Just How Good is Yaya Toure:-

Sami Nasri believes Yaya Touré is shockingly underrated outside Manchester City and that because he is African he is not given the acclaim he deserves. Nasri described his team-mate as the world’s best midfielder after his stunning chip into the top corner turned the Capital One Cup final against Sunderland. But the Frenchman is convinced Touré is always ignored in the global player-of-the-year awards because he is from the Ivory Coast rather than a more-established football nation. A recent vote by Barcelona fans said that Touré was the former player they would most like to re-sign and City have never underestimated his value to them. Tell me one defensive midfielder who can go forward like him who can score 16 or 17 goals in a season? This is Yaya Toure for you.
Where would you rank Toure amongst the midfield greats?

To me, he’s probably one of the best all-round midfielders I have seen play the game. He is big and strong, he can shrug people off. He has pace for a big lad, and exceptionally quick feet for a big lad too. He has unbelievable technique, a very strong and consistent short passing game and a good but not great long passing game. He’s mobile and agile for his size, and I’ve seen him play some through balls that some of the best passing midfielders in the game would be happy with, abeit not as consistently as the Xavi’s and Pirlo’s etc.

For me what he lacks defensively he makes up for going forward as a box-to-box midfielder? Often he can seem quite lazy, and has on occasion been a liability defensively. But does his exceptional impact going forward make up for the lapses on concentration going backwards? For a box-to-box, they are often competent enough on the ball to keep play ticking and are energetic to get back and defend. I think Yaya can defend, but he sometimes is a bit lazy getting back, but he offers so much more than a normal box to box.

My biggest criticisms of him are that he leads by performance, rather than is a true leader (although we can’t confirm or deny that). He has on occasion gone missing, sometimes in Europe, but he has also carried Man City at times when they’ve struggled. However when you think of the Keanes and the Vieiras, these guys would hardly ever, if not never, go missing when the team needed them. Yaya can sometimes drift off games.

I find it very hard to rate him, because with Keane and Vieira you have the rivalry, the passion, and the club rivalry too all in the background. You had two ferocious, passionful, energetic and willing-to-die midfielders go head to head, which creates a sort of nostalgic epic history. Yaya doesn’t have that. But then again the guy from the Ivory coast has the quality to take him at the summit, right now he is the best midfielder in the English Premier League. He have dominated teams like Manchester United, Everton, Sunderland, Totenham etc

Where would you guys place him?