06 Mar 2015 14:17:51
What is the opinion on balotelli?
He had a terrible start, partly due to his attitude and partly rodgers tactics.

Recently he's played so much better, looks to be getting some confidence and I'm sure more goals would follow.

Yet Brendan Rodgers looks adamant to drive him out the club. Surely every player deserves a 2nd chance. Putting lambert on instead is just a wind up really.

1.) 06 Mar 2015
06 Mar 2015 14:55:57
To be frank he's very limited as to the style he suits and can't perform outside his comfort zone. Our current 3-4-3 suits him.

2.) 06 Mar 2015
06 Mar 2015 15:31:58
Opinion is he's lazy with a poor attitude, Has ability but is wasting it. BR won't play him because he's static and the tiny amount of movement he does have is spent aimlessly strolling around the pitch looking un-interested. Surely your question should not be why BR won't give him a second chance it should be why is Mario not making it impossible for BR to not pick him. He's done ok in the last few appearences but Sturridge at 50% has been better so why does he deserve insistence on him playing ?.

3.) 06 Mar 2015
06 Mar 2015 15:33:33
We are winning. Don't change anything

4.) 06 Mar 2015
06 Mar 2015 15:37:46
Actually thought he had been playing a lot better in his last few games and still no where near paying off his investment has looked like he can play a part.

bit weird in in comparison with sturridge. Weirdly last few games thought sturridge's overall play was worse then mario's (lost the ball a lot, poor touch, passing, etc) but has scored and gets into better chances fair more.

Still hope he turns it around but seems to take one step forward one back. played better then most our attackers against besiktas but stupid yellow meant he had to come off (and we lost on penalties, his specialty).

But tbh think he offers more off the bench than borini or Lambert but still needs to stop with the stupid parts of his gameplay

5.) 06 Mar 2015
06 Mar 2015 17:31:35
He changed a couple of games coming off the bench, was rewarded with a start against Besiktas, in which he only bothered playing football for 45 minutes & then disappeared. Sums the player up, can be great, but is more often than not a waste.

He's too liable to be a passenger and isn't special enough when he does put the effort in to be a regular starter. And I don't see him quietly accepting being a sub most of the time who gets occasional starts. We should cut our losses asap.

Tbh, at the rate he's going, by the age of 28, I think he'll either won't be playing Europe's top leagues (Prem, Serie A, La Liga, Bundesliga) at all, or playing for a club in one of them that finishes in 10th place on average.

6.) 06 Mar 2015
06 Mar 2015 17:54:43
Yeah everyone does deserve a second chance.
Ballotelli was lucky enough to have several.

7.) 06 Mar 2015
06 Mar 2015 18:48:01
Playing better yes, suiting our style of play no.

8.) 06 Mar 2015
06 Mar 2015 23:04:20
I have to agree that he doesn't suit our style, but that isn't his fault. As a player, if a club want to buy you, you would think that they have done a bit of scouting on you. And that they would have a plan of how to play you? The whole transfer wasnt thought out very well. Although Mario hasn't really shown a whole lot of trying to fit the style of play he has looked better the last few apps.

9.) 07 Mar 2015
06 Mar 2015 23:48:07
Balotelli has the ability to be anything he wants and could be exceptional in any system but simply can't be bothered. No option but to move him on unless he radically changes his attitude.

10.) 07 Mar 2015
07 Mar 2015 01:08:07
Good point from Mark, it's not Mario's fault we bought him. I actually quite like the guy, he's probably just a very good example of someone who doesn't handle the money and fame particularly well.

I think he's done well over the last month, we need someone who gets in the box because we're currently terrible at that. How many times do we cross the ball or have the opportunity to cross and there's no-one in the box?

11.) 07 Mar 2015
07 Mar 2015 07:03:41
I was really hoping he will come good but lost any hope about him. He doesn't get on the pitch to play football but to show off. He puts so much energy on showing off. Even when he runs (or more often don't run) back to the defence it is done with a lot of thought of him how to do the run so it will make him look cool. He is always happy to get into fights with or without the ball with defenders and sometime you think his main aim is to get a foul at any cost. His contribution in or out of the box this season was embarrassing, albeit that we didn't have very good service in term of accurate crossing into the box. He is probably still a decent box player for a team that can afford him not taking part in the game at all (both going forward and defending) other than waiting for the right cross in the box. I said before that in terms of value for money he is one of our poorest investment ever in line with Andy Carrol and he will have to score a hat trick every game from now to the end of the season for me to take that back.

12.) 07 Mar 2015
07 Mar 2015 14:32:45
We bought Balo w/o a plan on how to use him hence, we should not be surprised that it has not worked out even though, he has helped us in the past few games. To me, that is down to management and strategy because Balo did not buy himself. We did hence, the blame should be equally shared b/w him for his atimes poor attitude and the management for their lack of vision and strategy of how to integrate him and make him suceed.