Jack Wilshere and our future midfield

[BOBN]

This is Real Madrid's Fellatino Perez slagging off a certain shortarse midfielder after flogging him to pay for Beckham(reminds me a lot of ozil/bale but that's another story)

"We will not miss Makélelé. His technique is average, he lacks the speed and skill to take the ball past opponents, and ninety percent of his distribution either goes backwards or sideways. He wasn't a header of the ball and he rarely passed the ball more than three metres. Younger players will arrive who will cause Makélelé to be forgotten.["

I've heard Gooners querying Wilshere in much the same way. 'Doesn't score enough or create enough. Passes very short' etc. and as for lacking size, Jack is taller than makalele and not much shorter than Gattuso. Plus his best performances for club and country have been with someone else as the attacking mid

Too bad he doesnt have Makeleles footballing IQ.

[Nayan]

Too bad he doesnt have Makeleles footballing IQ.

Makalele was in a 1990s the Nantes Atlantique B team at age 20. Wilshere was already in the middle of a modern champions league and premiership outfit and being taken seriously for England.

Allowing for age Wilshere's IQ is ahead of where Makalele's was as a young man. The Makalele you are comparing him to is the one who left a gaping hole in the middle of real madrid when they allowed him to go make chelsea tick.

So unless you were watching French football in the mid 90s and can honestly say that this guy:


was streets ahead of this guy:


Then I respectfully suggest you are talking out of your arse being a bit hasty in your assessment.

[Nayan]

I didnt ignore them. They speak for themselves. Pirlo used to play in front of Gatusso too by the way. And petit/vieira wasnt exactly shite.
Busquets? might be a six foot two but he weighs in around 70KG. That gives him the physique on a middle distance runner. Not sure what point youre trying to make there


What I did do was point out that sissoko, alou diarra, salif diao etc were, are and always will be- shit. They are not the only ones trading off being big and african either: cf Christopher Samba.
After them there are countless others whom nobody hears of because they are shit. They keep getting bought though because numpties (fans and managers alike) think too much about 'physical presence' and 'the new Vieira' or other such hokum.


Once again, there is much more to being a defensive midfielder than 'physical presence.'

[BOBN]

Makalele was in a 1990s the Nantes Atlantique B team at age 20. Wilshere was already in the middle of a modern champions league and premiership outfit and being taken seriously for England.

Allowing for age Wilshere's IQ is ahead of where Makalele's was as a young man. The Makalele you are comparing him to is the one who left a gaping hole in the middle of real madrid when they allowed him to go make chelsea tick.

So unless you were watching French football in the mid 90s and can honestly say that this guy:


was streets ahead of this guy:


Then I respectfully suggest you are talking out of your arse being a bit hasty in your assessment.

Well, you were the one who compared him to Makelele. Im telling you where that comparison falls flat.

And Wilshere is "taken seriously" on raw talent alone. Remains to be seen if he has the smarts to use that to become an effective player.

[Nayan]

My point exactly - its far to early to make a sweeping statement like wilshere in his early 20s can never be as good a midfielder as makalele, who lets face it you didnt know about until he was closer to 30.

You'll notice I didnt compare him to makalele. I actually pointed to Madrid's laughalbe criticisms / retrospective justification for selling maka and compared those inanities to the way in which some gooners have now turned on wilshere. The idea was to throw into sharp relief how (a) fickle and (b) stupid certain 'gooners' can be.

For the record though I think wilshere, like rooney for example is one of those footballers who understands every team members jobs better than most and does indeed have a fine 'footballing brain.'

[Dr Singh]

Pirlo and Gatusso were both deep lying CMs regardless of who was ahead of who. Pirlo and Gatusso actually has a similar natural balance to it that Arteta and Flamini would have. I have no doubt those two would be a very solid midfield and perhaps our best option in this system if it wasn't for Ramsey being in such irrepressible form. Fair point about Busquetes being a pussy compared to everyone else mentioned, but many consider him as the finest DCM in the world and he's got a dirty cynical side to his game for sure. I hate Busquetes but I'd feel a lot happier long term if we had someone like him (minus the cheating) partnering Ramsey/Wilshere in the middle, because we would have the natural balance I'm saying we lack.

Who said anything other than Petit and Vieira being utterly world class? That's the exact sort of midfield dynamic I would love at our club, and one that our system demands with this 4231 formation. I can see Ramsey being one half of that, but I'm not sure whether Jack would be an ideal partner for him long term despite his obvious talent and quality.

Once again, who is saying we should have lumps like the names you've mentioned? All the combinations I mentioned include HIGHLY technically gifted players, who are also balanced by being very powerful. For this system to work, you need both. My primary concern is long term if we look to develop Jack and Ramsey as our double pivot - whether they'd have enough to dominate a midfield due of Vidal and Pirlo for sake of argument. I am not questioning their technical ability. I'm saying that the VERY BEST midfield double pivots have technique combined with a certain amount of physicality that ours may lack.

I didnt ignore them. They speak for themselves. Pirlo used to play in front of Gatusso too by the way. And petit/vieira wasnt exactly shite.
Busquets? might be a six foot two but he weighs in around 70KG. That gives him the physique on a middle distance runner. Not sure what point youre trying to make there


What I did do was point out that sissoko, alou diarra, salif diao etc were, are and always will be- shit. They are not the only ones trading off being big and african either: cf Christopher Samba.
After them there are countless others whom nobody hears of because they are shit. They keep getting bought though because numpties (fans and managers alike) think too much about 'physical presence' and 'the new Vieira' or other such hokum.


Once again, there is much more to being a defensive midfielder than 'physical presence.'

[Dr Singh]

Wilshere can be as good as any midfielder England have ever produced.

But we need a Makalele. Wilshere can never be a Makalele.

I really have no idea why people are comparing the two, other than to make a point that small guys can excel at DCM. While this can be true on exceptions, I think it's fair to say that Makalele + Yaya Toure would be a more balanced double pivot than Makalele + Wilshere/Ramsey.

Wilshere/Ramsey + Yaya Toure would probably be even better than both in this system.

Hence I'm raising the question - do Wilshere and Ramsey have the natural balance to be our long term solution to our double pivot?

My point exactly - its far to early to make a sweeping statement like wilshere in his early 20s can never be as good a midfielder as makalele, who lets face it you didnt know about until he was closer to 30.

You'll notice I didnt compare him to makalele. I actually pointed to Madrid's laughabe criticisms of maka and compared those inanities to the way ion which some gooners have turned on wilshere.

For the record though I think wilshere, like rooney for example is one of those footballers who understands every team members jobs better than most and does indeed have a fine 'footballing brain.'

[Montyzuma]

In this case size doesn't matter at all. Iniesta and Xavi do the job for Spain Vieira and Petit did the job for Arsenal as long as they are good players there is more than one way to skin a cat.

[LDG]

In this case size doesn't matter at all. Iniesta and Xavi do the job for Spain Vieira and Petit did the job for Arsenal as long as they are good players there is more than one way to skin a cat.

Aye.

I usually start with the tail first.

[Nayan]

In this case size doesn't matter at all. Iniesta and Xavi do the job for Spain Vieira and Petit did the job for Arsenal as long as they are good players there is more than one way to skin a cat.

quite so