brady1993

1 hour ago, BIllyD said:

It's also worth noting what he actually said

 

He also said this about the other forwards.

WR here. Very critical of the forwards today: “They have to want to score a goal. They need better movement. A desire to get across their man. We put some really good balls in today but our forwards...wasn’t good enough today.”

What's really really odd about these comments is Sibley gets what 5 minutes here, 5 minutes there shoved out wide and even when he does start and does well (Thinking of the Birmingham game particularly) he's prone to getting dropped anyway. What's he supposed to do ? Why is the onus on him to do something the minute he gets on the pitch but several players don't produce anything for weeks running and yet get pick regardless of form ? 

If one forward player isn't performing to their standards then it's on them, if all of them aren't then the problem lies elsewhere.....

14 minutes ago, Beetroot said:

Bird/Knight/Sibley could have 30+ games under their belts this season as a midfield 3, well on their way to becoming the most exciting partnership in the league. Watson coming through.

In that parallel universe would we have done any worse than we've done this season?

Instead we've got Knight being played all over the pitch and out of form, Bird and Sibley rotting on the bench.

We should do the decent thing and sell all three of them cheap to a club that knows how to use them.

Do any worse ? I'm convinced we'd be on more points....

Right now I think it's a bit tricky to know for certain. There are a lot of question marks and a lot of unknowns. So for know I'm going to cheat and name a side that I think has the highest potential and a side that is likely the most consistent. 

Firstly the most consistent:

                 Marshall

      Wisdom Davies Clarke

Byrne          Rooney         Buchanan

            Knight       Shinnie

                    Jozwiak

                    Waghorn 

I don't think it would be particularly exciting but I expect it would be functional and competitive in most games.

Secondly the highest potential:

                 Marshall

Byrne   Bielik  Clarke Buchanan

                    Bird

            Knight   Sibley

Ibe            Waghorn       Jozwiak

There are obvious question marks over this side that I won't belabour but I genuinely believe that side has the highest potential in terms of ability as a football team and I think something akin to this is what we should be working towards.

Based off what we've seen so far:

                Marshall 

Byrne Wisdom Clarke Forsyth

           Rooney   Bird

   Ibe         Sibley    Jozwiak

               Waghorn  

There's a few tricky areas and  I think it will change over the season.

Wisdom over Te Wierik as so far Wisdom has looked better there by a far bit so far but it won't be surprising if that changes.

Buchanan I think will replace Forsyth eventuall

Rooney/Bird is a best proven combination anyone putting Bielik in there is going off his theoretical potential not his actual consistency of performance for us so far. Again I won't surprised if he ends up in there but he needs to show it's worth dropping someone for.

Ibe is tricky because of his lack of recent playing time but I suspect will claim the rw birth and not let go. Jozwiak if he replicates his performance at Luton will be in the team every week.

The Sibley pick is the one I had to spend the most time thinking because I think both picking either him or Lawrence are built on a couple assumptions. Lawrence hasn't really played as a #10 for us much at all, the assumption is that the glimpses we've seen of him there and the occasional high performances from the wing will become more consistent played as a #10. With Sibley it's a case of can he demonstrate the kind of form he showed in his first handful of performances consistently with better attacking talent in the side to take the attention of him. Both are assumptions but I think the second scenario is actually more likely. If we can get Sibley regularly playing at around the level he showed against Millwall (or even a bit lower) then I think he would be the better player and I don't think it would be close, Lawrence has never come close to that kind of performance for us. I also think with how we play a 4231 we want more of a midfielder at #10. With all that said it's a close call either way.

Lastly this was honestly one of the easier picks. Waghorn > Mariott.

2 hours ago, Ambitious said:

I hope Lampard does a good job at Chelsea, not that I think he will. I personally don't think he will get the time to perform in what was already a really tough ask regardless. I think the only way he keeps his job is if he keeps within the top six. The next game is against Liverpool in the UEFA Super Cup. The first chance of silverware for Frank. I'd imagine that could end in a similarly bad way then you've got a tough home game against Leicester, who I imagine will have a lot of Chelsea fans expecting to win. 

I can see them losing their next two. 

To be honest it was why I was a little surprised he went. It seems clear he's the fall guy to ride out a season where they can't make transfers. 

7 hours ago, Premier ram said:

Dont ask me for names , but i think either in this window or if not defo in the summer we should be looking to bring in a Captain , this isnt a go at Keogh who has been very good so far this season , but i think we should be looking for a Van De Laan type player , somebody who can keep us playing and focussed for 90 mins , Chris Evans , over to you

I think that is very far down the priority list for transfers right now. We first need to get back to a squad with tactical cohesion first.

4 minutes ago, Nuwtfly said:

Just to be clear, we arguably only needed to bring in a new LW, an attacking midfielder and a LB on loan this window.

Instead we've brought in David Nugent and Julien De Sart.

Who is in charge of recruitment at this club? 

I'd actually argue that bringing in a new striker and a cover for DM was paramount this window. We desperately lacked a striker with an ability to help linkup with the midfield and so unless we could get Martin back we needed to recruit. Whilst Johnson was doing a decent job at DM, he can't control games like we need him to and if he got injured we'd be buggered because we need to allow Thorne time to get fit and shouldn't rely on that being the case.

You are right in that we need to improve LW and attacking midfielder but we have enough to cover these areas and the players playing there are doing an adequate job. A Lb on loan would have been reasonable but Olsson, Lowe and Anya were only short term injuries.

4 minutes ago, Nuwtfly said:

That sounds like a real stretch to me...

I'm not saying that is the case but it'd be very logical to do something like that. If the selling club thinks you're desperate for a midfielder they have a stronger position to negotiate for a bigger fee. It's like when club's announce that they've got a 'warchest' together to go to market with and suddenly find everyone is trying to charge them a premium.

1 minute ago, Nuwtfly said:

“At the moment, we are not active, we are not looking. If anything does develop, then fine, but I don’t see it at the moment.” 
 

Doesn't look like we are, which I find pretty puzzling. 

That could just be an attempt to seem disinterested to not make us look desperate to recruit when it comes time for negotiating.

3 hours ago, McLovin said:

If we can't get Martin then possibly Ulloa? Ranieri said in his press conference today that any unhappy players, including Ulloa can leave if they want to.

Agreed. If Martin can't come back then Ulloa is who'd I go after next. The other target I'd look at would be Afobe.