EPL Talk » Dimitar Berbatov

Defoe Continues To Shine For Club And Country

Paul Bestall — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 19:25:46 +0000

Jermain Defoe has had a fantastic start to the new season, with goals for England and Spurs; including his 50th for the club in the 2-1 win at West Ham. His hat trick and all round performance against Hull City was clearly his best performance in a Spurs shirt in either spell. When he rejoined Spurs in January this year, he was welcomed back with open arms as a disastrous season began to show the green shoots of recovery under Harry Redknapp.To be reunited with his mentor at a club that could finally match his talent was a win-win situation for all concerned.

Whilst I appreciate Defoe had already been at Tottenham prior to Redknapp’s appointment, he was always considered a luxury player. Under Santini and Jol, the Defoe and Keane partnership didn’t really seem to pay off. This saw Berbatov and Mido brought in 2006 and to this end, either Defoe or Keane would then partner the bigger man upfront. As time went by, the starting pair was consistently Keane and Berbatov and Defoe became 3rd choice.

Under the hellish reign of Juande Ramos, Defoe felt completely unloved, under rated and unwanted. Strikers, like the lead singers of a band, are in general, very precious, needing to be loved and told as much for them to perform. The chance to leave Spurs to link up with Redknapp at Portsmouth was too good a chance to turn down. In January 2008, Defoe moved to Fratton Park for £7.5 million.

17 goals in his 36 appearance for Pompey is some return, but with the financial difficulties beginning to bite on the South Coast last Christmas, Defoe made no secret of the chance to once again be reunited with Redknapp and return to White Hart Lane after 340 days away. Around the corner however, fate had a cruel twist awaiting Defoe.

After breaking his foot in a training ground accident, Defoe was laid up until April and had just returned to the squad on April 19th when his half brother, Jade was murdered. Defoe was devastated, he was close to Jade and his death hit him hard and given compassionate leave for two weeks by the club, on his return to playing, the Spurs fans gave him a rapturous welcome. He was clearly moved by the fans support that day.

Still finding his way back, fitness wise, Defoe managed to get a goal in the win over Manchester City and a brace for England against Andorra. It was a precursor of what this season had in store for him.

He has continued to find strength in the adversity that has happened to him in the last 6 months and along with his team mate, Wilson Palacios; whose brother was found murdered in May, 19 months after being kidnapped, the pitch is allowing them a place they can get away from it all. It has been to England and Tottenham’s benefit that Defoe is showing such character and feeding of the inspiring humilty of Palacios to deal with life correctly.

Defoe has spent the summer working on every aspect of his game, working on increasing his strength and changing his diet. He now realises he has a club manager that has always had faith in him and an international manager who now has a selection issue.For Tottenham and England fans, Defoe is showing signs of finally realising the potential that Redknapp spotted in him when he was at West Ham.

After Eriksson’s ludicrous decision not to take him to the 2006 World Cup, Defoe should be a shoe-in for South Africa and the only question for Fabio Capello is should he start him Wednesday night, his place in the World Cup Squad already assured. After all that’s happened to him this year, it’s the least he deserves.

United’s Berba Necessity

Michael Scallon — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 22:48:33 +0000

The year is 1996. The All New Manchester United juggernaut has just driven relentlessly to the Premier League and FA Cup double, sneering past the wheezing, spluttering, broken down Alfa Romeo of Kevin Keegan’s Newcastle on its way. The chance arises, that summer, to buy a young starlet from France, Zinedine Zidane. While there is no doubting his talent, where does he play? Who would miss out to accomodate the playmaker? Why overhaul the successful machine in the infancy of its powers? This major quandry means that United and Sir Alex Ferguson (or just Alex, as he was in those innocent days) turn down the chance to purchase him, leaving Juventus free to fill their boots.

Sound thinking, as it turns out, as United’s juggernaut goes on to win 4 more league titles, an FA Cup and a Champions League.

Eleven years later then, after winning a league and Champions League double with a young team and most importantly a young forward line, Ferguson purchases Dimitar Berbatov for £32.5m. In the end he took a gamble similar to that which derailed his previous juggernaut (the Veron signing), and gave himself the headache he chose to avoid – for a man who became one of the greatest players of the modern era – just over a decade earlier. Where does he play? Who misses out? Why overhaul the successful machine in the infancy of its powers?

Ferguson answered some of these questions more than adequately, he retained the league title and almost the Champions League (adding the Carling Cup too), but he didn’t improve the side, or its attacking output, at all. In a lot of ways he diminished its power: Cristiano Ronaldo, after 42 goals the previous season, scored 26 this time in a more disciplined role (whether it be in the centre or on either flank, he was more inclined to stay there, and less inclined to roam); Carlos Tevez scored just 5 goals in the league; and United just 68 in 38 games: The worst output for a United Champion outfit since 1993. If anything, instead of adding more attacking variation and guile, Berbatov helped to turn United into more of a passing machine, rather than the 4-6-0-interchanging-all-over-the-place fluid organism of the previous year. “1-0 to United” became as much of a popular scoreline as “1-0 to the Arsenal” had in the George Graham era. Fergie’s gamble hadn’t failed, but neither had it succeeded.

Yet that is only modern history, for now we must look to the future: Tevez has switched his red pyjamas for blue ones, CR7 has become CR9, and United are looking at an attacking overhaul that perhaps may not have occured if Berbatov hadn’t have moved to Old Trafford (certainly Tevez would not have left): Their wide areas post Ronaldo are almost scarily bare – Giggs doesn’t play there anymore; Fergie will be struck down with the plague if Rooney plays there again; Valencia is a Big Time Rookie (a shocker against Arsenal hasn’t helped); Nani is infuriatingly inconsistent and perhaps too young to shoulder too much responsibility (he may well have to in any case); Tosic and Obertan are surely Carling Cup merchants at best at the moment – i.e. United’s options out wide are not too far away from a shower. So why, in the first few games, has Ferguson persisted with two wingers? Does playing two wingers get the best out of Rooney, even if he is in His Holy And Righteous Place in the centre?

Surely now, after a numerically small but consequentially massive changing of the guard, it is time to let Berbatov show his worth, and repay the considerable faith shown in his abilities.

On Saturday, Berbatov didn’t start, with Valencia and Nani both playing to the sides of Rooney, and United were absolutely awful for large parts of the first 70 minutes. Valencia was poor, Nani was not much better, Rooney was chasing the lost causes he was meant to have stopped chasing, and United created almost nothing. Berbatov came on, with United very fortunately 2-1 up – they had created no clear chances other than the penalty (rather like the Burnley game) - and suddenly United had a spark, they became able to keep the ball, they became able to create chances. Pulling out to unorthodox areas – with just one winger space is not cramped on both flanks if either Berbatov or Rooney choose to roam wide – he glided out wide and created a simple chance for Nani, after missing one himself (absolutely hilariously) after a 50 yard run that left him looking absolutely knackered. While it is possible that United could have been running on the euphoria of the dramatic turnabout, there is no doubt that Berbatov gave United something that they didn’t have for the rest of the game. When he came on at Burnley, with United 1-0 down, the momentum started to build, and United seemed able to create chances on a regular basis. In his two starts, United have won 1-0 and 5-0, and created chance after chance. When he hasn’t started, they’ve looked like a wishy washy nonesense in attack.

Whilst there is no doubt that United have other pressing issues – The centre of midfield looks quite scarily open, with Darren Fletcher bearing a heavy load on his shoulders while Carrick, Anderson and Giggs look almost loathe at times to try and tackle. If Hargreaves doesn’t come back soon, United are simply going to have to fill the centre of midfield with three bodies (at least against the big teams) to compensate somewhat for the lack of bite in United’s engine room – there is surely no doubt for one thing – For United to create chances, Dimitar Berbatov must play.

Will The Real Dimitar Berbatov Please Stand Up?

Paul Bestall — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 22:20:20 +0000

So the dust seems to be finally settling on the criticism about Berbatov’s mishit penalty on Sunday in the semi-final defeat against Everton. There’s no doubting it was a badly hit penalty, but it seems to have unpicked a scab over his performances for Manchester United as his time so far with the Red Devils.

After the protracted courting ritual that saw Berbatov fluttering his eyelids at Sir Alex Ferguson all Summer long to try and engineer his dream move, it seems that for some, Berbatov’s debut season is turning into one long underwhelming performance. For a player that lit up White Hart Lane for two years, it seems as if his less talented twin brother has taken his place or has it really?

Now I’m not one of those Spurs fans that still thinks it’s the mid 80’s and we’re challenging for major honours every season. I’m a realist, I know we can’t compete with the Big Four. It’s tough to take but I can understand when one of our top players wants to join Manchester United, why wouldn’t they. We’ve still not replaced Michael Carrick and when Berbatov finally went on transfer deadline day to join him last August for £30.75 million, I was disappointed but I understood his reasons for wanting to leave. He didn’t go about it in the right way and Tottenham didn’t have a replacement lined up but that’s football these days.

Once he went to Old Trafford, I thought he’d show those United fans just what us Tottenham fans had been spoilt with for his two season at the Lane, with 46 goals and countless assists in his 102 appearances. What has surprised since Sunday is the level of vitriol aimed at the Bulgarian by Manchester United fans and the fact that people seem to be judging his season by that snail paced penalty.

Now I’m not sure just what type of striker people thought Berbatov was before he joined Manchester United, but I do know one thing. He’s no Ruud Van Nistelrooy, he’ll never get you 30 goals a season, but by god he’ll set 30 up for you. For people to start clamouring that he’s one of the worst transfers ever, one of the costliest flops is ludicrous, regardless of his experience of the Premier League, he’s still getting used to being a Manchester United player.

He’s no Juan Pablo Veron scale flop, who’s performances still have me scratching my head and thinking, is that the same player I saw so imperious for Argentina, Sampdoria and Lazio or Chris Sutton hell bound spell when he moved to Chelsea and couldn’t score a goal against the Pensioners, never mind anyone in the Premier League. Even a player of Shevchenko’s reputation failed to set his time in England on fire with just 22 goals in 2 seasons at his stint at the Bridge.

Yet to write him off now is crazy, 13 goals and 15 assists so far this season isn’t too bad a return but I think he’s still suffering from a little bit of nerves. I thought he’d dovetail perfectly with Rooney and Ronaldo this season but its not quite come off yet. Once he gets his first season out of the way and gets a full preseason of training rather than courting under his belt, he’ll show the Unitedites just how good he really is but remember he’s no Eric Cantona, he’s no Van Nistelrooy, He’s Dimitar Berbatov and people need to remember that.

That’s the crux of Berbatov’s problem for me, he needs to be judged on who he is, not who people want him to be.

Only Manchester United Can Stop Liverpool Winning The Premier League

Paul Bestall — Tue, 30 Dec 2008 11:40:05 +0000

Well they’ll be dancing in the red half of Manchester this morning after the fantastic day December 29th turned out to be for the Red Devils. Firstly, I awoke to discover that Steven Gerrard had been arrested after a night out in the Liverpudlian Rivera, or Southport as it’s really known, apparently after having an altercation with a DJ who wouldn’t play the music he liked, but no word if Gerrard wanted his favourites from Phil Collins or Coldplay on the decks: Note to self, never, ever book Steven Gerrard to DJ at a party. As I write this, Gerrard has been charged with assault and affray and has been bailed to return to the Magistrates on January 23rd. Ironically, as is the way with such things, Liverpool have to entertain Everton in the Merseyside derby on the 19th, so Everton fans will no doubt be composing suitable ditties as we speak. Can Gerrard maintain his excellent Christmas form after this?

Secondly, United won 1-0 in the evening kick off against Middlesborough in a laboured performance that only seemed to settle down when Gary Neville and Paul Scholes joined the fray seconds after Tuncay had missed a glorious chance to put Boro ahead. United had plenty of chances and possession but Middlesborough stuck to their task manfully and made United work to get the three points through Berbatov’s smashing volley under pressure. The post Christmas fixture list is usually when Manchester United begin to grind down the leaders, slowly, methodically, patiently, knowing that 10 Premiership Trophies shows exactly what their rivals fear the most, they’ve been here so many times and even misfiring up front, keep garnering the points to move them upwards.

Even though they’re struggling for goals, only scoring 9 in the last 7 matches, they’ve still collected 17 points, four more than Liverpool and seven more than Chelsea over the same period as well as winning the World Club Championship and moving into the Semi-Finals of the League Cup. Now that’s ominous form and with Chelsea, Liverpool and Arsenal all yet to go to Old Trafford, Ferguson knows that the Premiership is in his own hands, win all three of those games and United will be Champions again. Forget Chelsea pushing Liverpool, they’re all over the place at the moment, simply showing what an important and under-rated player Michael Essien really is to the Blues. Normally, with the transfer window opening, you’d expect them to go out and sign 2 or 3 players, but probably not this year, apparently all they need is a striker. Peter Kenyon has said so, so it must be true.

Manchester United’s next home game is crucial to Chelsea’s faltering title challenge as the Blues continue to struggle with absences, enforced and self induced, to keep pace with Liverpool and hold off United as well as battling on three fronts and the Red Devils will be waiting for them a week on Sunday, hoping that New Year will seem so familiar to Manchester United. I can’t see anything other than the Red Devils turning the screw on the the top two and it will finally show us if Liverpool and Chelsea do have the stomach for a title fight, because United certainly do.

Man United 2-2 Aalborg: Tevez Has A Lot To Learn

The Gaffer — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 10:00:55 +0000

If Carlos Tevez wants to be a starter for Manchester United, he needs to be more clinical in front of goal. Against Danish side Aalborg on Wednesday night in the Champions League, Tevez blew several chances to put the game out of the gutsy Aalborg’s reach. Instead the match ended 2-2, securing United’s position as the winner of the group, but leaving a lot to be desired regarding Tevez’s form.

The night started well for Tevez when he scored in the third minute after a beautiful link-up play from Wayne Rooney to Ryan Giggs, who flipped the ball into Tevez’s path where the Argentine struck a beautiful goal.

For the remainder of the match, however, Tevez’s form soured as he wasted chance after chance in front of goal. Sure, no one is perfect, but I believe Berbatov would have taken better advantage of the opportunities that Tevez had and, in doing so, could have easily scored a hat trick.

Based on this performance, Dimitar Berbatov should be the starter against Spurs this weekend. In the meantime, Tevez needs to continue sharpening his skills and his time will come.