Bindon And Mbengue: Reading's Best Centre-Half Duo In A Decade?

11/20/2024 04:32 AM

Harry looks into just how good the defensive duo have been, and asks if we've had as good a pairing since the glory days.

It was during the Fleetwood Town game in the FA Cup that the seed for this piece first blossomed in the mind, which is weird because Amadou Mbengue replaced Tyler Bindon in that game, so they weren't on the pitch simultaneously at any point.

However, Bindon skippered the team from the start, and it was then that it dawned on me that this kid is still 19 years of age. I say kid, but in every footballing sense other than his age, he's more of a man - a seasoned pro.

I say 'dawned on me' because it is very easy to forget that he's as young as he is. He is so composed on the ball, has been an ever-present for us for a long time now, and is making international appearances for New Zealand. And he never, ever puts a foot wrong. In a time when we've had plenty of players make some calamitous errors, Bindon just doesn't do that.

So this piece initially started as a, what we call in the industry 'Chafer Special' on Tyler Bindon (the industry being Sim and I). But then I thought, I can't talk about Bindon without talking about the Yin to his Yang, the Chaos to his Order: Amadou Mbengue.

If even at the start of last season you'd told me that, in 18 months or so, our starting centre-back pairing would be Bindon - a then-18-year-old who had never made a professional appearance - and Mbengue - a clearly talented player but one that needed a serious amount of finessing and fine-tuning - and that we'd all absolutely love them, I would not have believed you in the slightest.

But now, along with Joel Pereira, Lewis Wing, Harvey Knibbs and Sam Smith, they make up the spine of our team which is nigh-on irreplaceable. They showed in their performances last season that their ceiling is higher than Reading Football Club, at least as we are in our current state, and that we should cherish the time we have with them.

Mbengue is still very raw - rash at times - and plays with his heart on his sleeve. This can be to his detriment of course: you just have to look at his last two trips to Bolton Wanderers to understand that. He can get involved in things he doesn't need to, and his displays of... shall we say... gamesmanship can frustrate as well as delight me at times, I have to admit.

But all these traits are exactly why we love him too. His ball-and-man swooping slide tackles from long balls over the top have become a trademark, and how many times have we seen him already this season put his body on the line to block a shot or clear it off the line? And no win is complete until Mbengue's saluted the fans at full time.

All of that has etched him into the hearts of the Loyal Royals. But not only is he a fan favourite, you can also tell he's hugely admired and respected among his team mates too. At surface level anyway, he looks like a bloke who just enjoys playing football and enjoys himself in general. Anyone who brings good vibes into the workplace or into your life should be looked after, and the players and staff seem to appreciate that in Mbengue.

However, under Paul Ince he was always just filling in: playing right-wing-back or in a back three. He never had a set position, and if he were going to cement one down, none of us thought it was ever going to be - or even should be - at centre-back in a four. But since the departure in January of Nelson Abbey and Tom McIntyre, as well as Tom Holmes' injury, that's exactly what he's done - and he's now one of our most important players.

If Mbengue is the double shot of gin - aggressive, strong but sometimes taking it too far - then Bindon is the tonic with the wedge of lime: the finesse, the calming presence. That's not to say Bindon changes or dilutes how Mbengue plays - in a good G&T both should be just as effective as the other - but rather the way he complements Mbengue, and Mbengue complements him too for that matter, is almost perfect.

This might sound paradoxical, but the biggest praise I can give Bindon is that I very rarely leave the ground ranting and raving about how good he was. It's almost expected now that he's going to put in a 7/10 performance. And to be able to say that about a 19-year-old (yes, I'll keep reminding you of that), in just his second season in professional football is nothing short of astounding.

He just never seems to put a foot wrong, he rarely gets caught out of position and he seems to always be one step ahead of his opponent - not in terms of his feet, but in his mind. His footballing intelligence and awareness of where he needs to be and when is second to none when comparing him to most centre-backs we've had in the past decade.

Things like heading a ball away from a corner, or clearing your lines from a cross, are so unappreciated because they're just expected of defenders, but you can only do that if you're in the right place and your positioning is spot on - and Bindon is more often than not that man.

Recency bias may be playing a factor here admittedly, but I'm not sure we've had a centre-back partnership as well balanced, settled and important to our team as these two in a long, long time. They epitomise everything Ruben Selles wants his team to be: Mbengue's intensity, aggressiveness and passion, paired with Bindon's cool-headedness, decision-making and ability to play out from the back.

One of the things we've been starved of in the last few seasons, which sounds quite trivial in the grand scheme of things, is a consistent centre-back pairing. Our two great teams were built on that: Ibrahima Sonko and Ivar Ingimarrson in 2005/06 and Alex Pearce and Kaspars Gorkss in 2011/12.

Before anyone starts, I'm not comparing Bindon and Mbengue to either of these partnerships just yet, just observing that we tend to better as a team when we have a solid, reliable, consistent centre-back pairing.

All I'm going to say is that if Selles can get the chance he so thoroughly deserves to build a team that can challenge towards the top of the table, he doesn't have to worry about buying any starting centre-backs. With Mbengue and Bindon we have two wonderful, wonderful players who I want to see at the heart of our defence for a long time to come.