I think this particular game was a little different to judging him in his normal LCM role. He was given a task to protect an area of the pitch. He doesn't have the physicality of Pogba or tackling strength of Vidal so he's not a player you want isolated 1v1 or in individual battles. When he's given that role he's covering an area, preventing wide players from marauding just by holding position and being a nuisance. Marcelo went past him with pure speed I think once, in the first half. Ronaldo a couple of times from a very deep position, obvious. Marchisio on Marcelo, Vidal and Caceres on Ronaldo, that was the plan. He's also played this role on the left side before, sometimes quite obviously to the detriment of his individual performance.
Clearly if he is tasked with being a breaking LCM with runs into the box, 1-2s and shots and he is going into 'ghost mode' (not playing well) then criticism is no problem, personally I think he has spells where he does this. But rarely these days is he given that opportunity, he's withdrawn and caught up in the midfield area. Maybe he just can't be bothered to break forward, maybe he has no energy in every single game, or maybe he's just not being asked to do the same things anymore.
It'll be interesting to see what we get from him in a potential 4-3-3 over a time period. My bet will be going sideways to cover whoever our left back is for that particular game. I'd like to see him in a real box-to-box turned attacking role going in-between the DM and CF area.
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