Ousmane Dembélé
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FinBarcelonafan
Well-known member
He tried way too hard by himself. Although probably saw everyone else sucked so maybe not the worst choice.
Birdy
Senior Member
Served 2 goals on the plate for Auba, who didn't take them.
To make it more lucid: on a night when the team was NOT good in general, he still managed to create 2 clear goals, being arguably the best player on the pitch or at least among the best.
What else to say about this guy?
To make it more lucid: on a night when the team was NOT good in general, he still managed to create 2 clear goals, being arguably the best player on the pitch or at least among the best.
What else to say about this guy?
Defence was shocking, midfield crumbling and you have two wingers who think it's a good idea to literally take every single 1v1. Not gonna lie, I wanted to punch Dembele through my screen
And then Adama comes in and tops it.It's okay to pass it back.
FinBarcelonafan
Well-known member
Defence was shocking, midfield crumbling and you have two wingers who think it's a good idea to literally take every single 1v1. Not gonna lie, I wanted to punch Dembele through my screen
We didn't play as a team at all. I think the Madrid game messed us up. It went to their heads and stopped playing together, which made them good before.
FinBarcelonafan
Well-known member
Yes in a way he did well but he was trying to dribble three players way too often or two at the same time.
A bit too much.
Defence was shocking, midfield crumbling and you have two wingers who think it's a good idea to literally take every single 1v1. Not gonna lie, I wanted to punch Dembele through my screen
It's okay to pass it back.
Which choice did he have?? Pass it back but for what?? Did we looked like an organised team today??
We were mentally not here. At least he gave the example and looked like he cared about the result. Still want him out but he offer to great opportunity, run a lot. One of the last of the player to blame for the score today
Total-Football
Senior Member
This is a winger that is not good enough for barca and will explain it one more. And everything i will say applies to adama whom i deem an even poorer version of dembele.
First I will quote Thiery henry's criticism of Rashford during the VanGaal season. Henry, a pep disciple and a football conoisseur, verbatim, said that Rashford as a number 11 has no business "going to talk to the corner flag". He did this in the skysport program and showed what he meant by displaying a video of David Villa receiving the ball from messi to score the 4th goal. Villa, a barca winger starts from the line (exactly where dembele spends 99% of his time) but as much as possible either Goes inside to offer himself inside the box, or tries to cut inside as much as possible. The outcome? Scoring goals for fun. Same exact thing can be said about henry himself in barca although he was 32,and pedri (think about where he reveived the ball for the champions league final, inside the box,not talking to the corner flag or running along the side ref). Mind u, those players still spent a lot of time next to the line to strech, and tracked back relentlessly as well.
The problem with dembele is that he fools the fans with his cute runs and close control,where in fact, he lacks the fundamentals of the great modern winger. He has extreamly poor interpretation of space and poor reading of the game. Cannot do anything inside and every fucking single time he cuts inside it amounts to nothing: cant one two, cant read the movements of teammates (just as they cant read his), cant pass, nothing. Also, when was it that u saw dembele running to the box diagonally offering himself as a solution? Almost never. Now, ask urself how many times do u see Mane in the box receiving a ball? (perhaps last week when he scored vs city) most probably week in and week out. Football changed, this is not the times of wingers a la beckham, figo, cammoraneisi,etc.. Wingers nowadays (especially post pep era) are the scorers of the game. U cannot score talking to the corner flag or running down a lane like a fucking 100 meters track athlete. Mane, Salah, Foden, Koman, Sterling, Vinicius are players who look constantly either to attack the box, or make a run towards it. Lets not even talk about prime neymar. All of those guys i mentioned ard legit GOAL THREATS
No other game can show whats wrong with demebele today. How many touches he did inside the box, how many off the ball runs inside. How many times did he cut inside, how many shots attempts?
There were counters with ton of space.. Only for him to drift the ball outside everysingle time for a cross. Every time. Ferran who possibly is not a gifted footballer understands the space aspect of the game, starts from the line but always ends in the box, to score goals which he accumulated, which he would never have had talking to the corner flag.
Wingers are main goal scorers, and with sterile wingers like we have - adama is dembele on steroids not in a good sense- u cannot expect to compete. Aubamayang or even a fantastic CF will Never be enough. Those cute faints by dembele next to the side ref are deceiving the fans and its been The case for years, although the smoke started to clear now.
Having said that, dont mind demebele staying and letting his twin adama go because we cant fix everthing at once.
First I will quote Thiery henry's criticism of Rashford during the VanGaal season. Henry, a pep disciple and a football conoisseur, verbatim, said that Rashford as a number 11 has no business "going to talk to the corner flag". He did this in the skysport program and showed what he meant by displaying a video of David Villa receiving the ball from messi to score the 4th goal. Villa, a barca winger starts from the line (exactly where dembele spends 99% of his time) but as much as possible either Goes inside to offer himself inside the box, or tries to cut inside as much as possible. The outcome? Scoring goals for fun. Same exact thing can be said about henry himself in barca although he was 32,and pedri (think about where he reveived the ball for the champions league final, inside the box,not talking to the corner flag or running along the side ref). Mind u, those players still spent a lot of time next to the line to strech, and tracked back relentlessly as well.
The problem with dembele is that he fools the fans with his cute runs and close control,where in fact, he lacks the fundamentals of the great modern winger. He has extreamly poor interpretation of space and poor reading of the game. Cannot do anything inside and every fucking single time he cuts inside it amounts to nothing: cant one two, cant read the movements of teammates (just as they cant read his), cant pass, nothing. Also, when was it that u saw dembele running to the box diagonally offering himself as a solution? Almost never. Now, ask urself how many times do u see Mane in the box receiving a ball? (perhaps last week when he scored vs city) most probably week in and week out. Football changed, this is not the times of wingers a la beckham, figo, cammoraneisi,etc.. Wingers nowadays (especially post pep era) are the scorers of the game. U cannot score talking to the corner flag or running down a lane like a fucking 100 meters track athlete. Mane, Salah, Foden, Koman, Sterling, Vinicius are players who look constantly either to attack the box, or make a run towards it. Lets not even talk about prime neymar. All of those guys i mentioned ard legit GOAL THREATS
No other game can show whats wrong with demebele today. How many touches he did inside the box, how many off the ball runs inside. How many times did he cut inside, how many shots attempts?
There were counters with ton of space.. Only for him to drift the ball outside everysingle time for a cross. Every time. Ferran who possibly is not a gifted footballer understands the space aspect of the game, starts from the line but always ends in the box, to score goals which he accumulated, which he would never have had talking to the corner flag.
Wingers are main goal scorers, and with sterile wingers like we have - adama is dembele on steroids not in a good sense- u cannot expect to compete. Aubamayang or even a fantastic CF will Never be enough. Those cute faints by dembele next to the side ref are deceiving the fans and its been The case for years, although the smoke started to clear now.
Having said that, dont mind demebele staying and letting his twin adama go because we cant fix everthing at once.
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Not that I particularly rate Dembele, but the constant hugging of the touchline and spamming of crosses has mostly to do with how Xavi is instructing him to play. Ferran and Auba are the two main goal targets in this setup. In previous seasons with Messi under Valverde he played on the left and mostly moved inside as Alba overlapped.
Judging by Dembele's strengths and weaknesses this role suits him much better as his link-up play, touch and goal-scoring ability are not nearly as important and he can exploit his pace and decent crossing ability. Eventually he will put in a few quality crosses and one of them might create a goal.
Comparisons to the likes of Henry and Villa are absurd. Those lads had very different profiles that are suited to playing as inside forwards. Ideally you would have someone like Salah or Neymar that can do it all, but at the very least one attacking player must have some dynamic qualities. A front-line of three Ferran Torres' would be terrible.
Judging by Dembele's strengths and weaknesses this role suits him much better as his link-up play, touch and goal-scoring ability are not nearly as important and he can exploit his pace and decent crossing ability. Eventually he will put in a few quality crosses and one of them might create a goal.
Comparisons to the likes of Henry and Villa are absurd. Those lads had very different profiles that are suited to playing as inside forwards. Ideally you would have someone like Salah or Neymar that can do it all, but at the very least one attacking player must have some dynamic qualities. A front-line of three Ferran Torres' would be terrible.
Total-Football
Senior Member
Im sorry to say but those are deja-vus deju-entendus excuses for an attacker who is not good enough.. If an attacker in a 4 3 3 is exempt from scoring responsabilities then who to score for fuck sake? lets take a look at other wingers who occupy more or less the same position:
City:
Mahrez 22 Goals
Sterling 14
Foden 11
Liverpool
Salah 28
Mane 16
Bayern
Gnabry 14
Sane 13
Lord dembele = stunning 1 goal
Those are the teams barca should be in the mix with. And as u see.. The wingers score most goals and plenty too while doing all the other stuff lord dembele does. Except the useless optics of course, faints or what not.
One final thought.Xavi is instructing him to stick to the line to cover his weaknessess more than anything else because he has an even worse back up in adama. No manager in the world of elite football would be satisfied with a productless winger like that except is if his hands are tied.
City:
Mahrez 22 Goals
Sterling 14
Foden 11
Liverpool
Salah 28
Mane 16
Bayern
Gnabry 14
Sane 13
Lord dembele = stunning 1 goal
Those are the teams barca should be in the mix with. And as u see.. The wingers score most goals and plenty too while doing all the other stuff lord dembele does. Except the useless optics of course, faints or what not.
One final thought.Xavi is instructing him to stick to the line to cover his weaknessess more than anything else because he has an even worse back up in adama. No manager in the world of elite football would be satisfied with a productless winger like that except is if his hands are tied.
Ideally Fati would remain healthy and we would have a much better RW than Dembele. I am simply offering explanations for why he is playing the way he is, not excuses for his evident flaws that everyone knows by now. Not a goalscorer and not a question of whether he is a better player than likes of Gnabry, Mahrez or Salah (he's not). Dembele is what he is and Xavi has used him as well you could expect him to.
To be fair his end-product has been quite good lately. 11 assists in 14 La Liga matches, most in 2022 and has the highest xAp90 in Europe by some distance. Still would not trust him over a full season, but it is a matter of pragmatism. Would rather keep him on an acceptable contract than lose for free and splash the entirety of our summer budget on a replacement like Raphinha or Antony that are no guarantees to be any better. Much rather see those funds allocated for a new ST/FB/DM. Maybe give Trincao a chance or bring in some cheaper options to provide cover on the wing.
To be fair his end-product has been quite good lately. 11 assists in 14 La Liga matches, most in 2022 and has the highest xAp90 in Europe by some distance. Still would not trust him over a full season, but it is a matter of pragmatism. Would rather keep him on an acceptable contract than lose for free and splash the entirety of our summer budget on a replacement like Raphinha or Antony that are no guarantees to be any better. Much rather see those funds allocated for a new ST/FB/DM. Maybe give Trincao a chance or bring in some cheaper options to provide cover on the wing.
Iniesta Ultra
Senior Member
Losing's bad for his next contract.
feggydinho
Senior Member
If you watched this game clearly, you'll see that he always had 3 to 4 guys around him and mingueza with Pedri were bad for making combination plays to get in the box, hence why we saw dembele trying to dribble 3 of their players when trying to cut in (and pedri doesn't make himself as available as the likes of Frenkie). It was better when Frenkie came in as he combined well with him and would've been much better had he stayed on the rw when Dest came, so we would've seen combos between those 3. Its also clear that he seems to have a clear role on creating chances, which i think suits him better based on his limitations and he has been good in that role, created 2 great chances yesterday too. That being said, getting a quality replacement for Dembele would be more expensive than letting him go, and I bet you that the likes of Mahrez, Foden would've been ineffective in the first half yesterday if they had 3 to 4 opposition players on them without players to combine with
You are the only here that gets wing play, instead of just looking at spreadsheet 'asssits' and calling Dembele talented. You said it perfectly, Dembele does not know how to interpret space which effectively prevents him from being a goal threat. The fact that the lad cannot and has never scored more than 10 league goals a season in his entire career isn't a mistake. Blaming it on Xavi's instructions is hilarious, the things you listed that other wingers do on a regular basis Dembele has never done in his entire career, and yet his lack of goal threat is somehow Xavi's fault; always excuses for this lad. It's bewildering that so many users here are 'fine' with this average talent. We deserve better.
But just like you I see that we can't fix everything at the same time, I'm okay with Dembele staying but that Adama needs to fucking go.
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jamrock
Senior Member
Like a poster before Said, the way he plays & the spaces he takes up, is clearly what has been instructed by Xavi, who has said a number of times before joining Barcelona, that he likes his winger to stay wide & open up the pitch because that's where he thinks the space is to exploit.
Given that and the fact that we play with Alves at RB who isn't capable of getting up & down and providing width anymore, obviously the winger that plays on that side, will stay wide more often and provide crosses and going by his assist numbers it has worked.
He's not gonna score goals hugging the line, which is clear as day what he is being instructed to do.
If he played for Liverpool, city & the likes he would cut inside more.
That being said, we should still let him go in the summer, not worth all the stress.
Given that and the fact that we play with Alves at RB who isn't capable of getting up & down and providing width anymore, obviously the winger that plays on that side, will stay wide more often and provide crosses and going by his assist numbers it has worked.
He's not gonna score goals hugging the line, which is clear as day what he is being instructed to do.
If he played for Liverpool, city & the likes he would cut inside more.
That being said, we should still let him go in the summer, not worth all the stress.
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