[Almogàver]

Can anyone tell me the story of this guy? Can you describe his style? I know that he's galego, but I had never heard about him before. A couple of weeks ago the Spanish TVs began to talk about a Spanish guy who is one of the top scorers in Scotland and had scored a goal in the derby. Now some journalists say "Novo to the NT".

 

[The Exiled Heretic]

Even as a Rangers fan I'd say he's no where near the quality of the Spanish national team.

He's 25 years old and was born in Ferrol. He came to Scotland in 2001 to play for Scottish First Division side Raith Rovers from SD Huesca. After one season Scottish Premier side Dundee bought him. He was joint second top scorer in Scotland with Dundee last season so Rangers bought him. He is currently Rangers' top scorer at the moment.

He is small but fast. He should be playing up front through the middle but at Rangers he has played wider on the right too. He is very direct with his running too and combined with his speed this can be a problem for some defences. He has alot of positves but sometimes he snatches at things and his final ball is not always the best. He is a good player in my view. Scotland NT material rather than Spanish NT though.

 

[Teddy Bear]

I like him as a player, but like Chivo said he's not good enough for the Spanish NT.

However while i don't think he is be good enough for Spain i think the fans would still like certain aspects of his play - he puts in alot of work chasing loose balls, closing down defenders (because he is fast he can create attacking opportunies from "dead" situations) and generally being a huge nuisance to the opposition.

He is the opposite of Mikel Arteta in this respect. Arteta has/had great technical ability but seems to lack alot of heart and determination so will probably never achieve his potential, whereas what Novo lacks he makes up for in other areas so can play above his "natural" potential.

 

[Angle_eyes]

Yeah, while he's not Spanish NT quality (yet) he could probably do a could job for most Primera Liga sides. As Teddy says, he's a very hard worker, so he might attract the same sort of cult following that Rino Gattusso got when he went back to Italy.

I couldn't criticise him for last night. A lot of the time he was the only 'out' ball our team had. Most of the time he was finding 2 or 3 opposition player's around him, but even that wasn't stopping him. He can still improve his finishing though.

 

[Almogàver]

Thanx guys... it's quite surprising that suddenly a Spanish player that no one knows becomes a top scorer in Scotland. So he left Huesca (Tercera Division, the 4th cathegory) to play in Scotland... a brave and good decision.

Preciselly, after posting here, a sport radio program broadcasted an interview with him. He said that Celtic fans had thrown stones to his car after the derby. They also asked him about his religion and he said that he's Catholic, although he doesn't show it publically... is it that important to play in Rangers or Celtic?

I knew that Rangers was the team of the Protestants, but could a player who shows any Catholic preferences have problems in Rangers? Or the opposite, could a Protestant have problems in Celtic? I don't know how serious is this issue, I was just surprised for the question. I don't want to create a religious mess among Celtic and Rangers fans... I'm just curious.

 

[Angle_eyes]

I'll try and answer your religious related question and hope that it doesn't go a lot further, we've had too many of these debates recently.

The fact is that Rangers now have many Catholic player's and Celtic have, and have had for a while, many Protestant player's. Although some Rangers fans have said that our Catholic player's do show their faith on the pitch, I have yet to see it. In my opinion, if player's like Novo were to start crossing themselves after scoring they would get a lot of abuse. Not from all the fan's, but from enough that you would hear it very clearly.

I don't think Protestant's really have an equivalent of crossing theirselves. If they did, it would be interesting to see how they'd get received at Celtic, but the fact is they don't. So Protestant player's that play for Celtic, to my knowledge, don't really get any problems.

There are other threads that offer opinions on both club's problem with religion:

http://www.xtratime.org/forum/showthread.php?t=146755

http://www.xtratime.org/forum/showthread.php?t=146382&page=7&pp=15

I think there are more, but I can't be bothered dredging them up.

 

[Almogàver]

ok. Thanx. It was just a question. I don't want to talk about things that I don't know, really, I don't want to start a fight and my question was already answered.

 

[The Exiled Heretic]

ok. Thanx. It was just a question. I don't want to talk about things that I don't know, really, I don't want to start a fight and my question was already answered.

No problem mate. If you need to know any more about Novo then just ask and one of us will try to help out.

Angle pointed out that Novo's finishing needed improving and that is true. It's not the first time this has been noticed in his career though and did seem to be improved last season.

He spent a year with Raith Rovers in the 2001/02 season scoring 19 goals in 33 matches for the Kircaldy club. It's not that impressive because it's very easy for players to score in the lower league.

In the 2002/03 season he made the move to Dundee and played in the SPL. He wasn't very impressive. Although he was fast and direct it was his final ball that was a very big problem. This led to him scoring only 7 goals in 26 league matches for Dundee. Dundee were actually not a bad team that year and as Scottish Cup finalists, where they were beaten 1-0 by Rangers, they got a UEFA Cup place.

In the summer of 2003/04 Dundee brought ex-Rangers forward Mark Hately to the club as a strikers coach. He worked with Novo on an individual basis and especially on his finishing. They got the benefits from this and Novo was on fire. He scored 19 league goals in his 34 appearances ending joint second top scorer. This was all the more impressive as Dundee finished in 7th place. On top he also scored 2 goals in his 5 domestic cup appearances and 4 goals in his 4 UEFA cup appearances.

This prompted Rangers and Celtic to chase him and he chose Rangers. He ahd a good preseason and then started slowly in the League despite scoring away in Moscow during Rangers' Champions League qualifier. He was dropped for a while before coming on as a sub against his old club Dundee and scoring the two vital goals that won Rangers the game. He has never looked back and is currently the 2nd top scorer in the SPL.

Things are looking up for him at the moment but McLeish keeps playing him out of position. Rangers would do well to learn from Dundee and get somebody working with him on his finishing as he is begining to snatch at shots again. He needs that composure back again that he had last season. He has the makings of a very good forward but is still a bit raw.

 

[SPANIARD]

Viva Galicia, Joder!

 

[The Exiled Heretic]

Excuse my Geography. I didn't realise Ferrol was in Galicia although Koeman4 did say he was a Galego. Now he is a different type of Gael