Since the Mirror story broke last night it was going to always be obvious that it would split fans between those who say ‘good riddance’ and those who say he should stay.
There is no doubt whatsoever that Stan Petrov divides support amongst the Villans and for various reasons. However to address the naysayers I will post this defence of Stan, I expect many not to believe what I write or think I am talking cobblers, your choice really.
OK lets look at the PL Stats first and remembering Stan is a defensive midfielder
TACKLES
He made 143 tackles last season with a success rate of 76%. This put in 5th in the the list of tacklers with the 2nd best % rate behind in both cases Mascherano.
FOULS
He is 46th in the the list conceding 46 fouls all season. For comparison Mascherano was 7th after conceding 67 fouls.
He won a total of 84 fouls last season putting him third just behind Kevin Davies and Steven Pienaar
PASSING
Made 1412 passes putting him 28 in the list. Milner made more passes at 1514. Of these passes 1140 were successful putting him 22nd, Milner was even lower at 1084
YELLOW CARDS
Stan was top with 11 along with Muamba
So what do these stats say. To me it shows in the tackling area he is very effective and does the job of a defensive midfielder. Somehow he does get given a lot of yellows but more for petulance I think as I can barely remember a bad tackle. Passing wise is possibly the area with an average success rate but Milner’s was worse, this suggest to me more of a problem with the team’s ability to create space. What it does not show is the constant cry we hear of easy passes backwards or sidewards or otherwise it would be an higher success rate.
Sky LINK for Stats
Telegraph LINK for Stats
So to address some of the other complaints about Stan
- he tires out after 70 minutes – this is purely a personal standpoint and yes would agree not as early as the 70th minute but later he can. However could this because Milner is very offensive and Stan has to cover a lot of the ground, makes the case for a 4-3-3 more compelling
- not a leader – well watch him on the pitch, he commands the respect of all around him, surely he would not be captain after all. He is the captain of Club and Country, you do not get those positions unless by accident
- does not create or score enough - does he need to, that is not his position
Finally this post from ‘chads’ on VT if true sums up why Petrov within the Villa ranks IS appreciated and why if true Roy Hodgson (whose stock has never been higher) may actually rate him higher than ourselves.
let me give you the point of view of a villa player…yes player, who sees, trains and plays with him day in and day out:
when some friends of mine met fabian delph in a birmingham nightclub (last season before he got injured) one of them them told him he should be playing instead of petrov because petrov is shit etc, and started talking all the bollox some people on here who also dont know what they’re talking about usually come out with…slow, doesn’t score enough etc..
Delph ordered him to get down and give him 20 press ups because it was such a ridiculous comment. delph said that petrov was ‘the best player at the club’, and we would be nowhere without him and his midfield calm and control. he went on and on apparently and i wasnt there so cant convey his whole argument but this is a young and exciting footballer trying to takemake a name for himslef in petrov’s position so surely his opinion is worth its weight in gold in this argument? case closed?
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True on most counts! He is the best reader of a pass in the prem (bet his interception stats must be huge). However in a 4-4-2 he doesn’t work, which is therefore MON’s fault!
If MON can accept that 4-4-1-1 or 4-3-3 is the way to go, then keep him! If he sticks with 4-4-2 then I would move him on
Stevo in an ideal world I think this would good
Petrov Jenas
Albrighton Young Downing
Gabby/Carew
we have seen signs in pre-season of this but difficult to judge
I don’t think many Villa fans (except the never happy always moaning MON out crew) would deny Petrov has been excellent for us the last few seasons, in particular when Barry left he filled the role with ease! First let me say I think this rumour is ridiculas and will never happen as MON loves Petrov, he is our captain and I can’t see Liverpool ever coming in for him. But the only talking point I can see is would we let him go for 7mill as is touted!! At 31 surely 7 mill is pretty good and like we all know his days are numbered! Personally I think as the article implies we need him to help bring through Delph…who I have the highest hopes for out of all our youngsters!! UTV
To anyone with any knowledge of football this article is far too simplistic. As Stevo implies it’s far more complicated than, is Stan a good player or a bad player?
Here’s a stat that universally acknowledged within the game. On average players spend 2% of a match actually in contact with the football.
In centre midfield in a 4-4-2, it’s what they do for that other 98% of the time that has the most impact. And Stan is just so easy to play against. He allows opposing centre midfielders to run off him all game, that’s why we look so stretched and our centre backs often seem outnumbered. Watch replays of goals/chances we concede in open play and ask yourself where is Stan? For me there is only Milner and Reo-Coker with the energy to play centre midfield in a 4-4-2.
However, in 4-5-1, with more cover around him and more freedom I would definitely play Stan.
Dudley, yes it is simplistic in many ways but so are the arguments against him
Can’t tackle – rubbish
can’t pass – rubbish
can’t shoot – no needed to
yes there is an issue of formations with Stan and I addressed this
“However could this because Milner is very offensive and Stan has to cover a lot of the ground, makes the case for a 4-3-3 more compelling”
with Milner for me still going then this opens up a lot of alternatives, whether MON takes them is a different matter but is not about Stan the player.
Never a fan of Jenas, but NRC is a cracking choice alongside Stan as the pair of holding midfield players (just as long as we have the creativity in front of them)
Petrov has become a solid player in Villa’s midfield after a slow 1st season @ the club. However i do become frustrated when MON never substitutes him on the dying stages of any game!
The problem is Petrov plays in a position that is probably the least recognised for performances in football.
He runs the engine room of the Villa team, rarely on the scoresheet, and doing more of the nitty-gritty work – making the tackles, helping out the defence and beginning a move rather than ending it.
He isn’t the kind of player who is going to be the outstanding man on the pitch because he won’t be doing the fancy tricks or scoring blinding goals. But he should receive credit for us having one of the best defences in the league last season. If your defensive midfielder doesn’t do his job well, the defence is left exposed. It rarely happened with us last season, and Stan should take a lot of the plaudits for that.
I’m not sure he would be my first choice as captain. I’m not saying he did anything wrong last season, but when you have someone like Richard Dunne there as well, I don’t think Petrov is the obvious candidate.
I would be reluctant for us to sell Stan. He will do a good job next season, but the captain’s armband should go to Dunne.
“Petrov has become a solid player in Villa’s midfield after a slow 1st season @ the club. However i do become frustrated when MON never substitutes him on the dying stages of any game!”
That has much more to do with the lack of calmness and maturity on the bench. O’Neill’s bought a lot of hungry players that want to play quickly with only Petrov really the one centrally that can slow it down and open the game up.
With the super-fast super-fit athletes of the modern Premier League, the days of a player being able to slow the game down have long since gone.
Players of far greater quality than Petrov don’t manage to slow the game down unless you mean passing it back 40 yards to the keeper.
Players with quick vision like Scholes, Gareth Barry and Fabregas are capable of openning up a defence in an instant, but it’s done by quick thinking and keeping the ball moving under pressure, not by slowing it down. In the same way, ice cool strikers like Torres and Rooney can buy themselves a split second to finish in the box.
I’m sorry if it shatters a myth but yhat’s the reality and that’s the difference between top quality and average; the ability to think quickly and perform a skill sharply and accurately within a high tempo sport – nothing to do with trying to slow the game down.
I love Petrov as a captain.
He does the job well, never messes up and says all the right things to the press. I also believe he has the respect of the rest of the team.
I also rate him highly as a player, for all the reasons stated, but would say those passing stats are very misleading.
Milner tries to make the forward pass much more often than Stan does.
Indeed, Stan is often the cause of a totally unneeded passback to Friedal that has me cursing inside.
Now I don’t believe this story to be true for one minute, but I’d take £7M for him at the blink of an eye.
You’d have too, as it’s big money for a 31 YO.
Petrov
Hard working – Yes
Pass – Yes
Hold to ball – Yes
Score – Not his job
On the minus
He is slow in his moves and in moving the ball, this leads to our more attacking players being covered by the time a pass is chosen.
Therfore the ball nearly always goes backwards from his passes with defenders on thier backfoot – leading to long balls.
Calros looks in pain recieving the ball in the right back position.
May be in a reformed system further forward. For a 442 formation coker looks a better option bolton at home last season? 7 November 2009 5-1
WittonRd, NRC was captain for that match and he was superb, the team’s best attacking performance of the season. we could have won by 10.
In the next match Petrov returned from suspension and NRC was dropped again, we were awful and were lucky to scrape that last minute draw at burnley.
Dudley Villain, you are spot on.
Stan is useful against better sides where we need to retain possession. His calmness and ability to get his head up works well. Even then he struggles with 4-4-2 after 45-60 minutes though against these sides where his lack of energy begins to show, albeit they will often have an extra man in CM. This is where MON needs to sub him or supplement him and go to a 3 man CM.
Against lesser sides it has to be NRC. He doesn’t get overrun with their more energetic/in your face approach and he gives the team the necessary drive to get forward quickly before the opposition have parked the bus. The Bolton game was a perfect example of this (and NRC had to play with Sidwell and not Milner in that game). Compare this game to home games against Wigan, Wolves, Wet Spam etc..
Dudley and Tony
Yes I think your comments spot on.
The best teams seem to have mf players who can do it all – Parker – Keane – Gerrard even barry …….
Coker to me is not the quickest but seems to pick a high quality pass quickly and most importantly is by far the best tackler at the club IMHO – even though Dunne would come close.
If you hear the shout “Forward” in the Witton road upper when Mr Petrov has the ball its me and my mate.
Dudley – I am from Wombourne !!!
There was a really balanced look about the whole team that day. We were attacking at a high tempo and from all directions.
As already stated, Reo Coker had a big influence that day but the back four is also worth mentioning.
Most of us appreciate that our defenders are not only there to stop the opposition. When we attack both full backs should be able to link up with and provide a foil for our wide players, especially at home.
The defence when we thrashed and outplayed Bolton was Young Cuellar Dunne Warnock
Dudley
That Bolton game was impressive but MON decided to revert back to the “settled” team after that. Shame as NRC, not without his faults, was not considered after this point.
Yes when Carlos has played at CB he has looked great. There are soo many villa fans who want to know what has luke young has done wrong…great at left and right back can play at cb in an emergency…
May be the liverpool incident was a big come and get me to the london teams?
Russ