Let's just face it, as long as Parky is manager, Dickson is not going to play for us again, so recall clauses are irrelevant.
May be Parkinson is wrong, about both the player's character and ability. But looking at where we currently sit in the league table, I'll give the manager the benefit of the doubt and back his judgement.
But there is a part of me that suspects that PP hopes that Dickson might come back having seen that the grass isn't always greener and that the points about his general game that PP and MK have been making to him are backed up by Lennie and Paul Trollope.
[cite]Posted By: Oggy Red[/cite]As I understand it,all 3-month loanshave recall clauses after 28 days.
It's standard.
[\quote]
As I understand it almost nothing is standard in football contracts. There are all kind of recall, cup, first option clauses that get negotiated in. I don't think it's logical to make the jump that all three month loans contain a 28 day recall.
I'm sure I read somewhere that Leed's were monitoring him, and haven't read of Beckford signing a new contract. I can see Beckford going to a relegation threatened side in Prem or CCC and hopefully a bidding war for Dicko between Gills, Brizzle, Leeds and anyone he's played well against this season.
Another goal for Dicko today. That's 11 in his 17 starts in this Division (which equates to 30 in a season) of which all 11 have come in his last 15 starts for Gillingham and Rovers.
Dickson is a 30 goal a season man in this league. Simple as. The facts are there for all to see as AA points out - anyone who can't see that is a blind as Parky...
He needs to be brought back. Look how many good players we have let go. Turner for example. If Dicko can play and score in League One, he will surely develop his all round game as well. If we sell him someone will make a big profit because the likes of Bristol Rovers and Gillingham won't be paying much.
If his attitude is poor, then why aren't other managers put off by it? Goalscorers are like goldust, he could be the nearest thing we see to Darren Bent in the next few years - lets face it, we won't be buying a top striker in the forseeable future.
[quote][cite]Posted By: Godstone[/cite]He needs to be brought back. Look how many good players we have let go. Turner for example. If Dicko can play and score in League One, he will surely develop his all round game as well. If we sell him someone will make a big profit because the likes of Bristol Rovers and Gillingham won't be paying much.
If his attitude is poor, then why aren't other managers put off by it? Goalscorers are like goldust, he could be the nearest thing we see to Darren Bent in the next few years - lets face it, we won't be buying a top striker in the forseeable future.[/quote]
Team spirit is very important. Last year we are told there was none. This year the players seem very together.
No-one really knows what goes on behind the scenes. If bringing back Dickson and his alleged ego is going to upset the unity within the squad then personally I think it will do us more harm than good.
I say lets off-load him in jan,hopefully he gets a few more goals so we get a few more quid for him.Team is on a high at the moment and i dont think dickson will make it any better.
[cite]Posted By: Godstone[/cite]He needs to be brought back. Look how many good players we have let go. Turner for example.
I can understand why people want Dickson back, but don't use players like Turner as an example. He was a young inexperienced centre back, around 20 at the time, with his only experience being a couple of short term loans in League One and Two. He wasn't a multi million pound player back then, he was a young, inexperienced, but promising League One defender. At the time we had several decent and experienced Premier League centre backs. In fact if Fortune left like Turner did, he may well have worked his way back up and perhaps could have turned out better than he has.
[cite]Posted By: Clem_Snide[/cite]Team spirit is very important. Last year we are told there was none. This year the players seem very together.
No-one really knows what goes on behind the scenes. If bringing back Dickson and his alleged ego is going to upset the unity within the squad then personally I think it will do us more harm than good.
I have to agree with Clem here. We don't know what's been going on, all we know is Parky has his reasons to let a good lower league goalscorer go out on loan, and potentially on a permanent deal. He knows we need more quality in all areas, not just up front, and signing Mooney on loan shows that.
Team spirit, professionalism in training, players wanting to play for the club and fight for the place are all important. If Dickson hasn't worked on the areas Parky and the coaches want him to, or isn't working hard enough in training, or as suggested by some turning up late, he can't be given a place just because he can score goals. Might sound wrong but no player should get special treatment.
It's also rarely mentioned what type of goals Dickson is scoring. A lot of his goals come from long balls over the top, not really the way we do play or want to play. Not that I rate McLeod, but he's been fighting for his place and it always sounds like he's got the right attitude in training and keeps working hard. Even when he misses chances or makes terrible mistakes, like others have said he hasn't hid.
The goal on Saturday was a poacher's as was one on his debut. Another was a skillful chip. On the basis of what I've seen of him at Bristol he doesn't rely on long balls over the top.
Long balls over the top??? A majority of his goals come from him agitating inbetween defenders and then others are from when he picks ball up in the channels and trys opportunistic shots. Neither Gillingham or Bristol Rovers play/ed long ball, whilst Gills at the time were woeful and he had to make a lot from very little. He likes running at defenders with the ball at his feet, facing up I believe it's called rather than an off the shoulder player like say Owen.
You couldn't be more wrong on your assesment. None of our strikers are good at running off the shoulder, but Dickson is good at finding space in between defenders lines/channels. I'm not a hater of Mcleod, but he isn't suited to our style of play whilst Dickson would revel in the space Burton would make for him whether Burton was having an off day or not. Clearly Parky doesn't trust Dickson, but if we play 4-4-2 Dickson is far the better player than Mcleod. Team player no, hence Mcleod just edges it if he has to play on his own.
I confess that I'm not a great Dickson fan but, putting aside any issues around ego, attitude and effect on team spirit (and I'll assume that there is a basis for all that, although I haven't seen it) I'd rather have him available to us than McLeod.
McLeod is an awful footballer. We could have played until it got dark on Saturday and he would not have scored.
With Burton clearly subdued in recent weeks, maybe due to the hernia, we have significant goalscoring problems. Bailey has dried up, Racon is yet to score this season. It's three goals (including Mr Nutter's effort) in five League games since Exeter and our options are looking a bit limited.
Still, not to worry. We are second in the league after 14 matches, and we would all have settled for that at the start of the season, wouldn't we?
Time to fix it, Parky. It may not be 'broke', but the warning signs are there. At the very least, we need to get Bailey and Racon amongst the goals - and wasn't it time for Shelvey after an hour on Saturday?
[cite]Posted By: McLovin[/cite]The goal on Saturday was a poacher's as was one on his debut. Another was a skillful chip. On the basis of what I've seen of him at Bristol he doesn't rely on long balls over the top.
Totally agree.
I would also ask how many goals have we scored as a result of someone with pace getting beyond the opposition back line? Very few and the reason is that either the one playing up top (Burton) doesn't have the pace or his partner (McLeod) freezes when he gets the chance or (apart from Semedo's goal) our midfield don't make enough third man runs to get in behind.
Oh and ball doesn't have to be over the top. It can also be between the centre backs or the full back and centre back. Benayoun's ball to Torres was hardly route one and you couldn't say that Liverpool play that type of football. The finish, in seeing off the centre back, was no different from Dicko's other goal against Brentford.
In the immortal words of Alan Hansen "the one thing that scares defenders is pace". But you also have to be able to finish too. Dicko has and does both.
At the end of the day the end justifies the means. If we go up Parky will be vindicated and I will be the first to congratulate him. If we fail to do so and Dicko gets the 20 to 25 for Rovers then I will be gutted for the missed opportunity.
[cite]Posted By: McLovin[/cite]The goal on Saturday was a poacher's as was one on his debut. Another was a skillful chip. On the basis of what I've seen of him at Bristol he doesn't rely on long balls over the top.
Totally agree.
I would also ask how many goals have we scored as a result of someone with pace getting beyond the opposition back line? Very few and the reason is that either the one playing up top (Burton) doesn't have the pace or his partner (McLeod) freezes when he gets the chance or (apart from Semedo's goal) our midfield don't make enough third man runs to get in behind.
Oh and ball doesn't have to be over the top. It can also be between the centre backs or the full back and centre back. Benayoun's ball to Torres was hardly route one and you couldn't say that Liverpool play that type of football. The finish, in seeing off the centre back, was no different from Dicko's other goal against Brentford.
In the immortal words of Alan Hansen "the one thing that scares defenders is pace". But you also have to be able to finish too. Dicko has and does both.
At the end of the day the end justifies the means. If we go up Parky will be vindicated and I will be the first to congratulate him. If we fail to do so and Dicko gets the 20 to 25 for Rovers then I will be gutted for the missed opportunity.
The last paragraph sums it up.
Clearly something has gone on behind the scenes and that is why he is out on loan. What he does while he's there is, at the momnent, ilrelevent.
Come the end of the season, if we go up, no-one will care about how many goals Dickson scores. If he scores bundles and we don't. Parkinson knows he will have some difficult questions to answer.
If only we'd been in a position to offer some money plus Dicko for Ricky Lambert at the start of the season. It frustrates me as much to see Lambert banging them in for Saints.
With McLeod misfiring I wonder if we'll see Mooney start alongside Burton? Or a return for Jonjo.
From what I've seen of McLeod there's a lot I like, he looks for the ball, gets in the right area, has a bit of pace etc but doesn't seem to know what to do with it when he gets it. Occasionally it works - the goal vs Exeter, the disallowed goal vs Brenford demonstrate his ability, but that has to be balanced with say the miss against Oldham. Unmarked a dozen or so yards out he didn't seem to be anticipating that a pass might be made to him and when it was made he stuck his boot out reactively and sent the chance well wide. Mentally a striker has to be ready for the one half-chance that might comes his way in a match and have a certain coolness and sharpness of mind to make the most of that opportunity. Against Oldham his body language indicated that he was surprised rather than prepared. I'm not necessarily asking him to score from those sort of chances, but to get a shot in and on target and then see what happens.
As I said on another thread, I'm beginning to wonder if being a nice guy who kept his mouth shut was the reason why he and not Dickson was retained.
Another point..against Huddersfield he had a good game, a goal and played well to universal approval. But then Huddersfield attacked and contributed to an open game perhaps giving him a bit more space. Against Oldham and maybe Gilingham he didn't see that much possession (I was there on Saturday so I'm guessing) but perhaps when he's being marked closely he can't let some of the stronger attributes of his game - eg. running at defenders etc come to the fore.
[cite]Posted By: ColinTat[/cite]Long balls over the top??? A majority of his goals come from him agitating inbetween defenders and then others are from when he picks ball up in the channels and trys opportunistic shots. Neither Gillingham or Bristol Rovers play/ed long ball, whilst Gills at the time were woeful and he had to make a lot from very little. He likes running at defenders with the ball at his feet, facing up I believe it's called rather than an off the shoulder player like say Owen.
You couldn't be more wrong on your assesment. None of our strikers are good at running off the shoulder, but Dickson is good at finding space in between defenders lines/channels. I'm not a hater of Mcleod, but he isn't suited to our style of play whilst Dickson would revel in the space Burton would make for him whether Burton was having an off day or not. Clearly Parky doesn't trust Dickson, but if we play 4-4-2 Dickson is far the better player than Mcleod. Team player no, hence Mcleod just edges it if he has to play on his own.
Fair enough, I wasn't suggesting they're the same but my point really was that Dickson and McLeod (and Fleetwood) all try to use their pace, getting onto whatever they can, whether that's a ball over the top, through balls on the ground, in the channels etc. They are too similar to play together, even if they do play in slightly different ways. Both need someone like Burton or Iwelumo alongside them to be at their best. I don't think any of them are that great at it, they just have enough about them for it to work at the levels they've scored goals regularly at.
Do agree McLeod's the better team player (though not by a huge amount, it's not a strength of his like it might be said of Burton). I think Dickson would do ok, no worse than McLeod, though clearly there are reasons he's not been given that chance and McLeod has.
[cite]Posted By: Weegie Addick[/cite]Mcleod wasn't without his attitude problems last year either - had a big fall out with both us and Millwall...
The difference is that Mcleod seems to have learned from it and done the hard work in training.
Maybe Dickson wasn't prepared to do the same.
As I've said before Gillingham clearly had no problems with Dicko's attitude or they wouldn't have kicked up such a fuss when they didn't get him. And Lennie clearly has no problem with the guy.
If it is true (and I haven't seen this validated elsewhere) that Dicko was consistently late for training then he should have been fined accordingly. As for training does Parky seriously believe that everyone trains with the same intensity? Forwards are notorious for being lazy and their "talking" comes through goals and what they do on the pitch. On that basis the likes of Berbatov wouldn't get anywhere near our first team - even in the 3rd Division!
Each and every player has his own strength and weaknesses. The trick is to bring out the best in all of them. Not to reduce them to a common denominator where we end up with a team of robots.
Comments
And Parky said there was a recall clause after 28 days - it's standard procedure with this length of loan.
May be Parkinson is wrong, about both the player's character and ability. But looking at where we currently sit in the league table, I'll give the manager the benefit of the doubt and back his judgement.
But there is a part of me that suspects that PP hopes that Dickson might come back having seen that the grass isn't always greener and that the points about his general game that PP and MK have been making to him are backed up by Lennie and Paul Trollope.
It's standard.
In any case, Parky is keeping his options open....... but we know the reality, that Dickson will be sold if Rovers want to makethe deal permanant.
Especially as Dickson is out of contract at the end of the season.
Simple as. The facts are there for all to see as AA points out - anyone who can't see that is a blind as Parky...
He can come back at any time but Parky has, more or less, made it clear that he wants to offload him in January.
If Dicko can play and score in League One, he will surely develop his all round game as well. If we sell him someone will make a big profit because the likes of Bristol Rovers and Gillingham won't be paying much.
If his attitude is poor, then why aren't other managers put off by it? Goalscorers are like goldust, he could be the nearest thing we see to Darren Bent in the next few years - lets face it, we won't be buying a top striker in the forseeable future.
If Dicko can play and score in League One, he will surely develop his all round game as well. If we sell him someone will make a big profit because the likes of Bristol Rovers and Gillingham won't be paying much.
If his attitude is poor, then why aren't other managers put off by it? Goalscorers are like goldust, he could be the nearest thing we see to Darren Bent in the next few years - lets face it, we won't be buying a top striker in the forseeable future.[/quote]
Team spirit is very important. Last year we are told there was none. This year the players seem very together.
No-one really knows what goes on behind the scenes. If bringing back Dickson and his alleged ego is going to upset the unity within the squad then personally I think it will do us more harm than good.
I have to agree with Clem here. We don't know what's been going on, all we know is Parky has his reasons to let a good lower league goalscorer go out on loan, and potentially on a permanent deal. He knows we need more quality in all areas, not just up front, and signing Mooney on loan shows that.
Team spirit, professionalism in training, players wanting to play for the club and fight for the place are all important. If Dickson hasn't worked on the areas Parky and the coaches want him to, or isn't working hard enough in training, or as suggested by some turning up late, he can't be given a place just because he can score goals. Might sound wrong but no player should get special treatment.
It's also rarely mentioned what type of goals Dickson is scoring. A lot of his goals come from long balls over the top, not really the way we do play or want to play. Not that I rate McLeod, but he's been fighting for his place and it always sounds like he's got the right attitude in training and keeps working hard. Even when he misses chances or makes terrible mistakes, like others have said he hasn't hid.
Dickson is a poacher who will hang around the box and sniff out a half chance as he did for his goal on Saturday
You couldn't be more wrong on your assesment. None of our strikers are good at running off the shoulder, but Dickson is good at finding space in between defenders lines/channels. I'm not a hater of Mcleod, but he isn't suited to our style of play whilst Dickson would revel in the space Burton would make for him whether Burton was having an off day or not. Clearly Parky doesn't trust Dickson, but if we play 4-4-2 Dickson is far the better player than Mcleod. Team player no, hence Mcleod just edges it if he has to play on his own.
McLeod is an awful footballer. We could have played until it got dark on Saturday and he would not have scored.
With Burton clearly subdued in recent weeks, maybe due to the hernia, we have significant goalscoring problems. Bailey has dried up, Racon is yet to score this season. It's three goals (including Mr Nutter's effort) in five League games since Exeter and our options are looking a bit limited.
Still, not to worry. We are second in the league after 14 matches, and we would all have settled for that at the start of the season, wouldn't we?
Time to fix it, Parky. It may not be 'broke', but the warning signs are there. At the very least, we need to get Bailey and Racon amongst the goals - and wasn't it time for Shelvey after an hour on Saturday?
Totally agree.
I would also ask how many goals have we scored as a result of someone with pace getting beyond the opposition back line? Very few and the reason is that either the one playing up top (Burton) doesn't have the pace or his partner (McLeod) freezes when he gets the chance or (apart from Semedo's goal) our midfield don't make enough third man runs to get in behind.
Oh and ball doesn't have to be over the top. It can also be between the centre backs or the full back and centre back. Benayoun's ball to Torres was hardly route one and you couldn't say that Liverpool play that type of football. The finish, in seeing off the centre back, was no different from Dicko's other goal against Brentford.
In the immortal words of Alan Hansen "the one thing that scares defenders is pace". But you also have to be able to finish too. Dicko has and does both.
At the end of the day the end justifies the means. If we go up Parky will be vindicated and I will be the first to congratulate him. If we fail to do so and Dicko gets the 20 to 25 for Rovers then I will be gutted for the missed opportunity.
The last paragraph sums it up.
Clearly something has gone on behind the scenes and that is why he is out on loan. What he does while he's there is, at the momnent, ilrelevent.
Come the end of the season, if we go up, no-one will care about how many goals Dickson scores. If he scores bundles and we don't. Parkinson knows he will have some difficult questions to answer.
From what I've seen of McLeod there's a lot I like, he looks for the ball, gets in the right area, has a bit of pace etc but doesn't seem to know what to do with it when he gets it. Occasionally it works - the goal vs Exeter, the disallowed goal vs Brenford demonstrate his ability, but that has to be balanced with say the miss against Oldham. Unmarked a dozen or so yards out he didn't seem to be anticipating that a pass might be made to him and when it was made he stuck his boot out reactively and sent the chance well wide. Mentally a striker has to be ready for the one half-chance that might comes his way in a match and have a certain coolness and sharpness of mind to make the most of that opportunity. Against Oldham his body language indicated that he was surprised rather than prepared. I'm not necessarily asking him to score from those sort of chances, but to get a shot in and on target and then see what happens.
As I said on another thread, I'm beginning to wonder if being a nice guy who kept his mouth shut was the reason why he and not Dickson was retained.
In fairness, on this occassion, he's probably right.
The difference is that Mcleod seems to have learned from it and done the hard work in training.
Maybe Dickson wasn't prepared to do the same.
Fair enough, I wasn't suggesting they're the same but my point really was that Dickson and McLeod (and Fleetwood) all try to use their pace, getting onto whatever they can, whether that's a ball over the top, through balls on the ground, in the channels etc. They are too similar to play together, even if they do play in slightly different ways. Both need someone like Burton or Iwelumo alongside them to be at their best. I don't think any of them are that great at it, they just have enough about them for it to work at the levels they've scored goals regularly at.
Do agree McLeod's the better team player (though not by a huge amount, it's not a strength of his like it might be said of Burton). I think Dickson would do ok, no worse than McLeod, though clearly there are reasons he's not been given that chance and McLeod has.
As I've said before Gillingham clearly had no problems with Dicko's attitude or they wouldn't have kicked up such a fuss when they didn't get him. And Lennie clearly has no problem with the guy.
If it is true (and I haven't seen this validated elsewhere) that Dicko was consistently late for training then he should have been fined accordingly. As for training does Parky seriously believe that everyone trains with the same intensity? Forwards are notorious for being lazy and their "talking" comes through goals and what they do on the pitch. On that basis the likes of Berbatov wouldn't get anywhere near our first team - even in the 3rd Division!
Each and every player has his own strength and weaknesses. The trick is to bring out the best in all of them. Not to reduce them to a common denominator where we end up with a team of robots.