Gareth Bale

not misuse there, i mean more 'failure to use' arry seems to think he's a rm instead which he patently isnt

sort of amazing how little time has elapsed between bale being considered too limited for left wing and now so good he has to be given a free role.

id have predicted a few seasons at least, but once he scored the goal vs norwich it was inevitable.

he might have the chutzpah for a free role but he doesnt nearly have the sense for finding space around the penalty area that gerrard developed. kakà was preternarurally adept at it, bale just runs straight into trouble.

gerrard /is/ better in a free role, his string of backpass assists for henry drogba and zidane showed how he never had the concentration of a great midfield player. bale has already proven he can be a great left winger so the haste redknapp has shown in playing him inside is kinda stupid.

but i imagine this is going to be a recurring thing now whoever manages him, unless he ends up with someone like mourinho who never seems more than superficially impressed by any player. most of them are former players and ( w/ the odd exception like mancini) pretty limited ones, maybe they see a huge talent like bale and sort of relive their own desired career arc vicariously. i thought it was quite poignant when ferguson said of ronaldos thumping headed goal vs roma that it was the sort of goal /he/ would have scored. if only he was cristiano ronaldo.

eh was he ever considered too limited for lw? not since he was considered too limited for spurs at all, which was always a misconception for anyone that had seen him tbh.

yeah he was bought as a lb and played there mostly at southampton before becoming reserve to ekotto. even when he first had success drafted in at left wing two yrs ago, redknapp still spoke of him as a future great at lb (or lwb, if they still existed)

he was bought for lb but lwb really, i'm not sure at 17/8 it was because he was too limited rather than at southampton (and even spurs) it was ok to just consider lb an extra lm

this is some bill hitchert level obtuseness deems

eh i dunno how to respond to allegations like that tbh

i think players can break into a team in a position based on a lot more than where their talents would be maximised, and that's w/out takign into account any ensuing development over the formative years of their careers

has the player said anything about wanting to move into a more 'free' role or has 'arry said something to the effect of 'he does it really well in training'? It seems odd how they continue with something that obv. isnt working just for the sake of it

you a;lways assume it's player driven once it's obviously not working, i suppose? bale seems more than happy to continually drift in and try evermore hollywood shots/runs, doesn't seem to feel any onus to keep it simple and effective

maybe if Adebayor was less wasteful he'd want to cross more.

that's probably a point but ffs he had crouch all last year when he was really killin it on the wing

He was happy crossing to Crouch for long enough. Reckon it's manager driven.

Price/value/hype is a factor imo - wingers don't cost what Bale is apparently valued at, therefore he has to look like more than a winger.

that's very true- lots of direct central players with end product as good or better than bale's, imo, but not all that many wingers with attributes- power, pace, skill, crossing- so suited to the role.

I would definitely have Bale crossing from the left in an all time Prem XI who only scored headers.

this is a large part of what confuses me about the move away from the left. he reminds me so much of a less petulant ronaldo at utd. too tall, strong, athletic, etc. than yr average winger, can score beautiful goals from anywhere and whenever he wants to. (can also help out/switch with his full back!). it seems such a shame they want to give up a player who is on-paper-perfect for the position now, let alone that if he stays there he can most probably learn the ronaldo tricks that scare the shit out of players from the wing EVERY game. moving him around is stalling the process imo.

he needs to learn how to be a left winger who can also come central if it benefits the team, not a central player who can drift about.

Lennon's injury hasn't helped either, given we're overstocked with attacking midfielders we don't actually have anyone else effective to play there, it's weirdly threadbare. Certainly not Kranjcar, he's better on the left where he's never going to get a game, and not VDV either.

said this since forever but walker imo. letting corluka go (big fuckup on its own terms anyway) doesnt really make it an option any more however

Cosign all that.

see what you mean but ronaldo is much faster than bale though (in fact, harder, better, faster, stronger)

maybe not harder

http://i73.photobucket.com/albums/i214/justatest_photos/Soccer_boner_confusion.gif

Ronaldo is just much better in most every department. The initial post in this thread names a bunch of players who were better than Bale in various ways 18 months ago and I don't think he's raised his game that much since. Still closer to the often dangerous but technically limited types like Krasic and Valencia than the next-level attacking players.

it haunts me that i'll never know the identity of the other player in that gif

and yeah, Ronaldo was light years ahead of Bale even at the same stage in his career

xp p sure it's not scholesy if i recall that one particular photo correctly

I must have the evidence

really think about what ur asking for bro i beseech you

http://i.imgur.com/QKlOq.jpg

oh fuck

i knew not what i was asking for

Bale's a more consistent performer now than he was around the time of the Inter game. Obviously he's no Ronaldo and won't be until he can score 40 goals a season and take amazing free kicks etc.

he has taken amazing free kicks but vdv (and once recently bae) are ahead of him in the left footed queue

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WxlphjL3VZY

How often does he take frees anyway? Seemed to be fairly handy at them in his Southampton days

exactly it's kind of annoying he doesn't take them more

thankfully he has dropped that pirouette celebration. although the heart thing isn't much better.

Yeah I was under the impression when we signed him that he was amazing with a dead ball, like a left-footed Beckham, but if he was that good he'd have been doing it in training and would be right at the top of the pecking order.

dont think cron has scored an fk this season

There was this tap-in
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nQg_dGsr0GA

i thought that free kick in the last minute v chelsea was kind of ronaldo-esque

that was neat, stat i read was domestic i think

id like to see him score another like the fk vs portsmouth

thankfully he has dropped that pirouette celebration. although the heart thing isn't much better.

― mizzell, Friday, 30 March 2012 16:54 (53 minutes ago) Bookmark

NOTHING IS WORSE THAN THE HEART THING. as if he couldnt look any more kawaii anime git

http://postfiles14.naver.net/20110103_237/wngml8823_1294059153276iXNAO_JPEG/gareth_bale_with_his_hairclip_.mp4_000001525.jpg

never forget

yeah i hate the heart celebration. so twee.

lennon u & k to keeping a balance that gives bale oxygen on left, though he was excellent for the full 90 today.

agree with rtc that corluka should have been kept if only to allow for walker as cover on right- walker's come on so much that i won't argue with his first xi rb position now

Swansea have dyer, think a move for him over the summer as cover for lennon would be good? Pacy, direct and natural width.

is dyer better than hoilett? still would like to see marko marin too.

Marin has been p ropey for Bremen this season, including one game where the opposition put a man marker on him and he proceeded to basically sulk and stroll around until substituted after 55 mins or so. He was good last season though, although he doesn't play on the wing anymore iirc.

i see, i guess hoilett hasn't been playing on the wing eiter. all these guys want to play through the middle just so they can score goal for themselves?

Yeah the position seems to have evolved from winger going down the line on strongest foot and crossing ->winger playing on 'wrong' wing and cutting in onto his strongest foot to possibly shoot -> oh sod it I'll just play in the middle.