Cristiano Ronaldo was always going to be irreplaceable. When he left United he and Messi were by far and away the world's two best players, and neither of them were even as good as they are now. The goalscoring hole left by Ronaldo seems to finally be filled by Robin Van Persie (despite the best efforts of Wayne Rooney and Dimitar Berbatov in the last few seasons, neither has truly compared), however with the mouth-watering clashes between United and Real Madrid coming up in just over a month's time, I do not believe there is a single United fan who is truly over our former Portuguese genius.
At the beginning of this season, I did in fact believe that there was an opportunity to finally lay our Ronaldo dreams to rest. With RVP signed, we had a man with the ability to score as many as the man himself. We also had the Premier League's best right-footed winger of last season, the man bought in 2009 who was never going to replace Ronaldo, but has given United a much needed extra dimension out wide, Antonio Valencia. Between the two, it looked like we may finally have the closest we could ever get to a Ronaldo successor. RVP has not let anyone down, he is proving himself to truly be the best striker in the world, with Falcao being the only true competition for that crown (apologies to Liverpool and City fans but Suarez and Aguero just aren't quite that level whatever delusions you may have). The let down of the season however, and his failings have certainly been covered over by United's defensive frailties, is that man Valencia.
Voted the United fans' and players' player of the season last year, it has been an almighty fall for the Ecuadorian and until Boxing Day, I myself had been in denial about these problems. Every below par performance from my former favourite I had defended profusely, unwilling to believe that he was really playing that badly. Even his absolutely dire performance in the 1-0 defeat to Norwich didn't deter me, I still claimed Valencia was the league's best winger and it was only a matter of time until his performances picked up again. They haven't. The 4-3 win over Newcastle was the final straw in my defence of Valencia. He didn't play particularly badly, certainly it wasn't his worst performance of the season, but what I realised is that defenders have simply worked out what every United fan has been frightened of for a long time, which is that Antonio Valencia only has one foot.
Now by that I do not mean he is one-footed. One-footed in reference to a footballer usually means they are much stronger with one foot than the other, but in times of necessity they will attempt a shot, a cross or at the very least a pass with their weaker foot. When it comes to Valencia this is not the case. I genuinely do not think I have ever seen him attempt to do anything with his left foot other than use it for standing. There is nothing more frustrating for a United fan than watching him being shown onto his left foot. As soon as it happens the sight in front of your eyes becomes the same as when you leave your PlayStation on and forget to pause it. For anyone who does not know what I mean by this, when playing FIFA if you are to let go of the controller and leave a player standing over the ball, what they will do is shuffle very slowly in the direction they are facing, doing nothing of any worth whatsoever. Now if I could sum up Antonio Valencia's season in one line, I think that would have to be it. Every single time Valencia gets the ball in a position which in seasons gone by would have defenders trembling and crying like Helen Flanagan in a bushtucker trial, he is duly shown inside by said defender. Any other player in this position would at least attempt to make a short pass to the nearest team-mate, but not our Tony. Whether this nearest team-mate is 6 feet or twenty yards away, Valencia looks down at his left foot, bellows "YOU SHALL NOT PASS" in the style of Gandalf, attempts to turn and go back down the line, swings back his diamond encrusted right foot and kicks the ball straight into the readily prepared defender. Meanwhile 70,000 people inside Old Trafford groan in frustration while I openly weep in the street in front of a shrine to Jesper Blomqvist.
It has genuinely become beyond a joke now the lack of usage that left-foot gets. He may have suffered a serious injury on it and that could certainly have damaged his ability, but the fact of the matter is he goes out of his way not to use it in positions where it is even obvious to birds flying overhead that it would be the most productive thing to do. Yet every single time without fail, Valencia will attempt to either turn it back onto his stronger foot and cross it in (which defenders now expect and easily block), or he will pass the ball backwards like an over-excited Joe Allen. We are all crying for the same thing, we beg him to take the man on, shoot, cross, whatever, just USE YOUR LEFT FOOT. Even if he really cannot physically get any power behind the ball when using it, at least using his left foot to make a simple pass would carry on the build up play, unlike his small backward passes.
As far as I can tell, Valencia is possibly the most one footed player in the Premier League and defenders have now figured that out, meaning they know how to stop him. He was once arguably the best crosser of the ball in the league but defenders now know what he is going to do meaning the majority of his crosses are blocked. He only has three assists this season which says it all. Amazingly, it seems his low left-foot capabilities and dire performances have not been picked up on by pundits as of yet and in my opinion he is getting a very easy ride at the moment. It is very easy to criticise United's defence, and have a go at the likes of De Gea, Ferdinand, Nani and Rooney when they are under-performing rather than the more quiet Ecuadorian. Valencia is seen as a nice guy who just gets on with his job. He has avoided controversy so far in his career by being a consistent and solid player for both Wigan and United, especially when compared to the disgustingly inconsistent Nani and Tom Daley inspired Ashley Young. However, it will not be long before his poor performances appear on the media's radar. No player, however quiet they may be, can avoid being criticised in the long-term and Valencia is no exception. He is certainly not someone I want to have a go at, and he has been my favourite player of the last couple of years, but it is the frustration of knowing how good he has been that makes me worry about this left-footed inability.
In the past I have said that if he learnt how to use his left foot then he could be one of the best players in the world, now I think it is necessary just to prevent himself becoming a future failure at the club.
No comments:
Post a Comment