Despite the euphoria of yesterday it's still going to be very difficult to avoid the drop. We're in a horrible position, I really hope you can get us out of it. I understand you know far more about football than I do, but if we're all in this together then I guess we're allowed to give our opinions. Please don't get any loan players in. Please. I don't think anyone believes our current crop of players can win the league. They'll not win us promotion, they'll not get us in the play-offs and they'd really struggle to maintain a top half of the table position. But I do think, with the right management, they have enough about them to avoid relegation. If yesterday is anything to go by then they've certainly got the fight for it and that is half the battle. And it's not like we're low on numbers, the squad is plenty big enough. The players at this club care about relegation. It's a matter of personal and professional pride to them. From what I've seen from loan players over the years, the same cannot be said of them. There's been the odd exception, but 90% of the loan players I have seen over the years have been a complete waste of time and money. They don't care what happens to the club. They're either trying to get fit so they can get back in to the side at their parent club, or simply going through the motions in order to pick up a wage. We don't need that, we need players to fight. If we're going down it will be far more palatable if that happens despite our best efforts rather than because we are carrying a number of players who simply don't care. Anyway, best of luck.
Agreed - the likes of Dawson, Perkins, O'Brien, Dagnall, Harewood etc care passionately about retaining the club's status in the Championship and keeping them fit will be crucial to having a chance of avoiding the drop. Most loan players simply don't have the same edge; of the recent ones only Tudgay really seemed to be worth the money, the others go through the motions but know ultimately it won't affect them...
100% agree with all of that unless a loan player was actually from Barnsley, then he might have his local passion.
I think new signings are needed..if it's loans then so be it..... Don's stated twice in the past few Weeks (or same interview repeated ) it I'll be loans...and I understand your reluctance, but the previous loans have no bearing on future deals,this is where filker earns his dosh..
I would be delighted if the long term plan were to avoid loan players altogether for the reasons you give, but I think Flitcroft is going to have to do some business in the next couple of weeks. I personally don't think the current group is good enough to avoid the drop, even if he can get them giving the same level of effort as yesterday (which was an immense achievement). We may go down 'fighting' in the sense of giving 100% effort, but I don't think we'll be close to actually avoiding it. In particular, a forward is needed. It's highly unlikely that Harewood and Dagnall will both reach the same level of performance again together this year, because they both played out of their skins yesterday. I really, really hope Dagnall's goals give him the confidence to score more frequently, but the evidence to date suggests this still won't get us enough goals to give it a real go. In terms of the type of player you can get on loan, the key for me is getting the ones that have something to prove. Either they're young and need to show something to their parent club manager, or they're unlikely to get a new deal and need to put themselves in the shop window. Our most successful in recent years have been (IMO) Trippier and Hammill, both of which had evident quality and wanted to prove themselves, but ultimately were playing for clubs which they were never going to make it at. I definitely don't know enough about other clubs to give many names - less still to say if they're financially viable. But as a punt I'd say someone like Simeon Jackson at Norwich, who had a good record in the lower leagues, played a bit part in their promotion to the prem and rarely features nowadays. The longer they stay where they are, the more likely they are to buy 'proven' forwards, and the more likely he is to need to find another club. Like I say, he may be completely unrealistic, but he's the type of player I'd expect to need to prove himself if he went out on loan. Alternatively, you need someone who already has some affinity to the club, but that really only leaves Butterfield and Hammill. Flicker really needs to get this bit right, and for that reason I'm glad he's got the job. He doesn't need a month to assess the current squad first. He really needs to sit down this afternoon and decide whether the likes of Wiseman, Edwards, Collins, Cywka, Silva, Etuhu and Rooney are likely to be in his plans at any point in the future. If not, then he and the board need to try and shift as many as possible on ASAP in an effort to free up the funds to make just one or two signings which can improve us.
Good post Jay, I agree with you about the loans, but I do think that we need a top class finisher... or at least someone better than what we've got right now! Or then we can hope that Dagnall's two goals yesterday gave him a massive confidence boost, and he'll be scoring goals for fun from now on... I only get to listen to our games so I suppose I'm not qualified enough to have an opinion on this, but I understand that we've been creating quite a lot of chances at times lately, but our finishing has just been terrible. Yesterday we were banging our heads against the wall until we finally got that penalty, but the score could (and should?) have been 3-0 by that time already. Maybe we could bring Tudgay back on loan once he recovers from his injury... Wasn't there an option that we could sign him permanently at the end of the season anyway?
I don't think we have been creating that many chances. We have plenty of the ball in almost every game, but not in the final third of the pitch. I thought we created more good chances yesterday than in any game at Oakwell since the last time we played Leeds. We've missed some good chances, every club does, but that wasn't what I would consider our major problem. I thought it was creating good ones in the first place. Yesterday we played at a higher tempo and were much more direct than we have been at any time during the past 12 months. It was no surprise to me that this resulted in far more chances and a brace of goals for the first time at Oakwell in almost a year.
Aye, the more chances you create the more chance you have of scoring, the more time spent in final third gives more opportunity to create a chance. Two or 3 goals to the good then they can play tippy tappy showboating to their hearts content. Result first and performance second not the other way round. Hill went abart it arse end up in his last 12 months.
