Hands up all those Reds that thought Anderson was going to be the new Paul Scholes. At least that is what this Red was expecting to see, but somewhat worringly eight games into the season and so far Anderson has started only one game in which he was dragged off at half-time after what only be descrided as a very poor performance against Sunderland.
The Brazilian then came off the bench to replace Giggs against Sporting Lisbon, in both games, the former Porto player looked anything but a samba star in the making, his passing was dreadful, especially against Sunderland.
It is very early days as far as Anderson is concerned, he's had the relative luxury of being able to bed-in while Nani, another new recruit, was pressed into action pretty much from the off when United were down to the bare bones of the squad. The fans might have expected Fergie to send his new recruit into battle sooner that he'd have liked. But that did not happen.
The slight concern is that just perhaps having looked closely at the £18m man in training, maybe Anderson isn't quite living up to expectations. Hence his limited appearances for the club so far. It isn't that long ago that Kleberson another Brazilian arrived at the club for a fee of around £6m only for him to leave the club without making any impact at all. The Brazilian's exit led to suggestions that United bought 'the wrong one' due to scouting report error - which is a totally ridiculous suggestion if ever there was one and cannot be taken seriously.
Anderson has cost an awful lot more than Kleberson and so there should be absolutely no doubt about his ability, but there's more to it than just playing football. At least that is what we've been told countless times about new arrivals - they need to settle in - then there's the language problem to overcome and of course everyone is different...and so it goes.
However, you do wonder if Fergie has been casting a slightly envious eye over Elano at rivals Man City. He too is Brazilian and looks as though he could turn out to be one of the buys of the season, he was bought for a fraction of the fee United shelled out for Anderson. Elano is a superb play-maker, he would have been perfect for United and dare I say could have replaced Scholes.
United fans and Fergie will be hoping that Anderson isn't the next Kleberson. The Reds take on Coventry City in the Carling Cup this evening, perhaps the Brazilian will get his chance to show us the fans why we agreed a fee of £18m to bring him to Old Trafford. Jonny Evans the highly-rated young Northern Ireland defender will start the game, so it should be worth tuning-in.
Just give the guy some time. He only just broke his leg last year and has had a few niggley injurues at the start of the season. True time will tell wether he can hack the premier league but lets wait longer than 7 games in before we start calling him the new kleberson. Besides have you looked at him on youtube even at 17 he was oozeing class!!!!
ReplyDeleteI wasn't even going to mention Anderson for a while, but I got talking a long standing red whose opinion i respect and he said to me what I was thinking after I'd seen Anderson make his debut. Which is have we gone and done it again, bought the wrong player?
ReplyDeleteThere's been plenty of players who've needed time to adjust, Vidic and Evra to name two.
We do need to give Anderson time, but I just find it strange how little a part he's played since his arrival and I was posing the question have United's backroom team and manager now got doubts about this lad?
Time will tell.