Ruben Dias

Ruben Dias
Image from: freelargeimages.com

Ruben Santos Gato Alves Dias





Current Club: Benfica.

Previous Clubs: N/A.

Loan Clubs: N/A.





International: Portugal 7 caps.

Trophies Won: N/A.





Calm, composed young ball playing centre back. Mostly plays on the right side, being mainly right footed, but he is not completely uncomfortable on the left side, or in using his left foot for that matter. Like many coming through the top Portugese youth academies, he is extremely accomplished technically and likes to play a ball over the top into the corner for a winger to run onto. Also fond of stepping up and slipping through a through ball when a gap appears.



Looks to have a good reading of the game, but, playing in the Portugese league means he is not up against the best forwards in the footage I have seen, so maybe he just has a better reading than they do. Certainly he looks ready technically for a step up in league terms, to face better opponents on a regular basis, ones that can push him to his limits and force him to improve.



Physically he has pace but is weak and is brushed aside or nudged out from under headers very easily, which makes him struggle aerially. You would not want him as your centre back if you were to face a Tony Pulis side, for example, as he would struggle badly. That is one thing he really does need to work on, he needs to be stronger and tougher physically.



Also, it was difficult to see how he got on under pressure, as the matches I watched were dominated by Benfica, the opponents never even tried to put pressure on the man on the ball. Dias's passing was slick with no pressure, but it would be interesting to see if he can maintain his technique with less time to look around and pick out a pass.



Dias would certainly need to move the ball quicker in a tougher league, as he does have a tendency to take his time to look for the right pass before playing it. He does not have the awareness to just ping it first time, he needs a touch while he looks for a pass. I would also be very worried about his tackling.



That is one area his technique is badly lacking, as the few tackles he did make were all from the wrong side and gave away free kicks. Each time he made those challenges they were needless and he could have easily just stood up and forced his opponent to make something happen, instead of putting a boot in or trying to wrap a foot around from behind the player facing away from goal anyway.



To me he looks like a player in need of a step up now, before it is too late for him to realise he needs to work on those deficiencies. In the Benfica games I saw, Dias was coasting through, finding things far too easy and the mistakes could simply be made because he was trying to get himself involved in the game and show his manager what he can do. Young players often get caught out doing too much to try to impress.



Requested by - Ed002