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Pavlova & The Modfather

I've recently had a chat with a client of ours about Roman Pavlyuchenko. Our client is Russian and also supports Spartak Moscow and Manchester United (don't they all?!). I told him that I support Spurs and immediately, his face lite up. Before I could say a word, he said "Roman Pavlyuchenko!".

So I asked for some info on our player. We spoke for ages about Roman, Modric, Manchester United, Hiddink, England and finally, Tottenham.

Our client (we'll call him Mr. X), said that the decent newspapers in Moscow are filled with direct quotes from players and their agents all the time. You'll never get "a source close to the player", or "a club insider said" type comments. Mr. X told me that he read that Pav has said that he's unhappy at the moment because he feels he's in great shape and form and wants to be given the chance to play.

"I completely agree with him. He would have been better off at a club like Arsenal where they play good football". I smiled and explained that we also try to play "good football".

"Yes, but Roman isn't in the team. You have such a good player, you know the one..." I asked if he was talking about Luka Modric.

"Yes. He is fantastic!" Again, his face sparked up. "He plays football as it should be played." I agreed with him and we spoke about the Liverpool game, which he had watched with my boss (who happens to be a Cypriot Liverpool fan).

"Roman needs players like him (Modric) to play around him. You know, you haven't even seen 10% of what Roman can do. He needs passes to be played to his feet, not high passes like a lot of the English teams do."

I again found myself agreeing, but the way Mr. X was going on about Pavlyuchenko, I had thought that he can't be talking about the same player? So I told him so.

He didn't agree with me one bit.

"Last season, he was without his family. he was in a new country, he had no friends and was lonely." Fair enough. I also added that he must have been pretty exhusted, but that didn't seem to bother Mr. X.

"He needs Modric to feed him the ball, then you will see what a player Roman is. He needs to be playing regularly and you will see that he will score goals for your team."

We said our good-byes and I'll be seeing Mr. X again in November when he comes over for his next visit. I hope that by the time he returns, Harry has started to use him. I completely agree that Pavlova (nicknamed that by the Spartak Moscow supporters, not because he likes the cake, but because he moves like the famous Russian ballerina; another golden wonder provided by Mr. X), especially last season, showed us glimpses that he is quality. Unfortunately, Harry only saw glimpses of that talent to.

Someone on here the other day called Modric, The Modfather. I quite like the ring of that. I also believe that he is our finest player and one that we need to hold onto.

Would Pavlova play better with The Modfather on the pitch? Of course he would. Any professional footballer playing alongside Luka would benefit greatly. Whether Harry sees this is another matter altogether.

26 comments

  1. would rather crouch
  2. I still think Pavlova needs to be given a run, regardless of Crouch.
  3. id like to see pav and defoe at hull...but i think the temptation will be to play crouch, and hoof the pig skin for 92 minutes
  4. It was a good read, Nice!!!!
  5. Cheers mate.
  6. Totally agree, give Pav the chance he deserves, i feel he has much potential and i suppose so does arry or i guess he would of offloaded him to Roma etc etc. And don't even get me started on Crouchy, he was awful when he came on against Liverpool.

    Pav and Defoe to start at hull, come on arry, pull ya finger out

    Macca - Wolverhampton

    P.s - Cracking article
  7. yes pavlova and the modfather would be brilliant at the club, they are both great players..

    pav needs time on the pitch and i already think hes better than crouch.

    crouch is 29 while pav is 27 so i rekon crouch shoube be our 4th striker..

    but i doubt harry will see the same as me..

    also bale should be ou left winger in certain matched where we can put modders in the amc position..

    i also think pavlova would play brilliant in a lone striker position and therefore gives us a gr8 alternative..

    sorry for the long message but one more thing- pavlova will play better with both defoe and keane than crouch will (its given that crouch has good feet but still unreliable)..
  8. Cheers for the comment. You can make your comments as long as you like. It was good to have you on here.

    Jaymes
  9. I aggree,If Keene cannot score goals he should be reminded that he is not indispensable and Pav should be given a chance.
  10. Can you effing believe!! Bent can't stop scoring
  11. In my humble opinion Mr Pavlova is the best striker at the club...
    Technically brilliant with an eye for goal, the ability to hold the ball up and bring others into the game like berbasulk with workrate and a happier demeanour.
    hope we play 4-5-1 tomorrow with pavlova leading the line and modders just off him, would love gio to play on the left with lennon on the right so we have pace and skill in abundance,with hudd and palacios in the centre providing the guile to compliment the craft, after sunday cannot see hull being able to cope with us....
    COYS
  12. pav's missus was/is here... he talks in previous articles that he hates english food, but its ok as his wife is an amazing cook of russian food...
  13. nice article. I agree with the comment about crouchy being pretty rubbish on Sunday, but he is a useful addition to the squad and offers a different option to the other strikers. I think Pav will get his chance if Keane fails to score after a couple more games and it sounds like now Pavlova has his family here he will be happier and therefore more focused on the job in hand.

    Someone also made a good point about Gareth Bale. he has an awesome left foot and I hope 'arry plays him on the left of midfield, rather than defense - two reasons; he can't tackle and we have BAE -when the time arises, not that I want to see modric out of the team. With Gio hopefully given a chance too we have an embarrasment of riches in most positions (hopefully not just an embarrasment!)
  14. Was talking to a russion guy at a show and we spoke about pav and arshavin and I asked him who the Russians prefered. Believe it or not he said that pav was the darling of russian football and would easily be selected over arshavin. I saw him play half a dozen times last year and he looked tired and out of sorts, whereas the friendly last week he sharp, had great close control and looked class.

    I reckon he and crouch should start tomorrow, not because they didn't start on Sunday but because the are perfect partnership for an away game at hull.
  15. I have been saying this for ages!!! Pav cannot be judged on one season in the PL after spending god knows how long in the russian league. He scored some important goals for us last season, a lot of them having come off the bench. He is a Teddy Sheringham type player who we should give a chance to.
  16. I don't think Bent was ever the right player for spurs, but he stuck it out for a couple of seasons with a decent strike rate. I wonder what diff it would have made, had he been given a proper run.

    I think that Pav is more of a Spurs Player than Bent, but worry that I will be asking in a years time, what might have been if we had given him a run
  17. Been arguing for weeks that Pavlyuchenko and Defoe should be our main strikers. Was surprised that Keane and Defoe started against Liverpool but it worked in the sense that Keane had three decent chances which he unfortunately missed.

    Pavlyuchenko should start against Hull as he has more all round ability than Crouch, and Keane is not on scoring form.
  18. Been looking forward to seeing Pav this season, I do agree he links up with Modric well, I think they'll forge a good understanding...if Super Pavlova is given the chance!
  19. don't care how many bent scores - and lets be honest it wont be that many - he wasn't a 'proper' spurs player. Bent certainly wouldn't have created the chances Keane did on Sunday, let alone score them. OK he was quick but any other stricker in his position last year would have scored twice as much given the service.i'm happy with the four strikers we have. Pav will do the business and I expect harry to change the team to suit the opposition, so he should get his chance.
  20. SuperCalifragilisticRomanPavyluchenko!
  21. Bent is a quality striker who will score hatfulls of goals if the team play to his strengths. Spurs are a side of quality players and cannot/will not change its way of playing to suit one player. Sunnerland will play to the strengths of him and jones and score a decent amount of goals. end of.
  22. I could actually see Crouch and Pavlyuchenko playing alongside each other. They would be frightening for any defence to cope with and between them have enough skill to score a hatful
  23. Spurs were awesome on sunday until lanky splitpin came on , I do rate pav give him a run with Defoe.
  24. Apart from all the stuff about moving to a foreign country and having played 18 months without stop etc and all these arguments being used constantly to defend him, 1 that has not been used actually refers to his 14 goals in terms of who he scored them against. Many will say 14 goals in 36 games or whatever, but 9 of them were in 8 cup matches so weak opposition etc. The thing is those cup matches were against Newcastle (1), Wigan (2), Liverpool (2) and Man Utd (1) and I think Burnley (2) who are now a Prem side. Burnley's team etc now is probably in the main the same one we faced last year in the semi's of the cup. Thus ultimately it was only his goal against watford, which was against sub Prem standard defences. Newcastle's defence consisted of Bassong who we now own and Taylor who is wanted by a host of Prem clubs. On this basis his record in terms of Prem quality defences reads more like - 13 in 35, not so bad considering his Prem record reads 5 in 28.
  25. Pavlova has never been Pav's nickname among Spartak fans. Apart from prompting immediate connotations with a ballet dancer (hardly a compliment when it comes to football players), that name sounds absolutely ridiculous in Russian (in which differences betwen feminine and masculine nouns and adjectives are stark) when used in reference to a man and suggests an unmistakable reference to a gay.
    Myself Russian, I cannot imagine that nickname being used at all (other than as an unfunny joke among your friend's pals).
    Instead, Pavlyuchenko was initially called Pavlik, but now he's just Roma to everyone (it's a diminutive form of Roman).
    Pronounced rOOma (like in "former").
  26. I'm a big believer that Pav and Defoe should be our striking pair up front. Pav didn't deserve to be used as a "dying minutes" sub on Sunday; not after his form in preseason. At Hull tonight, Keane will most definitely be given the nod as Ledley is out and Harry will need a captain on the pitch.