I know all alyuh blind and biased peeps on here will jump on me for this, but Birchall is as much a liability as he is an asset. He can tackle and win the ball and hit good long crosses, but he loses the ball way too often and easily when he's put under pressure from the opposition because he cannot create any space, can't link up in attacking interplay well, and hits a good few misplaced passes on his day. He's an enigma- has his positive and negative impacts on the team, and in being respectful of the quality of other midfielders we have like Trent Noel and Silvio Spann, I can understand fully why Latapy left him out, and if he leaves him out in the future. A good example of his shortcomings is in the Costa Rica game, Carlos threw in the ball to him, he just had to hit a simple return pass to Carlos, but hit is much too soft and a Costa Rican came in and took the ball- chance gone and pressure now on the our very suspect defense.
I don't EVER see anyone on here talking about Birchall's weakness, but instead you all talk about him like he's Steven Gerrard and leaving him on the bench is treason, Birchall can do no wrong in the eyes of all the supporter- people seem to be blinded to and do not mention his errant passes and soft losing of the ball under little pressure in matches.
Right, so now that I've personally dispelled all the very annoying and biased talk about Birchall that every spouts, I still believe he should be on the field because we need a lively midfielder to protect the defense and who can tackle well, just that unlike everyone else, I acknowledge the weaknesses in his play that can cost us, and believe that he should play a very rigid and disciplined defensive midfield role, taking as LITTLE RISKS AS POSSIBLE, keep it simple, and leave as much of the advancing as possible to the other midfielders. I hear people talking about his shooting ability, but we have other players like spann who can also shoot from distance, and can create space when crowded out higher up the field, and since Birchall can't do the latter, again he should stay deep and leave the advancing to the other midfielders, because in attack his liabilities outweigh his assets.
We don't have many players who are solid and complete players, most have some skills but lack others, so need to have 2 players doing what one should be able to do, but the thing is there's only 10 outfield spots available, so when you sacrifice one player, you sacrifice one aspect of the game that is required to win matches, and enhance another, so it's always a trade off, so whether Latapy takes off a midfielder like Trent Noel to play Birchall, we may be more defensively sound when the opponents have the ball, but at the same time we probably won't be as creative and fluid in attack and build up play to create chances- and goals win matches.
So like I said, with the incomplete nature of most of our players, it's always a trade off and sacrifice, there's only 11 spots on the team, so what ever route Latapy goes, I'm sure he(with his experience and football knowledge, unlike us armchair coaches) more than us will know according to the players we have, what trade off has the better chance of yielding results and have us winning football matches. I see disadvantages and advantages of having Birchall on like many other players, I trust Latapy more than us will be able to filter it down and come up with the definitive and best solution.
The only sure starter on this team is certainly Carlos Edwards, he's been our best player by a good amount for years on running.
On the post, I feel that Birchall could possibly work as defender(but definitely not wingback), he's faster than any we've got now, and he's very lively and has aggression.
On a side note, with how Kenwyne playing in attack for Trinidad, I feeling Latapy should put him back to play defense, he might be of much better use to us there. Even saying that, I still feel he can display his quality in attack for us, if we were creating as many chances in the past 7 months as we did against Costa Rica, I'm sure Kenwyne and Scotland would have scored a good few.
You all played very honourably against Costa Rica fellas, keep your heads up. Of course we have many things to improve on, but from this showing, I'm very confident that Latapy will get them right!!!!!
BTW...-
WE BEATING MEXICO IN AZTECA.
WE BEATING MEXICO IN AZTECA.
WE BEATING MEXICO IN AZTECA.
I know all alyuh blind and biased peeps on here will jump on me for this, but Birchall is as much a liability as he is an asset. He can tackle and win the ball and hit good long crosses, but he loses the ball way too often and easily when he's put under pressure from the opposition because he cannot create any space, can't link up in attacking interplay well, and hits a good few misplaced passes on his day. He's an enigma- has his positive and negative impacts on the team, and in being respectful of the quality of other midfielders we have like Trent Noel and Silvio Spann, I can understand fully why Latapy left him out, and if he leaves him out in the future. A good example of his shortcomings is in the Costa Rica game, Carlos threw in the ball to him, he just had to hit a simple return pass to Carlos, but hit is much too soft and a Costa Rican came in and took the ball- chance gone and pressure now on the our very suspect defense.
I don't EVER see anyone on here talking about Birchall's weakness, but instead you all talk about him like he's Steven Gerrard and leaving him on the bench is treason, Birchall can do no wrong in the eyes of all the supporter- people seem to be blinded to and do not mention his errant passes and soft losing of the ball under little pressure in matches.
Right, so now that I've personally dispelled all the very annoying and biased talk about Birchall that every spouts, I still believe he should be on the field because we need a lively midfielder to protect the defense and who can tackle well, just that unlike everyone else, I acknowledge the weaknesses in his play that can cost us, and believe that he should play a very rigid and disciplined defensive midfield role, taking as LITTLE RISKS AS POSSIBLE, keep it simple, and leave as much of the advancing as possible to the other midfielders. I hear people talking about his shooting ability, but we have other players like spann who can also shoot from distance, and can create space when crowded out higher up the field, and since Birchall can't do the latter, again he should stay deep and leave the advancing to the other midfielders, because in attack his liabilities outweigh his assets.
We don't have many players who are solid and complete players, most have some skills but lack others, so need to have 2 players doing what one should be able to do, but the thing is there's only 10 outfield spots available, so when you sacrifice one player, you sacrifice one aspect of the game that is required to win matches, and enhance another, so it's always a trade off, so whether Latapy takes off a midfielder like Trent Noel to play Birchall, we may be more defensively sound when the opponents have the ball, but at the same time we probably won't be as creative and fluid in attack and build up play to create chances- and goals win matches.
So like I said, with the incomplete nature of most of our players, it's always a trade off and sacrifice, there's only 11 spots on the team, so what ever route Latapy goes, I'm sure he(with his experience and football knowledge, unlike us armchair coaches) more than us will know according to the players we have, what trade off has the better chance of yielding results and have us winning football matches. I see disadvantages and advantages of having Birchall on like many other players, I trust Latapy more than us will be able to filter it down and come up with the definitive and best solution.
The only sure starter on this team is certainly Carlos Edwards, he's been our best player by a good amount for years on running.
On the post, I feel that Birchall could possibly work as defender(but definitely not wingback), he's faster than any we've got now, and he's very lively and has aggression.
On a side note, with how Kenwyne playing in attack for Trinidad, I feeling Latapy should put him back to play defense, he might be of much better use to us there. Even saying that, I still feel he can display his quality in attack for us, if we were creating as many chances in the past 7 months as we did against Costa Rica, I'm sure Kenwyne and Scotland would have scored a good few.
You all played very honourably against Costa Rica fellas, keep your heads up. Of course we have many things to improve on, but from this showing, I'm very confident that Latapy will get them right!!!!!
BTW...-
WE BEATING MEXICO IN AZTECA.
WE BEATING MEXICO IN AZTECA.
WE BEATING MEXICO IN AZTECA.
Thais sense.
Birchall's best play is when he has no offensive resposibility, ala. Makalele, Toure etc.
All we want is a man to shield the defence and bring it.
Probably him and Yorke need to share pick, because we need a pivot man in front of the defence, and Yorke was roast after 1st half.
Ah ent want to blight Spanner, but for the longest, I see men crying down the man.
In truth, he has always been a central midfielder. Even on his best play at wingback, I was like, 'This man is wasted as a defender'. The man finally get his chance, and the man look good. I wouldn't have taken him off, but then Latas is the coach.