Max Aarons

[TheGunnShow 6,095]

16 hours ago, Mason 47 said:

Stacey has better weapons but Max is the better player. JS is better in the air, too, but incredibly prone to ball watching and switching off to a player lurking in behind.

That's a pretty good summary, I'd say Stacey might have the edge on crossing as well.

[king canary 7,705]

17 minutes ago, TheGunnShow said:

That's a pretty good summary, I'd say Stacey might have the edge on crossing as well.

Max was never really asked to be a crosser- under Farke he was excellent and those short give and goes in the area and his linkup play in tight spaces was fantastic.

By his biggest weaknesses was in the air.

[TheGunnShow 6,095]

8 minutes ago, king canary said:

Max was never really asked to be a crosser- under Farke he was excellent and those short give and goes in the area and his linkup play in tight spaces was fantastic.

By his biggest weaknesses was in the air.

Partially agree, there was no point him floating one in if Pukki's your man in the middle, so agree that there was less demand for crossing, and also agree that his link-up play is ahead of Stacey by some way. However, that said he didn't really come up with many low skidding balls between a retreating defence and the goalie, where you'd think Pukki would be sniffing around with real interest.

Usually, if Aarons did something it was a good cut-back rather than a cross.

Edited February 6 by TheGunnShow

[Mello Yello 2,315]

Bournemouth...An ideal Prem club for Jo Jo Rowe to go to...

[Google Bot 3,390]

6 minutes ago, king canary said:

You said he's objectively bringing more to the table then listed a bunch of meaningless stats.

The stats available back up what my eye saw, I can't really help that.  Your retort is that the stats are all meaningless and nobody uses them to assess defenders, which is just more generalisation.

I'm not sure what the underlying issue is here, I gave an opinion and when countered, backed them up as objectively as possible - it seems all you want to do is be as obtuse as possible to counter it, without providing any kind of pro-active demonstration of why Stacey isn't an improvement on last years Aarons.

That's because there is none, Max was entirely in self-preservation mode and wanting a move away for several seasons, and that's the reality of this situation.

[king canary 7,705]

1 hour ago, Google Bot said:

The stats available back up what my eye saw, I can't really help that.  Your retort is that the stats are all meaningless and nobody uses them to assess defenders, which is just more generalisation.

I'm not sure what the underlying issue is here, I gave an opinion and when countered, backed them up as objectively as possible - it seems all you want to do is be as obtuse as possible to counter it, without providing any kind of pro-active demonstration of why Stacey isn't an improvement on last years Aarons.

That's because there is none, Max was entirely in self-preservation mode and wanting a move away for several seasons, and that's the reality of this situation.

To break it down a bit...

The stats you presented are counting stats. They don't actually prove anybody is good at anything. To give a couple of examples- tackles and blocks. Having more of them doesn't mean you're doing better than another player. The defender in the Premier League with the most tackles per game right now is the Everton left Mykolenko. Blocks are Craig Dawson. I don't think anyone is claiming those elite defenders and that showing high numbers here doesn't mean they are playing better than the top defenders in the league. So you can say these stats are 'objectively' backing up your opinion but in my view they are largely meaningless. These sorts of stats are very often driven by the style of football and level of the team rather than the individual. 

You're stats also left out any attacking stats which are important in a modern fullback. On that Aarons at his worst last season still matches Stacey for key passes (and beats him most other seasons), played more passes per game and completed a higher % of those passes. Last season he had double the amount of successful dribbles a game compared to Stacey. So 'objectively' he was contributing more from an attacking standpoint and achieved all of this in a team that was scoring and attacking less than this season.

Finally, to move from the objective to the subjective, we can't measure things like positioning via stats. In games I've seen Stacey is far too often out of position and doesn't have the raw athletic ability that Aarons possesses to get back and cover for his errors. I don't think this is purely down to Stacey- I think this is partly the system Wagner employs. 

I personally didn't see this 'self preservation mode' from Max last season. I saw a player who was being poorly used by a succession of managers who didn't know how to set up the team. 

[Nexus_Canary 1,045]

19 hours ago, Mason 47 said:

Stacey has better weapons but Max is the better player. 

So Maxi lacks because he doesn't have a glock hidden in his sock and a Pump action shot gun across his back?
WTF are you watching / dropping?

[Google Bot 3,390]

38 minutes ago, king canary said:

I personally didn't see this 'self preservation mode' from Max last season. I saw a player who was being poorly used by a succession of managers who didn't know how to set up the team. 

Oh I don't disagree with the cause, but I felt it was there for sure - and I don't blame him for going into self-preservation mode, the club was going to **** and he's got a career to worry about considering the names that were in for him in the past.

The last thing he wants is to be caught halfway up the pitch and the highlights shows him out of position and fingering the blame cause the rest of the team is disjointed.    We know Max was a perfectionist, and the environment was killing him - and that was winding me up to see each week.

I find Stacey is the opposite of that, like Kenny, both are more akin to worker types who bring 100% each game, and seek to drive the team in a physical sense no matter.  I just prefer that kind of player in this setup.  It's not ideal, but it's an improvement on the frustrated figure we had at right back last season, for me, anyway.

I'd go further and say that without Stacey bringing that physical drive on the opening day of the season, Rowe wouldn't have got off to such a flying start either.  They were superb down the right, and I have no doubt that we'll see it return soon.

Edited February 6 by Google Bot

[king canary 7,705]

2 hours ago, TheGunnShow said:

Partially agree, there was no point him floating one in if Pukki's your man in the middle, so agree that there was less demand for crossing, and also agree that his link-up play is ahead of Stacey by some way. However, that said he didn't really come up with many low skidding balls between a retreating defence and the goalie, where you'd think Pukki would be sniffing around with real interest.

Usually, if Aarons did something it was a good cut-back rather than a cross.

Again though I'd suggest it is more the system, especially under Farke. Those sort of crosses need space in behind to work and teams were generally defending deep. 

[repman 642]

2 charts here comparing Max last year and Stacey this season. As has been said already on this thread, defending stats like clearances, blocks and tackles are counting stats and therefore maybe not the best way of judging the quality of defending, only the quantity. 

The chart for Max goes to show how much of the load he had to carry in terms of progressing the ball, this was something he took on after we lost Buendia. Compare that to Stacey who isn't tasked with that, our buildup is very left side heavy now. 

The other interesting thing on there is how Max grades out slightly higher for shot creating actions but much lower on xG assisted. Certainly back at the start of the season Stacey was putting more crosses in from quick transitions, that's the one obvious difference in our chance creation I can think of compared to last season.

[Google Bot 3,390]

1 hour ago, repman said:

2 charts here comparing Max last year and Stacey this season. As has been said already on this thread, defending stats like clearances, blocks and tackles are counting stats and therefore maybe not the best way of judging the quality of defending, only the quantity. 

Great charts, I then had a look through both players as a comparison and it's really interesting comparing Max under Smith/Wagner to Max under Farke.  And also Stacey was hitting some great numbers for Bournemouth in 20/21 but was frequently played in a more advanced role.

I think Stacey gets a lot of detractors because being a replacement to Max is also very symbolic of our change from being a top class possession based team at Championship level, bringing through youngsters, to this more aggressive/physical setup that's relied on certain free agents.

I can't shift the frustration I had with Max last season though, he was done with this club and it was very apparent.

[Robert N. LiM 4,664]

3 hours ago, Google Bot said:

I think Stacey gets a lot of detractors because being a replacement to Max is also very symbolic of our change from being a top class possession based team at Championship level, bringing through youngsters, to this more aggressive/physical setup that's relied on certain free agents.

I'm still not really over us replacing Ian Culverhouse with Carl Bradshaw

[king canary 7,705]

17 hours ago, Google Bot said:

Great charts, I then had a look through both players as a comparison and it's really interesting comparing Max under Smith/Wagner to Max under Farke.  And also Stacey was hitting some great numbers for Bournemouth in 20/21 but was frequently played in a more advanced role.

I think Stacey gets a lot of detractors because being a replacement to Max is also very symbolic of our change from being a top class possession based team at Championship level, bringing through youngsters, to this more aggressive/physical setup that's relied on certain free agents.

I can't shift the frustration I had with Max last season though, he was done with this club and it was very apparent.

Does Stacey have that many detractors though? I think the general opinion of him is he's fine. Saying he's a downgrade on Aarons isn't a criticism as I think Aarons is excellent. Stacey is an upper midtable fullback at an upper midtable club.

[Google Bot 3,390]

2 minutes ago, king canary said:

Does Stacey have that many detractors though? I think the general opinion of him is he's fine.

Well this is the confusing aspect, when I watch him live I think he can be a bit of a crowd pleaser, he's hard as nails and fans love it when he throws himself into tackles. The amount of times he's gone in for heavy challenges and just gets up without any fuss I find really endearing. 

Many times i've walked from the ground thinking he's put a hell of a shift in, and how pleased I am that he's in that position vs Max.  (As mad as that may sound to others, and i'm not even on a wind up!).

But then i'll come on here that same night and read a load of negative comments about him and it really confuses me.  In truth, they're probably just the same people recycling comments, or they're fans who watch on a stream so don't get to him close up and his physicality in close encounters.

But, Unless you're tracking everything read on here back to a person and profiling their agenda it's hard to know if there's a lot of detractors, or just a lot of noise from the same few.  But whatever it is, I think those that have a dislike to him even making the starting 11 is more an attack on where we are as club rather than the player himself.

[It's Character Forming 1,167]

22 hours ago, repman said:

2 charts here comparing Max last year and Stacey this season. As has been said already on this thread, defending stats like clearances, blocks and tackles are counting stats and therefore maybe not the best way of judging the quality of defending, only the quantity. 

The chart for Max goes to show how much of the load he had to carry in terms of progressing the ball, this was something he took on after we lost Buendia. Compare that to Stacey who isn't tasked with that, our buildup is very left side heavy now. 

The other interesting thing on there is how Max grades out slightly higher for shot creating actions but much lower on xG assisted. Certainly back at the start of the season Stacey was putting more crosses in from quick transitions, that's the one obvious difference in our chance creation I can think of compared to last season.

Interesting, am I right to read it as just 3 aerials won for Max, which is the fundamental weakness he has and there's no getting away from it.  We used to see teams targeting him in the air in the Champs and I'd expect that sort of weakness is going to be exploited in the Prem even more.  It's a shame because otherwise IMO he's a really talented player.  If he was average height for a fullback, he'd probably be playing for one of the big teams.

[It's Character Forming 1,167]

17 hours ago, Robert N. LiM said:

I'm still not really over us replacing Ian Culverhouse with Carl Bradshaw

I'm with you there 😀