duncanjwitham

Exactly. If you start Collins, you need "proper" wingers.  If you start Waghorn, you can afford to have players cutting in and running off him.  It's simple, simple stuff.

I'll have you as my assistant when I get the job.

You've answered your own question there...

You've answered your own question there...

Fikayo Tomori - not sure I've ever seen a player get caught so far out of position and get away with it so many times, because he could make up 10 yards on a striker without breaking a sweat.

Fikayo Tomori - not sure I've ever seen a player get caught so far out of position and get away with it so many times, because he could make up 10 yards on a striker without breaking a sweat.

Fikayo Tomori - not sure I've ever seen a player get caught so far out of position and get away with it so many times, because he could make up 10 yards on a striker without breaking a sweat.

In the last league game, 8 of the starters had played 100+ times at Championship level or higher (I.e. the league above where we are now), many of them significantly more times than that. The others being Wildsmith (who’s been excellent since he’s been here) and Cashin and Fornah (2 very good young players).  What “things of significance” do you expect them to have done? We have players who’ve got promoted out of this league. Players who’ve been promoted to the prem. Players who’ve been in the League One team of the year.  We are still a league one club, we aren’t going to be fielding a team full of current prem players.

Mate, have you seen the rest of the squad too! They’re all playing in League One as well! How terrible they must be!  Why oh why isn’t our squad full of current Championship players?
Back on track… Korey Smith, 7 consecutive seasons at Championship level before signing for us…

Prior to signing for us, he’d played 9 consecutive seasons at Championship level or higher…

We’re talking about England Internationals here, so “lower leagues” is anything below Prem IMO.  By your metric all of those players have played the majority of their careers at Championship or below, so are Championship-standard players.

Fikayo Tomori - not sure I've ever seen a player get caught so far out of position and get away with it so many times, because he could make up 10 yards on a striker without breaking a sweat.

Fikayo Tomori - not sure I've ever seen a player get caught so far out of position and get away with it so many times, because he could make up 10 yards on a striker without breaking a sweat.

I don’t know about you lot, but this England game is soooo entertaining that I’ve resorted to working out which of the current England team are “predominantly lower league” players, based on this thread.  I reckon at least 4 are - Watkins, Dunk, Johnstone and Bowen.

Fikayo Tomori - not sure I've ever seen a player get caught so far out of position and get away with it so many times, because he could make up 10 yards on a striker without breaking a sweat.

Fikayo Tomori - not sure I've ever seen a player get caught so far out of position and get away with it so many times, because he could make up 10 yards on a striker without breaking a sweat.

Fikayo Tomori - not sure I've ever seen a player get caught so far out of position and get away with it so many times, because he could make up 10 yards on a striker without breaking a sweat.

Fikayo Tomori - not sure I've ever seen a player get caught so far out of position and get away with it so many times, because he could make up 10 yards on a striker without breaking a sweat.

Fikayo Tomori - not sure I've ever seen a player get caught so far out of position and get away with it so many times, because he could make up 10 yards on a striker without breaking a sweat.

Fikayo Tomori - not sure I've ever seen a player get caught so far out of position and get away with it so many times, because he could make up 10 yards on a striker without breaking a sweat.

To be clear what I mean, I suspect he got a bit lucky in terms of inheriting a squad at Rotherham that was mostly set up to do what he wanted.  And all he had to do was get them doing it, and maintain the squad over the years.  And that worked, so he kept doing it.  I don't think he ever came close to the situation he walked into here, which was a squad built in completely the opposite style to what he wants.  A squad where no amount of telling them to work harder, run more and get it wide quickly is going to yield consistent results, because we don't have the legs in midfield, or the wide-players to cross consistently, or the physical presence up front or whatever.  Yet we keep trying to play that way anyway, so what's the alternative explanation?
Maybe, given enough time, he gets the squad he wants.  But I suspect he won't get it, because inconsistent results (particularly at home), poor quality football, all while at a lower level than the fans are used to, is not a recipe for patience.

I've seen enough managers do well at other clubs and struggle at Derby, and vice versa, to know that success doesn't always follow you from club to club.  Everything I can see on the pitch, and from what Warne says, is screaming to me that he has his "one magic trick to win football games", and it worked all the time at Rotherham (in League one anyway), and it's not really working here (often enough anyway), and he doesn't really understand why, but he's going to keep doing it anyway because that's all he knows.

Maybe it's just me, but if a player plays a bunch of games at League One level, then steps up and plays a bunch of games at Championship level, then steps up and plays a bunch at Prem level, that makes the player a Prem player.  Not a player who's spent most of his career in the lower leagues 🤷‍♂️.