When Bielik is fit….

[Orphanram]

With Shinnie & Bird forming a decent partnership in midfield and Morrison taking the AM role in front of them (they do rotate a bit), what does the team look like when Bielik is fit? 

On the assumption he is back up to full speed and is a good as he was…

Does he come straight back in as the first choice midfielder?

Who drops out? 
 

 

[Boycie]

I fear bird will drop out.

I don’t think Morrison would handle being left out.

So it would be one headless chicken runner, Shinnie, one master crafts man, Bielik, and one flair player, Ravel.

[Taribo]

Unfortunately i think it'll be Bird dropping out for the three games Bielik is fit 

[IslandExile]

We might leave both of them out, go with one CDM (Bielik), and play an extra attacker.

[Bald Eagle's Barmy Army]

I can't wait to see this beast playing again.

Hopefully we see him training in the open session tomorrow. 

[Crewton]

I think it's more likely that Shinnie would be the casualty because, with Bielik in the team, we wouldn't need Shinnie's defensive strengths and Bird is the more creative player. 

[Jubbs]

I know Shinnie scored at the weekend but personally think he's been pretty average recently, so I could see him coming out.

[Ghost of Clough]

Bielik in for Shinnie which allows Bird to play further forward, in a similar role to the one Hughes used to have for us.

A fully fit team being something like this:

Roos
Byrne   Jagielka   Davies   Buchanan
Bielik
Bird              
                  Ravel      
Knight                      Lawrence
Kazim

[WoollyJumper]

22 minutes ago, Taribo said:

Unfortunately i think it'll be Bird dropping out for the three games Bielik is fit 

Bird dropping?

Oh poo.

[RadioactiveWaste]

I could see a bit of horses for courses going on between Bird and Shinnie with Bielik.

Drop bird you sacrifice some passing ability but Bielik makes up for it, sacrifice Shinnie and you sacrifice some battling and tackling, which Bielik makes up for.

I do think it'll mostly be bird who misses out and I think it's probably the right call, we're forging our team around scrappy underdogs who won't get beat and despite his limitations Shinnie is a big part of that.

[Sidd10]

Shinnie... who would make a great sub in the last 20/30 mins with his energy

[Ghost of Clough]

Davies/Jags ?

[i-Ram]

Bird is the best footballer we have in our team. Wouldn't drop him. Great prospect and at 21 nowhere near his full potential yet. I can't get too excited about Bielik yet. 1) He isnt going to be the same player for somewhile given his injuries. Mentally, he will be very wary of over extending himself. 2) He might be sold in January.

[Beetle]

It has to be Shinnie. Great to see him get the goal second half and go bananas but if we had another option he would have been pulled off at half time because he was dreadful first half. He needs to improve.

[MackworthRamIsGod]

Can he play upfront? In fact, I don't care if he can't, give it a go.

Actually, in all seriousness, when Bielik was at his best, we had the chance to try Bird further forward and it was just starting to pay dividends.

It could be what happens again.

Bielik fully fit isn't just the best CDM in our squad, he us probably the best in the division.

Edited October 25, 2021 by MackworthRamIsGod

[Dimmu]

Drop both wingers and go for a diamond. Jozwiak and Lawrence neither has hardly been an attacking threat, so it would be good time to try something new. I wouldn't play Bielik at the bottom though, I don't think he is that defensive. More of a proper midfield general.

Partner CKR with Stretton/Festy and leave room for attacking fullbacks. Especially Byrne, who is our most creative and dangerous player, should benefit from this. Also, at last Byrne would have some target in the box with CKR and hopefully Bielik as well. 

Bielik-Morrison combo sounds awesome. Interesting to see can they create good understanding and partnership.

[Carnero]

3 minutes ago, Dimmu said:

Drop both wingers and go for a diamond. Jozwiak and Lawrence neither has hardly been an attacking threat, so it would be good time to try something new. I wouldn't play Bielik at the bottom though, I don't think he is that defensive. More of a proper midfield general.

Partner CKR with Stretton/Festy and leave room for attacking fullbacks. Especially Byrne, who is our most creative and dangerous player, should benefit from this. Also, at last Byrne would have some target in the box with CKR and hopefully Bielik as well. 

Bielik-Morrison combo sounds awesome. Interesting to see can they create good understanding and partnership.

Nice idea, the only problem is you'd need to play one of the midfielders on the right of the diamond, in fact that should be Knight who'd play that role.

Still only leaves 3 slots then for Bielik, Bird, Shinnie & Morrison.

[Dimmu]

2 minutes ago, Carnero said:

Nice idea, the only problem is you'd need to play one of the midfielders on the right of the diamond, in fact that should be Knight who'd play that role.

Still only leaves 3 slots then for Bielik, Bird, Shinnie & Morrison.

I totally forgot Knight!  Goes to show we have options in the middle compared to the wingers... So, diamond actually would give us some options from the bench as well! Sibley or Knight could both take Morrison's place, depending who we play against. If we are desperate, then even Lawrence.

[Curtains]

I wouldn’t drop Bird for anyone sorry .

 

[Alty_Ram]

11 minutes ago, i-Ram said:

....I can't get too excited about Bielik yet. 1) He isnt going to be the same player for somewhile given his injuries. Mentally, he will be very wary of over extending himself. 2) He might be sold in January.

I think this is a very valid point. There is so much expectation because he looks absolute quality but we need to be wary of over-relying on his return to fitness and effectiveness. We've watched quality players before who never really recovered. Hopefully he will be back and strolling around bossing things but we need to just be a careful that we are not expecting too much too soon.

He's had such a long time out that only part of the challenge will be getting his body right. He's a lot younger than me but as someone who has had a bad knee injury it does play on your mind and even when I was back up and running I was aware that I was playing it a bit safe with any sports or exercise that I was doing. My physio helped me rebuild the structures around my knee and address some of the mental side but getting past it was a battle in the head as much as it was on the physio table or the gym. I still have a nagging doubt when my left leg is at full extension. 

Clubs employ sports psychologists to work on these things with players with long-term injuries but it is still going to be down to the individual to a degree and how they react and how mentally strong they are. We just don't know what kind of Bielik will return at the moment. Of course, it would be massive for us if he is anywhere close to what we saw in that purple patch so fingers crossed for him.