“Not something you see from Sancho” – 3 ways Neto has given Maresca a “headache”

The London is Blue podcast always do a really nice match review where they get Twitter user CFC Central on, and today was no different.

For us, the best part was his commentary on Pedro Neto, which really neatly summed up our feelings on what had been so good about the Portugal international yesterday, beyond the goal, and what made him an essential pick for Enzo Maresca now, well ahead of Jadon Sancho in the pecking order on the left.

The two positives and one difficult decision Neto brings to Maresca

“One: He’s sensational out of possession. Odegaard was trying to move away from Lavia to the wing, and Neto was essentially just shuffling between Ben White and Odegaard. So he had to mark two players, had to jump on one and shadow the other. He kept doing it every time, without giving up on his attacking duties,” Central explained.

“The second thing I’d like to highlight is the fact that, unlike Jadon Sancho, this guy doesn’t need an overlap or an underlap. If you remember the first cross for Gusto, he made Ben White do the tango for like 6 second before shuffling onto his other foot and then crossing to the far post. It’s not something that you see from Jadon Sancho. He waits, he points to the byline, asking somebody ‘run there’ before he makes a decision – usually making a pass diagonally inside.

“I still think the conundrum is that he’s a more explosive shooter from the right hand side. But his crosses, his deliveries are great from either side. So irrespective, just nice to have that let wing sorted. Super impressive performance, even without the goal.”

We couldn’t agree more – Neto has been a workhorse too, playing 90 minutes in 3 league games running without fading. As Central says, the only hard part is picking which wing to use him on.