Sicario2 I’m hearing comparisons of Rice with Vieria. How far is our number 41 to the great Frenchman?
Way too premature to say that. Vieira is one of the best box to box midfielders I have ever seen in football. Ever. He was just a complete footballer defensively, playmaking, attacking technique, shooting, passing. He had it all. People make him seem like some kind of destroyer like Keane but with the technique he had, he could have easily played further forward. Easily.
Maybe it's rose tinted glasses or maybe just the change in the game over the years and the extra high level of tactical and positional disciple opposition players have but some of the stuff Vieira used to do on the ball used to leave me wondering wtf. Chases a guy, slide tackles him and keeps the ball under his body ready to start a counter. He then plays a give and go and gets the ball at knee height and starts juggling the ball over various opposition players' heads before feeding it into Dennis or Thierry.
Rice has the engine, can do the defensive side of things to a very, very high level. His set pieces are crazy good as well and given time he can shoot well. He can also drive with the ball at his feet pretty well as well. But these are things Vieira was elite at and the rest of his game was elite as well at a time when CMs were expected to do it all defensively and attacking wise, yet still looked above all his peers.
