That last sentence is the most relevant one posted in this whole thread, we are obviously a better team with him in it.

Edited January 11, 201511 yr by dkw

I did, he also made a very good pass to Drogba in the Spurs 3-0 game.

 

He has had some good highlights and you might be right, when you look at it that way he can be undervalued, those are all 3 different types of quality assists. However I think his game in general can be sloppy and far too slow. But when it works off it is excellent, like with the Fabregas goal against Palace, but that's when it does work off, it's kind of rare it actually does.

 

I personally prefer Fabregas there, I'll admit Fabregas's performances have been the best when he is in midfield but logically I prefer Fabregas to have the freedom behind the striker. I find him levels above Oscar as a footballer.

I did, he also made a very good pass to Drogba in the Spurs 3-0 game.

He has had some good highlights and you might be right, when you look at it that way he can be undervalued, those are all 3 different types of quality assists. However I think his game in general can be sloppy and far too slow. But when it works off it is excellent, like with the Fabregas goal against Palace, but that's when it does work off, it's kind of rare it actually does.

I personally prefer Fabregas there, I'll admit Fabregas's performances have been the best when he is in midfield but logically I prefer Fabregas to have the freedom behind the striker. I find him levels above Oscar as a footballer.

He's got a 84% pass success rate in the league this season, compare that to Willian who is regarded as one of the safer and more conservative players in attack who has 85% pass success rate (worth noting that Oscar has made around 200 more passes).

Okay you prefer Fabregas behind the striker but who plays in the midfield instead of Cesc? Mikel? Ramires? In my opinion neither of those are as good as Oscar and so why drop Oscar for Fabregas when you can have both, it's not like Oscar's presence and the side is hindering Fabregas' contributions.

He's got a 84% pass success rate in the league this season, compare that to Willian who is regarded as one of the safer and more conservative players in attack who has 85% pass success rate (worth noting that Oscar has made around 200 more passes).

Okay you prefer Fabregas behind the striker but who plays in the midfield instead of Cesc? Mikel? Ramires? In my opinion neither of those are as good as Oscar and so why drop Oscar for Fabregas when you can have both, it's not like Oscar's presence and the side is hindering Fabregas' contributions.

 

Well this is were you will find it odd. But I prefer Mikel and Matic in the deep midfield. I don't like Fabregas's consistency in the deep midfield, he's not in position often enough, he's certainly no Xabi Alonso, he likes to venture forward more often than not.

 

Spurs absolutely picked us apart with Eriksen in the hole with so much space, John Terry was also left for dead twice against Newcastle aswell. There was the Swansea first 20 minutes, Gary Neville and Jamie Carragher did a great analysis of it, Phil Neville has also picked up on Fabregas's positioning in the midfield even when we were playing well, what do you expect with MOTD lately though. Also the Everton game was also a mess wasn't it, the side was all over the place, it was one of those games but the lack of positioning from Fabregas gave the space for the Mirallas goal if I remember correctly, also a similar situation when Liverpool got that lucky deflection against us, he shouldn't really of had acres of space like that.

 

But back on topic, I feel Oscar can be the same as Willian, granted that Oscar has the better statistics, but he also faffs around with the ball, a lot of sideways and back passing just like Willian. I think that's why many people have been complaining about the two all season, mostly with Willian though.

 

So I suppose if we are able to keep the ball then we are hard to play against with Hazard-Oscar-Willian then Fabregas-Matic in midfield, however if we don't which we were incredibly sloppy in the first half we can get punished severely, lucky for us it didn't turn out to be the case, Cech was on top form. But I prefer the more defensive approach of things, Mikel doesn't give a large amount of cover but he is in position a lot more and as I said earlier I prefer Fabregas behind the striker than I do Oscar.

For me when Oscar ticks the team ticks.. at 23 he is natraully going to have up and down games, in the next couple of years he will really come in to his own

For me when Oscar ticks the team ticks.. at 23 he is natraully going to have up and down games, in the next couple of years he will really come in to his own

 

Exactly. I've criticised him in the past (especially in the second half of last season when he lost interest) but he's such an important cog in that midfield for us. The fact that he's getting more assists and goals whilst still maintaining that high workrate and defensive impact is very encouraging.

 

Not his best game by a long stretch but still contributed massively to the win.

The problem with Oscar and Willian is they don't tend to drag our team out the dirt. They contribute when the whole team turns up.

The problem with Oscar and Willian is they don't tend to drag our team out the dirt. They contribute when the whole team turns up.

Erm, so like Saturday then.

The problem with Oscar and Willian is they don't tend to drag our team out the dirt. They contribute when the whole team turns up.

Or maybe the whole team plays better when they're at their best?

Not really as Oscar has been hooked off at half time on a couple of occasions. I do like Oscar and Willian too, but for attacking players they need to put more numbers on the board (especially Willian). I feel that too much responsibility is left with Hazard (cesc aside) to unlock defences and provide a constant attacking threat.

Edited January 13, 201511 yr by Cech_Hook

Not really as Oscar has been hooked off at half time on a couple of occasions. I do like Oscar and Willian too, but for attacking players they need to put more numbers on the board (especially Willian). I feel that too much responsibility is left with Hazard (cesc aside) to unlock defences and provide a constant attacking threat.

 

Couldn't agree more, I think people let Oscar off the hook a bit.

 

He got a goal and an assist but you can't expect everyone to get carried away with that.

 

Give it a full season anyway but I want to see better from Oscar, it's not just the stats, Willians don't look so good yes but he hasn't been terrible by any means. I just think we should expect more from Oscar and Willian in attack, we are far too reliant on Hazard at times.

 

Hazards stats don't even tell a true story do they, that's the point really, but realistically Hazard has been absolutely crucial in most goals or us this season, without him I dread to think.

Not really as Oscar has been hooked off at half time on a couple of occasions. I do like Oscar and Willian too, but for attacking players they need to put more numbers on the board (especially Willian). I feel that too much responsibility is left with Hazard (cesc aside) to unlock defences and provide a constant attacking threat.

 

He was subbed off at half time against Watford following a hefty collision with the goalkeeper... Same as Gary Cahill was against Hull following a clash of heads. 

 

Only other game it happened was the Spurs away match (a game in which he assisted our opening goal) due to Ivanovic and Cahill's defensive ineptness on that night we gifted Spurs a penalty and their all important 3rd goal goal right on the stroke of half time. Spurs were getting through the middle far too easily so Oscar was essentially sacrificed to attempt to shore up the midfield... I saw that as much a comment on how poorly the midfield and defense were playing as apposed to just Oscar's performance.  

He was subbed off at half time against Watford following a hefty collision with the goalkeeper... Same as Gary Cahill was against Hull following a clash of heads. 

 

Only other game it happened was the Spurs away match (a game in which he assisted our opening goal) due to Ivanovic and Cahill's defensive ineptness on that night we gifted Spurs a penalty and their all important 3rd goal goal right on the stroke of half time. Spurs were getting through the middle far too easily so Oscar was essentially sacrificed to attempt to shore up the midfield... I saw that as much a comment on how poorly the midfield and defense were playing as apposed to just Oscar's performance.  

 

That's cutting Oscar a lot of slack tbf, I don't want to sound like an Oscar hater here, because this isn't the case at all.

 

But his work rate in that game was very poor, often times he didn't come back enough, it definitely wasn't an Oscar game by any means. The Harry Kane thing was one of those situations, I guess you would expect Oscar to either get the ball or take him down, but you wouldn't really expect Kane to score from there, but that turned out to be a very cruel game.

 

However that's just one game, I have no complaints with Oscars hard working, I know we will get that almost every single game so that's the last thing I'll criticize him for.

That's cutting Oscar a lot of slack tbf, I don't want to sound like an Oscar hater here, because this isn't the case at all.

 

But his work rate in that game was very poor, often times he didn't come back enough, it definitely wasn't an Oscar game by any means. The Harry Kane thing was one of those situations, I guess you would expect Oscar to either get the ball or take him down, but you wouldn't really expect Kane to score from there, but that turned out to be a very cruel game.

 

However that's just one game, I have no complaints with Oscars hard working, I know we will get that almost every single game so that's the last thing I'll criticize him for.

 

Thing is, why is it our #10 who's trying to tackle the opposition centre forward on the edge of our own area from open play? 

 

Why weren't the centre backs closing him down instead of standing off, where was our holding midfield? 

 

I'm not saying Oscar is absolved of blame in that match but to point at it and say "well he was hooked at half time so he's sh*t" is over simplifying that substitution.

 

The whole team were woefully under par in that first half and so a change or changes were needed. As I said Ramires introduction was about trying to wrestle back control of the midfield which was being bypassed far too easily. 

 

Hazard and Willian were unlikely to be subbed because Hazard was our main attacking threat and Willian's much admired work ethic and more natural width were going to be needed if we were going to get into the match. 

 

Short of going 3 at the back which would have been a huge gamble considering how badly we were defending, what other change was there to make? 

That does bring other matters into it, which is a reason why I'm not a huge fan of Fabregas having that responsibility for the rest of the season.

 

It was definitely a midfielders job, Cahill and Ivanovic were shocking but Eriksen is going to cause anyone problems with that much space. You also need to realise Eriksen has never had that much space all season, why on earth is he getting that against us? I think Mourinho took a gamble that game, he expected us to be more clinical. However we were punished very harshly and severely.

 

I suppose for that reason alone it's not exactly a good reason  to pull up Oscar for his performances.

The only thing Oscar lacks as a #10 is flair imo. That's why he doesn't get mentioned as a good #10. Other than that he has everything.

http://youtu.be/_5-lSL-RDa8

<3

I never understand when people group Oscar in with Willian as lacking final contribution.

 

Oscar is head and shoulders above Willian in that department and often has good games where we struggle.

 

When Oscar plays well, it really lifts the team's performance. 

Oscar is class people seem to forget he is only 22 he will only get better he just needs to work on his final ball and build up some consistancy.

Oscar: Has now directly contributed to 13 PL goals this season, 3 more than he managed in his 33 apps last season

Oscar: Has now directly contributed to 13 PL goals this season, 3 more than he managed in his 33 apps last season

 

He can suffer from dips in form more than some of our other players, but when he's good, he's f**king fantastic!!

I hope whoever it was who said that they would rather have Sigurdsson in the squad than Oscar is quietly tucking into some half-time humble pie.

I hope whoever it was who said that they would rather have Sigurdsson in the squad than Oscar is quietly tucking into some half-time humble pie.

He is pretty good in assisting Oscar though. 

Oscar: Has now directly contributed to 13 PL goals this season, 3 more than he managed in his 33 apps last season

certainly seems to have helped his form that he doesn't have a world cup hanging over him at the end of the season!

Nice to see the understanding him and Cesc are starting to have, with one moving up when the other drop back and vice versa.  Great to have two players on the pitch who can switch so seamlessly between a n10 and a deep laying play maker.