Player Watch Player Watch: Yves Bissouma

[Misfit]

Been what we've been missing since Moose in counteracting the other teams midfield. General. Can turn momentum on his own. Great having Sarr playing alongside him, soaking it all up.

 

[SargeantMeatCurtains]

Facts won't help with this one - the myth that Conte hated Bissouma and didn't play him has taken root...

Thankfully the new reality is Biss is the beating heart of our progressive play. And what a joy to watch he is.

Context is important.

Bissouma made 5 starts for Spurs out of a possible 22 between August 6th and February 5th (when he had surgery).

There was virtually no rotation. He didn’t start a single Champions League game either.

He was subbed on in 12 premier league games and 8 of those appearances were after the 75th minute.

Conte may not have ‘hated’ Bissouma but he certainly didn’t trust him and preferred Hojbjerg, who is inferior to Bissouma is nearly every recordable metric. That alone is enough slate Conte.

 

[SargeantMeatCurtains]

Appeared in every pl game but one prior to his broken ankle.

Coincidentally cut off the amount of minutes and substitution appearances he made then or what?

 

[Thenewcat]

Out of interest how many Arsenal players are you putting in a combined XI?

I’ve been thinking about this since the Bent one and football365 going 10-1 arsenal. I think it’s very hard because our team is so new. I can see the argument arsenal fans would make on every position, and the media will go with PL experience every time. You can argue almost every position. GK and Defence is close across the board. Midfield is 4 top quality options for 3 positions (Rice, Biss, Maddison and Odegaard) with Bentancur still to come back. You’d pick Saka and Son up top but who’s the 3rd one? I feel most sure about picking our full backs but you can’t expect everyone else to have noticed how good Udogie is yet

 

[Rosco1984]

Out of interest how many Arsenal players are you putting in a combined XI?

Raya
Porro Saliba VDV Udogie
Bissouma
Rice Maddison
Saka Son Martinelli

I think this is realistic at the moment but I think Vicario will be seen as one of the top keepers in the world very soon.

 

[Thenewcat]

Context is important.

Bissouma made 5 starts for Spurs out of a possible 22 between August 6th and February 5th (when he had surgery).

There was virtually no rotation. He didn’t start a single Champions League game either.

He was subbed on in 12 premier league games and 8 of those appearances were after the 75th minute.

Conte may not have ‘hated’ Bissouma but he certainly didn’t trust him and preferred Hojbjerg, who is inferior to Bissouma is nearly every recordable metric. That alone is enough slate Conte.

Also just looking at whether he played Bissouma and for what minutes is only half the story. He didn’t trust him to play his natural game and put him in a tactical straight jacket thereby completely wasting his talent

 

[dvdhopeful]

Raya
Porro Saliba VDV Udogie
Bissouma
Rice Maddison
Saka Son Martinelli

I think this is realistic at the moment but I think Vicario will be seen as one of the top keepers in the world very soon.

Trying to think back to mine, I think that was exactly what I went with.

 

[Bluto Blutarsky]

Out of interest how many Arsenal players are you putting in a combined XI?

Assuming everyone is relatively healthy, and we are playing Postecoglou-ball:

Saka > Kulusevski
Son > Jesus
Martinelli/Trossard > Solomon

Maddison > Odegaard (This is close, and would not think anyone was crazy for going the other way)
Rice > Sarr
Bissouma > Partey

(I would take Bissouma over Rice, and Sarr over Havertz if Partey is not a starter)

Porro > White
Romero > Saliba
Saliba > Van de Ven (I would play Saliba out of position here, since he is the 2nd best CB, but would take VDV over Gabriel)
Udogie > Zinchenko (Zinchenko has a nice cross, but Udogie is better at every other aspect of the position)

Vicario > Raya

Really there is not much between Raya and Vicario, but both are a level or two above Ramsdale.


So, personally, I would have 4 in my team, but would not be offended if others included Odegaard or Raya.

 

[bubble07]

Might have felt like an overkill but would have like ange to have included him in the captains group as one of the 3 VCs

 

[Bluto Blutarsky]

Might have felt like an overkill but would have like ange to have included him in the captains group as one of the 3 VCs

Watching him play - and he is clearly a leader on the pitch, and I suspect off the pitch as well.

 

[Col_M]

Assuming everyone is relatively healthy, and we are playing Postecoglou-ball:

Saka > Kulusevski
Son > Jesus
Martinelli/Trossard > Solomon

Maddison > Odegaard (This is close, and would not think anyone was crazy for going the other way)
Rice > Sarr
Bissouma > Partey

(I would take Bissouma over Rice, and Sarr over Havertz if Partey is not a starter)

Porro > White
Romero > Saliba
Saliba > Van de Ven (I would play Saliba out of position here, since he is the 2nd best CB, but would take VDV over Gabriel)
Udogie > Zinchenko (Zinchenko has a nice cross, but Udogie is better at every other aspect of the position)

Vicario > Raya

Really there is not much between Raya and Vicario, but both are a level or two above Ramsdale.


So, personally, I would have 4 in my team, but would not be offended if others included Odegaard or Raya.

If everyone is fit, are you saying Bentencour doesn’t make it into the 11?

 

[DarwinSpur]

Context is important.

Bissouma made 5 starts for Spurs out of a possible 22 between August 6th and February 5th (when he had surgery).

There was virtually no rotation. He didn’t start a single Champions League game either.

He was subbed on in 12 premier league games and 8 of those appearances were after the 75th minute.

Conte may not have ‘hated’ Bissouma but he certainly didn’t trust him and preferred Hojbjerg, who is inferior to Bissouma is nearly every recordable metric. That alone is enough slate Conte.

Look I have no love for Conte's man management but the fact is Biss had a slow start getting up to speed with the formation/tactics and never looked himself under Conte (ie he wasn't great even when he got on the pitch) and then got a bad injury. It wasn't like Conte just froze him out completely. It was just a shit year for all involved.

Ange has had the fortune of having a fully fit Bissouma to build his team around and now, thank fuck, we are seeing the absolute beast midfielder we bought from Brighton.

 

[chas vs dave]

I listen to this guy a bit, he's very good. Doesn't get into banter nonsense.

 

[Bluto Blutarsky]

If everyone is fit, are you saying Bentencour doesn’t make it into the 11?

You must have missed my post in the Bentancur thread - which is odd, because everyone else saw it (and made their feelings clear!) - but I don't think Bentancur walks back into Spurs XI.

So, with that in mind - I can't see how he would fit into my combined XI.

If he comes back, and shows that he can play the full role of the 8, in Ange's set-up - I would be happy to revisit this. I think he is a great player for Spurs to have - and only player to give us adequate cover at all 3 CM spots. But, I am not convinced that a post-ACL player is going to be a great fit as the 8 in this set-up.

 

[Col_M]

You must have missed my post in the Bentancur thread - which is odd, because everyone else saw it (and made their feelings clear!) - but I don't think Bentancur walks back into Spurs XI.

So, with that in mind - I can't see how he would fit into my combined XI.

If he comes back, and shows that he can play the full role of the 8, in Ange's set-up - I would be happy to revisit this. I think he is a great player for Spurs to have - and only player to give us adequate cover at all 3 CM spots. But, I am not convinced that a post-ACL player is going to be a great fit as the 8 in this set-up.

So I’m supposed to read all threads before responding to a comment that’s off topic. Gotcha.

so when you say If everyone. Is fit you mean everyone except for Bentencour unless he plays a minimum of x games that qualifies him for consideration. I’ll check the Gil thread to see if you mentioned that caveat.

;-)

 

[ItsBoris]

You must have missed my post in the Bentancur thread - which is odd, because everyone else saw it (and made their feelings clear!) - but I don't think Bentancur walks back into Spurs XI.

So, with that in mind - I can't see how he would fit into my combined XI.

If he comes back, and shows that he can play the full role of the 8, in Ange's set-up - I would be happy to revisit this. I think he is a great player for Spurs to have - and only player to give us adequate cover at all 3 CM spots. But, I am not convinced that a post-ACL player is going to be a great fit as the 8 in this set-up.

My argument would be that Bentancur at his best was better than Rice is, so if you've included Rice, then Bentancur gets in. Maybe people don't remember, but we had a 55% win rate last season until Bentancur's injury and it dropped to 33% after he was gone. He was our most important player imo. (Not to mention after we signed him in January the prior season our form improved so much that we went on a run that got us into the top 4 after a disastrous start under nuno).

 

[ItsBoris]

I know Rice is good, but how come he is being heralded as one of the best in the league now that he's playing for Arsenal and carries a 100m price tag. Its like the hype has doubled and yet he hasn't been any better than he was at Wham.

To be fair, his absence was pretty obvious in the 2nd half. They weren't the same team without him

 

[Misfit]

My argument would be that Bentancur at his best was better than Rice is, so if you've included Rice, then Bentancur gets in. Maybe people don't remember, but we had a 55% win rate last season until Bentancur's injury and it dropped to 33% after he was gone. He was our most important player imo. (Not to mention after we signed him in January the prior season our form improved so much that we went on a run that got us into the top 4 after a disastrous start under nuno).

It'll be interesting to see what he can do in a team that actually wants to play football too. He'll be devastating once he's back 100% IMO.

 

[ItsBoris]

It's interesting, if you look at the team at the end of the 2022 season, that won vs Norwich to secure top 4, I'd say we've upgraded on 7 of the players that started that game. Obviously losing Kane is a major downgrade, but for the rest of the team we've actually made pretty insane progress in a little over a year.

 

[Col_M]

There’s been a glitch in the matrix.
Not sure how Rice got the #4 berth.