Conor Bradley

[vlahka]

And the most kneejerk and predictable post of the year goes to...

If its so knee jerk why are there people agreeing? He runs at people more often. His crosses are just as good. Hes given assists and goals. And there is zero doubt that hes a better defender. Put that all together and hes better. Especially with trents sub standard effort lately. And by lately i mean a while. Him and Robertson have fallen.

Bradley - PL 2 games, 1 goal, 3 assists.

Trent - PL 20 games, 2 goals, 3 assists.

[Alex]

If its so knee jerk why are there people agreeing? He runs at people more often. His crosses are just as good. Hes given assists and goals. And there is zero doubt that hes a better defender. Put that all together and hes better. Especially with trents sub standard effort lately. And by lately i mean a while. Him and Robertson have fallen.

Bradley - PL 2 games, 1 goal, 3 assists.

Trent - PL 20 games, 2 goals, 3 assists.

Trent before his injury was one of our best players and Robbo has been injured for 4 months. Harsh words.

Bradley is good no doubt and I like how solid he is. But hes young and will dip in form, Trent's strength is having the ability to be consistently amazing.

[Fivex]

He has the ability yes, but I’m not sure anyone can say he actually is consistently amazing.

Amazing in spells depending on how the games pan out, and has saved our skin plenty of times with his vision & creativity, but he’s not a banker for an 8 or 9/10 performance each game.

I think he’s a square peg in round hole & often at the detriment of wider cohesion of the team.

[danperkins]

If its so knee jerk why are there people agreeing? He runs at people more often. His crosses are just as good. Hes given assists and goals. And there is zero doubt that hes a better defender. Put that all together and hes better. Especially with trents sub standard effort lately. And by lately i mean a while. Him and Robertson have fallen.

Bradley - PL 2 games, 1 goal, 3 assists.

Trent - PL 20 games, 2 goals, 3 assists.

I'm not a fan of the hybrid role, what others have to do to cover it & frankly Trent as a defender. It was refreshing to see Bradley in that role bombing up the wing. Bradley may well be a better defender and he has looked excellent in the games played recently but he is an inexperienced kid, it's so early in his career and imo it's just too small a sample size to suggest that he's way better than Trent.

[Doc_Piptorious]

I'm not a fan of the hybrid role, what others have to do to cover it & frankly Trent as a defender. It was refreshing to see Bradley in that role bombing up the wing. Bradley may well be a better defender and he has looked excellent in the games played recently but he is an inexperienced kid, it's so early in his career and imo it's just too small a sample size to suggest that he's way better than Trent.

Think that is a fair and sensible take tbh.


For me we have no idea how good or not Bradley will go on to be, but think it would also to fair to say that in the very short term both Bradley and Gomez have looked far better in our RB slot than TAA has.

Just think we have seen more solidity when one of those two are in that slot.

Also thought it was interesting how Arsenal used a variation of the FB hybrid role against us yesterday and it was pretty much the way City used to do it before they switched to using CBs for their current hybrid set up.

When Arsenal inverted they used to it create genuine overloads in the centre against us. They also used to to help combat our press and to reinforce their own press. Was a clever tactic to use against our take on the hybrid system as they took away any numerical advantage we had and also used their inverting full back to increase their work rate in the middle along with using him to reduce the time our guys had on the ball.



What might also be food for thought is that Alonso likes to use hybrid roles within his own set up too. Frimpong tends to start as either a RB or RWB for Leverkusen and instead of inverting in his own half, he stays wide until he reaches the other team's final third and then he inverts.

[vlahka]

Trent before his injury was one of our best players and Robbo has been injured for 4 months. Harsh words.

Bradley is good no doubt and I like how solid he is. But hes young and will dip in form, Trent's strength is having the ability to be consistently amazing.

He used to be consistently amazing. This season hes been quite low. Regardless of injury, we have a player whos gone and put in excellent MotM performances in multiple games. Why shouldnt we pick him again? Trent played and was abject. It would be silly for him to play again over someone whos been putting in amazing performances. Clearly trent needs more time in training to get back to his best. But no matter how many times I see it, I will never be able to accept his lazy track backs from midfield. Thats something he should not be doing. Ever.

[rudedog]

Trent was playing brilliantly before he was injured

[Alex]

He used to be consistently amazing. This season hes been quite low. Regardless of injury, we have a player whos gone and put in excellent MotM performances in multiple games. Why shouldnt we pick him again? Trent played and was abject. It would be silly for him to play again over someone whos been putting in amazing performances. Clearly trent needs more time in training to get back to his best. But no matter how many times I see it, I will never be able to accept his lazy track backs from midfield. Thats something he should not be doing. Ever.

Can it not be argued that hes doing quite well, as were top, and as a Right Back in that defense we have conceded only 22 goals in 23 games. Was only 19 before yesterday. He must be doing something right?

[Charly]

The team looks better, more fluid in attack with overlapping fullback. overloading the middle is becomes pointless as it makes finding gaps really hard. We end up with tons if possesion and no penetration.

No idea why Trent cant play his old role.

[Irishnev]

The team looks better, more fluid in attack with overlapping fullback. overloading the middle is becomes pointless as it makes finding gaps really hard. We end up with tons if possesion and no penetration.

No idea why Trent cant play his old role.

When we went to **** last season when we lost our legs in midfield the management team tried to compensate by inverting Trent to give us another counter pressing option off the ball and help us in build up on it.

Many of us here said to keep the system but replace the engine, we’ve done that with younger midfielders but we persist with the inverting ****e. Added to that I think Trent just doesn’t want to play there anymore….. based on his half arsing defensively.

I still would like us to go full 4-3-3 and just upgrade the players. We’ve seen this season his well that can work. I understand getting Trent on the ball is a good thing but against certain sides it hurts us more than helps us like yesterday

[rudedog]

The team looks better, more fluid in attack with overlapping fullback. overloading the middle is becomes pointless as it makes finding gaps really hard. We end up with tons if possesion and no penetration.

No idea why Trent cant play his old role.

Surely that would lead to more gaps at the back/space to exploit?

[rudedog]

When we went to **** last season when we lost our legs in midfield the management team tried to compensate by inverting Trent to give us another counter pressing option off the ball and help us in build up on it.

Many of us here said to keep the system but replace the engine, we’ve done that with younger midfielders but we persist with the inverting ****e. Added to that I think Trent just doesn’t want to play there anymore….. based on his half arsing defensively.

I still would like us to go full 4-3-3 and just upgrade the players. We’ve seen this season his well that can work. I understand getting Trent on the ball is a good thing but against certain sides it hurts us more than helps us like yesterday

We could be top of the league and still in the other three competitions if we hadn't been playing this inverted ****e

[Charly]

Surely that would lead to more gaps at the back/space to exploit?

Not with a proper midfielder in front who can run and press and cover.

Didnt see a problem when Bradley got forward.

[Charly]

We could be top of the league and still in the other three competitions if we hadn't been playing this inverted ****e

We havent been in top gear all season. Suddenly we look really good with our fullback proving width, and then awful when we revert.

We cant keep scraping results on the back of 15 minute spells if we want to push for the top spot.

I dont understand why we need to change something that objectively works (when we have a fit squad). Our limiting factor of fit midfielders and backups at fullback has been resolved.

I guess Alonso will have his own system, but Id like to see us go out using the old system.

[Irishnev]

We could be top of the league and still in the other three competitions if we hadn't been playing this inverted ****e

I know, I know….. it’s completely paradoxical because we’ve been going great results wise but I genuinely think our performances have been hit and miss but we’ve found a way

Trent is Schrödinger’s fullback - equally right back and not right back