The Afonso alves myth

Jedi boro

Jedi boro

Well-known member
I’ve seen a few people on here denigrate Dutch football and they always seem to rope Afonso sled as the main evidence of this gulf.

But was he really as bad as some now think

After he may have only scored 10 in his 40 game spell but that includes 2 v man united and a hat trick Man City.

So was he really the issue in what was a dreadful season.
 
Jedi boro said:
I’ve seen a few people on here denigrate Dutch football and they always seem to rope Afonso sled as the main evidence of this gulf.

But was he really as bad as some now think

After he may have only scored 10 in his 40 game spell but that includes 2 v man united and a hat trick Man City.

So was he really the issue in what was a dreadful season.
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No, he was just one of them. To be fair Man City were a pub team in that game. The standard of player around him was also poor, O’Neil, Emnes, King, Mido, Aliadiere, Shawky, Arca. Gibson sold Luke Young for profit after 6 months to replace him with Hoyte. Up to 2006 we signed quality, but thereafter it was hopeful punts to keep costs down. It was around the time or just after that Lamb said the club will have the team the town can afford (or something like that). May even have been around relegation. But quality of player was reducing post 2006, year on year.
 
When he came in the January he looked ok (apart from the blue boots 🤣). We were a lot weaker quality wise in his first full season. Boateng, Schwarzer, Young, Cattermole etc all had left to be replaced by inferior players. I imagine he also felt a bit let down...being told of a clubs ambitions and ending up with Emnes and Digard.
 
We had massively high expectations, and he was introduced to great fanfare. Local papers did all sorts of comparisons with when we signed Juninho, because he was also Brazilian and because of his very impressive record in Holland. Instead of the second coming of Juninho we overpaid for a frankly average striker who seemed to struggle to get settled in and who was surrounded by some pretty average players.

He was OK, but we expected too much, paid too much and over-hyped the signing too much.
 
A few more goals would have made all the difference.
RIP 'Goal Machine' banner in the North Stand o_O :LOL:
 
selling Young really upset me , wasnt aware of the player wanting away so purley for commercial gain , A little bit of my love for boro went when Young went . People here rightly sound Giles as a decent knock but he wouldnt be able to lace Luke Youngs boots
 
I remember all the hype, Brazilian etc, all the cameras there the day he arrived when he signed, and couldn't keep the ball up, think he managed 3 keep ups.
The 12M price tag did not help matters, his goal return was poor.
After us he really improved, he played for Al-Saad then loaned out to Al-Rayyan, then played for Al-Gharafa all massive clubs.
That was his level.
 
This is linked to what seriously frustrates me about modern football.
Clubs with the resources of Boro have to take a real risk when signing players like this.
If it goes wrong.....such as with Alves or Assombolonga it screws the Club up for some time - really serious consequences.

Billionaire Clubs in the PL can buy 3 or 4 of these 'risks' a year.
If they don't work they just quietly let them go and buy another.
Zero peril.
 
Given how many he scored in Netherlands (more than people like Ronaldo, Romario and Suarez), he can’t have been as bad as we saw, could clearly finish in certain situations. And we have had worse too (even in that season).

That season was just awful though, an amalgamation of lots of mistakes. He was just one of the blame figures, perhaps a little unfairly. It wasn’t his fault we couldn’t give him the kind of service he was used to (or anything remotely close to it).
 
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atypical_boro said:
Given how many he scored in Netherlands (like more then people like Ronaldo, Romario and Suarez), he can’t have been as bad as we saw, could clearly finish in certain situations. And we have had worse too (even in that season).

That season was just awful though, an amalgamation of lots of mistakes. He was just one of the blame figures, perhaps a little unfairly. It wasn’t his fault we couldn’t give him the kind of service he was used to (or anything remotely close to it).
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That’s really my point AT as he did score v some top clubs so he clearly had ability.
 
Badonde said:
This is linked to what seriously frustrates me about modern football.
Clubs with the resources of Boro have to take a real risk when signing players like this.
If it goes wrong.....such as with Alves or Assombolonga it screws the Club up for some time - really serious consequences.

Billionaire Clubs in the PL can buy 3 or 4 of these 'risks' a year.
If they don't work they just quietly let them go and buy another.
Zero peril.
Click to expand...
We don't have to take stupid risks like this. We could have bought Marlon harewood for a couple of million and we would be better off. Defoe went for a handful more.
The club just made some utterly risible transfer decisions. Young for hoyte. Cattermole for Digard. Morrison for O'Neill.
We got relegated because of the utter dogs breakfast that was made of our transfers.
 
Sheriff_John_Bunnell_ret said:
We don't have to take stupid risks like this. We could have bought Marlon harewood for a couple of million and we would be better off. Defoe went for a handful more.
The club just made some utterly risible transfer decisions. Young for hoyte. Cattermole for Digard. Morrison for O'Neill.
We got relegated because of the utter dogs breakfast that was made of our transfers.
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I’m not disagreeing btw but if it was so bad and Southgate was so against it then why didn’t he walk.

The fact he stayed and even championed it publicly ( this only changed after he left) then it shows he was happy to go along with it at least in part.
 
Sheriff_John_Bunnell_ret said:
We don't have to take stupid risks like this. We could have bought Marlon harewood for a couple of million and we would be better off. Defoe went for a handful more.
The club just made some utterly risible transfer decisions. Young for hoyte. Cattermole for Digard. Morrison for O'Neill.
We got relegated because of the utter dogs breakfast that was made of our transfers.
Click to expand...
Easy in hindsight though isn't it?
What I'm saying is that many Clubs now don't seem to have to take a 'risk' at all.
They can make 10 bad buys as long as one or two hit the spot.
People can have a go at the Club's past decisions all they like (I agree we have made some bad choices of course) but we are fighting a in a nuclear war aimed with peashooters :mad:
 
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