da dobrowin： This article is part of Football FanCast’s Pundit View series, which provides opinion and analysis on recent quotes from journalists, pundits, players and managers…
da leao： Barcelona legend Rivaldo discussed his former team’s illustrious new front three. But he seems to believe that Antoine Griezmann still hasn’t fully adapted and that the “MSG” will never reach the heights of “MSN”.
What did he say?
Rivaldo is a figure well known to the Blaugrana.
After all, we’re talking about an icon who played 236 games for the Catalan giants, scoring 133 goals and assisting further 42 in the process.
For that reason, he definitely knows a thing or two about the club and being a prolific goalscorer himself, he should also know what he’s talking about in regards to Griezmann’s situation and adaptation to the Barcelona system.
Watch Spanish Football Live Streams With StreamFootball.tv Below
According to him, it might take the Frenchman a while to get to the level he was on during his Atletico Madrid days.
As reported by Goal, here’s what he said in full:
“Barca’s new attacking trio, of Messi, Luis Suárez and Antoine Griezmann (MSG), is giving some good signs and showing it can work in the future, but I don’t believe it will reach Messi, Suarez, Neymar (MSN) level. Neymar is a distinctive player who creates a lot of assists, scores many goals and takes control of the game when needed thanks to his personality. That’s something Griezmann doesn’t have yet, and even though he has scored goals already, he hasn’t fully adapted to his new team’s style of play. It could be a while before we see him playing at the same level as we saw for many years at Atletico Madrid.”
A recurring issue
It seems that the Griezmann issue is something that still haunts Barcelona.
After all, we’ve seen the man himself practically pleading for more time to adapt just recently, and one way or the other, that subject somehow always seems to become a talking point.
Watch Lionel Messi and Gareth Bale answer the internet’s weirdest questions in the video below…
Of course, seeing how the Frenchman was their big summer signing and he did arrive with a certain pedigree and reputation, it’s not really surprising that a lot is expected from him.
But Griezmann has very much been performing.
After all, he already scored four goals and assisted three in eight games he played in La Liga this season.
The issue of his preferred position, however, still remains unresolved. Luis Suarez seems to be Ernesto Valverde’s go-to striker which puts the Frenchman in an uncomfortable situation out wide.
Rivaldo believes that Griezmann will never give the Catalans what they had with Neymar and it seems he is not really optimistic about this newly formed trio of “MSG”.
Maybe he’ll be proved wrong, but the early signs aren’t encouraging.