Ex-Sporting striker: Ioannidis and Suárez can't play together | OneFootball

Fotis Ioannidis made his debut by scoring for Sporting last Monday, September 22, in the victory of the lions against Moreirense. Since then, no one has remained indifferent regarding the player and the signing achieved by the club's management at the close of the transfer window. Paulo Alves believes that both the Greek and Luis Suárez have already shown good signs in Rui Borges' team.

“The Sporting structure is fully aware of this player's value because it was already an old interest. He is a typical area striker, robust and good at holding the ball,” he began by saying, in statements to the newspaper O Jogo, continuing: “You can tell he has a nose for goal. He knew exactly where he should position himself to take advantage of the cross. He seems like an excellent alternative to Luis Suárez.”

The former Alvalade Club player recalled that, besides Ioannidis, Suárez also quickly became one of the team's highlights: “Luis Suárez is technically very advanced, has a good support game, associative, and shows a great goal-scoring ability. Ioannidis seems to be physically stronger in duels and it's still early to assess his aerial game.”

"Neither player has the goal-scoring ability of Gyokeres,” he emphasized, although he noted that they can “complement each other”: “Initially, it doesn't seem so because it would alter the team's tactical matrix, its structure. Maybe in the final phase of a game, when the team needs to play more directly and have presence in the area. Suárez, as seen against Casa Pia, has already shown signs that he can drop back and link the play. Both can coexist in the final phase of a game. For now, it seems early to me.”

Regarding Viktor Gyokeres, Paulo Alves ends up disagreeing that the Swedish international did everything alone at Sporting: “I don't think Sporting was less democratic for having Gyokeres. It just had a player with certain characteristics who stood out for his goal-scoring prowess. Without this player, it has to integrate all the others in a simple and objective way.”

“The players who came in brought new things to the team and are well integrated. This is how great teams are built. Sporting has done this well and the coaches have to adjust,” concluded the current football coach.

This article was translated into English by Artificial Intelligence. You can read the original version in 🇵🇹 here.