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What is our best midfield pairing?

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Mikel Ramires they compliment each other better than any other pair

 
I think Ramires is far better on the wing in the front three, gives us good balance to what is in my opinion an overloaded attacking trio. SFL is going, lets not kid ourselves, so unfortunately he doesn't enter my thinking here.

I feel Oscar along with Mikel/Luiz is our best option. Oscar works every bit as hard as Ramires and has a fat better range of passing and vision. Ramires on the other hand is quicker and will track far more than Oscar, giving the fullback more support. Oscar tends to try and win the first tackle, but when he doesn't win it, he won't get behind the ball.

Mikel I would play against stronger teams and Luiz when we need a little more creativity to break down a deep/narrow defense.

Just my opinion of course.

 
Damo810 said:
Your not convinced by Ramires and Mikel yet put Lampard and Luiz as your selection? Doesn't seem logical to me..
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Why doesn't that seem logical ? Lampard and Luiz have both shown that at times they can be consistent, especially Lampard. I am yet to see any consistency with Ramires and Mikel this season, they have both been really poor.

I'm not getting carried away by 1 half of good football like many others seem to be doing today.

 
Scott Harris said:
Why doesn't that seem logical ? Lampard and Luiz have both shown that at times they can be consistent, especially Lampard. I am yet to see any consistency with Ramires and Mikel this season, they have both been really poor.

I'm not getting carried away by 1 half of good football like many others seem to be doing today.
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"at times consistent" That doesn't make sense. Thats like saying, sometimes I do things well and sometimes I don't, thats not consistency. Also Luiz and Lampard are far from consistent  Luiz is by far the most erratic player we have and all too often Lampard blows hot and cold, sometimes within the same game. Too often he'll deliver a great ball forward and then fail to do his defensive duties and how often does Luiz send a wild ball forward and fail to hit any target? Or smack a plainly stupid shot into the top tier. Neither are CDM's and pairing both together against top teams would be suicidal imo..

 
Problem is we play with 2 holding midfielders, and only one of them is a natural holding midfielder. Neither Lampard or Ramires are good in that position. I think the best pairing would be Mikel and Ramires. Mikel stays in position and is strong on the ball and can cover Ramires when he bombs forward. Having these two give a good combination, Ramires can use his pace and Mikel's strength. With Lamps and Mikel its way too slow and with Ramires and Lampard none of them are disciplined enough to stay defensive. We left very exposed when these two are in the middle I feel. 

 
None of the potential duos are perfect but I think the least flawed is Mikel-Ramires. I agree with g4 in that Luiz is far too erratic to be a midfielder; parterning him with Ramires would be far too inconsistent and unreliable a combination, while combining him with Mikel wouldn't offer enough to the attack. Luiz-Lampard seems like a cobbled-together partnership to me which would be left positionally wanting more often than not I would imagine.

Lampard-Mikel, as successful as they were during the Champions League run while providing a shield to the defence, simply do not have the athleticism to control the centre of the pitch. Lampard-Ramires (as we saw today) do not provide enough defensive cover as they are both inherently attacking players.

After the great success that was the home Newcastle game early on in the season, I wondered whether there might be a future in a Mikel-Meireles partnership (one I hadn't really considered as I always thought of Raul as an attacking mid from his Liverpool days), but the club suddenly sold him.

As a result we are left with Mikel-Ramires, which while neither of them are perfect, are a pair who complement each other. Mikel is far more cool, pragmatic and slick with his passing (although today he started a fair few decent attacks) while Ramires is far more direct and unpredictable (but as a result less reliable). Ramires' excellent speed allows him to cover for the slower but physically stronger Mikel. Mikel's positioning is very conservative and he usually doesn't contribute much to the attack; Ramires is the opposite, his positioning is far less good but he scores goals and provides a lot of thrust to our often-sluggish front four. Obviously neither of them are as good as Michael Essien but in my opinion that is the best midfield pairing in the squad.

However I do think there is something to be said for a midfield three featuring Mikel, Ramires and Oscar...

 
I have only seen Chalobah about 4 times this season. Maybe somebody can shine more light than me on this: Do you think he's more a 'natural holder' or a complete midfielder. From what I've seen he joins in attacks a lot, and is not very disciplined in the midfield covering. Does he have the qualities to fill that holding role, because that would really be fantastic.

I believe Mikel is a good player, but he is certainly one of the areas of the team which is the most pressing to improve replace.

 
For the moment, Ramires + Mikel gives us the best combination in my opinion. They have very different skill sets and complement each other very well.  Lampard and Ramires together simply don't work at all, both just want to go forward. 

For the 4-2-3-1 to work effectively and consistently, we need a pair that can seemlessly interchange between playing the offensive and defensive roles. As an example, Bayern Munich gave a masterclass of how to play the 4-2-3-1 in midfield at Arsenal through the fluid way in which Martinez and Schweinsteiger interchanged in defence and attack.

As far as we're concerned, I would be very interested to see how a Luiz and Ramires combo would work. I could imagine those 2 forming a similarly fluid combination - both have a lot of ability both defensively and offensively aswell as having excellent stamina. They'd need to improve their positional discipline but that would come with time.

 
just said:
Because I think he can learn the position and I think he has the attributes to blossom there.

We both agree that he is not really a defender. We both agree he is, by instinct, attack minded rather than defensively minded. We saw today what he can offer us when he is pushing forwards. He has the range of passing, (unlike Mikel). He has the skill, and the ability, (unlike Mikel), to carry the ball at his feet. The other crucial plus he has over Mikel is his athleticism. Mikel has the turning circle of the Ark Royal. Not to mention Luiz can pop up with a finish every now and then.

It's hard to put into words. Sometimes you just have a gut feeling about a certain player. I get that with Luiz. When he is played at centre-half Luiz gives me heart palpitations, I can barely watch. He is an accident waiting to happen. But when he is played in midfield he gives me hope, entertainment. At times he can be such a forceful, dynamic player going forwards,  he gets me off my chair with excitement. I can't put it any simpler than that really.
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what I'm curious about is why would you then pair him with ramires? if you agree he's essentially an attack minded player then does that mean ramires should be the defensive player? I think that would be a waste. and that the partnership would concede the ball too often. especially against good sides.

remember what mikel said about ramires:

""I said to him as we got on to the pitch: 'Where shall I play?' He said he'd play the holding role and that I should go forward. I said OK but, when the game started, I looked up and he was already up their end of the pitch."

I don't disagree that luiz has loads of things mikel doesn't. but if you make the comparison directly between them, then you have to ask about positioning, pass selection etc. if luiz won't learn those things in defence, what makes you feel he would in midfield (a position he's even more unfamiliar with)?

I agree he could be a good attack minded midfield player (though personally I don't think he'd be good enough for us, nor do I think he'll curb the directness of his passing). I think he offers an alternative to ramires with his energy and his drive. I don't think he offers any of the things we need in a defensive player, be it in midfield or defense.

 
I think people are getting a bit carried away with the mikel/ ramires partnership because of today. It worked a treat today but in the past it hasn't gone so well ( west ham away). The luiz/ lampard partnership should be used in games where we need to break teams down and in the big games where the counter attack is needed I would play mikel/ ramires.

Under no circumstances should the lampard/mikel ramires or the ramires/luiz,lampard combinations be used as they simply don't compliment each other. Expect to see the lampard/mikel partnership next game then......

 
My opinion is that in games where teams will actually attack us (mostly other big teams) Mikel and Ramires could be the best partnership, Mikel has the discipline to stay behind the other teams #10 and Ramires actually has space in front of him to run with the ball.

For the majority of teams however I think Luiz and Lampard can give the most against teams that are sitting deep and are compact.

 
Ramires & Mikel every day

Playing Mikel as a sweeper and giving Ramires freedom by allowing him to roam box to box is a strategy Rafa should use more often.

It is is great on the counter as we saw for Rami's goal against United and allows us to control the middle of the park.

Ramires is wasted playing deep as he did with Lamps 1st half United we should be utilizing his pace on the break

 
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Maksimov said:
Right-o... :happy001:
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Damo810 said:
"at times consistent" That doesn't make sense. Thats like saying, sometimes I do things well and sometimes I don't, thats not consistency. Also Luiz and Lampard are far from consistent  Luiz is by far the most erratic player we have and all too often Lampard blows hot and cold, sometimes within the same game. Too often he'll deliver a great ball forward and then fail to do his defensive duties and how often does Luiz send a wild ball forward and fail to hit any target? Or smack a plainly stupid shot into the top tier. Neither are CDM's and pairing both together against top teams would be suicidal imo..
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Take the piss all you like assholes because it does make sense. Of course you can be consistent at times, if you play well for say 10 games in a row that would be consistent and then you could lose that consistency by not playing well for a few games, that would count as being consistent at times. If you read my post properly maybe you would be able to understand it.

Lampard has shown consistency at times, meaning in the last 15 or so games he has played consistently well, but the last 5 or so games he has been on and off. CONSISTENCY AT TIMES, get it now ?

Ramires and Mikel have not shown this level of consistency this season at all.

 
dkw said:
Was mikel and ramires the midfield of choice the start of the season? I remember thinking they looked ideal together in certain games.
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It is for certain situations but we've no player at the moment who can really put their foot on the ball and control the game. I'm hoping that either KDB or Josh in a few years can come back and provide that.

 
It depends on the opposition. 

But generally I think Ramires and Mikel is the most defensively solid. Luiz and Ramires is the most dynamic. Ramires and Lampard is the most offensive. Apart from Lampard, whoever plays alongside Ramires should be under strict instructions to sit deep and allow him to go forward and join attacks.

I'd always have Ramires in there. Its just a case of who plays alongside him. Luiz or Mikel would be my choice. Lamps should be used when Ramires needs a rest, which should be very rarely. 

Next season KDB will take over from Lampard and challenge Ramires for his position.

 
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Scott Harris said:
I would go with Luiz and Lampard, i'm still not convinced by Mikel and Ramires, until we see more consistency from them then i won't be changing my mind.
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So, you're not convinced until we see more consistency, but you wouldn't play them to allow that consistency to be developed and displayed?  Good logic, that

 
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