It's been the most drawn-out transfer saga of the summer, Newcastle United's pursuit of Marc Guehi has been dead and done more times than anyone can remember. But with a substantial wad of cash burning a hole in the Magpies' back pocket, and Eddie Howe clearly identifying a centre-back as their priority position, why is the Crystal Palace man seemingly the only player they want?
Well, Adam Clery examines the player, and the club he's set to join, to tell you why.
Well, Adam Clery examines the player, and the club he's set to join, to tell you why.
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00:00Bienvendo chums, and more importantly, are it, how's it gannon, Adam Cleary from 442
00:08here, and by the time this video goes out, Mark Gahee should be a Newcastle United player.
00:14Right, no, sorry, just to say I'm going to have to stop that there. Hi everyone, Adam
00:18Cleary from the present, that's Adam Cleary from the past, and I made this video the very
00:24first day that we got told that the Mark Gahee thing was as good as done, which if you are
00:29a Newcastle fan, you'll know was about eight billion years ago, so I'm just, can't be arse
00:35waiting anymore, so we're putting the video out now. It's all still true, same strengths,
00:39same weaknesses, same impact you'll have on the team, same reasons why you want them,
00:43it's all still great stuff, but if there are any comments that you hear me make and think,
00:48feels about three weeks old, him saying that, that's why. And maybe signs now, maybe doesn't,
00:55I don't f***ing know at this point, but enjoy!
01:00Okay, so, and this might be hard to picture given all the injuries last season and how long ago you
01:06saw it, but if every single Newcastle player was available to Eddie Howe, this is probably what
01:10the starting 11 looks like. Do you remember Nick Pope? Do you remember Sven Bottmann? What a time
01:15to be alive that was. Now it should go without saying that the two areas of this team that are
01:20most easy to improve upon are a goal-scoring, dangerous, not Miguel Almiron right attacker,
01:26and a new right-sided centre-back. And despite my enormous love of Fabian Scheer, I mean,
01:31I'm not blind, am I? Mark Gaye does not just represent a small upgrade in that position,
01:36he represents a massive one. But the thing is, if you look purely at the numbers, that's not
01:41something that becomes immediately obvious. Like, I'll show you Mark Gaye's, let's say,
01:45defensive stats from last season, and we'll compare them to Fabian Scheer's, and if you
01:49are feeling enormously underwhelmed by those green bars and the numbers in front of them,
01:54then yeah, you should be. They're not very good. I mean, if you just make a direct comparison
01:58between the two of them, you wouldn't say there's any particular area there in which Gaye looks
02:02better than Fabian Scheer. And again, if we look at them in possession, you would say Scheer's
02:06actually a much better player than Mark Gaye is. He seems to do more when he's in possession,
02:10he carries it forward better, he gets on the ball more, he looks to be a better ball-playing
02:15centre-back than his Crystal Palace counterpart. In fact, and theoretically this is the most
02:20alarming bit, one of the main things you hear about Mark Gaye's games is his ability to bring
02:24the ball out of defence and break the opposition defensive lines, either through carrying it through
02:29them directly with excellent dribbling, or playing long, raking, accurate passes into the attackers.
02:34And looking at these numbers, which are the best representation of that ability,
02:38Scheer wipes the floor with them. And this is going to sound weird coming from a guy whose
02:43job is largely to show you stats and to tell you why they're actually interesting. This is a very
02:48good lesson in why stats can often be quite misleading. What you're actually looking at here
02:54is not a comparison between one player who is good at certain things and another who is less good at
02:59those things. You are looking at two players who play for very different teams. There is a world
03:05of difference between what a player is capable of doing and what a player is required to do.
03:10Under Eddie Howe, Newcastle are a high-possession, front-foot team who get on the ball
03:15and look to push the opposition back into their own half and their own third
03:19as much as possible. It means players like Fabian Scheer, who are comfortable on the ball,
03:23see an awful lot of it. Now Crystal Palace did become that sort of team last season under Oliver
03:28Glasner, but Gay had a long-term injury that saw him miss most of those games. He played the bulk
03:34of the front part of the season, where under Roy Hodgson, they were arse. They would sit back,
03:41they didn't have an awful lot of the ball, they didn't play particularly expansively
03:45when they did have it. So when Mark Gay was able to get on the ball,
03:48his options in front of him were quite limited. And that's what's reflected in those numbers,
03:53like the key passes, the through balls, the switches of play, the attempted take-ons.
03:57They're lower than Fabian Scheer, but they're coming from a position
04:00where the opportunity to do them was considerably rarer.
04:03But thankfully, the great thing about your eyes is that yes, you can use them to look at stats,
04:09but you can also use them to look at actual football being played. And when you do that,
04:13it tells a very different story. Statistically, at Crystal Palace,
04:17Mark Gay has been nothing to write home about, but in actual football,
04:20which is thankfully where he's going to be playing most of his games for Newcastle,
04:24he is exceptional. And one of his greatest strengths is something Newcastle currently
04:29do not really have. From that left-sided centre-back position, he has one of the best
04:35long diagonal balls in the league. My opportunities to do it were slightly limited. When he did do it,
04:41it really caught the eye because the benefit of being a left-sided centre-back who is right-footed
04:46means that the way he receives the ball, once he turns into an open field, he is on a strong foot
04:52for looking at this entire part of the pitch. Whether it's a run in behind from the right
04:56side of the attacker, an overlap from the full-back, two things you see a lot at Newcastle.
05:00He's in a position to curl that ball around and play it long in a way that runs it into the
05:05channel. As you're on your left foot, it'll curl around the other way out of play. And it isn't
05:08just that he has the ability to do this, it's that he thinks about doing it all the time. You
05:12can see here in this example, there are several way better, way safer options available to him,
05:18but instead he picks his head up and he finds that pass into the space and that creates a chance for
05:24Palace. But his other main strength is something Newcastle currently have under Fabian Scheer.
05:28It's just that Mark Gay is considerably better at doing it. If one of those passes isn't on,
05:32but Gay still thinks he can break a line of attacking pressure or break a press
05:37or something like that, he's supremely good with his close control dribbling past attackers,
05:42dribbling past midfielders and opening up space that way. And that's something that actually is
05:47reflected in his numbers. If we go back two seasons to where he had the entire campaign
05:51under Palace and they were nowhere near as bad as they were in that first half under Hodgson,
05:55you can see with his take-ons and his take-on percentage that he's easily one of the best
06:00players in the league at doing that. And again, on the eye test alone, he is not one of those
06:04defenders that gives you the heebie-jeebies every time he tries to carry it out. That is the
06:08technique and the composure of a supremely talented ball carrier. Actually, he registered an assist
06:14for Crystal Palace last season, which is hardly the definition of putting it on a plate, but in
06:19a very subtle way shows you everything that he's about. You can see he ventured forward a little
06:24bit into the space. He's happy to receive it, but he does so facing his own goal, which for a
06:29defender is a bit of a nightmare. There is a man straight up his arse, but he does not panic. He
06:33brings that ball in, he controls it, and he rolls that player with all the composure of a dainty
06:39South American midfielder. And then again, where are the easy options? He could have laid it off
06:43here first time in a panic. He could have played it safe to the defender here, but no, he gets his
06:47head up. He thinks, how can I bring this forward? He sees, I think it's Alise, rolls that in for
06:53him and he admittedly does some of the harder work. But I know I can hear you like, oh, look at you,
06:58Adam, you're one of these new age football types who thinks defenders should be judged by how good
07:02they are with the ball at their feet instead of how they should be properly judged, which is like
07:07how much of an egg and chips heed the ball can they be when necessary? Well, I mean, he's not
07:12obviously an egg and chips heed the ball central defender, but that same composure he has on the
07:16ball is very important for how he defends. And I'm sorry if you've never heard this analogy before,
07:20because if you haven't, I'm going to sound absolutely radio rental, but you know, the whole
07:24dog and cat central defender partnership thing, is that ringing any bells? You want one central
07:30defender who's a dog and goes and chases the ball and woof, woofs and barks, barks. And the other
07:34one is a cat who just sits composed on its perch and just nips in when you have no. Well, OK, to
07:41put that in the more technical term, you always want to send the back who engages the opposition,
07:46who looks to challenge for the ball early, who breaks out of position to snuff out danger.
07:50But you also need another one who reads the whole situation behind them, sits a few yards off. And
07:55then if the ball does break or it gets passed, they are there to sweep that up. I know I've said
07:59sweep, but it's not a sweeper. Sweep is something different, but it's kind of they do some sweeping.
08:04Marguerite is fantastic at that. His ability to read the play around him, to only engage when
08:09absolutely necessary, to allow a central defensive partner to get into all kinds of space, get into
08:14all kinds of trouble and then still be there to make sure the whole system is solid. You can look
08:19at pretty much any clip you want of him. You so rarely see him diving in. He reads the play
08:24superbly, finds himself in the exact right position to be in. He doesn't show players either
08:29one way or the other. He gives them nowhere to go. And his ability to win the ball back without
08:33leaving his feet is wonderful. You can see in this clip, the attacker will think, oh, perfect,
08:39I've drawn him close enough to me that I can now zip past either side. But Gay gets a leg out
08:44fantastically, puts that ball away, never looked even remotely worried. And that is part of the
08:48reason why Newcastle are happy to spend that much money on him, because in Sven Botman, they have
08:52one of the best dog defenders in the Premier League. He loves to rush out, to engage, to win
08:57the ball back early, to close down any spaces that the midfield has left. And Gay, just like Fabian
09:03Schär does, reads the play behind him very well. But the difference between Gay and Schär is the
09:09athleticism. Gay is far quicker across the ground. He's slightly stronger in the tackle. He's another
09:15reason why that's a huge upgrade. And I am absolutely not shitting all over Fabian Schär,
09:19by the way, unless he asked me to. He's been a fantastic central defender for Newcastle,
09:24but we saw last season with Nick Pope's injury and all those huge gaps they were leaving between
09:28the midfield and the defence, that he hasn't quite got the legs to make these, like, ecstatic,
09:34panicky recovery runs. Gay is objectively much quicker across the ground than Fabian Schär is.
09:40And in my opinion, it's just mine, a slightly better reader of the game. So his positioning
09:46and his athleticism are a huge advantage. Again, not something that is even remotely apparent in
09:51the underlying numbers, but if you watched Palace last season or the season before,
09:55or even England at the Euros, you'll have seen that plenty. So great. That's amazing. If they
10:00pull that transfer off, it's going to be brilliant and they're going to win the league and everything's
10:03going to be all like roses and galaxy caramel forever, isn't it? There are currently, in my
10:10head, two fairly major issues to Newcastle signing Mark Gay, right? One of them, perhaps
10:17the most important one, is positional. Now you may have heard me say it already in the video,
10:21one of Mark Gay's best attributes is he has a left-sided centre-back with a right foot. So
10:26that's where a lot of his long passing, a lot of those really excellent balls come from. Like this
10:31was his heat map from all of last season. You will see he so rarely ventures onto the right-hand side
10:36of the pitch. He does all his work on the ball and off the ball in this left-hand side. But
10:40he's coming in to replace Fabian Scheer, we all presume. And this is his heat map from last season.
10:47Except no, haha, I fooled you. That's actually his heat map from two seasons ago when Sven
10:52Botman was permanently available to Newcastle United. He was over on the right-hand side
10:58because Sven Botman plays on the left. This is Sven Botman's heat map for when he plays for
11:03Newcastle because he, being a left-footed centre-back, is a left-sided centre-back.
11:09This feels like it could be an entire video of its own because it's not really something people
11:12were talking about until a couple of years ago. Does it really make that much of a difference
11:17which side of the central defensive pairing these players play on? And the answer is yes,
11:22massively. And the reason for that is that fundamentally you want to be playing on the
11:27side where your strong foot is because when you receive the ball it means when you face
11:31into the pitch you're on your strong foot for playing the ball forward. And the reason why
11:36that sentence can be true and it also be true that Mark Gay is a left-sided centre-back on his
11:41wrong foot and that's what he's really good at is simply because right-footers are so much more
11:46common than left-footers. I think about it this way, if you're coming up through an academy and
11:51you're a right-footer, chances are you're going to be in a centre-back pairing or even a three
11:55with another or two other right-footers. You have to learn at some point to play on the left-hand
12:01side because otherwise there'd be like 90% of all centre-backs play on one side and only 10%
12:07on the other. So on the rare occasion you do get a naturally left-sided centre-back,
12:12they have to play on the left-hand side because that's just the best use of them imaginable.
12:17Now don't get me wrong, it's not a catastrophe by any stretch of the imagination, it's just
12:20something that Mark Gay is going to have to work on. If the idea is that him and Botman are the
12:25preferred centre-back pairing going forward, he'll have to play on the right-hand side,
12:28he'll have to re-teach his brain how to get on the ball and find those same raking passes from
12:34the opposite side of the pitch. And he can absolutely do that, he's young enough to learn,
12:37he's talented enough to learn, it's just that muscle memory and pattern repetition are important
12:43and as of yet he's not really done that. The other issue, and this absolutely is something that's
12:48apparent in the data, is he is quite weak in the air. Standing at six foot tall, which is exactly
12:54the same as me, means he's often targeted by the opposition for long balls into the air. And you
13:00saw this for that absolutely awful goal that England conceded at the Euros. They hit a hopeful
13:06diagonal into his area, he challenges for it and he does not win it. Now that's fine, obviously
13:12defenders don't win every single ball that comes into their area, but such a known weakness is this
13:17that John Stones leaves his position to cover over because he doesn't expect him to win it.
13:23And from there, just by targeting that area, Slovakia pull England all the way across the
13:27pitch and in the ensuing confusion get in and score that goal. And if you slow it down, there is
13:32another moment in this which is a small weakness in his game. Gay just fractionally switches off
13:38when that ball goes loose. He is occasionally guilty, occasionally guilty, of just forgetting
13:44what's around him and focusing on what he can see. Now don't get me wrong, he reads the game in front
13:49of him absolutely superbly, it's just sometimes that vision stops here and his brain doesn't fill
13:54in the rest. I could make a similar comment about the winning goal in the Euros final, but I don't
13:59want to talk about that again and I'm pretty sure you don't want to talk about that again. So we'll
14:03just, we'll take that point as read. So it is a mixed bag this, albeit one that has very, very
14:08delicious treats in it. Like potentially, Mark Gay is an enormous ceiling raiser for Newcastle.
14:14His ability to get on the ball from central defence and bring it out allows Bruno to push
14:18further up the pitch, allows the whole defence to play slightly further up the pitch with Nick
14:22Vogt back in goal. That's not even a problem, it would make them more attacking, it would make them
14:26more incisive. He could be providing those balls through the defence that they sometimes lack
14:31in deep positions. It could really, really push Newcastle on a number of levels. But the caveats
14:38are that while we know he can do all these things, we're yet to see him do them consistently
14:42from that exact position on the pitch. And as stupid as it sounds, like I can hear people
14:48watching this video going, if you were paying me £100,000 a week, I would not care which side of
14:52the centre-back pairing I was on. And you're right, it's just that it does take a period of adjustment.
14:57And also, theoretically, it does make Newcastle, who are very good at both attacking and defending
15:02set pieces, slightly less good at that. Theoretically. But overall, do I like this
15:09transfer? No, I don't. I f***ing love it. Newcastle spending fat cash on an England
15:14international centre-back when it's a position they actively need to improve.
15:19My pants are off, mate. Pinch me. Anyway, that's all I could think to talk to you about on this
15:23one. If you have enjoyed the video, please do let us know in the comments below. Are you excited
15:26about this transfer? Are your pants also indeed off? All thoughts, all feelings, all poetry,
15:31all verse, all song. Welcome down below. And a very special end of video message to those of
15:36you in the North East who may be watching this. I, me, yours truly, doing the Great North Run in
15:41approximately, I don't have a watch on, far too soon. If you follow me on any social media, you
15:46will know that I have no knees. My heart is bad. My childhood asthma simply never went away. So
15:52it's obviously a terrible idea, but we are trying to raise some money for Mind in the UK, who are
15:56a mental health charity who do vital, vital work in this country. It's a cause particularly close
16:02to my heart. No pun intended. So any small donation you would be happy making will go so
16:07much further than you even realise. They're an awesome thing to be doing it for. And even though
16:11it's going to suck for me, I'm doing it not happily, but gladly. Anyway, speaking of social
16:18media, you can get me there. I'll put a link in the description for the fundraiser, just in case
16:21you have got a couple of quid lying around. The 442 socials are in the corner of the video. And
16:25until next time, God, I really hope they've actually made this transfer. Otherwise, what a
16:29waste of an afternoon that was, eh? Oh, well, fingers crossed. Bye.