Players I reckon will be off...

Do you honestly believe we're going to sell a number of our first team players and not bring in any replacements?

 

Tbf I hope both come good. Don’t think Oduor is trusted defensively but they can work on that. Halme just doesn’t seem ready maybe a loan would help both.

 

You never know. The bench could have Ritzmaier, Oduor, Schmidt, Christie Davies, Palmer, Walton, Brittain.

 

You don't have to be Paolo Maldini to pass a ball 5 yards to one of your team mates either. We did it quite a bit in the last 20 minutes and scored from passing football.

I'd argue we played much more ideologically to cover flaws rather than playing to strengths. I don't think we played to Styles, Dikes, Woodrows, Morris', Mowatts, Palmers, James', Chaplins (not exhaustive) strengths at all.

 

I didn't think that was a bad 11.

 

That's a politician's answer! You've answered a question I didn't ask.

 

I think the more interesting fact from that list is that 4 of the 12 are no longer at the club and another 3 of them spent time away on loan this season.

A couple of additional things we should consider:

• We didn't have a CEO during that pre-season. We now have Dane Murphy who seems to be clued up on the football side of things (Mowatt staying for the end of this season when in the past we would have probably pocketed the 800K from Millwall). In addition, our recent record of signing players has been good - Morris, Brittain & Helic are 3 of the 4 last permanent signings (can't comment on Kitching due to injury) we've made and all would make our strongest first team.

• We allowed the manager at the time to sign players that he wanted and unfortunately he wasn't the best at talent spotting - Bahre, Radlinger, Wilks and Thomas were reported to be his players and all were (or have to date) been found wanting at Championship level. One of the refreshing things I've liked about Val is that he trusts the club to recruit for him and personally I would like this approach to continue.

My personal viewpoint is that Mowatt will leave as he's out of contract. I also think that Woodrow will go as he's probably got a clause in his contract that will be met. Other than that, the only other outgoings will be for silly money as the club have everyone else on long contracts and maybe one would be accepted to balance the books and refresh the squad. If Dane is to believed, then we have an option on Dyke which I hope the club try to exercise - I don't think he'll sign as he'll probably have 'other' options but I hope the club do their best to sign him.

 

Truthful answer is no but I can take solace that the potential departure's won't decimate our team this time and any incomings would be gratefully received.

 

Morris has never scored as many goals in a season so I don't think that's true.

Under struber we struggled to get the ball to move from defence to midfield mowatt dropped too deep we played the football in our own half too much. Vals was quite the opposite but it got results to finish 5th with the 3rd smallest budget is some achievement one of the biggest I've witness at oakwell. If he does leave we have plenty of fans on the bbs who will be able to get down and show the lads how to play to the players strengths and get us promoted good to know.

 

I didn't see much of it, but Struber seemed to have a style that retained the ball much more, but at times it lacked teeth. It didn't help him lambasting the strikers every week over the latter part of his stay, but such is life. Ismael has a style that is much less about football and more about territory and the quality of possession we have (not quantity) is very poor.

Morris has hardly played and suffered a horrible injury that put him out for a long time, but its evident he's got bundles of confidence and ability when the ball is at his feet, while he also provides enough aerial presence to be a nuisance. Dike, was often pointing for the ball in behind that didn't always come. Woodrow looks for cut backs or to drop slightly deeper to engineer shooting chances.

We were horrible to play against and that assisted defensively. But it didn't help us attacking wise. Fuse Ismaels side at set pieces and defensively with a bit of Strubers desire to retain the ball once its won back and Stendels attacking ethos and you might have a Barnsley side that rivals the great DW's.

 

I think under Stendel, Struber and Val we've had three interpretations of the same system. If Val does leave in the summer. I reckon we could get another boss who takes it a step further or cherry picks the best bits from the above.

 

Its easy to retain the ball if your playing possession football in your own 3rd teams will often let you because you aren't a threat. In strubers 5 games this season before he went we scored one goal a woodrow pen away at boro and he didn't get a single win to his name.

Morris has had his best ever goal return from a season and he has only played half a season for us. I know he has had injurys but he will be very pleased with how its gone here.

We have just finished 5th with the 3rd lowest budget in Championship massively overachived. To build on this we need to retain the players and staff add a few more players and give val a full season imo.

 

But you're comparing extremes. Vals mega hoof, versus insipid possession.

Theres no reason at all not to play more football and use the ball better. I'd hope, if Ismael is still here, that the main work goes into using the ball more wisely. Even if we only doubled the amount of football we played (and its a very low base, granted) it would make a much more enjoyable watch, and I think we might actually look like scoring more too without compromising defensively.

But we'll see what happens next season once we see what coach and players we're faced with.

 

Not really strubers football was possession based very defensive and boring to watch. Struber was also criticised for not playing to woodrows strengths 2nd half of last season when he was struggling to score apparently playing him too deep. I think val will be gone this summer sounds like that with his interviews the owners will get a few million and get the next head coach in.

 

I don't think you're seeing there's a middle ground. Watch Wycombe away again if you get chance.

 

I agree with your point Marc about changing the way we recruit this post season. For me,the squad needs rejuvenating and a lot of the players moved on. It's not a popular view but it helps maintain and build success.
The players that are brought in should have a higher skill level in key areas. For instance, we need a Left back,a Midfielder who can pass and maintain the tempo of the game. Upfront we are short of ability barring Morris and Woodrow. Is it unreasonable to think how much better we might have done if Keifer Moore and Jacob Brown had been in a front 3?.
Off the top of my head I would replace Adebayo,Chaplin,Freiser,Halme, all of the players loaned out, Oduour, B Williams and one of the goalkeepers.
Brutal,I admit but isn't it what we abd other sports teams do? Good examples might be Tottenham, Burnley,Liverpool, Sheffield United.
Valerian alluded to in his interviews about not having the quality, I believe he is correct. Next season will be a much more difficult season in the Championship than this. As well as the team has done this season, without improving and strengthening, they will struggle. Look at the teams coming down,they are miles better than the ones going up.
I'm not meaning to be controversial or cheese anyone off but now is the time to improve and strengthen not 2022.

 

Even your best players eventually become stale because they've been in the building too long.

 

I can see the point but people saying were not playing to all these players strengths is total ******** asif we could have done better if we had a diffrent style. We haven't played to woodrows strengths for the past two managers according to some on here. We just finished above bournmouth and Cardiff who have miles better more expensive squads on paper. Just enjoy the season we had best for 21 years minght be another 21 before we get close to it again.

 

I enjoyed winning. I didn't enjoy us inviting pressure v Wycombe when if we'd stuck to our guns we could have had 6.

 

Assuming we're still playing 3-4-3, I think it will be Kitching in the back three with Andersen and Sibbick, a new left wing back and Woodrow up front with Morris and Chaplin / Frieser.

The first 11 won't be too bad, the quality of backup won't be great though. We've been fairly lucky with injuries this year compared to a number of other clubs, so hasn't been an issue yet.