Ndidi, Soumaré and Youri midfield

[jayfox26]

Totally agree but other than Mendy we have little else. KDH has been as poor as the others 

[Ross 'LCFC' Turner]

Rodgers has ultimately done unforgivable damage, but Dean Smith needs to take a lot of the blame too for me - he's had decent enough fixtures to get us out of this mess (IMO) and got his team selections, in particularly in midfield so wrong its criminal! 

 

Persisting with Soumare and Tielemans as a midfield 2 has killed us, we got over ran in midfield every time and we were so open. Teams were cutting right through the centre of us with one pass by countering on our mistakes, making every game become like a basket ball match. Tielemans is not athletic enough and needs protection. Soumare is just braindead who has no awareness and doesn't track runners. 

 

The only player in the midfield who can give us the 'control' Dean Smith asks for is Mendy and he is constantly frozen out of the squad - it doesn't make sense! We haven't kept a clean sheet in 21 games and at no point has Dean Smith tried to tighten this up and offer any protection to an absolute mess of a defence. 

 

 

[Chelmofox]

This is actually the most depressing thread of them all. And i add Maddison into the list of problems. All of them are easy to play against and all have been found out. Youri cant deal with pace, Madders slows everything down, Soumare crumbles when pressed and Ndidi can't actually play football.

 

So much time looking for newer defensive options yet the biggest problem is the midfield. We get overrun so easily and they are all slow or crocked. 

 

Soumare looked his best when Maddison wasnt playing, so would be inclined to go for Soumare / Youri / Mendy. But there is clearly something wrong with Mendy, as our last 2 managers have largely sidelined him. I can only presume that its his attitude in training? When we have played him he can't last anywhere near 90 minutes. 

 

The problem we have is that Youri and Maddison both need dropping. If Kels is fit then you can drop Madders, but it just leaves a whole load of weak minded out of form midfielders. 

[Mark 'expert' Lawrenson]

All 3 useless. 
Tielemans is unfit and lazy.

Soumare and Wilf  clueless and clumsy. 

[funkyrobot]

58 minutes ago, Chelmofox said:

This is actually the most depressing thread of them all. And i add Maddison into the list of problems. All of them are easy to play against and all have been found out. Youri cant deal with pace, Madders slows everything down, Soumare crumbles when pressed and Ndidi can't actually play football.

 

So much time looking for newer defensive options yet the biggest problem is the midfield. We get overrun so easily and they are all slow or crocked. 

 

Soumare looked his best when Maddison wasnt playing, so would be inclined to go for Soumare / Youri / Mendy. But there is clearly something wrong with Mendy, as our last 2 managers have largely sidelined him. I can only presume that its his attitude in training? When we have played him he can't last anywhere near 90 minutes. 

 

The problem we have is that Youri and Maddison both need dropping. If Kels is fit then you can drop Madders, but it just leaves a whole load of weak minded out of form midfielders. 

I’ve never seen Mendy look tired. He got hooked early in the rare event he started because Rodgers didn’t rate him. He was fine putting in 90 min MOTM performances for his country at AFCON. He’s been treated poorly since he’s been at this club and ultimately his recent total exclusion has exposed how poor we are in the middle of the pitch. There’s absolutely no way that Ndidi should be starting games ahead of him. We shouldn’t play without a CDM pivot with our current squad as has been demonstrated in the Fulham and Liverpool games. Mendy is our ONLY capable pivot.

[foxgas]

On 16/05/2023 at 16:26, Old Fox said:

Be careful what you say about KDH - more to his absence alongside Ward and Soyuncu......they are not injured but I think we will learn more in time...........this bunch need moving on as the whole squad largely have ideas of grandeur and forgotton their roots .............some maybe think they are better than they are ................personally I would suggest Vards, Daka, Souttar, Iversen, Justin (if we can), Ricardo, Thomas should be the back bone and Albrighton too for next season..................majority of the others can just do one!!

I would add Choudhury to that list, energy was never an issue with him, just too rash. 

[sacreblueits442]

On 16/05/2023 at 07:18, Sudjambon said:

Biggest issue with the last night was half time and no subs. We’re staring relegation in the face, do something, yank these three off and put Mendy on, move Maddison to the middle, Tete on and Dhaka up front with Vardy. Instead these three stayed on and we did nothing 

 

...this is not about the midfield three, but about the thinking and approach of Smith and his team!!!

  I expected a few changes, it is a good time to use a substitution window, and bringing  Praet on for Tielemans and revert to match up with Liverpool. 

  For a manager who initially was not afraid to make changes in the first half of games, and has now it seems bought in to the Brendan Rodgers approach,  where you wait till minute 65 before you even contemplate the switch.

[ithuriel]

N'Didi seems to have been watching old Junior Lewis videos and has taken it upon himself to emulate him, or so it seems to me  Soumare  has obviously been  a guest of Paul McKenna at one time and was hypnotised into thinking he was a football player and Tilly seems to have developed Piles, hence the slight jogging around the pitch and falling over onto his backside at every opportunity 

[Foxin_Mad]

They are all shite id like them not to play for us again if possible!

[cropstonfox]

Agreed they are all shit.

Tillersman stealing a living till he fecks off.

Wilf injury Rsvaged and actually about 39 years old.

Soumare can only play on You Tube

Never play any of these again.

 

[dylanlegend]

On 16/05/2023 at 07:11, Tom12345 said:

If the club had sold Ndidi before as an expensive sale, we would be in a much better place. But no club has ever come in for him because they can see how inept a footballer he is.

To be fair Wilf used to be a beast. But I think he’s a different player since his injuries.

[Buzzell]

Get rid of all three.

[Dan]

The most Trabzonspor midfield in the Premier League.

[Dan]

.

Edited 19 May 2023 by Dan LCFC

[Deeg67]

The problem with selling Tielemans and (especially) N’didi is that their limitations as players make them unsuitable for the sort of club that fit our “buy low, sell high” model.

 

I have no doubt there were times when we could have sold both those players.  But it would have been to clubs at roughly our level - not PL big 6 or the Real Madrids and Bayerns of the continent.  N’didi has always been useless as a distributor even when he was in his prime.  Tielemans simply lacks the athleticism and motor most power clubs would demand in a CM.  The notion that we could have sold either of these guys to a.power club for huge money was a fantasy in the minds of fans who systematically overvalue our players.

 

Now Ricardo, if he’d stayed healthy?  That’s a guy big clubs would pay big for.

[Leeds Fox]

Mendy, KDH and whoever looks up for it. 
 

Let them run about, the two I mentioned have never not given 100% for LCFC.

 

Pearson would ‘trust’ Mendy and KDH. Rodgers trusted the ones who he wouldn’t be slagged off for not starting. Smith, well… I don’t think he has a clue. 
 

Go steady, stay in both games. Steal something. We’re the worst team in the league bar Southampton (and I think they’d do us if we played them tomorrow). It’s the only hope. 

[fazzyfox]

Yep, need to play Mendy & K DH, we haven’t played them in this current run of heartless collapses, if we don’t try something different we can’t say we left no stone unturned, instead we’re lemmings jumping off a cliff or that old failing whilst doing the same thing over and over again definition.

There was a stat that we haven’t won a game this season without KDH playing at least 45 minutes, he at least buzzes about and disrupts the opposition flow, Youri just passes players on and stands pointing like a traffic cop at a Parisian roundabout.
 

I differ from others by probably having Wilf in there too, for Newcastle at least, he has been error prone and low on confidence but I don’t associate him with the casual “couldn’t give a f***” performances of Youri and Soumare and Mendy would be outfought by JoeLinton physically.