I'd love us to keep Jennings, Cranie, O'Grady & Steele however I can't see Cranie staying as he's not under contract. I could see the team looking like this next season: Steele New RB Hassell Nyatanga Kennedy O'Brien Dawson Digby Jennings O'Grady Rose Subs: Dibble New Defender M'Voto Woods RNL Cwyka New Striker I'm realistic enough to realise that Mellis & Cranie will be off as will McCourt. Cranie would be a big loss but I wouldn't be worried about losing Mellis or McCourt as neither have the consistency needed if we're looking at a promotion challenge. Unfortunately we won't be able to move Kennedy on so he's in the team, though I think he'd be ok at that level. Dawson would do well in league one like he did for Orient. I'd like to think Cwyka would stay & if Jennings is sold he could have a massive role. It'd be a great chance for the youngsters to excel. Frimpong, Ramage, Hunt, Proschwitz, Pederson will all go & won't be back. I don't think the team above could win the league but I reckon they'd be top half & push for the play offs
Interesting that you mention Foster. He's currently without a club. Surely he's worth a short-term deal whilst Cranie/Ramage are out. Failing that, I'm happy to come in and play centre half instead of M'voto.
Cranie has another year on his contract, but surely somebody will come in with a decent offer for him.
Good call. The decision to let him go looks like a bit of a bungle now, unless he was injured or there was something else we didn't know about.
Unfortunately mate, he has retired. He hasn't been training so he'll be miles off the pace. Ramage and Cranie would obviously be the first choice partnership even if Foster was here, but give me Foster as back up over what we've got any day of the week.
Only history can eventually tell us whether we overestimated, right now we haven't a clue how they would do in L1. You could be right, but they could also rip it up and win the title with 100pts.
Absolutely, you're bang on with that. It's just that most teams go down thinking they'll do very well in that league and very few do. We might do well, we might not, but I don't think it's irrelevant that last time we thought we'd do well and didn't. I think it serves as a warning not to be complacent.
Not sure about that. Donny, Posh Scunny for a while, all seemed capable of doing well after relegation, Wolves this season too. No reason why that can't be us. I would say it's no more or less than 50/50. Plenty of clubs have struggled too, we can agree on that.
I think a lot would depend on the manner of our relegation. If this team doesn't have the stomach for a relegation dog scrap then they've probably not got it in them for a promotion push next season. Factor in the possibility that we're looking for a new manager at the end of the season and we won't have an ideal pre-season to build and gel the squad which in all probability will bear only a passing resemblence to this season's squad. I think promotion back to the Championship is unlikely.