Are our players as good as most think ??I

[Chris_Martin]

56 minutes ago, Hector was the best said:

We need ( for the older audience ) a Willie Carlin, Barry Bannan, type midfielder with some bite and skill.

Bring in whatever player you want, but if the tactics are get the ball out wide and hoof it into the box over and over until it falls to you. It's not gonna make any difference

[oomarkwright]

4 hours ago, jimtastic56 said:

We have a problem . To get a striker in January to shoot us up the table will take cash . Cashin and Bird are running their contracts down and having mediocre seasons. The chances of getting £2 mill, like we did for Knight , are looking very slim.

J Lingz is still available. 😁

[jimtastic56]

45 minutes ago, Premier ram said:

Bird and Cash mediocre?

 

              

Didn’t think Benny Hill was p c now , 😜 but I said “ mediocre seasons”.

[Hector was the best]

24 minutes ago, Anag Ram said:

I’d agree that Cashin hasn’t been at his best. Bird is a class above the players around him which makes him look less effective.

True, however he is to lightweight.

[DCFC Kicks]

6 minutes ago, Hector was the best said:

True, however he is to lightweight.

The general conclusion seems to be that we have good technical players who aren't overly athletic or physical. So why not play a system which favours more technical players? No because our manager wants to play the complete opposite 

[jimtastic56]

5 hours ago, Hector was the best said:

True, however he is to lightweight.

Just got home , really pleased for Max . The challenge is to keep it up. Let’s not make it a year before his next goal . Barnsley at home would be great.

[IslandExile]

"Are our players as good as most think ??"

Max Bird is.

[Ghost of Clough]

19 hours ago, DCFC Kicks said:

Everyone keeps saying we need a striker. Is this striker going to just create chances for themselves? I’m not sure what any striker is supposed to do if we continue to play this way. I agree with Phil Brown on Waghorn being an excellent striker at this level. He’s somehow managed 6 goals in 11 starts.

Our entire offensive play for the first 10 games of the season involved giving the ball to NML in RWB and hope he does something. In recent weeks we’ve resorted to simply long balling it and hoping our players can out fight the defender and it might fall to someone. What is a new striker meant to do?

In terms of chance creation, we aren't far behind the leaders, with the same top 6 for shots

However, we're mid-table for open play chances created and shot accuracy. Those two could be linked, as set piece chances are typically headed efforts or with a lot of bodies between the attacker and the goal. This is backed up by us being 10th for open play xG. This is something I would be looking to improve on.

I would say our main issue is attacking depth. Rest a couple of players (eg. Waghorn and Bird) and we're struggling to find creativity/goals. Prior to last night, only Bird, Waghorn, Mendez-Laing, Collins and Hourihane were statistically high attacking contributors from open play. Cashin was actually 5th in our squad for xG and ahead of Collins for xA.

I would look at someone like Demitri Mitchell, to add much needed depth at LWB and LW (dependant on formation). With only 6 months on his deal and Exeter destined for the drop, I think he'd be available on the cheap, maybe even in a deal similar to Fornah or Wilson.
Dan Kemp is an odd one. His contract expires at the end of the season and was loaned out by MK Dons to Swindon, but has been one of the best players in the league this season. 8 goals and 4 assists from AM, which is why I would also look into signing him to compete with our AM options.
Ali Al Hamadi is having a decent start to the season (4 goals and 5 assists) for Wimbledon and is still only 21. We had him on trial with our U21s, but any chances of us signing him disappeared when we entered admin. Contracted until 2025, but one to keep an eye on.
In the meantime, I would enquire about Callum Marshall (West Ham) until the end of the season. I've mentioned him before, but he's now on 13 goals and 2 assists in 8 games (2 goals in 90 mins vs Bristol Rovers in the Pizza Cup)

[MadAmster]

"Are our players as good as most think ??"

They all were last night. Now, let's see that on a consistent basis.

[DCFC Kicks]

3 hours ago, Ghost of Clough said:

In terms of chance creation, we aren't far behind the leaders, with the same top 6 for shots

However, we're mid-table for open play chances created and shot accuracy. Those two could be linked, as set piece chances are typically headed efforts or with a lot of bodies between the attacker and the goal. This is backed up by us being 10th for open play xG. This is something I would be looking to improve on.

I would say our main issue is attacking depth. Rest a couple of players (eg. Waghorn and Bird) and we're struggling to find creativity/goals. Prior to last night, only Bird, Waghorn, Mendez-Laing, Collins and Hourihane were statistically high attacking contributors from open play. Cashin was actually 5th in our squad for xG and ahead of Collins for xA.

I would look at someone like Demitri Mitchell, to add much needed depth at LWB and LW (dependant on formation). With only 6 months on his deal and Exeter destined for the drop, I think he'd be available on the cheap, maybe even in a deal similar to Fornah or Wilson.
Dan Kemp is an odd one. His contract expires at the end of the season and was loaned out by MK Dons to Swindon, but has been one of the best players in the league this season. 8 goals and 4 assists from AM, which is why I would also look into signing him to compete with our AM options.
Ali Al Hamadi is having a decent start to the season (4 goals and 5 assists) for Wimbledon and is still only 21. We had him on trial with our U21s, but any chances of us signing him disappeared when we entered admin. Contracted until 2025, but one to keep an eye on.
In the meantime, I would enquire about Callum Marshall (West Ham) until the end of the season. I've mentioned him before, but he's now on 13 goals and 2 assists in 8 games (2 goals in 90 mins vs Bristol Rovers in the Pizza Cup)

I'm not sure how squad depth affected the game at Stevenage or any in recent weeks. We've had all the key players you mentioned available, apart from Waghorn occasionally, for a while now.   

In terms of transfers, doesn't it all depend on what formation we're going to be using? We still don't know if Warne has permanently changed to a back four, or if he still wants to eventually go back to the back three.

The squad doesn't make much sense. E.g. - Ward's crossing ability is too good to be left out but he's not going to play at RB, and he doesn't look like a RW. Wilson is similar.  

[RoyMac5]

I looked at some last season Rosenior line-ups and was surprised to find that we started out playing like last night (4-3-3) and ended up playing like early this season (5 at the back)! I still think this is an overall good squad - Washy proved that old adage 'feed the fish and he will score'. Is that right? 😄

It's playing to the strengths of the players is all. #simples

[Ghost of Clough]

21 minutes ago, DCFC Kicks said:

I'm not sure how squad depth affected the game at Stevenage or any in recent weeks. We've had all the key players you mentioned available, apart from Waghorn occasionally, for a while now.   

In terms of transfers, doesn't it all depend on what formation we're going to be using? We still don't know if Warne has permanently changed to a back four, or if he still wants to eventually go back to the back three.

The squad doesn't make much sense. E.g. - Ward's crossing ability is too good to be left out but he's not going to play at RB, and he doesn't look like a RW. Wilson is similar.  

For Stevenage, DM, RW and CF were all depth problems.
DM - Whilst Fornah is a Warne type player, he is still inexperienced and prone to being inconsistent. No suitable DM
RW - We started with a RWB at RW because we don't have depth on the wings
CF - Waghorn is our best forward and was injured. Whilst Washington will do very well against some opponents (such as last night), he will struggle agaisnt others (such as Stevenage)
I would also add LB to the list, due to Elder being unavailable for most of the season so far and an aging Forsyth struggling to play every game.

Formation would be a factor, but we currently have 2 wingers contracted until the end of the season. We either get rid, or continue to use a formation which gets the most out of our squad (ie play with wingers). The players I suggested wouldn't be affected by formation changes.