Totally agree with that. I hope they prove me wrong next year but from what i've seen of them both this year they're both good players in their own right but they don't complement eachother. Not only on the ball but off it, as neither of them seems to be disciplined to just sit. They both go haring round the pitch chasing people, which would be fine if we were a pressing team playing high up the pitch, but we aren't so they just leave massive gaps to be exploited. The two of them as a pair just don't really work in my eyes, which again leads me to believe that our recruitment criteria is 'good and available' rather than 'fits into what we're trying to do'.
Agree though tbf I think if you bring in a midfielder who can hold onto the ball, but also has that ability to create and stuff, then it gives Allan/Docuoure more freedom to play to their strengths.
That also comes back to Ancelotti a bit, tbf.
I'd say the player that is most suited currently (forgetting Gbamin altogether now) to playing as a 6 is Davies. We saw that while Allan was out. Yet in the few games Allan was back, alongside Davies, it was Allan sitting and Davies being pushed into a role that didn't suit him but would probably have suited Allan better.
It's just a proper mess at the moment and the injuries aren't helping us. What I will say is that signing the quality of player that we did last summer will help because, generally, good players can play in multiple ways pretty well - but we need them to stay fit. Allan, it might be an age thing, but we've been so reliant on him to come back when fit, it's no surprise to see him keep getting little niggles (again, no pre-season will play into this, but that's the same for every team). Doucoure, he's brilliant engine wise, but we've run him into the ground because we literally have nobody else at all who can even offer something similar (and that to me shows up the poor recruitment in the past). And we just end up in a situation with these injuries (and the medical department HAVE to be questioned here, because it's their job to prevent these injuries as much as possible; we can't have 24 players out at different points in this season and just shrug it off as bad luck).
Bit of a ramble, but to me the issues are across the board and while there's been progress in terms of our league position (as it stands, though we need wins very, very quickly or we could well end up 10th/11th), Brands, Ancelotti, the lot of them, all aren't really doing as well as they should, but I do take into account all of the caveats.