don't need stats to understand football. I use my eyes.

I am dead serious now, without trolling or anything.

Eyes are subjective.
Let's imagine that you and me watched a match together and commented on everything.
In my eyes and how I see football, Rakitic for example had a good match.
You would say: he was bad, or average at best.

So, one pair of eyes see that Rakitic is playing well.
And the other pair of eyes see that he is playing bad.

What now?

It is based on how do you see football.
For example, for guys whom I like to call Pepistas, of course that a midfield consisted of Busi-Arthur-Frenkie or Frenkie-Arthur-Alena/Puig looks perfectly normal and they don't see anything wrong with it.

Or regarding our play as a team.
Again, for "Pepistas" (obsessed with Pep) or for guys who started to watch Barca during Pep's years, of course that a current football is a total disgrace.
And I don't mean anything bad with that, I get where those fans are coming from.

On the other hand, since I watched Barca in 90s, during early 00s, and during Rijkaard, to me our play isn't THAT bad.
I have seen similar Barcas or worse Barcas.
Even worse, I have seen a lot of Barcas with weaker play, similar play or slightly better play who didn't win ANY trophies for years.

So, if a standard is Pep when we both played awesome and we were winning 82 titles per season, of course that a current era is a disaster in terms of beauty.
On the other hand, imagine how painful was in 90s and 00s, watching your team playing a CL 14 times in row to finally WIN a title, and even then we needed tons of bravery, skills and lots of luck.

It doesn't mean that I don't want a nice passing football.
But, for example, I would rather see us play EV's football and win La Ligas each year, then having a fancy coach like Sarri, playing a nice football for the eye, and yet finishing 3rd in La Liga.
Ok, the world is not black and white and there are other options in between Valverde's football and being 3rd in La Liga, but I don't think that it is "that easy" to win La Ligas and that a world will be so simple if we'll really play with Frenkie-Arthur-Alena, Dembele-Messi-Malcom and other crazy formations mentioned here often.

Anyway:
1. stats can be tricky, true
2. but eyes are also subjective, based on how your brain works and based on of which "Barca's school" are you coming from (Pep's era or from other eras)

So:
1. Arizona Scott watched a match with his eyes and his eyes say that Raki was good
2. Bbz has seen the same
3. Cule, Gnidro, Barca22, Catalinutz and others have seen the opposite

What now?
Who is right?
Or, maybe BOTH of us are right and maybe we will need neutral judges (fans from other clubs, without bias, for example, let's ask [MENTION=18429]Morten[/MENTION] or RM's fans what they think), or we could use: stats...

 

[te amo barca]

He had a good game, best midfielder that night, gonna see you later haters

 

[Gnidrologist]

He was 'decent'. Was solid participating in defensive positioning, blocked some advances and didn't make outright blunders. Was utterly impotent in buildup as per usual. Not only his legs are slow, but his brain has gotten so senile that it's obvious he simply doesn't have a clue what to do with ball and after fumbling around aimlessly for 3-6 seconds, gives the ball back to Busi or to the side to one of the wingbacks. As expected that doesn't lead to any advancement and ball needs to get recirculated again and again in this fashion. Add to this that he doesn't even move forward to open up in more advanced position, but is always in one line with Busi or behind him, and we have situation, where Busquets is our most creative midfielder. He at least manages to find Messi with an occasional line breaking pass. Not like Roberto was better or anything, but as far as buildup play goes he's atrocious. Given that Barca can only ever properly defend by constantly having ball and not giving it away, while concedes humongous amount of clear cut chances, when defending statically, Rakitic is absolutely inappropriate in his current condition. Under Lucho and MSM he was at least your lauded workhorse, who ran around harassing opponents relentlessly. Now, with his new comfortable unbenchable form he just jogs around small radius the whole match.
I guess we have to have actually good, mobile mid with technique and vision to swap him for many people to realize how inadequate he is. Really hoping on De Jong.

 

[Arizona Scott]

Yeah i don't need stats to understand football.

....

That's how stats are supposed to be used.

No the best stats are overall composite measures of performance. That account for all regularly recorded information, as impartially as possible. For instance looking at goals made (or baskets, or hits, or completions), has less meaning unless you consider volume of shots taken. Shots (and goals, and goals per shot) doesn't take into account key passes and assists. Even those stats don't account for lost possessions, or interceptions or cleared headers, and on and on, still other things that contribute to whether your team loses. Again the composite metrics consider all things measured in as impartial a way as possible (sofascore and whoscored have some good ones). If your own internal ratings of players on the same squad are way off from the impartial ratings, and the impartial ratings are based on a large sample, it means you are watching the match with highly colored glasses. It could be because you eyes are bad, or more likely because your brain is processing the information to confirm to how you expect to see it, from your own bias, not how it is. BBZ and I (and others) are challenging you and others to *possibly* explore your own biases a bit. So far without success. All humans have them (biases), but the rational person is open to change and makes efforts to identify his/her own biases. A good sign of the rational person is to change or shift movements when new information (good play you witness, new data/stats) comes in. If you want to be non-rational, tribal, world, so be it. It just means we will go circles and circles around until we get bored, decide it is a waste of time, have too much work, or whatever.

Real is behind freaking Atletico in the table. La liga doesn't have that many rich teams to match Real's budget still they have been outplayed by teams like Levante to be bailed out by refs and luck. Somebody who just checks results and stats wouldn't know that

CL really? Yeah they barely beat the mighty Ajax so they must be one of the best MFs in the world. Oh wait they were beaten by freaking CSKA Moscow

And Copa semis really? Yeah Leganes and Girona were big scalps.

Do you not realize Atletico is one of the 6 or so best teams in the world at the moment? Being a point off them means you are very very good (and Real smoked them pretty good at their place, right before they smoked Juve). Real is near the round of 8 in the CL, no matter how you slice it that suggest they are one of the best (top 10, top 8, maybe better--what if they make the semis?). Of course I'd rather see Ajax upset them and gladly say Real is not a top 10 team in the world--like to eat my words there, but yes any sensible performance rating of teams would have Real top 10, top 8 in the world based on this year's performance. It ain't because they have scored like they used to, nor the play of their backline this year, why they have been very formidable and still can beat anyone on a given day. They can beat anyone on a given day because their midfield at full strength is the best in the world and can paper over other flaws for a short time. They played well and tied with us in the Camp Nou just earlier this month, and we had a full squad, including Arthur. It took Barcelona to knock them out of the CdR BTW, unless you want to debate me Barca ins't one of the top 4 teams in the world this year based on play across competitions.

 

[Arizona Scott]

He was 'decent'. Was solid participating in defensive positioning, blocked some advances and didn't make outright blunders. Was utterly impotent in buildup as per usual. Not only his legs are slow, but his brain has gotten so senile that it's obvious he simply doesn't have a clue what to do with ball and after fumbling around aimlessly for 3-6 seconds, gives the ball back to Busi or to the side to one of the wingbacks. As expected that doesn't lead to any advancement and ball needs to get recirculated again and again in this fashion. Add to this that he doesn't even move forward to open up in more advanced position, but is always in one line with Busi or behind him, and we have situation, where Busquets is our most creative midfielder. He at least manages to find Messi with an occasional line breaking pass. Not like Roberto was better or anything, but as far as buildup play goes he's atrocious. Given that Barca can only ever properly defend by constantly having ball and not giving it away, while concedes humongous amount of clear cut chances, when defending statically, Rakitic is absolutely inappropriate in his current condition. Under Lucho and MSM he was at least your lauded workhorse, who ran around harassing opponents relentlessly. Now, with his new comfortable unbenchable form he just jogs around small radius the whole match.
I guess we have to have actually good, mobile mid with technique and vision to swap him for many people to realize how inadequate he is. Really hoping on De Jong.

There is some of this I would agree with. Rakitic does have great technique and vision however, but he is slow. Busi has even greater technique and vision (like few players ever), but he also is slow. It does create its weaknesses, they are not ideal to have together. The problems are the alternatives in their two posts either sacrifice too much technique or vision for what they might provide. Hopefully FDJ changes this balance, we will see, but he isn't on the team yet. In terms of back/sideways passes, not like that isn't the primary technique of the young darling midfielder (who I like and want back ASAP BTW). Some times good controlling and accurate passes (even if sideways or slightly behind) is the right thing to do, leaves opponents distressed and gets to other spaces on the pitch where you can attack.

I will also add against Real he had to be paired closely with Busi and support. Leaving Busi isolated could have been a death sentence. But for instance in the last two Sevilla matches he was more forward. His cross from far on the left wing to Messi led to our 1st goal. Our 2nd goal was when he intercepted the ball, got it Dembele on the right wing, who fed to Messi and goal. The match before vs Sevilla he made the run (and goal) to further put us in command and recover from a bad 1st leg in Sevilla.

Look I know Rakitic isn't the best midfielder in the world and has limitations. The limitations are exacerbated when he is overused. Hopefully he starts getting much more equal time off the pitch as on it. But in the current squad he is one of the 11 best players we have without a doubt. Maybe that will change next year but for now we want the best he has got for the matches where this season will be judged as 1) outstanding, or, 2) historic.

 

[sickstar]

With our current midfielder composition, he's 3rd best below arthur and bob, but quite close with bob.
He's confident with the ball and has nice skill,but doesnt have that fast burst and pin point passes that is needed. Well, it should be no problem if hes bob's position, but with arthur and bob already with central midfielder role, we needed a more aggresive one, and raki still lacking it a bit. Coutinho doesnt perform well lately, hopefully it would change.

 

[Arizona Scott]

With our current midfielder composition, he's 3rd best below arthur and bob, but quite close with bob.
He's confident with the ball and has nice skill,but doesnt have that fast burst and pin point passes that is needed. Well, it should be no problem if hes bob's position, but with arthur and bob already with central midfielder role, we needed a more aggresive one, and raki still lacking it a bit. Coutinho doesnt perform well lately, hopefully it would change.

His composure, accuracy, mental processing and full field vision is much higher than Bob or Vidal. They offer more hustle factor and quickness, but we are a much less secure team with the ball and less positionally sound without it. I guess it depends some the the style and strengths of the opposing team who should play among them. But either way there should be a healthy rotation (maybe include Coutinho and Alena too) to keep all core midfielders fresh--including Busi and Arthur. Bob is also needed to spell Semedo and Alba as well, so once we get Arthur back hard to imagine him getting much time back in midfield.

 

[Cule4life]

snip

First of all- Last year Valgreen fans like you were crying that he was playing shit football because the squad was shit. Now hundreds of millions transfer spending later we're playing the exact same shit football. So will Valmierda fans like you finally admit that their dear manager is incapable of playing decent football? Or will you keep up with deflections and whataboutism?

Secondly- How does being bad in the past excuse us for being bad in the present? Did those teams have Messi? Did they spend hundreds of millions on their squads and still played badly? Were Barca as big a name and financial juggernaut back then? Blackburn were winning EPLs in that era. Take off your nostalgia glasses and come back to the reality of the present.

Thirdly- Pepistas really? Is that your go to juvenile insult when you can't come up with any counterpoints? Majority of us here don't want us to go back to tiki taka. We want a clear offensive philosophy with dynamic movements on and off the ball. We are just fed up with the "sit back with a team not built for it" philosophy from Mr. Safety.

Fourthly- Your holy grail stats. You have gone so far down the rabbit hole of stats that you have stopped trusting your own eyes and stopped watching matches. Thankfully the rest of us haven't.

If only those stupid football pundits would get the hint and stop analyzing match plays on those big screens with expensive freeze frame technology and instead just pull up whoscored pages on those screens (wouldn't that be a sight ) football would be much better wouldn't it?

While we're at it, since football is all about the stats and attractive football doesn't matter, why do TV channels spend billions to acquire match rights and why do people pay money to watch them. If only they could see the forest for the trees and just check whoscored (which smarties like you started doing long ago)

Fifthly- Criticizing someone for some of the aspects of their play isn't hating. Raki has been rightly criticized in some aspects of play (like his buildup play) while acknowledging he was okay/average in other aspects. On the other hand ignoring those aspects and shouting rhetoric like "good game" and "haters gonna hate" exhibits one or more of fanboyism/but but stats/holier than thou/lack of football understanding.

Lastly- Yes different people can perceive games differently due to different reasons (fanboying like Arizona scott, stats whoring like your majesty, lack of football understanding and yes sometime even hating). But stats (especially without context) is never a be all neutral judgment pillar of football. And neutral fans might have their own agendas which makes them biased (like Malmierda glorifying trolls like Wolfe)

Remember people are different and hence opinions will be different.

 

[Gnidrologist]

I think pepistas are the dreadful derivation of those awful cruifistas.:[

 

[Cule4life]

No the best stats are overall composite measures of performance.

Every stat needs context. Cesc had great stats too. Why did we sell him then?

Do you not realize Atletico is one of the 6 or so best teams in the world at the moment?

Atletico and Madrid both have been crap this year. Just because others are shit, doesn't excuse us for being shit as well.