….I think there’s just too many excuses made for his underperforming, Zat.
Blame his teammates, blame the system, blame the manager, blame his age, blame his home sickness.
There is one very basic, fundamental issue I have with him; he’s a footballer on a football pitch who is given possession of the football and invariably fails to do anything with it. That is nothing to do with tactics, age, teammates etc. I was realistic but I wanted a ‘that’ll do me’ moment but there’s still not an instance that sits in my memory that made me think we have a player here.
He was ok in one game (Newcastle?), but that was in comparison to what we’ve seen before. Even if he didn’t want to be here, I’d expect one wow moment from a young Italian international who we expected much of.
It takes a great leap of faith to think he could come back here and be an effective member of the team.