Was bored waiting the fiancee to get ready this morning so spent some time watching his clips - I'd describe him as a cross between JP + Cucho - he has the flair, playmaking ability and dribbling ability of JP combined with the Cuchos pace, finishing ability and willingness to pull the trigger along with the dogged South American determination and aggression. The end result is a versatile, pacey (not Sarr level but probably more Cucho level) player who can either play up front or on the wing - on the ball he's unpredictable and is equally comfortably dribbling across the pitch to slow things down or beating a defender 1 vs 1 and then using his pace to blast past him, puts in a good shift defensively as well. Does often fall down quite dramatically over nothing though which I'm not sure refs in the Championship would buy as easily as the refs in Brazil do. Here's a brief compilation of some of his (he's #37 if it doesn't have the spotlight on him) best clips that I liked from his games over the last month (yes this is just a months worth - he's exciting):
Would be hilarious that we sold an overseas player in Cucho with rule-of-11 and the lack of guaranteed game time cited as key factors - to then spend the money on a player with more or less the exact same profile.
Rule of 11: A HG Football League Rule Synonym [for Watford FC] : A way of disguising a fire sale of valuable assets E.g. “the club is going to proactively sell Sarr, Cucho and Dennis and replace them with £5m Bayat duds, due to the rule of 11”
Would say Martins has a much higher ceiling. We’ve got a good record with these signings so all for it. Can’t imagine there’s nothing in it if he followed us on Instragram last night.
He meant to follow Wolves. Bloody technology. Will be the last time he lets Giaretta borrow his phone.
Rubbish. You’ll always be the guy who had to change his user message to acknowledge “TUT knows more about football than me” Ps wasn’t the arrangement for a full season ??!! I just couldn’t be bothered to scroll up and check !
That’s more like it. If I done it correctly then it should say it. If it doesn’t, then I have no clue where it is on the profile setting.
Looks great ! You’re a good sport. I’d have honoured it too of course but would have had the satisfaction of knowing we’d survived comfortably.
Watched a YouTube highlights compilation and whisper it quietly but... he takes set pieces. Although obviously he'd have to force his way past Gosling in the pecking order after his stellar efforts the other night!
Has he got much more insight in his article? Would Martins only come as a JP/Sarr replacement, for example?
Really? Leventhal just parroting what’s found across the internet and posted here? Doesn’t sound likely.
No, I disagree. He was delicious for the Golden Boys until he was no longer considered a core member of our squad and got the pip.
To be fair to AL, I don’t think that’s what’s happening on this occasion. He was asked yesterday on his Twitter space about Martins and said he didn’t know anything about it but just that we have links with Fluminese given that we’ve signed JP and Richarlison previously from there. Today he’s confirmed we’re in talks so clearly he’s had a source confirm that for him.
We are 100% in for him, just sadly don't think it's a coincidence that we made our move once we'd heard that Newcastle were going to come in for JP.
I do not think that this is necessarily the case. There were reports about our interest in Matheus Martins sometime before the JP bid (which has come out of the blue). Fluminense have financial problems, but they have made it clear that they will not release Martins before the end of their season in December because they are having a good season and do not want to jeopardize their chances of success.
The bid has come out of the blue but I think we've known of the interest for a while, always maintained we wouldn't sell so lets see if money talks. Pretty sure the bid would've been leaked Newcastle end to try and unsettle Pedro.
30million quid we should think about , 35 million give him a train ticket up north! what worries me more is 1) will it be reinvested in the team? 2) Our recent poor record on players in . the dud to star ratio is way off where it should be.
But the signings of Davis and Hamza have given me hope that they're going in the right direction with new incoming players.
I do like our incomings this season, Davis and Choudhury are going to be great as long as they don't get injured (and even Bayo and Manaj I don't think will be bad)
Fingers crossed on any injuries but it's inevitable we pick up knocks along the way. It's really only Bayo that has made me scratch my head so far. But as you said could be more than useful in this league. But do we play to his strengths? I'm not so sure yet.
