@Sage what kind of centre mid would you reckon we need? We now have Dobson, Watson, Clare, Gilbey, Morgan and JFC when he's back from injury. That's six players to fill three central spots. Is a 7th centre mid necessary?
Would it be better to find a player who can play the 10 role but also slot into the wide areas if necessary? Feels like wingers have to be the priority now in my mind.
We need a creative midfielder who pulls the strings and chips in with 8 - 10 goals. We currently don’t have one. Without a playmaker I can’t see where enough goals are coming from. None of our current midfielders are prolific enough for a promotion team.
In the last 9 games of last season Gilbey scored 3 and got an assist. That's about 15 goals a season.
@Sage what kind of centre mid would you reckon we need? We now have Dobson, Watson, Clare, Gilbey, Morgan and JFC when he's back from injury. That's six players to fill three central spots. Is a 7th centre mid necessary?
Would it be better to find a player who can play the 10 role but also slot into the wide areas if necessary? Feels like wingers have to be the priority now in my mind.
We need a creative midfielder who pulls the strings and chips in with 8 - 10 goals. We currently don’t have one. Without a playmaker I can’t see where enough goals are coming from. None of our current midfielders are prolific enough for a promotion team.
In the last 9 games of last season Gilbey scored 3 and got an assist. That's about 15 goals a season.
Problem with a short example of nine games is that it can throw up an aberration. I’m also not sure we’ll see very much of Gilbey until late September at best. The poor man has been quite ill and it’s quite likely to have knocked the granny out of him for a bit. I think he’s going to be a key player for us this season but he’s never been prolific.
Are Clare and Dobson both first team starters? Do they have the quality we need - or are they more back up's to our first choice? I dont know enough about them to answer that.
I think back to the Powell promotion season which is what I guess we were all hoping to replicate in approach.... buying the best players from league 1.
Havent a clue if these are the best players in league 1 - or how they compare to someone like Fraser who went to Ipswich?
Then again - look how many games Pritchard played in our promotion season and he came from non league!
Dobson and Clare seem to be indicative of a slightly different approach. Where Wigan are "doing a Powell" and pillaging players from bigger teams and direct competitors, these are two players who seem to have been stand outs at clubs that otherwise struggled.*
I would presume the logic is that if they can look good in a poor team, they will therefore turn out to be really rather tasty in a team of better quality.
* I suddenly realise this also applies to Stockley, except that the struggling team in question was us!! 😏
I don’t think what we’re doing is very different to what Powell did at all. We took players from Bournemouth, Oldham, Exeter and Dagenham, and cast offs from Preston, Reading, Wednesday, Scunthorpe and Leicester. The only team who were really a direct competitor was Weds and they couldn’t wait to get rid of Morrison. With the possible exception of Bournemouth, who were still a year away from properly starting up as a force, we didn’t actually take any bigger teams’ players off them that they wanted to keep
I think that we are a world away from the level of player we signed under Powell. Hollands and Wiggins were two of the most in demand players at league 1 level and had championship clubs looking at them. Kermorgant came from the Championship. Taylor was deemed a legend at Exeter. Evina was Oldhams best player - well other than Dale Stephens who we also signed after a cameo for the team who came second. Green had half the league chasing after him.
What I would say is that the likes of Famewo and Stockley (who were here last year) compare favourably to what we had the season before.
But Powell wasnt signing players that Oxford aren't up in arms about losing. He would have signed Oxfords star player.
Your argument has shifted a bit here. What you said was that 'doing a Powell' is nicking all the best players from direct competitors and taking players from bigger teams. I've pointed out that Powell didn't do that, he took good players from pretty average to poor teams and players surplus to requirements from above us. But now that the conversation has shifted to player quality, Kermorgant indeed came from the Championship but he was also a joke; the most well-known thing about him was the song making fun of him missing a penalty. Stockley also came from the Championship but at least comes in with proven goalscoring ability at this level for us. Yann was a god but on paper before kicking a ball the Stockley transfer makes more sense. Weds fans were delighted when we took Morrison off them, absolutely laughing their holes off, that's the more accurate comparison. We signed Portsmouth's player of the year though, so I'm sure that would fit your description in terms of a more accurate comparison (though I hope he's better than Evina!)
You've also got to recognise that the market is completely different to what it was like 10 years ago. We picked up Taylor, Hollands and Evina on free transfers; they might have been well-thought of at their clubs, but once a bigger team with a bit of money came in there was nothing the clubs could do to stop them moving. There's not as many players like that available right now, and teams are better at protecting their interests. Exeter want £1m+ for a 21 year old who has 16 games in League 2, we didn't get near spending that on an individual player under Powell, the £1m we got for Jenkinson covered a fair bit of our transfer outlay.We've still got work to do on the transfer front but I reckon it's not far off at all what Powell would have done in these same circumstances
The changing transfer market is a brilliant point. How much would someone like a Dale Stephens be in today's market? Wouldn't be £350k that we paid for him , probably be in the millions.
Oxford are our 2nd league game so should be a good target for him to show he's not a RB. I saw that interview when he signed for them, it was just odd. "So, you've been brought in as an attacking right back, what is your best position?"
The changing transfer market is a brilliant point. How much would someone like a Dale Stephens be in today's market? Wouldn't be £350k that we paid for him , probably be in the millions.
and that's the type of midfielder I think we're missing at the moment, someone who can pick a pass and keep the team ticking
The changing transfer market is a brilliant point. How much would someone like a Dale Stephens be in today's market? Wouldn't be £350k that we paid for him , probably be in the millions.
and that's the type of midfielder I think we're missing at the moment, someone who can pick and a pace and keep the team ticking
Absolutely agree , that's exactly what we need in the middle of the park.
The changing transfer market is a brilliant point. How much would someone like a Dale Stephens be in today's market? Wouldn't be £350k that we paid for him , probably be in the millions.
and that's the type of midfielder I think we're missing at the moment, someone who can pick a pass and keep the team ticking
I see Albie as this type of midfielder? Think we do need another option with Jake being out for so long though.
The changing transfer market is a brilliant point. How much would someone like a Dale Stephens be in today's market? Wouldn't be £350k that we paid for him , probably be in the millions.
and that's the type of midfielder I think we're missing at the moment, someone who can pick a pass and keep the team ticking
I see Albie as this type of midfielder? Think we do need another option with Jake being out for so long though.
It's that "keeping play ticking" aspect he needs to just improve on. A huge season for him that could define whether he makes it as a solid Championship player or one lingering around L1/2 for the upcoming years.
I expect we'll probably get one more midfielder on loan, can't see us signing another one on a perm personally. We'll most likely need that money to go to other positions to secure the players we want/need
Interesting background. Alongside Stockley, Washington and a few others, we have players who can give a decent post match interview now. Just a shame Scottie won't be there to hear we was the better team.
“I went to college. This was Year 11 in England, I was 16, 17 and I did my GCSE’s and from there I went to ‘football colleges’, you could say.
“I went to one in Walthamstow called Rushcroft, another one in Essex called Shenfield.
“I did a BTEC in Sport and Biology and did that as well as playing football.
“I went to the Nike Academy a bit early, which wasn’t educational in a sense but that almost came as a second thing because I had already applied to university.
“So when I got in I knew I wasn’t going to university!
“I applied to Loughborough, Brunel and Bath. Loughborough was a conditional offer, Brunel said they’d have me and I can’t remember if Bath ever got back to me.
@Sage what kind of centre mid would you reckon we need? We now have Dobson, Watson, Clare, Gilbey, Morgan and JFC when he's back from injury. That's six players to fill three central spots. Is a 7th centre mid necessary?
Would it be better to find a player who can play the 10 role but also slot into the wide areas if necessary? Feels like wingers have to be the priority now in my mind.
We need a creative midfielder who pulls the strings and chips in with 8 - 10 goals. We currently don’t have one. Without a playmaker I can’t see where enough goals are coming from. None of our current midfielders are prolific enough for a promotion team.
Once Gilbey got back into the side under Adkins, he scored three goals in nine appearances. I’d back him to get to ten this upcoming season.
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I though he was a dirty bastard hard working combative player who was effective against us.
What we need to add are more goals from elsewhere in midfield, an alternative to Stockley
Bit more from SC in this. I really like the sound of him.
Interesting background. Alongside Stockley, Washington and a few others, we have players who can give a decent post match interview now. Just a shame Scottie won't be there to hear we was the better team.
“I went to college. This was Year 11 in England, I was 16, 17 and I did my GCSE’s and from there I went to ‘football colleges’, you could say.
“I went to one in Walthamstow called Rushcroft, another one in Essex called Shenfield.
“I did a BTEC in Sport and Biology and did that as well as playing football.
“I went to the Nike Academy a bit early, which wasn’t educational in a sense but that almost came as a second thing because I had already applied to university.
“So when I got in I knew I wasn’t going to university!
“I applied to Loughborough, Brunel and Bath. Loughborough was a conditional offer, Brunel said they’d have me and I can’t remember if Bath ever got back to me.
In the last 20-years only three other teams have been promoted from League One with 100-points or more.
Powell's team have the second highest points haul in the entire history of this Division!!
That's your challenge Sean.