Cesc Fàbregas

[Daniel1980 1,425]

Mechromancer, on 02 Oct 2014 - 11:31 PM, said:

The board and his fans can't do so much. They don't sign the guy because he is a middlefield who can do 20 assist in a season, i don't believe that. They want domain, not numbers. And in three years, the best of him is in the striker position. The old ones are better. That says a lot. Even in the national team, the most dominant in the last lustrum.

Be an amazing player with a great productivity is one thing, be a good player with a great productivity is another. Koke is a great example of that; in my opinion, a good launcher and not more. Even a player like Song do 14 assist in one season. And that's their best argument.

Like i said, see a player like Zidane, who won a Ballon d'Or, by the way. His numbers can't be an argument, right?

Even for the striker the productivity isn't the best argument. I think in Huntelaar, Cavani, Gómez... ¡Chicharito!(yeah, maybe not).

And Modric is better, yes, technically. If his objective is creates more chances and be more free, maybe his numbers can grow up. Why not? With his wonderful partners is possible. He has the ability to do everything. But his team no need that and isn't his great value. Is more than that.

You do realize that creating big chances and racking up assists isn't just a matter of technical ability, right? If it was, Willian would have been (one of) our most creative players and assisters. It takes excellent vision, decision-making, the ability to provide the final ball(not the same thing as general passing ability), through balls, and the ability to read the game in attack. You also do realize that Cesc is playing in the pivot, in a deep midfield role that is as far from free as it can get, right?

But then again, I remember how you once claimed Isco at 20 was more decisive and effective than Fabregas at the age of 20. Once again, your opinion is based on nothing but suppositions, not facts.

P.S. The Zidane argument is just getting silly. It comes up every time to defend a player who shows no productivity. Willian has a great technical ability, great teamwork and little productivity. Let's give him a Ballon d'Or. And Zidane's end product was still much better than Modric's.

[Dion 2,476]

Not to mention that Zidade would would come up huge in matches that really mattered. His WC performances are a testament to that.

IMO, Fabregas is better than Modric and it's not even close. Comparing Fabregas to Koke is also silly. Koke has began his world class performances like the other day, Fabregas has been doing it for several years.

[meetdoscar 335]

Fabregas has been an excellent CM since modric was wearing diapers never mind they are almost of same age. It has been very clear in the last decade that xavi and pirlo were of a different class but also that fabregas would succeed them and so it is no surprise that fabregas is currently the best CM in the world. Call it form or whatever you like but it has since been obvious that after xavi and pirlo you have cesc to succeed. Modric is not as good as cesc and never has been whether at spurs or madrid.

[Victor Von Doom 258]

Cesc isn't better than Modric at shooting @Daniel1980

[Daniel1980 1,425]

^^ Not sure what it proves. I can give you as many examples of Fabregas's goals--and there will be a lot more goals. Modric scored 18 goals in all competitions in 2009-2014. Cesc scored 59 in the same period, playing the majority of the time as a CM. He's a more prolific scorer.

Enjoy, if you can bear watching Arsenal:

[Stats 7,056]

Cesc isn't better than Modric at shooting @Daniel1980

IMO, yes he is. Fabregas has scored much more long range shots than Modric in his career. Modric is not renown for his shooting. Fabregas main strength is his passing but has scored many long range shots as well. Especially at Arsenal.

[Nike 373]

i like how Modric went from being the best cm to insignificant on this board....

I would take modric over cesc anyday. But, I take Cesc over any Cm (in the bpl) minus the city giants.

[Victor Von Doom 258]

^^ Not sure what it proves. I can give you as many examples of Fabregas's goals--and there will be a lot more goals. Modric scored 18 goals in all competitions in 2009-2014. Cesc scored 59 in the same period, playing the majority of the time as a CM. He's a more prolific scorer.

Enjoy, if you can bear watching Arsenal:

Oh - with the way you just said "shooting" I thought you meant only from range, which I would disagree with. But, as you don't just mean that I guess you're right.

[Dion 2,476]

i like how Modric went from being the best cm to insignificant on this board....

I would take modric over cesc anyday. But, I take Cesc over any Cm (in the bpl) minus the city giants.

Modric was never the best cm in the world.

[Daniel1980 1,425]

Oh - with the way you just said "shooting" I thought you meant only from range, which I would disagree with. But, as you don't just mean that I guess you're right.

Fabregas scored quite a few goals from range too. There are about 10 goals scored from outside the box for Arsenal in that video.

[Nike 373]

Modric was never the best cm in the world.

Last year, a lot of people thought Modric was the best CM in the world,

[Daniel1980 1,425]

Last year, a lot of people thought Modric was the best CM in the world,

Don't know who those people are. Personally, I never thought that. I considered Iniesta the best CM in the world until his dip in form. Sure, back when Cesc played for Arsenal, I couldn't stand him, but I still considered him the best creative midfielder in the PL and one of the best overall. Definitely not Modric. Tbh, I had some doubts about Fabregas: I didn't like his Barcelona form--he seemed completely unmotivated in the last couple of months--and I wasn't sure if he could recapture his PL form, but he did. And the PL!Cesc is definitely one of the best midfielders around. It's not like it's just Chelsea fans' biased opinion. Many United fans think the same and wish they got him.

For example, a few comments at Redcafe after the game against Sporting:

Jesus he's good. Just watching the Chelsea highlights and he seemed to make about 300 brilliant chances for them.

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best player in the league IMO. Must be tough for Arsenal fans watching him play like that while their supposedly best 10 in the world isn't anywhere near his class ATM.

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He's incredible. Hilarious that Wenger thought he didn't need him.

If Wenger had brought him back Arsenal's midfield would look so much stronger, especially with their current injury problems.

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Brilliant player. Would have absolutely loved him at United. Not sure what went wrong for him at Barca as his ability is there for all to see.

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He's a wonderful player. His ability was surely never in doubt?

Gutted we didn't sign him last season.

And so on.

[Dion 2,476]

Last year, a lot of people thought Modric was the best CM in the world,

Real Madrid seems to have this effect on a lot of people. Especially when they're winning titles. Every player in every position is suddenly the best in the world.

[LondonsFinest 692]

Am I the only one who thinks Fabregas is a typical spanish c**t and will want to get one over Arsene for prefering Ozil over him?

[kellzfresh 7,229]

Am I the only one who thinks Fabregas is a typical spanish c**t and will want to get one over Arsene for prefering Ozil over him?

Good for us then

[communicate 2,703]

Last year, a lot of people thought Modric was the best CM in the world,

Kinda hard to define the best cm because there are so many type of cm.

[Chelsea Legend 11 4,062]

ewww why should we employ a pivot or a midfield with Rami and Mikel?

Fàbregas isn't defensively inept to the point he needs players Rami AND Mikel to be behind him. It's either one or the other, but even then, 'no, thanks' from me.

I think Matic + Fàbregas have been working much better now than they were a month ago. I can only expect them to be even better a month from now.

Against the biggest sides, we could bring Ramires and play 4-3-3, which is what we did against City, but surprisingly enough Fàbregas wasn't the most advanced, Ramires was. That's a waste imo... Fàbregas as the most advanced midfielder isn't immediately behind the striker, as were playing with Willian and Hazard. I get it that Rami has pace - much more than Cesc - and being ahead allows him to make runs. But let's be honest... Ramires didn't have one single run during the first half as far as I remember. We were that tad defensively. I don't expect Mourinho to be that defensive playing Arsenal, Liverpool or United away from home. He knows City have two good CBs and an amazing attack. The other teams - even the top ones - are unbalanced and we don't need to be as cautious, although I'm sure we'll be a bit cautious nonetheless when playing away, but not to that extent.

on the second line of your post... haven't we been winning matches by 3, 4 goals anyway? City was the exception, as covered above (despite Costa's unlucky woodwork), but every other single match we played and didn't score more than three goals (Leicester, Bolton, Schalke and Sporting) it was because of bad finishing, not because we didn't break through the opponents defense. There's nothing to be fixed there. Adding both Ramires and Mikel to the team would affect us negatively in the attack and I'm not sure there's such an incredible improvement in the defense. This is going back to last year tactics. If we bring the two of them, as you're suggesting, it means we're wasting an AM to be replaced by a MD. If you want Ramires to improve as defensively, he needs to go forward less often. There's no reason at all for that.

I know Villa and Sporting aren't that great attacking (the latter created some stuff but their finishing was even worse than ours), but we've managed to get too consecutive clean sheets. It's expected for the team to get used to the new tactics and for players to have a better understanding of one another, especially Matic and Fàbregas - as the rest of the team, except Costa, is the same as last season's. That's what I've been saying we need: time. Time is getting the job done and I can see us improve defensively some more, but we won't ever be as good as last season and there's no similarity between us and Liverpool, being an unbalanced team that attacks a lot and but is terrible defending. We aren't even close to being that. The Everton match was a one-time-off thing, that I don't see happening again once the team is ready.

I said in a few posts in August that by the end of September we should be able to see improvements in our defensive system and if we still didn't have at least the slightest progress then it'd be concerning. I've seen more than enough progress in the last few weeks and I think we're going in the right direction, and the right direction has a midfield (pivot, diamond, triangle, whatever you want to name it) with Matic and Fàbregas and three AMs ahead of them. The exception is the tough away game here and there where I see us playing a 4-3-3 with Ramires joining them. Mikel is a sub that won't be used in the majority of the matches and Ramires will mostly be employed as a RW more than a defensive or holding midfielder. There's no need for him to be anything different from that.

Also, even if we don't win matches by 3 or 4 goals every time, what's the matter? We already progressed into a more attractive football many were demanding, now the demand is for us to win by 3 or 4 goals most of our matches. What's next? There's no need to win every single match or most of them by a big scoreline. Seriously, we're very solid in the attack, regardless of how many goals we score, and we're on our way to have stability in the defense, but we'll never be as solid defensively as last season at the same time being as solid offensively as City was last season. In the real world where football is played by human beings, that's not possible. You simply can't have everything like in the video-games... What City accomplished last season with 102 goals scored and 37 conceded is already way too much and that's basically 1 goal conceded by game on average. For an attack that could score 102 times, that's outstanding and very difficult to achieve.

When we play 4-3-3 Ramires is the box to box, Cesc is the deep lying playmaker, Matic is the anchor. Its exactly the positions each of those players excel in. We use it on the counter and when you play on the counter you need pace from deep, no one better in those scenarios than Ramires. Because Ramires didn't get a run has little to do with the formation or him being ineffective, it had to do with City being at Etihad and being a very good team. We had the right formation we just couldn't get out... I didn't think we were extra cautious either what I saw was one of the best teams showing why they are just that. We won't have another game as tough as that one away from home so naturally if the same tactic is employed we should have more success. Having said that we were a goal post and maybe 5mins from winning it.

[Chelsea Legend 11 4,062]

Last year, a lot of people thought Modric was the best CM in the world,

he had a fantastic year last year