Maatsen

[Ampth7]

Seems to be a common theme with fullbacks needing to improve their defensive work and Maatsen will certainly need to do so if he is to excel next season in the prem.

However, there’s no doubt in my mind that we sign him up if we can for next season because he looks so comfortable with the ball and has been a vital cog in our team this season.

[Socrates]

Someone has clipped his performance from the other night:

https://twitter.com/AREDlTS/status/1645743571415302144

The pass for JBG at 1.38 was a thing of beauty (and the pin point cross field ball to Benson after it not bad either).

There’s four passes in that video that only one other full back in the history of Burnley football club could have made - and he scored in a World Cup semi final.

If you watch that video and watch him generally and think he isn’t good enough …… when he can do that at 21 ….. well, I don’t know what to say to you.

[ArmchairDetective]

Someone has clipped his performance from the other night:

https://twitter.com/AREDlTS/status/1645743571415302144

The pass for JBG at 1.38 was a thing of beauty (and the pin point cross field ball to Benson after it not bad either).

Seems to have the skill and attitude needed to have a big career in the game. It's a shame some can't see it yet but we've been lucky to have him.

[jedi_master]

Maatsen is absolute class. He’s got a few defensive things he can improve on (sometimes struggles with the initial bounce/flight of the ball on long balls) but he’s 21 for Gods sake.

We should be doing everything we can to sign him.

[Ampth7]

Some unbelievable passes in that clip! Certainly the one through to JBG and the cross field ball to Benny to start the move for the second goal really stand out. He’s also really comfortable using his right peg as well. Good player!

[Big Vinny K]

Really good player technically.
Good with both feet and one of the few players in our team who can hit that 50 or 60 yard switch pass
He makes mistakes for sure - more concentration than anything when he plays those short cross field passes without looking. But as said he’s only 21 and will hopefully continue to develop and cut out some of the mistakes.
Alongside Tella he’s probably our fittest and most athletic player which is key to our second half performances where we have just run many teams into the ground.

Hope we sign him and he continues to develop under VK.
I’d say a price of about £10m would be pretty fair……but Chelsea could ask for a lot more.

[CoolClaret]

Someone has clipped his performance from the other night:

https://twitter.com/AREDlTS/status/1645743571415302144

The pass for JBG at 1.38 was a thing of beauty (and the pin point cross field ball to Benson after it not bad either).

It really is staggering how people can watch football like that every week and think we’d be better off like when we had a left hand side of two one footers in McNeil & Taylor

The interplay and movement both ways is just so much more, we really are good

[claretspice]

Turns out that the second goal involved a long range 1-2 of wild proportions. Superb ball from Maatsen to Benson, wonderful burst forwards from Maatsen, great ball across from Benson.

That, combined with a couple of right footed passes over a decent distance in the first half (shown on those clips) epitomise why Maatsen is such a talent. That combination of tactical intelligence (a lot of the time his role with us is to sit in the half-back role, but he picks his moment to attack expertly as the second goal on Monday demonstrated - he's very rarely caught high of the ball), passing range of either feet and outright pace (again shown for that second goal) is an extremely rare combination.

He does have dodgy 10-15 minute spells when he loses his head and gets caught defensively, and gives the ball away cheaply, and his positioning defensively can be suspect. But if he improves over the next 6 months at the same rate he has over the last 9 months, that won't be an issue next season. I'd love to have him back.

[Papabendi]

He does have dodgy 10-15 minute spells when he loses his head and gets caught defensively, and gives the ball away cheaply, and his positioning defensively can be suspect. But if he improves over the next 6 months at the same rate he has over the last 9 months, that won't be an issue next season. I'd love to have him back.

and that's exactly why he will cost us repeatedly in the Prem.

[claretspice]

and that's exactly why he will cost us repeatedly in the Prem.

Yeah, I'm not with you there. It may well cost us occasionally, but I think you're overplaying the scale of the risk. On Monday night, he started a bit slowly and had a first 10 in which his passing composure was a bit lacking, but thereafter I thought he was pretty much flawless give or take one or two occasions late on when he was slightly caught out of position - once led to a half chance, once his pace got him out of trouble. And that's often been the way - when he has a weak 10 minutes, he tends to use his pace to recover a rush of blood to the head, and often the biggest problem is that he gives the ball away cheaply. But analyse him over 90 and - as on Monday - his passing stats will still be very good taken as a whole because when he's good, he's outstanding. The fact that his negative contributions (if you like) tend to be concentrated in that way probably draws more attention to them than they deserve. Give the ball away 10 times in 90 minutes evenly spread and it doesn't particularly become a talking point. Give it away 8 times in 10 minutes and it does, even if you only give it away twice more in the rest of the game.

Charlie Taylor used to give the ball away quite a lot in the Premier League, and we also tended to concede quite a lot of chances from him side overall - but he was (rightly) regarded as a decent enough, functional Premier League left back. Personally I don't think there's much between them as outright defenders overall now. And there's no question that Maatsen overall adds a huge amount in attack with his progressive passing, tactical intelligence and so on, and also helps the teams defensive shape because of his comfort stepping into that left half position to block counters and help us keep possession. In simple terms, if we can have 10% more of the ball next season than we did previously in the Premier League (i.e. 50%ish possession) then that goes along way towards reducing the number of chances we concede. Having a left back with the pace to see a counter-attacking opportunity and get into the attacking third probably also increases our goalscoring ability notably. Decent trade for the odd lapse, in my view.

[CoolClaret]

and that's exactly why he will cost us repeatedly in the Prem.

More than not having ball playing skills in his locker and playing an inside ball to a holding midfielder to hoof it into a channel or back to a keeper to hoof it and more than likely lose posession?

The offensive output and benefit is clearly on show - not to mention we are more likely to play teams that have a go at us, meaning that Maatsen's passing range could actually be super beneficial on the counter as we will gave more space and less bodies back negating our transition

[Taffy on the wing]

Someone has clipped his performance from the other night:

https://twitter.com/AREDlTS/status/1645743571415302144

The pass for JBG at 1.38 was a thing of beauty (and the pin point cross field ball to Benson after it not bad either).

That makes his detractors look foolish!........what a player & only 21.

Sign him up.

[brexit]

Seems to be a common theme with fullbacks needing to improve their defensive work and Maatsen will certainly need to do so if he is to excel next season in the prem.

However, there’s no doubt in my mind that we sign him up if we can for next season because he looks so comfortable with the ball and has been a vital cog in our team this season.

An interesting point. Does anyone play with full backs any more? Are they all wing backs? Even in a 4 at the back?

[northernpowerhouse]

Daft thread. If we wrote off every young full-back who made a few defensive mistakes the likes of Roberto Carlos, Marcelo, Kyle Walker, Alexander-Arnold etc. never would have made it.

[CoolClaret]

An interesting point. Does anyone play with full backs any more? Are they all wing backs? Even in a 4 at the back?

There’s a few teams that do but the trend at the top echelons of the game well, it’s almost going beyond formations.

The game now more than ever is requiring very intelligent players to be able to take up varying positions on the pitch dependent on the phase of the game.

Look at City last night for example, their back 5 can basically be anywhere on the pitch at once (within reason) and it’s these sort of principles that Kompany has put into our side….

When you think about it, it really does make sense, and this is where the evolution will continue.

[Ampth7]

There’s a few teams that do but the trend at the top echelons of the game well, it’s almost going beyond formations.

The game now more than ever is requiring very intelligent players to be able to take up varying positions on the pitch dependent on the phase of the game.

Look at City last night for example, their back 5 can basically be anywhere on the pitch at once (within reason) and it’s these sort of principles that Kompany has put into our side….

When you think about it, it really does make sense, and this is where the evolution will continue.

Very good post! It’s fascinating to see how the game is evolving and when you see fullbacks like Maatsen now able to nail 70 yard cross field passes to the opposite winger you soon realise that the old fashioned number 3 position/player is slowly but surely becoming defunct.

Having said that, the modern-day fullback/wingback still needs to be able to defend effectively. Trent AA is the perfect example of this because as great as he is going forward, he is turd going the other way.

A previous post mentioned the likes of Roberto Carlos; for me he is the model modern day fullback because he could defend, he could get up and back all game long and he was crazy good when attacking! His free kicks weren’t to shabby either - France game for example!

[CoolClaret]

Very good post! It’s fascinating to see how the game is evolving and when you see fullbacks like Maatsen now able to nail 70 yard cross field passes to the opposite winger you soon realise that the old fashioned number 3 position/player is slowly but surely becoming defunct.

Having said that, the modern-day fullback/wingback still needs to be able to defend effectively. Trent AA is the perfect example of this because as great as he is going forward, he is turd going the other way.

A previous post mentioned the likes of Roberto Carlos; for me he is the model modern day fullback because he could defend, he could get up and back all game long and he was crazy good when attacking! His free kicks weren’t to shabby either - France game for example!

The biggest thing with Trent alongside being a bit poor defensively is how he switches off and often doesn’t even put the effort into properly trackback or bust a gut making it into the box to get into a position to clear it.

I don’t see any of that with Maatsen - the opposite infact. Yeah he might not be quite as good as a Chaz in one on ones but he does enough and normally will have help off one of our defensive midfielders.

But yeah a player like Roberto Carlos or Cafu they really are top drawer. Dani Alves is another one

[KlyBfc]

The way I see it with Taylor we may have less chance of conceding however with Maatsen we have more chance of scoring / playing on the front foot. As much as I like Taylor I’d rather the latter.

[Ampth7]

The biggest thing with Trent alongside being a bit poor defensively is how he switches off and often doesn’t even put the effort into properly trackback or bust a gut making it into the box to get into a position to clear it.

I don’t see any of that with Maatsen - the opposite infact. Yeah he might not be quite as good as a Chaz in one on ones but he does enough and normally will have help off one of our defensive midfielders.

But yeah a player like Roberto Carlos or Cafu they really are top drawer. Dani Alves is another one

Exactly this! TAA is a liability defensively and if you’re playing them you are definitely telling your team to target that wing. The thing is, you don’t need to be as good as a Stuart Pearce/Nigel Winterburn defensively, but you do need to do the basics such as track back, bust a gut, put your foot in etc….

With that in mind, Maatsen is without question a really good fullback and we would be nuts to not want to keep him for at least next season!

[Papabendi]

Another poor display defensively. Won't get away with that on the Prem and we didn't against Rotherham

[CoolClaret]

Another poor display defensively. Won't get away with that on the Prem and we didn't against Rotherham

We didn’t get away with 442 bricks and mortar in our last season either with Chaz, who often lost out to Erik Pieters.

Let’s have some positivity going forward eh?

[123EasyasBFC]

Maatsen brilliant going forward this season and has improved defensively but out of our loan signings, Beyer and Tella would be above him to sign, wouldn’t over pay for Maatsen

[KRBFC]

Tonight was probably his worst performance of the season but nothing he coulda done with the second goal, just an unfortunate glance from Al Dakhil

[superdimitri]

Made an amazing pass through to Gudmundsson in the second half that should have resulted in a goal.

His main issue with defending is down to his stature. Think Kyle Walker before he bulked up.

His role is also one of the hardest in our team. Not only does he have the stamina to sprint back and forth over and over he also has to balance that with decision making between defence and attack. Not easy to do for 90 mins. He also gets no cover from Cullen on the left unlike Roberts does on the right.

I remember thinking that Trippier had some weaknesses in defence when he was with us so with experience he'll get better and better.

[Lancasterclaret]

Poor last night, been largely brilliant all season

[Burnley1989]

They bullied us a bit last night, Vitinho didn’t look to be enjoying it either, they’re a physical side and I’ve no issue with it, we need to toughen up a bit but look much stronger than earlier in the season.

[Conroysleftfoot]

Made an amazing pass through to Gudmundsson in the second half that should have resulted in a goal.

His main issue with defending is down to his stature. Think Kyle Walker before he bulked up.

His role is also one of the hardest in our team. Not only does he have the stamina to sprint back and forth over and over he also has to balance that with decision making between defence and attack. Not easy to do for 90 mins. He also gets no cover from Cullen on the left unlike Roberts does on the right.

I remember thinking that Trippier had some weaknesses in defence when he was with us so with experience he'll get better and better.

You're spot on about the fact he gets no cover. At Hull he was up against a very good winger but he got no help and he still got slated on here. When we are attacking our wingers go up against 2, sometimes 3, players.

[agreenwood]

He’s a fantastic prospect, but he’s been on a bit of a rough run of form by his standards. That’s all.

[tiger76]

Maatsen hasn't been at his best recently, but most players have these spells during the season.

He'll come good again soon just bear with his dip in form.

Roberts was copping plenty of flak prior to the World Cup, and now he's being spoken about as the best right back in the division,

[RVclaret]

I know it was a cup game but I thought Maatsen looked comfortable in the game at Old Trafford against Rashford.

An interesting comment from Kompany this week about Al-Dakhil was that he ‘has a profile perhaps more suited to the PL’.

With this, I understood it meaning his pace/style of defending is more suited to the technical, on the floor type of football rather than the more physical, up and at ‘em we get in this league (last night prime example).

I’m just wondering if Maatsen might fall into the same category, while also knowing his two full seasons at this level will have improved him significantly.

[Steve-Harpers-perm]

Does anyone have the number of clean sheets we’ve kept when Maatsen has been part of the defence this season? And also the goals created from him at left back?

[KRBFC]

That switch of play last night was top draw inch perfect, that pass through to JBG should have been a goal too.