Can we at least have an educated talk on what he is doing so that we dont just say this player is good! PLay him! We sound like paarents who never played at their childs game. Only thing missing is everyone constantly yelling shoot.
We have an extremely deep team this season more than any other season in our recent past. We are well balance and have a great squad but a few things could hurt us if we want to get to the top. These things have nothing to do with Cuadrado or Mandzukic not being fast or great offensively or whatever everyone on this forum seems to think.
What made us a top team last year was how good we were at defending. Not just our backline but as a team. We let very few chances even get to us and everyone pulled their weight. There was no weakness to exploit most of the time. This season it looks like our right side could struggle as we lost 2 world class players. Arguably the best in their position. So the main priority for max is to protect the defense and get a solid unit and then to build on that.
One of the oldest truths in soccer, but much more recently as the tiki taki made its force known and possesion was not something you could win off Barca but also Bayrn with pep or a few other teams, is possesion vs position.
We dont need to win both of these but we better win one of them. We have gotten very good at controling the position on the field in which we allow other teams to play. Even in the first half against Madrid we controlled it fairly well but then in the second Madrid coplately controlled posesion and where they were going to have it. Having said that this is Maxs biggest priority. Can we control the game both offensively and defensively and if not which will we rely on?
Eventually we will integrate our wingers more and probably start them but for now our priority is our back line and finding a cm to partner Pjanic. We can say that Max doesnt start new players or play them which is true but there is one player that is getting time just a day after he arrived and that is Matuidi. He is something we desperately need. We have to break up attacks and have the ability to press midfields at times.