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Mohamed Salah

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Dreambeliever said:
He's been superb but I want to see it over an entire season and beyond.

He'll eventually have a dip in form, I want to see how he reacts to that to see how special he really is.

The EPL is full of players who were one season wonders that never hits those heights again.

Having said that we'd be fucked without his goals this season
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I've no doubt City are saying that about Aguero, United about Lukaku, City about Morata and so on ....
 
C/O said:
Is there much thought worth going in to the idea that any decent player in his position would be getting similar results.

Is it a case of the team creating the chances for that outlet, or that outlet excelling?
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Quite a few of his goals come through his incredible pace, either through breaks, or him darting into a position ahead of a defender. The fact is that kind of ridiculous pace is relatively rare. So any decent player just wouldn't be part of the kind of goals he regularly scores, because Mr Decent would be yards behind the positions Salah gets into.
 
doctor_mac said:
Quite a few of his goals come through his incredible pace, either through breaks, or him darting into a position ahead of a defender. The fact is that kind of ridiculous pace is relatively rare. So any decent player just wouldn't be part of the kind of goals he regularly scores, because Mr Decent would be yards behind the positions Salah gets into.
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Doc you were the only one who consistently bigged this dude up when we were chasing him. Major props my hypocratic buddy.
 
I think Real Madrid will make a massive offer for him in the Summer as Ronaldo will look to go elsewhere.
 
He fits the system perfectly - and a number of his goals are only possible because of the movement, input, support etc of his colleagues. E.g. his second goal yesterday wouldn't have been possible without Firmino drifting and causing VVD to follow him out of the box.

His work rate is impeccable and I think we benefit from the fact that defences are shit scared of Mane & Coutinho, whilst having no idea what to do about Firmino with Salah being a new entity that they wouldn't have known what to expect from leading into this season.
 
I met him at Heathrow a couple of weeks ago during the international break and got to chat with him for minute.

He's a decent enough bloke too.
 
He has blunted Mane's form.

Mane's less of a threat this season from wide left.

Jus' sayin'.
 
doctor_mac said:
Yeah, Mane being out injured blunted his form. He has looked just as effective when he has played.
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You think?

I think the move left has curtailed his ability to stretch and impact. He has to cut inside more and look for neat one-tow's, or tight gaps to fashion something up. He was able to blitz outside of the left-back last year and drift and in and out from the touchline to devastating effect.

The shift hasn't negatively impacted us - cos obviously Salah's inclusion has been magnificent - but it's impacted Mane in my view.
 
I think Salah has blunted Mane's form largely because Mane was the one giving us penetration last year. He was the ONLY player looking to get in behind the defence and he had Phil and Roberto looking to get him in.

Now Phil has moved back, and Salah is making the penetrating runs, Mane, as Ryan says, is looking more to combine and get in behind.

Also, the first pass the midfielders look for is now Mo, as opposed to Sadio.

That said, I expect when Sadio is back to 100%, whilst he may be less effective in terms of goal output, he will still be our 2nd highest scorer and the team as a whole will be more effective scoring. Scoring 3 against Southampton (a team we've notoriously struggled against) is a good sign of progress offensively.
 
Ryan said:
You think?

I think the move left has curtailed his ability to stretch and impact. He has to cut inside more and look for neat one-tow's, or tight gaps to fashion something up. He was able to blitz outside of the left-back last year and drift and in and out from the touchline to devastating effect.

The shift hasn't negatively impacted us - cos obviously Salah's inclusion has been magnificent - but it's impacted Mane in my view.
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I don't think that's the case. He's played 7 games. He was sent off early in one of those. He's been feeling his way back after an injury in the past couple of games. He still has 3 goals and 2 assists and looks like our most exciting player. He's doing pretty much exactly what he did last year except on the left. He always cut back in at times. He has been torturing left backs instead of right backs. He hasn't been 'blunted' as far as I can see. If anything he looks better than ever.
 
doctor_mac said:
I don't think that's the case. He's played 7 games. He was sent off early in one of those. He's been feeling his way back after an injury in the past couple of games. He still has 3 goals and 2 assists and looks like our most exciting player. He's doing pretty much exactly what he did last year except on the left. He always cut back in at times. He has been torturing left backs instead of right backs. He hasn't been 'blunted' as far as I can see. If anything he looks better than ever.
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Agreed. If anything has "blunted" Mane's form this season its injuries. The move to the left hasnt effected him at all.
 
doctor_mac said:
I don't think that's the case. He's played 7 games. He was sent off early in one of those. He's been feeling his way back after an injury in the past couple of games. He still has 3 goals and 2 assists and looks like our most exciting player. He's doing pretty much exactly what he did last year except on the left. He always cut back in at times. He has been torturing left backs instead of right backs. He hasn't been 'blunted' as far as I can see. If anything he looks better than ever.
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I think when he is in the team ... defenders shit themselves. Wht its just Mo and Coutinho - I think the opposition feels that they can contain them to a certain degree. Also i think Mane has licence to roam right and/or right.
 
When you look at the whole impact on the team though I think it would kind of look like this from a front 6 perspective:
  • CF - benefitting from two pacey attackers rather than one to fill the gaps he leaves
  • AMR - Salah providing more of a direct goal threat than Mane, which is quite an achievement given Mane is still arguably in my view our best player
  • AML - by moving Mane here we have increased the output of this position which Coutinho was playing. It wasn't his natural role but he filled it because it worked for the team.
  • CM3 (furthest forward) - we have moved Coutinho here. Lallana was typcially this role last season and was quality there, although you can't deny that Coutinho is a better player there than Adam. I bloody love Lallana though.
  • CM1 & CM2 - We will benefit as a team by not having to play all of Can, Hendo & Gini in the same midfield, although we have had to at times due to injuries. Playing 2 of the 3 has us looking great with one of Lallana or Coutinho as the third.

So whilst we may have blunted Mane a bit (and I think that is probably fair, although we need to see him have a run without injury), it has sharpened other positions thus improving the team. I think he & Salah will rotate enough during games that he'll still get chances to tear by opposition left backs but i'm happy enough seeing Salah do that and Mane being in the box as he is a great finisher.
 
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