How many of the squad would you keep?

[RadioactiveWaste]

We kept a hold of Bogle, that was a key part of the summer business. As was bringing in Beilik - two key pieces of business.

I remain lukewarm on the Rooney thing, OK commercially it makes sense but I can just see it turning out "OK but nit amazing" a higher profile Darren Bent (different player, but you catch my drift).

The rest, just trying to keep fielding a competitive side without ploughing a ton of money in. They're a bit mediocre but there's some good players in the squad.

I'd give it til the new year, but even then, I'm always worried about signings in January, we never seem to get a good deal.

 

[Ramslad1992]

6 hours ago, Ghost of Clough said:

Easier to say who we won't keep: Hamer, Wisdom, Davies, Clarke, Forsyth, Huddlestone Thorne, Dowell, Paterson, Anya, Martin.

Wisdom being the only one we're likely to receive a fee for!

Whatever fee (if any) we receive for Wisdom will be nominal at best. I’m not saying he’s rubbish but if a club wants him they will know we don’t and will know getting him off our wage bill will be incentive enough, I’d be amazed if we got over 500k.

[Shaftesbury st]

On 29/08/2019 at 00:03, IslandExile said:

Lots of discussion on how we have a weaker squad than last year. I agree with that though, unlike some, I'm patient enough to wait for the academy players to develop.

I do think we were spoilt by the three loanees last year; they partly masked the poor quality in other areas.

So, considering the squad as a whole and the first team in particular (versus WBA, not that against Forest), how many would you retain in the side if you could bring in other players from the teams at championship level?

Bielik, Marriott, Bogle.

Keogh? Waghorn? Lawrence?

I admire you’re patience, personally I don’t feel I should have to be that patient after splashing out without question year on year for four season tickets, I think we deserve more. 

We went to Wembley last year so I think we should be around that process again this time round, yes we lost players on loan but we should be ensuring we get replacements either via loan or transfer to ensure we compete at that level again, obviously we don’t really know for sure yet if what we have is enough but most seem to think not, I am 50/50 at present. 

In terms of being patient for academy players to develop, well how long is a piece of string ?. Like the look of Knight, Buchanan and Sibley, the latter should be included in the squad most weeks on what I’ve seen but we need more.

I do feel with Rooney coming in January that could be the lift we need, we always crash in that window and miss the chance to freshen up, add another couple and who knows where that could take us. 

[Spanish]

13 hours ago, Marriott Ram99 said:

Keogh, Bogle ,Bielik and Marriott are the only players I would be bothered about keeping, other than that I'm neither here nor there on quite a few.  Waghorn, Roos, and Lawrence could be a key part of the team obviously, but at the same time I am not seen enough from them on a consistent basis to warrant me being too assed if they left, as savage as that sounds they could be replaced with similar players without spending more than about £4 or 5mill. Players like Shinnie, Paterson ,Dowell we can't judge yet even though Dowell has been poor he might come good. Obviously we have young players like Knight and Sibley coming through but it's too early to judge if they will be good enough to start week in week out. Rooney again how the hell can you judge him yet? To put him down as a squad player and Lawrence and Lowe who is unproven as core players seems questionable, people seem to assume he will be coming here unfit and unable to start many , when Eustace at a similar age with much less talent was a key player for us.

Last season I posted a not good enough list.  It wasn’t about moaning about a particular player just my view about who needed to be replaced to take us to the promised land.  There was also a bit about getting rid early enough to get some money back.  Your post is very similar so I obviously approve ?

TL is not consistently good enough and sadly needs to be moved on as long as we get proper money for him.  He can be superb just not often enough.  Waggy has confirmed he isn’t quite good enough close but no cigar.  Roos is more of a find someone better category

[Bubbles]

If we had the money to actually spend on a new(ish) team I'd like something like this (taking budget into account)

Roos/New GK

               Bogle   Keogh   Cooper*(Millwall)   Lowe

Bielik

                      Knight   Stoger*(Dusseldorf)

Bowen*   Marriott   Sinclair*

* - indicates the players contract to expire at the end of the season, targeted these players as they'd be a little bit cheaper to purchase if we can't do what we did with shinnie (sign them pre contract). 

Scott Sinclair I put there mainly because regardless of what people say he is a good player and even if he isn't it finally gives Lawrence a bit more competition.

[BathRam72]

10 hours ago, Tyler Durden said:

I'm slightly disappointed with this summer's recruitment, I think the addition of Rooney has moved the attention away from the fact that our summer business was mediocre at the best. Some of the late additions such as Hamer and Paterson just seem to be making up the numbers rather then replacing existing with better quality 

To answer your question I would really only keep Keogh, Bogle, Bielak and Marriott, I haven't included players like Knight in this until they consistently get a run in the first team.

 

 

Interesting that you say this. Because I don't consider a couple of games for Beilik as a run of first team performances, and although he shows promise he certainly hasn't settled yet.

[rammieib]

Top Two: Keogh, Marriott, Waghorn, Bielik, Bogle

Top Six: Holmes, Clarke, Forsyth (Assuming old form)

Mid Table: Lawrence, Huddlestone, Dowell, Evans, Malone, Lowe, Davies, Roos, Shinnie, Hamer, Paterson, Wisdom

Relegation: Bennett, Flojo

I'll leave Knight and Sibley out of the above - both have great careers ahead of them. Buchanan I'm sitting on the fence.

Bird and Whittaker I don't think will make it.

And the above is exactly why we will finish mid table.

[IslandExile]

1 hour ago, rammieib said:

Relegation: Bennett, Flojo

I agreed with most of that but not about Bennett but that's for another thread ? I also think FloJo could improve

Your formatting illustrates exactly what I was trying to ask - what level of quality are the players we have? Who is good enough to play in a team that wins promotion automatically?

One player you didn't mention that I think should fall into the promising youngster category is Jayden Maitchell-Lawson (JML).

[RandomAccessMemory]

4 hours ago, Shaftesbury st said:

I admire you’re patience, personally I don’t feel I should have to be that patient after splashing out without question year on year for four season tickets, I think we deserve more. 

We went to Wembley last year so I think we should be around that process again this time round, yes we lost players on loan but we should be ensuring we get replacements either via loan or transfer to ensure we compete at that level again, obviously we don’t really know for sure yet if what we have is enough but most seem to think not, I am 50/50 at present. 

In terms of being patient for academy players to develop, well how long is a piece of string ?. Like the look of Knight, Buchanan and Sibley, the latter should be included in the squad most weeks on what I’ve seen but we need more.

I do feel with Rooney coming in January that could be the lift we need, we always crash in that window and miss the chance to freshen up, add another couple and who knows where that could take us. 

The thing is every fan of every club could say the same as your first point, and we've had a lot more for our money than most of them recently.

I do think the late change of manager made recruitment this summer more difficult, I think if we hadn't changed manager, it had occurred much earlier or the window wasn't shortened (this was the first one that we couldn't at least do loans until the end of August/beginning of September) then things might look a little different right now because we'd be further along in the process.

Cocu had a limited amount of time to assess the squad and find its strengths and weaknesses, I think he wanted to give everyone a chance to show what they could do during pre season, which is a good thing in the long run. I like that we've not been panicked into signings and ended up with people for the long term that aren't the right fit for what we need, in the past those signings that don't work out have cost us too much money for too many years in terms of the wage bill, it seems like we've learnt a lot from that and are finally getting it under control.

I agree, I hope Rooney can be the lift we need at that point in the season. We've seen a lot of teams make some really important signings in January when we normally look a bit haphazard, but Cocu will know the squad much better by then and will have had plenty of time to plan any further signings, so hopefully that works in our favour, providing we have the funds.

Ultimately everyone wants us to be successful, and we all have different thoughts about what it's going to take to get there, I feel the one thing we've not had for a very long time is some stability (it's not always been anyone at the club's fault - the last two managers have left of their own accord) let's see if we can have some of that this time and see where it takes us.

I think one of the reasons I find him blooding the youth and not panic signing players as a quick fix so refreshing is because I believe it shows that he is planning to be here for the long haul. I get the impression from his interviews that he's quite methodical in the way he works and that he's not just out to make his CV look good by making sure he's got all of the best players at his disposal without thinking about the long term implications for the club, he wants to make sure he gets it right and build us a squad.

[admira]

On ‎29‎/‎08‎/‎2019 at 01:14, Jourdan said:

To go (11): Hamer, Paterson.

Wow, a little early to judge don't you think? Give them a chance at least!

 

 

[Ghost of Clough]

Cocu clearly doesn't like Scots so I think we'll see them all leave asap. He isn't putting any in the team - Shinnie, Forsyth, Anya and Martin. Then he made us sell Macdonald, turned down the chance to sign Scott Sinclair, and to top it off, humiliated Scott Malone by replacing him with a child.

[Jourdan]

1 hour ago, admira said:

Wow, a little early to judge don’t you think? Give them a chance at least!

From what I can gather, both players were signed on transfer deadline day as ‘emergency’ loan signings simply to provide the squad with extra cover.

Maybe you are right and maybe they will take their chance, play well and force their way into Cocu’s plans in the long term.

But given Paterson is 28 and Hamer is 32 this year and the Championship is seemingly the extent of their ceilings, it’s safe to assume these two were signed as stop gaps, players to plug a few holes in the squad, and not with the future in mind.

Time will tell.

[rammieib]

4 hours ago, IslandExile said:

I agreed with most of that but not about Bennett but that's for another thread ? I also think FloJo could improve

Your formatting illustrates exactly what I was trying to ask - what level of quality are the players we have? Who is good enough to play in a team that wins promotion automatically?

One player you didn't mention that I think should fall into the promising youngster category is Jayden Maitchell-Lawson (JML).

Honestly not seen enough of him to comment. Hasn't looked scared the two times he has come on the pitch for us which is a plus.

[NottsRam77]

On 29/08/2019 at 21:24, Jourdan said:

I don’t know how much input Cocu had into the signings, but it is concerning at the half baked nature of our recruitment. For me, Hamer, Dowell and Paterson don’t really improve us or really suggest that they are going to make much of a mark here.

Of course, they could yet prove me wrong. At the same time last year, I didn’t see the value in of half of Lampard’s signings either.

As for the rest? Not bad players, just probably in need of a fresh start for both us and them.

Agree mate 

U could argue that while his loan signings were ultimately a success for us Lampard permanent ones as u correctly put it were certainly more half baked

malone , joflo very much have the jury still well and truly out on them ... Marriott looks a cracking signing 

but I do wonder if we should have shaken up the recruitment team when we changed managers 

just food for thought 

[Jourdan]

1 hour ago, NottsRam77 said:

Agree mate 

U could argue that while his loan signings were ultimately a success for us Lampard permanent ones as u correctly put it were certainly more half baked

malone , joflo very much have the jury still well and truly out on them ... Marriott looks a cracking signing 

but I do wonder if we should have shaken up the recruitment team when we changed managers 

just food for thought 

At this time last season I think we had made nine signings.

At the time, I felt confident and excited about 3-4 of them. Mount, Wilson and (funnily enough) Jozefzoon. Brentford usually sign good players for this level. Marriott too obviously had an excellent track record at Peterborough which had caught everyone’s attention.

The big question marks were over Waghorn, Malone, Evans, Holmes and Tomori.

Waghorn - did we really need another forward?

Malone - was he better than Forsyth and why not give Lowe a chance instead?

Evans and Holmes - what were their best positions and where would they fit in?  

Tomori - isn’t he too raw?

I would say Mount, Wilson and Marriott did as many expected. Waghorn and Holmes grew as the season went on and proved how valuable they could be moving forward.

Tomori was very much the success story of Lampard’s signings. Lampard’s best signing, in my mind. No one watching his debut v Leeds could have predicted what was to follow.

Evans and Malone haven’t done badly but we are probably still asking the same questions. It’s only really Jozefzoon that has completely failed to live up to expectations.

It will be interesting to see how Cocu’s signings get on. Maybe Hamer, Dowell and Paterson will surprise us and do better than anticipated.

But the overwhelming feeling from me is that four of the six signings we have made are questionable. Add that to failures in previous windows and you’re right in saying that having a shake up of the recruitment team might not be a bad idea.

[NottsRam77]

15 hours ago, Jourdan said:

At this time last season I think we had made nine signings.

At the time, I felt confident and excited about 3-4 of them. Mount, Wilson and (funnily enough) Jozefzoon. Brentford usually sign good players for this level. Marriott too obviously had an excellent track record at Peterborough which had caught everyone’s attention.

The big question marks were over Waghorn, Malone, Evans, Holmes and Tomori.

Waghorn - did we really need another forward?

Malone - was he better than Forsyth and why not give Lowe a chance instead?

Evans and Holmes - what were their best positions and where would they fit in?  

Tomori - isn’t he too raw?

I would say Mount, Wilson and Marriott did as many expected. Waghorn and Holmes grew as the season went on and proved how valuable they could be moving forward.

Tomori was very much the success story of Lampard’s signings. Lampard’s best signing, in my mind. No one watching his debut v Leeds could have predicted what was to follow.

Evans and Malone haven’t done badly but we are probably still asking the same questions. It’s only really Jozefzoon that has completely failed to live up to expectations.

It will be interesting to see how Cocu’s signings get on. Maybe Hamer, Dowell and Paterson will surprise us and do better than anticipated.

But the overwhelming feeling from me is that four of the six signings we have made are questionable. Add that to failures in previous windows and you’re right in saying that having a shake up of the recruitment team might not be a bad idea.

Couldn’t have worded it bette myself mate 

great post, agree entirely 

[dcfcfan1]

not many of them tbh

[Ewe Ram]

At 16:30 on Saturday 31st August - non. Not one.