Torreira was very good for spells last season I thought, so for me he’s already shown his quality. If he recaptures that form from the early months of last season he walks back into our strongest XI
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Thoughts on Willock @A.F. and others?
Can’t really make up my mind on him.
Same. Like him but need more time to see what I think his trajectory is.
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His awareness is what stands out for me. Rarely runs into trouble. Is confident enough to make risky passes in dangerous areas, trusting in his ability. He’s also able to beat players which is rare for CM’s (haven’t seen that since prime Wilshere).
He’s a star in the making for me.
From what I’ve seen. He is decent on the ball, can move it on relatively quickly and accurately. He seems to get into some decent positions going forward and he seems pretty confident to do a bit of work and get stuck in.
Sounds like a template for a pretty good B2B in the future.
I’m a sucker for players that don’t mind throwing themselves about for the shirt, fucking sick of some of the soft players we had during the late Wenger-era.
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Yeah he looks like a decent prospect to me. I’m not particularly sold on his long term qualities but he’s certainly someone who has the ability to have a solid career at Arsenal.
I’d love it if he was a resounding success. It’s always satisfying to see an academy graduate translate his youth form into the senior ranks.
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This is key for me. Too many times in recent years have we had midfielders who love to hide and play the ball to the next safest option.
He presses and wins the ball well, carries the ball and decent intelligence. Decent squad player who can do a job, never going to be a world beater
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Agree he looks more mature than, for comparison from the Burnley game, Nelson at least. But of course not dooming any of them (the recently promoted kids), things can change fast at that age, development really isn’t linear and some grow slowly, some do nothing for a while and then just pop.
I still wouldn’t throw him in vs Liverpool if we have alternatives, it is different to play a game at home vs Burnley where we have like 70% possession and you’re outnumbering your opponent in your local area on the pitch most of the time you’re on the ball, compared to being absolutely hounded by the best pressing team in the world, away, on their pitch. Not saying he can’t do it, just saying it is a risk to find out.
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But then if you don’t let him experience it how is he going to improve? For me the Liverpool game won’t affect our season because we never win there anyway. Give him a go and aim for the draw
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I’m not sure, he brings pace/stamina/pressing which could be useful against Liverpool
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Difficult to say anything interesting about a player when you’ve only seen him play once. Looked interesting, but that’s about all I can say.
Should probably start against Liverpool though, since I can’t imagine anyone producing a bigger disasterclass than the one by Torreira in the last game against them.
Small sample size, but Willock has completed 5 dribbles in two games and hasn’t failed with one. Among central midfielders he’s leading the way with Chamberlain (4 and 0), Ceballos (4 and 0) , Ndombele (3 and 0), and Kovacic (4 and 0) following closely behind.
How Willock performs against Liverpool will allow us to better judge his ability. Only 20 years though…
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Watching him in preseason and in the first couple matches, the thing I like most about him is his positioning. Haven’t seen him in la la land like Xhaka does many times and we concede due to him taking a walk about. Pretty decent going forward, but nothing spectacular yet. I do agree that he’s a decent option as a squad player and he does the grunt work which is honestly what our midfield needs sometimes, just keeping it simple and executing the basics.
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I was impressed with him overall. In the grand scheme of things he held onto the ball well at times and looked strong and assured.
He’s got a long way to go, but the early signs are promising.
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I thought he played well yesterday, will grow hopefully from this match. But the lad has potential to be a very good PL player for us. I leave him in the side for foreseeable future.
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This was the hardest match he’s faced in his career so far and he wasn’t bad at all. Glimpses of great touches and movement.
I’m personally a big fan. He’s going to grow into an absolute player.
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He’s a great prospect, but let’s not get ahead of ourselves here. Wilshere had that performance against Barca when he was 19. This guy’s 20, and while he’ll still grow, chances of becoming a world beater are slim, if you look at all the young talents from a decade ago, of those showing the greatest promise very few made it to the top. (Fran Merida, Macheda, Wilshere, Eisfeld, Zelalem, Joel Campbell and so many others).
Still, chances are he’ll make a decent midfielder.
LE. To be fair, it does seem like the most promising players do actually make it to the top, with a few exceptions (like Bojan Krkic). http://www.just-football.com/2010/11/top-100-young-players-in-world-football-2010-don-balon/ - most of them are decent footballers now
Also, WTF happened with Badstuber, he was touted as the best young defender about a decade ago.
Would we play him against Tottenham? That might be the sign of a tŕuly good player or just a makeshift
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His ball carrying was good but his missplaced passes weren’t and he was possibly most guilty of this.