Vishwa’s Note: Here is Aswin again but this time he has declared war on all the Berba haters/doubters.
“He’s a great player and you’re all idiots.. I wish I had bought him for 10.9 million”
Some Scotsman.
“NO JOHN!!! He could have never survived playing like that in the Malaysian league”
Shebby ‘wiseass’ Singh
Off late, I have been pretty pissed with the Berbatov bashing going on in TV commentary/forums/ opinion columns. It hit an all-time low when my roomie got mocked at work for sporting a Berba jersey by Glory hunting (to be more precise ignorant) “MANU” fans who cannot name the starting back 4. So I decided to write this discourse without referring to the sublime West Ham skill, the overhead kick assist to Valencia or calling him misunderstood genius (!!!).
Berbatov is lazy and he doesn’t do his bit for the team.
If running around and jumping at the feet of goal keepers in possession of the ball means work rate, of course he doesn’t have that and he was as lazy at Spurs too by that definition. Only people with Wenger style deluded vision cannot see his forays into the United box to defend every set piece and corner. Also, nobody seems to bother about his hold up play (possibly the best in the business), ability to hold possession and close control that helps relieve pressure from tight situations. A lazy guy won’t have the determination to do that.
He has not re-produced his Spurs form.
He had 11 assists 23 goals of 52 games in the last season he played for Spurs. Compare that with the 14 goals and 10 assists (2nd in league) of 43 for United last season. Which is pretty much the same considering the fact that he came off the bench a lot for united, did not have a pre-season and 1st month of the season, his injuries till date? I also remember seeing a field in Sky Sports opta stats called “key passes” in which he was league leader (forgot the exact number but it was surely 40 plus), which means he would have had more assists with some better finishing from other united players. This season’s return of 9 from 24 league games isn’t bad either considering the number of sub appearances.
His goal rate is not up to the mark.
He has always been a one goal in three games striker and it is a decent rate for a striker who doesn’t take free-kicks/penalties.
STAT ATTACK: Let’s start with Rooney shall we. Starting with the season before this and going backwards. 20 off 49 games, 18 of 43, 23 off 55 and 19 off 43 all of which look similar to his. Drogba’s league record reads 5 off 24 games, 8 off 19 , 20 off 36, 12 off 29 and 10 off 26.Not to forget that fact that he starts almost all of his games and takes Chelsea’s free-kicks in goal scoring positions and I am not even going into his “assists” numbers. So does this mean they are useless too???
Also Berbatov is much more of a goal-maker than a goal-scorer, a fact that he is proud of. All the other United front men are much more selfish than him. Several times this season I have personally seen him take some excellent positions and not get picked out.
He’s not worth 30 million.
Initially he wasn’t till City started a bidding war on deadline day. Spurs were bound to accept a 20% lesser bid. Also, it is hard to change the mentality that a 30 million big buy should be a 30 goal a season striker.
Surely ALL izz not well for him. There’s no smoke without fire.
Agreed. There are a few problems that he has with this united team.
# United are a counter- attacking team and their counters typically begin from set plays in their own box and carried on by pacy players that are left up field. He can’t participate in them as he is back defending in his own box because of his height.
# Set pieces. I din’t see him score a single set piece goal for United , while he was out-jumping the likes of Terry while he was at spurs. For that matter I don’t see united score in that many set-plays since later part of last season. Even Vidic doesn’t score in set-plays nowadays. Delivery/practice problems??? 2 or 3 more set piece goals would make that goal-rate look better.
# Intelligence levels: Not every one might agree with this point, but I am seeing people not making proper runs to his passes or not picking him out when he is in excellent positions in almost every match played this season. He had a similar problem at Spurs too with players other than Keane. I hate saying this but only Barca could be an ideal team for him.
# Poor finishing in some cases: Hard to argue against. But I have seen Rooney, Tevez and Ronaldo miss chances similar to those that he has missed. It’s pretty hard to find a natural finisher these days anyway.
# British favoritism: When United lose, it is easy for the press to blame the lazy looking eastern Europeans than their darling little striker whose reputation they had built up for years. It’s even easier for United fans to do the same due to prolonged exposure to the same junk and easiest for opposition fans who don’t even watch him play. One typical example was last weekend’s defeat at Everton when people were discussing Berba’s form instead of Rooney’s part in everton’s 3rd goal (and his overall shitty performance) as well as his early substitution despite playing well. Media apart, Fergie does favor/back his British players more than his foreign players. He made most believe that Foster was gonna be England’s no 1 and surely a Vidic can’t get away with Rio Ferdinand like behavior/lifestyle. It’s the same with Wenger and the French and Benitez and Lucas.
“I wish I were Carlton Palmer”
Shebby singh
I can’t say i agree with some parts of your post there mate..
Stats can be beguiling and don’t always paint the true picture. It can be ticked into suiting your arguments. Heck, you can even twist facts to show that pinky shoes and Lucas are good.
I’ve been disappointed with Berbatov myself. Apart from a few splattering of games, his work rate has been dismal and it shows him up a bit more because of the man who plays alongside him and works his ass off. Berba’s job is to score goals and he doesn’t get into enough good positions to do that. Defending set pieces is not an excuse and he isn’t that good in the air anyway. The only reason he can’t work in counters is coz his pace isn’t good enough.
The other issue is that he is not a natural finisher. Neither is Rooney but he brings so much more to the team. IMHO, therein lies the crux of the problem. Their playing styles may differ but they perform the role of holding up the ball and play the role of second striker. As prolific as wazza has been this season, he’s still not in the bracket of the finest fineshers (finest players sure but not finishers). Wazza tracks back so often and ends up in the midfield or on the left that he provides a lot of killer passes. The problem is that berba is not at the other end to receive them. I personally believe that berba+Owen combination has the potential to be really good because of owen’s predatory instincts. But sadly we’ll never get to see it.
But berba is still a handy player to have in the team can produce moments of brilliance and can win matches on his own. Part of the problem has also been the high expectations of him due to his huge price tag. We’ve got to remember the circumstances of the transfer and the fact that the blue shite caused a massive hike in his price. That is not berba’s fault. He’s still doing what he was doing at spurs. My problem is that it is not good enough. This is United and he should step up big time and time is running out before he is branded a failure. I still have faith that berba can produce the goods and find a permanent starting berth in the team. It’ll also take us back to 4-4-2 that i love United to play.
Hmm nice to c “MANU” fans argue ..Becoming more of the BJP 😉 I say lets get down to solve more such conundrums need more such healthy discussions , lets continue this segment with critiques on Anderson and Nani any takers???
To be fair I don’t think funguson can name his ‘starting back 4’ at the moment.
Nice points man. Happy to see our chat blossom into a post. But you can’t hate Rooney just because he is overhyped by the media or because of gloryhunters. Of course he is not of the Ruud or Torres kind, so cut him slack .
I don’t think we should be discussing our scoring options because they are there. First off, the main discussion should be of the back four, especially Jhonny Evans who was highly hyped by ferguson last year but has proven absolutely nothing this year, a player that may suit a championship team maybe Middlesborough. I wont start on Wes Brown, and Rio has been a big disappointment. Berba has been brought in to score goals and he is doing that with the addition of fine passing skill.
@Arvi post is about berbatov so rooney was brought up for comparison purposes only….(pretty much inevitable when i am involved 🙂 )
@venky: Thanks for you lengthy post man… but i disagree that he is not good on the air and is not good enough to cut it at united.. Cut the guy some slack… and why were you inclined think about a “goal scorer and work rate” when we bought him????? days of finishers and and goalscorers were gone with RVN….one query … Why weren’t you complaining about CR’s “work rate ” then…. do u want all our strikers to keep running back like headless chickens with any disregard for shape/system???
@sk: critique on anderson and nani?? WTF dude???
Nope,Only theo is allowed the headless chicken run.
When he gets better nani can take over
Chumma da :), Nice post it really takes good courage (not as in Sir Humphrey’s words :P)to come out with a post like this esp when the whole world is against you.Thumbs up Agreed that Berba is expected to deliver what he isn’t really.Set pieces and finishing mus be improved no arguements there though.
personally i dont find him that bad or that good… but i guess he still needs to prove a little bit more before being deemed suitable enuff 4 United…n 4 tht he needs more starts….
Very well written man, hats off 🙂
I think the main point is something me and my friend were discussing when we were randomly talking about England’s favoured strike force. Surely Heskey’s not the second best striker in England (Defoe, or Gabby).
But sometimes, you don’t need your best 2 players on the pitch. You need the player who plays best ALONGSIDE your best player. And for both United and England, that’s got to be Roon. And unfortunately for United, Berba hasn’t been that ‘alongside’ player.
@ Aswin,
I don’t want berba to track back and defend.. What i want him to do is stop looking at the heavens, count the starts and make barbecues every time he misses a chance orwhen the defenders rob the ball off… why the feck can’t he just get on with the game and look for the next opportunity… Another disappointment of his has been his aerial ability… Contrary to what you might say, he is very poor in the air and does not win the important aerial battles.. how many headers has berba scored?
You must understand that i’m not against berba.. I love his silky touches and amazing ball control.. But my opinion is that he is still the same player he was at spurs… That is just not good enough for united.. He needs to step up his game and willing to work more.. CR7 never came under this sort of critism coz he did run his ass of when the team needed it and he had the pace to do so… See the CL semi against wenger’s school kids… CR7 was also the best in the business at set pieces and his aerial ability… To compare berba and CR7 is stupidity
dude i have been saying he hasn’t scored many headers, while he was doing so at tottenham… i too agree that he heasnt scored many headers….
@ Aswin
but i disagree that he is not good on the air
But i take everything back after the beast of a performance against Villa.. If he gives more performances like that and works hard, i’d have no complains.. He was worth every penny today..
Oh and btw, Park put in another splendid shift.. He is one of the most underrated players for us..
lol. what happened did the headless chicken finally crossed the road?
lol! Crossed the road nd straight into venky’s heart 😛
i actually feel that even ferguson is a little at fault and i dont think that he really trusts berba.Mind u this can have a great deal of impact on the mindset of the player. i believe he is a very talented player and has been talked about ever since his bayer days. What if he becomes the next forlan ..