OPINION
Newcastle United attacker Miguel Almiron may be struggling to show his ability in Steve Bruce’s side currently due to the language barrier.
The Athletic reported that one source suggested that Almiron takes longer to digest information from Steve Bruce due to his inability to communicate with him.
The respectable football outlet point out that Almiron’s English is okay and acknowledge that other sources dispute that the language barrier is causing problems.
However, while Almiron’s English is rated as okay, it does leave room to the idea that it isn’t perfect and sometimes he isn’t going to understand what his manager wants from him straight away.
And if this is the case, then it surely suggests that the Newcastle attacker can turn his form around as he can slowly but surely start to understand Bruce more with time.
It also implies that it’s not his lack of ability or not being able to cope with the demands of the Premier League that is the root of the problem, and that’s a very good sign as those issues would be considered unfixable.
The 25-year-old is currently struggling for form at St James Park as he has been unable to score a goal or register an assist, however he has shown glimpses of his talent.
For example, Almiron did impress in the 1-0 victory over Tottenham.
The Magpies attacker touched the ball 43 times against Spurs, only Matt Ritchie touched the ball more, and while he didn’t score, he did help out defensively by registering one tackle as well as one interception. (Source: WhoScored).
In fact, Almiron was so good that former Newcastle player Jermaine Jenas even heaped praise on him for his performance, while on BBC Radio 5 Live (18:14, Sunday August 25th), as he was blown away by how much ground the attacker covered.
Also, it’s worth noting that Almiron has been fouled on average 1.5 times per game, as per WhoScored, and that at least suggests his opponents are struggling to deal with him and are unfairly bringing him down.
The 25-year-old just needs to be less wasteful in front of goal, he’s averaged 1.4 shots per game despite not scoring, and then he’ll slowly but surely be able to be the full package for Bruce and the Magpies will be able to rely on him.
However, if the source suggesting the language barrier is an issue happens to be wrong, and there’s nothing like that causing Almiron to struggle, then the longer his poor form continues, the more doubts there will be that he’ll ever come good.
