Lucas

[Mattshark]

but didi and masher have or had so much more to there game!!
yr right though it is ALL lucas does and we need more imo.

Squad player yes, key player in a pivotal postion for a title challenging team- no

Lucas does have a lot more, he is better going forward than Mascherano is!

[Craig_H]

He may be better than Mascherano going forward, but that doesnt make him great in an attacking sense.

He's decent, neat and tidy and solid. I havent seen a great deal more though and i dont think we need two 'destroyers' to break up the play. Unfortunately for Lucas, Mascherano's much better in that role.

[BillobShaisley]

Lucas would look much better in a team playing to his stregths of quick short passing, such as Barcelona. He'll look better for us when he actualy has confidence he's looked better this season for simply not having an abject lack of it.

I think even Stevie at his best would struggle in the Barca team and stare around in bewildermment at what he should be doing whereas Lucas would slot straight in. Its a different quality in understanding your place as part of a flowing move, thinking 3 passes and 2 runs ahead at the same time as your team mates rather than how to skin 2 players and shoot from 30 yards.

Didi is a legend but he too had the almost fatal flaw of being slower than tectonic plates which in turn had its own effect on how we played as a team, forcing us to defend deep.

[Scratch]

He may be better than Mascherano going forward, but that doesnt make him great in an attacking sense.

He's decent, neat and tidy and solid. I havent seen a great deal more though and i dont think we need two 'destroyers' to break up the play. Unfortunately for Lucas, Mascherano's much better in that role.

Unfortunately for Masch he's too limited in going forward, so i guess Lucas' more all round game will suit us better, cos we're far too defensive at the moment.

[BillobShaisley]

I'm a supporter of Lucas, but he's nowhere near as good as Macher, even taking into account their different strengths.

I think its the wrong way to support his role in the team. We need to change our style of play to involve pasing and moving rather than sitting around waiting for either SG or FT to do something magical. As a result of doing that all 3 of them will produce a lot more.

[Craig_H]

Unfortunately for Masch he's too limited in going forward, so i guess Lucas' more all round game will suit us better, cos we're far too defensive at the moment.

Not really what i was saying. Mascherano's brilliant defensively, less so going forward. Lucas can be reasonably ok going forward (but offers no attacking threat IM) and ok defensively.

Put the two together, and it gives us hardly anything going forward.

If anything, Mascherano's more dynamic and more driven, so if we're talking about bursting forward with passion and desire, he'll do that.

But the solution is to drop one of them in favour of a central midfielder with attacking threat - Gerrard or Aquilani.

Mascherano's world class in the defensive midfield duties, so keep him in and bring in either Gerrard or Aquilani to play as the 'attacking' CM.

Oh - and play 442.

[jbarnes18]

I think we can all agree Lucas and Mascherano should NEVER be partnered with each other again, it definitely makes both of them look worse than they are.

[RedReet]

I think we can all agree Lucas and Mascherano should NEVER be partnered with each other again, it definitely makes both of them look worse than they are.

I think I disagree, and their respective scores in the MOTM threads would also suggest otherwise.