Match Ratings Ratings vs Brentford

[karennina]

Kulusevski - Don't understand why he wasn't subbed. Just looks a bit slow and lacking in dynamism. Feel like getting Porro on with his runs could've made us more dangerous.

He was slow and lacking in dynamism. But the ball sticks to him better than to anyone else in our team bar Bissouma and Maddison, so we'd lose that even when he's not finding the final pass - can we afford to relinquish that control, now that Kane's incredible retention of possession is gone?

As for danger, he did get to the byline in the six yard box, in a full yard of space, and with almost a second to pick his cross, a couple of times. When most of our other players arrive at that spot, they're at full stretch and about to fall over. I think he was dangerous, just didn't find the right cutback.

 

[alexis]

Vic 4.5
Royal 6.5
Romero 7
Sanchez 6
Van de ven 7.5
Udogie 8
Bissouma 8.5
Skipp 5
Maddison 8.5
Kulu 4
Richarlison 4
Son 4

brilliant in the middle third, front three were honestly quite bad.

Harsh on royal

 

[PrettyColors]

Harsh on royal

He got rinsed twice, quite badly I might add, at the end of the first half. The first was directly responsible for the 2nd goal and the second he got very lucky that Mbeumo missed a tap-in. Felt he didn’t really offer much attacking wise aside from the goal. Still thought he was good just wasn’t happy with his defending on either of those two chances.

 

[MiakSarawak]

I don't think they picking on him.... more pointing out his performance which was a bit nervy but I'm sure he will grow into his position in the PL in the coming games.

He did look like a deer caught in headlights at times last night. But he will come good I'm sure.

 

[Finchyid]

Well well well what do we have here

I really enjoyed that. I thought Maddison was class as was Bissouma. Add another of that ilk, as I keep saying, and we have one of the best midfields in the league.

Son and Richarlison need replacing in time. Emerson also just does not give me confidence.

Rodrigo says hello

 

[daveduvet]

…chuffed for Sanchez
…. Really pleased we have Biss & Maddison
… loving Emerson’s energy & on field character
… vdv & udogie blinding
Biss motm
Great debut for Ange… Brentford first game is a tough gig

 

[Kirito]

Vicario - Concerning

Royal - Iffy. Some good moments and some difficult moments defensively.
Sanchez and van de Ven - Very good
Udogie - Beast

Bissouma - Beast
Skipp - Very average
Maddison - Great

Son and Richarlison - Poor. With Son you know he can go to the next level but Richarlison looks like a big problem. That chance Richarlison had in the 88th minute; I'd expect a lot better for a £60m player.
Kulusevski - Don't understand why he wasn't subbed. Just looks a bit slow and lacking in dynamism. Feel like getting Porro on with his runs could've made us more dangerous.

Porro 100% the better option in this team. Kulusevski had a purple patch when he joined but has been average/poor for a year now.

 

[Gilzeanking]

Don't need to add to the general opinion we're all pretty much in agreement.We have some great players these days.

I've been on about Kulu(5) and Son(5) needing replacing for months now, after a full season of bad form and was thinking it a risk to buy Kulu on the basis of his form from a full year previously. He runs with the ball and defenders zoom past him to recover. His last 20 mins of the previous match though(Barca) he seemed to suddenly wake up from a season's sleep and was great, so I thought he'd continue that vs Brentford, but no.
It does have to be added that there was precious little space for the 2 vs a packed defence, but still its chequebook time imo.

Luv a comeback story and as someone here pointed out Sanchez(7) last 180 mins have been great. Since his humiliation end of last season he's been way better, pleased for him. Good 3rd choice, well done Dav.

Think part of Skipp's (6) problem is that we have wonderful players in midfield now and its hard to look good around them.

I'm looking forward to Forster recovering from his back injury. Vic(6) will improve , but if not, Forster is more than an able substitute imo....and Ange(8) is a man to react to what he sees rather than reputations (eg Son substituted) so he'll act in the best interests of the club I hope.

Overall, good stuff.

 

[NEVILLEB]

Royal also got caught out again and Brentford somehow put it over, more a case of wasn’t alert rather than tactics. Also think Perisic was much better than Son and combined well with Udogie. Was a bit surprised Ange didn’t change out Kulu as well to get Gio or Solomon out there.

Bissouma, Udogie and Maddison were all quality. Good debut for VDV and credit to Sanchez, thought Vicario was sound enough and hopefully builds on that.

As many have pointed out the front three were poor with Son and Kulu ineffective, Richy battled hard and made a nuisance of himself. Almost forgot Skipp which is probably quite appropriat.

Yes he did. You wonder if some on here are watching or understand the game at all.

 

[dannythomas]

Son needs to play centrally instead of Richarlison

Vic 5
Emerson 6
Romero 7
VDV 7
Udogie 8
Skipp 5
Maddison 8
Bissouma 9
Kulu 4
Richarlison 4
Son 4
Sanchez 7
Sarr 6
Perisic 7

 

[PLTuck]

Agree with the general sentiment. Bissouma was the Bissouma we bought. VDV and UDogie looked great. Maddison will be so important for us.

Vicario doesn't fill me with confidence right now but he's a young (for a GK) keeper that will need time to adapt to the country, league and club.

Think Richy needs a good run of games and as Ange said we need to be looking for him more. He made some great runs. It's a tough gig having to, in the fans eyes, fill the H shaped void. I think we need to stay patient with him.

 

[easley91]

Bissouma, VDV, Maddison, Udogie - Very good

Vicario - ok

Royale, Sanchez - Shouldn’t still be at the club. Terrible defenders.

The rest were quiet.

They were perfectly fine. Swear some love to pick on these two for zero reason. Sanchez was solid after coming on for Romero and his pace was an asset. Emerson is being used in a new role, while the passing was slower than I'm sure Ange would have liked, they were much better than what you suggest here.

Second half especially I really can't remember many Brentford chances? It's opening game in a new system, new backline and we lost Romero early. For what it's worth and under the circumstances they were fine and they are not terrible defenders. Sanchez was fine yesterday and proved v Barca that is his a very good defender. Emerson has proved time and again he is a better defender than Porro.

Think you need an appointment with Specsavers.

 

[Japhet]

My take on the game;

Vicario - a bit flappy but it's his debut.
Emerson - Mixed bag
Romero - very unlucky with the sub.
Sanchez - Did fine.
VdV - Much better than I expected. Looks first choice material.
Udogie - Belter of a game both offensively and defensively. No problem as a RB.
Skipp - Mixed bag. Needs to up his game to keep the shirt.
Bissouma - Monster. Has everything we need at 6.
Maddison - Nice debut. Killer delivery for Romero's goal. Going to be a big, big player for us
Kulu - Still a bit out of sorts.
Richy - Worked hard but couldn't really get into the game.
Son - Still a bit lost.

The front 3 in general struggled with Brentford sitting deep. Might have had a few more scraps if GLC had got on.

 

[PLTuck]

They were perfectly fine. Swear some love to pick on these two for zero reason. Sanchez was solid after coming on for Romero and his pace was an asset. Emerson is being used in a new role, while the passing was slower than I'm sure Ange would have liked, they were much better than what you suggest here.

Think you need an appointment with Specsavers.

Agree. Sanchez was bloody good I thought. And Emerson scored a quality goal that got us a point.

Some just insist on looking for negatives while simultaneously ignoring them for the players they 'like'

 

[GutBucket]

Bissouma, Maddison , 2(3)CBs, Udogie were great. Son, Kulusevski, Richarlison, Skipp not good enough. Mixed feelings about Vicario. Postecoglu fucked up concussion sub and waited too long for others. Better than expected considering our short preseason and players still having to learn opposite tactics of what we did for past few years.

 

[Barmby Army]

I'm still not quite sure what to make of Bissouma's performance. In many ways it was brilliant, constantly probing and basically acting as the lynchpin of all our moves - I think Guardiola used to call it a 'reference point' player, the one player who is always where you expect him to be while everyone else is buzzing around. At the same time though, I felt like - particularly in the second half - there were a lot of occasions where he slowed the game down just as we had pulled Brentford into a position where a quick pass would break them down.

It's very encouraging that most of the good performances came from the debutants and players who weren't regular starters last year - Vicario could do nothing about the goals and made a couple of good saves, Maddison was my MOTM, Udogie was excellent, Bissouma was very good (with reservations as mentioned earlier), van de Ven and Sanchez were solid.

On the down side, Richarlison put in a shift without ever really looking like a threat and Son and Kulusevski were kept very quiet, which is a bit of a worry because it felt like a consequence of the system rather than them playing badly or being especially well dealt with by the Brentford defence - they just never seemed to have space either to run into or whip in a cross.

 

[NEVILLEB]

They were perfectly fine. Swear some love to pick on these two for zero reason. Sanchez was solid after coming on for Romero and his pace was an asset. Emerson is being used in a new role, while the passing was slower than I'm sure Ange would have liked, they were much better than what you suggest here.

Second half especially I really can't remember many Brentford chances? It's opening game in a new system, new backline and we lost Romero early. For what it's worth and under the circumstances they were fine and they are not terrible defenders. Sanchez was fine yesterday and proved v Barca that is his a very good defender. Emerson has proved time and again he is a better defender than Porro.

Think you need an appointment with Specsavers.

Absolute rubbish.

They are both liabilities and have proven it over and over again.

Sanchez has been here 6 years. Surely that’s long enough for everyone to understand why he’s always been backup.

 

[Whazam]

Kulusevski - Don't understand why he wasn't subbed. Just looks a bit slow and lacking in dynamism. Feel like getting Porro on with his runs could've made us more dangerous.

He was slow and lacking in dynamism. But the ball sticks to him better than to anyone else in our team bar Bissouma and Maddison, so we'd lose that even when he's not finding the final pass - can we afford to relinquish that control, now that Kane's incredible retention of possession is gone?

As for danger, he did get to the byline in the six yard box, in a full yard of space, and with almost a second to pick his cross, a couple of times. When most of our other players arrive at that spot, they're at full stretch and about to fall over. I think he was dangerous, just didn't find the right cutback.

Also, take a look at the pass map. Kulusevski was way too isolated with Skipp and Emerson occupying the same position. He received the most progressive passes, but seemingly had no where to pass the ball from there. I'm sure the idea was for Skipp were to push forward higher up the pitch, similar to Maddison.

 

[SonicSarr]

Seen a lot of these maps today. Seems Skipp and Royal were on top of each other which affected our shape. Thought Sarr was probably the better option, but looking at those maps maybe Lo Celso would be the answer, if this is a problem.

 

[DannyNZ]

Also, take a look at the pass map. Kulusevski was way too isolated with Skipp and Emerson occupying the same position. He received the most progressive passes, but seemingly had no where to pass the ball from there. I'm sure the idea was for Skipp were to push forward higher up the pitch, similar to Maddison. View attachment 130652

Kulu was poor and the combination with Skipp and Emerson wasn’t great, understand Ange being a bit conservative first up but Skipp doesn’t do it for me and against a low block opposition doesn’t have the guile And was a bit of a waste.