SouthCoastShankly wrote:stu_the_red wrote:SouthCoastShankly wrote:He is the exact player we need in the squad. If there has been one thing we've been lacking in the past is the need for some midfield steel. Sissoko provides that, Hamann is able to do so but is getting on and less likely to be as energetic as Sissoko. He needs improvement with choice of tackle, etc but all in all a decent addition to the squad
Alonso and Gerrard don't provide steel?
Can't agree with that at all.
Alonso and Gerrard can provide steel when needed but yo can hardly catagorise them as tacklers. They aren't the same players as Vieira, Hamann, Sissoko, Gravesen, Keane, are they? Alonso and Gerrard are more creative players, their jobs are different.
Steven Gerrard is probably the most the natural ball winner in the premier league lad.
Watch the Man Utd game. He's the best tackler in the country, hence the reason he's probably the best right back in the country.
The amount of times he tracked back and won tackles on Rooney (one of the worlds best players) in that game says it all.
The best things in Gerrard's game are aggression, bottle, passion, work rate and tackling ability. Closley followed by athletisism and shooting ability.
As for Alonso again you're simply wrong. He's a deep lying playmaker with great vision and picks incredible passes that open games up, but he's also excellent at tackling, his positional sense and reading of the game are amounst the best in the country and his ability to sweep up, calm situations down and win tackles are invaluable to this side, last season away to Juventus, he'd be out for 6 months then marked Nedved (one of the best players in europe) out of the game.