Albanians abroad

[Simboli i Diellit]

Emanuele Ndoj played for Brescia’s primavera two days ago. He’s not favoured by Brescia’s coach anymore.

[Aurora Bulkualis]

You can’t really compare diaspora players to domestic player development. Diaspora players (more so the Ksoovars) have technical players like some of you guys mentioned and always have developed them. They just didn’t have the mental fortitude to be elite players (Shaq and Januzaj) or just peaked (Mehmedi) and some other ones just flopped hard after their big move like Tarashaj. There’s other names I’m obviously forgetting.

In countries with bad development physical players always make it out. The technical side of the game really needs strong training from a young age and that requires investment and professionalism. Since the infrastructure is so bad the technical players never develop and only the physical players excel in the youth ranks and get promoted to senior teams. It’s why African teams always do well in the youth tournaments but end up being mediocre or bad in senior tournaments.

I wanna say some of this is changing with the rise of more academia and private academies but I could be wrong. It seemed like 10-20 years ago the only players were getting developed is through the superliga teams youth set ups and there wasn’t any private academies. Now it kinda seems like the best players are developed in private academies then transfer. I’m thinking of Akademia e futbollit and some others that Jupi, Bulku and some former players have created.

Agreed. Physicality is often times just a way to compensate for lack of technical ability.

[Aurora Bulkualis]

Shqiperia ka numrin me te vogel te futbollistave per koke banori ne Europe, trajnerat shqiptar qe punonin ne Kosove habiteshin per numrin e madh te femijeve neper shkollat e futbollit dhe Kosova eshte shume keq krahasuar me vendet tjera te Europes. Si Mkhitaryan, Pjanic apo Elmas kan fillu me u aktivizu si titullar ne moshen 16 vjecare ne kampionatet respektive ndersa futbollisti i fundit ofenziv qe eshte aktivizu ne Shqiperi si 16 vjecar me duket se eshte Odise Roshi. Per futbollin shqiptar eshte emergjente qe per disa vite me vendos ndalese aktivizimi per futbollistet e huaj mbi 23 vjec dhe te pakten 3 futbollista nen 21 vjec te jene me detyrim ne fushen e lojes per gjitha kampionatet kombetare.

Albania has a little bit of that "Moldovan" effect, where the quality of the league makes it seem like the state of football isn't that bad. Not that we have a good league, but it's not any worse than Armenian or Macedonian league.

But you look at Moldova's NT and player development and it's terrible. Only reason their teams do well is $$$. Albanian clubs just raise their league quality to Armenia/Macedonia level through $$$ and shameless match fixing, but their player development is below them for sure.

[Princ]

Agreed. Physicality is often times just a way to compensate for lack of technical ability.

You want a balance of traits, where a player is technical but also strong physically, ideally with good height.

Broja is phenomenal as he possesses unique blend of the technique, size and athleticism needed to do damage at the top levels.

Dobra, on the other hand, does not lack technical ability, but struggles due to poor physicality. Kace was super technically and much better than Dobra, but could not solidify a starting spot with the NT over the likes of destroyers Xhaka and Abrashi.

A strong physical player should have no problem beating out a primarily finesse type, when size is a constant.

[artan]

Of course you want a balance. Players with physical ability mixed with technical ability breeds unstoppable players (ie Ronaldo) but in most cases the superior technical player outclasses the player with pace/strength. Just look at Barca's golden generation (Messi, Xavi, Ineista, Busquets) who weren't great because of their strength or pace but because of their superior technical skills. Players with physical ability breakout out earlier but often peak earlier and have a lower ceiling. These players are easier to produce.

As for Kace he definitely was not a superior technical player. Yes, he's a midget who gets bullied which limited his ability as a professional footballer but at POAK he never had an important role offensively and was a midfielder who was a presser for them. If he truly had technical skills he would probably be playing for a decent club right now but in reality he was average at best technically speaking. I think we just assumed he was the "Albanian Xavi" because he looked comfortable on the young age and because the other guys we had were just bulldogs/goons.

[Dallku]

Yeah Kace was never that technical and that's actually why he never made it. Not technical enough to play as a #10 or an attacking position and certainly not physical enough to play as a DM/CM. So basically someone like that is stuck in the middle. Not good enough for any position. We overrated Kace in an era where we were desperate for any talents. Any player who knew how to make the safe pass was a God for us and that's the only thing Kace knew how to do.

Which brings me to my next point, a lot of Albanian fans don't really know what technical players are like because we never had them besides very few(Skela and older players).

Right now Muci is considered as a "technical" player but that's actually false. He might have some technique elements like a good shot but that's not enough. A main characteristic of a technical player is that it's hard to get the ball from them. Muci, a player who loses the ball 8 out of 10 times he touches it can't be considered technical when he's so insecure with the ball. That's the opposite of a technical player.

[artan]

Yeah Kace was never that technical and that's actually why he never made it. Not technical enough to play as a #10 or an attacking position and certainly not physical enough to play as a DM/CM. So basically someone like that is stuck in the middle. Not good enough for any position. We overrated Kace in an era where we were desperate for any talents. Any player who knew how to make the safe pass was a God for us and that's the only thing Kace knew how to do.

Which brings me to my next point, a lot of Albanian fans don't really know what technical players are like because we never had them besides very few(Skela and older players).

Right now Muci is considered as a "technical" player but that's actually false. He might have some technique elements like a good shot but that's not enough. A main characteristic of a technical player is that it's hard to get the ball from them. Muci, a player who loses the ball 8 out of 10 times he touches it can't be considered technical when he's so insecure with the ball. That's the opposite of a technical player.

Muci is a very technically gifted player for our standards but for German or English standards he’s obviously not. I personally think he’s technically gifted. I just think he doesn’t know what to do when he doesn’t have the ball and he has a low work rate. If he doesn’t have the ball he kinda just stands there and doesn’t know how to be useful. To me he needs to work on that aspect.

Also seems like Gymcity recovered from his injury

[Aurora Bulkualis]

Yeah Djim played in 2nd half against Man Utd. Looked decent from what I saw.

[ZenMaster]

Yeah Djim played in 2nd half against Man Utd. Looked decent from what I saw.

Djimsiti was really good but it is tough to play alongside donkey as Demiral.

[Dallku]

It's wild how superior Atalanta looked in 2 games against United but they only got 1 point to show for it. Only reason being... Ronaldo.