My view on squad, signings and league position

Should it be any surprise to us fans, when we see our current bottom 3 position, when we look at the facts facing us?

Last season we finished 4th bottom and stayed up, we deserved it over 46 games.

We then see club change both non and off the field and we swell with price and promise for the forthcoming season.
Problem is that we have signed the majority of players who are either injured or not ready for Championship football, meaning we are not that much stronger a squad than what finished last season.

Nyatanga not featured injured
M'Voto not enough Chamiponship experience, and it shows
McCourt not fit enough
Jennings not fit enough and has he got the experience
Cofie no experience, despite shining in U21 squad
Crainie was re-signed, but not fit
Pollit now injured (I don't view this as critical)

Only two players that look to be "plug and play" are Pedersen and Ramage (plus the re-signed COG).

Add to this, we have Perkins and Dawson playing well below par.

Not a major surprise to me where we sit in the table.

If I was manager, I would always be looking for my team to be majority experience with a hint of youth up-and-coming starlets. Flicker ain't done that as he?

Trim the squad with the likes of McNulty, Daggers, etc and bring in experience.

 

My view

It's f-cking w-ank.

Too many from last year resting on their laurels or unable to lift themselves to the heights of last season. Despite the manager's protestations to the contrary there is complacency in that squad, and we have not in any way shape or form been positive, except for an hour against Huddersfield, mainly due to RNL giving us an attacking option on the left flank, but of course he then gets dropped straight after. Which only gives ammunition to the argument that certain players are treated differently to others.

This season was always going to be a vastly different prospect to the '**** or bust' 20 game mini season that Flitcroft got us through last year. I hope that he's learning about piloting us through a full 46 game season, but the over cautious, tentative approach allied to picking a midfield that creates f-ck all will get us in bother and him the bullet.

 

Good post, at the end of the day we should be looking to finish above the teams with comparable wage bills - so the likes of yeovil, Doni, Charlton, Birmingham and Millwall and hope they don't over achieve.

 

Bang on, Wakey. First and foremost we need to finish top of our mini-league...you can add the S6 Massive to the list.

 

I don't understand why some expected us to do so much better this season, as well as we did 2nd half of last season most of the same players got us into the poor position in the first place, most of them nearly got us relegated the season before and most of em have got us in the same poor position again. Last season wasn't a average bunch of players suddenly realising they were so much better, it was an exceptional set of circumstances that resulted in what, for most of the season, looked impossible. This season isn't players resting on there laurels, its players simply showing that its extremely difficult if not impossible to recreate what they did last season.

 

Re: My view

I am a little puzzled with RNL, he clearly has the talent and can pretty much play anywhere except Goalie and centre-half, He's a no-brainer for left sided wing back in a 3-5-2, maybe there's more to that one then his output on matchday? but then ultimately that's all that counts.

 

Agreed but to finish the top of our mini-league we need to start playing with the passion and attack mindedness that saved our skins last season instead of the sidewards, backwards tip tap stuff that reminds us all of Flickers predecessor. Tactical changes needed for tomorrow.

 

Re: My view

Dunno, imho whenever he's gone on the pitch he's performed.

Wouldn't like to speculate, except to say if you're going to drop a player(s) and/or change formations from a team that has just beaten one of the form teams in the division then results had surely better justify it ? 2 losses does not.

 

Re: My view

I have to agree there, maybe there's too much overthinking going on? Rather then worry about the opposition so much, make them worry about us.

 

Re: My view

If we are constantly being told about the promise of Digby, Cofie, RNL, Rose and the like, where are they? At this rate they'll all be hacked off before they can secure a place. If they're not, there's something wrong.

And Flicker adopted a more direct style than Hill when he took over, with immediate results. This season we seem to be somewhere between the two.

As I've said before - change is needed in the playing personnel. And I'm still up for Warnock as DOF.

 

Those who constantly throw scorn on the recruitment policy fail to address the difficult question. That question is the same as it has been for the last 7 years. The question is how can the club improve the quality of the first team squad with one of the lowest budgets in the league. We all wish that our team could win more games and be higher up the league table, but the lack of success in recruiting players this Summer and Autumn has shown that even though the club is prepared to increase its budget and compete for better quality players, those players just do not want to play for us. It must be soul destroying for the management, that they work every hour they can, but they know that they can only do so much. There are problems with the abilities of many of our players, problems that the manager must attempt to cover up in our system. But he knows that there is a management team on the opposition bench who have now had time to find the faults in the games of our players and who have seen through the systems our manager uses to hide those faults. He knows he needs to strengthen, but he also knows how difficult it is to recruit, even though he is putting his heart and soul into it. When he looks behind him for support, he finds an increasingly large minority with short memories, who see explanations as excuses and for whom a losing manager is a soon to be ex-manager.

 

Do you believe we have a better squad this season than last? Because considering the recruitment of Ramage/Nyatanga/Pedersen/O'Grady/Jennings & the retaining of Cranie & Steele I do.

The problem is we have, in my opinion, the most 'Championship Experienced' squad we've had in years yet we're struggling because of mistakes Flitcroft is making. I believe we'll be fine but he needs to learn and we don't need anymore players.

 

Re: My view

Spot On

 

Agree with that Dys, he seems happy with his players and that they are on the whole doing what he requires of them, barring the odd set piece **** up.

Will he continue with it hoping it clicks into place of revert back to what was successful. I think we will be up and at em tomorrow or maybe I am hoping we will.

 

The Huddersfield game was great, however, we still only created two chances and two great finishes got us the points. Since then we scored a penalty and a wonder strike. That's it.

Quite simply we're not creative enough without Mellis or Cywka on the bench.

4-5-1

O'Brien/Jenning/Cywka playing out wide.
Mellis as Butterfield
O'Grady as O'Grady.

E.Z.

 

Good post within our budget we recruited well and have been unlucky with injuries and have in Flitcroft a very inexperienced manager. I'm relatively confident he will learn quickly and start picking a formation that suits the players we have.

 

Re: My view

Should be in the team we look stronger with him in it. Pretty inexplicable.

 

Am wi thi on that, width and Mellis.

 

Every player Flitcroft wanted to retain he has.

By and large the signings he wanted we have made. Sharp and FRyatt notwithstanding, but he signed Cofie, Pedersen, retained Scotland, COG and Dagnall.

He said it was RNL's 'time' and he now needed a run of games after the Hudds match - errr.

His other 'assurances' we can only assume have been met otherwise he wouldn't have signed up.

in short, he's had all he wanted and we're coming up to the end of Sept with 4 points on the board.

If we're talking about 'faults' with players now - then who the bleeding hell brought them here ?

He needs to buck his ideas up sharpish, otherwise the early season 'finding our feet' will turn into something more serious.

 

Of the players you have listed, Ramage has started only the last two games, Nyatanga has been injured all season, Pedersen has started only once, Jennings is not fit and Cranie has been injured for 50% of the games. Furthermore, Nyatanga's last club was relegated, O'grady's last club are as bad as us, Jennings has never played in this league and Cranie's last club was relegated. Even if I accepted your argument that we have strengthened, we have not spent the amount of money that others have done, so using your logic, many of the other teams in our league have strengthened with a better quality player than we have. I know all of this is a bit of a cheap shot, but equally you have not answered the question at the heart of my original post which was how can we improve the quality in our team with the lowest budget in the league when the better players we have targeted do not want to play for us.

Has Flitcroft made mistakes? Of course he has, loads of them. All managers do make mistakes, but Flitcroft's mistakes are compounded because his squad is not strong enough to bale him out. Do we need more players? No, but we do need better quality so there will have to be a turnaround. In some ways, it would have been easier if we had lost at Huddersfield. If we had gone down, there would have been a huge clear out. In the golden glow of the final game, there was a belief among the fans that we needed to keep the side together that had done so well in the second half of the season, and some players were retained who should have moved on. If this had been recognised at the time, then we would not currently have such a large squad. Is Flitcroft to blame for this situation? Of course he is, but he was encouraged along this path by the majority of the fans who overrated the players on the basis of their achievement and who believed that the squad could repeat the trick on an ongoing basis.

Unless you recognise that the club is trying to survive in this league with one of the lowest budgets, and that every year that we survive, we do so against the odds, then the inevitable consequence is supporter unrest and a constantly changing team manager. I take my current position every time our team manager comes under pressure from supporters, and I do so for the same reason every time.