Antolin Alcaraz

[Darth Toffeeman]

I thought he might prove to be a shrewd signing but he has been a bit rubbish.
his reading of danger is terrible, either playing dangerous, lazy passes or scoring mad diving headers in his own net when under no pressure whatsoever. That last weekend was enough for me.

No coincidence that most of our defeats have come with him in the line up. I was hoping to see Browning play a part seeing as he is highly rated. Hopefully we will only see him in the early league games of the Europa next season. He may be useful in this but not against decent opposition.

 

[Zatara]

I said after his debut against Southampton at goodison he looked awful, everyone was jizzing themselves coz he could pass a ball

the man is an absolute joke of a footballer

So did I.

 

[Zatara]

Can't stand these ''I told you so'' posts.

Buzzing their tits off like their glad about their negative prediction..

Mate when youve been vaulted as much as I have this is one of lifes little pleasures.

Please dont take it away.

 

[Zatara]

He smells of Gary Breen to me, kind of player who never quite snuffs out danger, but gets mighty close...

Odd creature that breen

 

[ilikecheese]

Mate when youve been vaulted as much as I have this is one of lifes little pleasures.

Please dont take it away.

Hahahaha...nice one. At least you 'get it' on the vaulting front.

 

[ilikecheese]

Regarding Alcaraz...I still think he can help us. Squad depth is going to be so critical next year if we want to even consider 5th or higher in the league next year.

 

[deipnosophist]

He's ok ... but not top quality

 

[ilikecheese]

He's ok ... but not top quality

He's good on the ball for sure. Not sure about the rest of his game, but to be fair he's been injured for large portions of the season. Willing to see what he can do in the League Cup/FA Cup/Dodgy Eastern European game...if he's fully fit.

 

[Zatara]

He was actually a pointless signing with a long injury record.

We have Jagielka/Distin and Stones.

At the beginning of the season we had Duffy and Heitinga - thats 5 centre backs + now browning as well so 6 centre backs plus alcaraz. So seven players less the now departed heitinga = 6 players for 2 spots.

What we really need is Distin and Jagielka as the senior players + Stones as the emerging superstar. Backup would be Duffy or Browning (duffy was excellent in his games for us before) thats 5 players of which 2 arent on big contracts and 3 can only improve (note stones will have a new deal soon).

I think 5 players where 4 have already performed very well is adequate for two positions.

 

[tiny_jacky]

As he is poor defensively but can do some good passes, is it better for him to play as a defensive midfielder(like David Luiz)?

 

[Southall1EFC]

As he is poor defensively but can do some good passes, is it better for him to play as a defensive midfielder(like David Luiz)?

no mate, he's as slow as molasses. we'd be overrun in midfield.

 

[ilikecheese]

He was actually a pointless signing with a long injury record.

We have Jagielka/Distin and Stones.

At the beginning of the season we had Duffy and Heitinga - thats 5 centre backs + now browning as well so 6 centre backs plus alcaraz. So seven players less the now departed heitinga = 6 players for 2 spots.

What we really need is Distin and Jagielka as the senior players + Stones as the emerging superstar. Backup would be Duffy or Browning (duffy was excellent in his games for us before) thats 5 players of which 2 arent on big contracts and 3 can only improve (note stones will have a new deal soon).

I think 5 players where 4 have already performed very well is adequate for two positions.

A bit harsh that. Bringing in a player for nothing who fully understands your system when you've just been hired seems to make a lot of sense to me.

Is he good enough? Maybe not, maybe so. Having his experience around on the training ground I'm sure paid high dividends.

 

[tadpole]

Started 5 premiership games this season.
Clean sheets : 0
Own goals : 1
Won : 1
Drawn : 1
Lost : 3

Doesn't inspire me with confidence, though maybe he'll improve if he gets a run in the side.

 

[toffee matt]

Our defending for all 3 goals was atrocious yesterday

 

[Eggs]

Our defending for all 3 goals was atrocious yesterday

....agree, don't think it helped that we didn't have Barry's presence in front of the back four and that Jagielka was clearly off the pace.