Yeah mad that a manager didn’t drop a completely inexperienced (at league level) player in the first team straight away…
It's difficult because they're entirely different players, playing completely different roles. But yes, Pinnock was as good at what he did as Glavin was at what he did. I rate Glavin immensely. As I do Pinnock.
Pinnock was fantastic. Some of my favourite players (Redders, Futcher, Baker, Glavin, McCarthy, Banks, Eaden, etc) we got to see over a few seasons or more, but Pinnock is in the list that includes Stones, Morris, Hignett, Hirst, Ward, Geddis, etc, who left us too soon. Edit - too soon for my liking, that is. I’m sure their bank managers didn’t think it was too soon!
He played in the first round of the league cup that first season and looked a bit ropey.....pleased he's come on a bit since then!
Yeah there are some posters on here that irrationally hate Hecky that use this as some sort of Gotcha.
He gave a speech at an awards ceremony at the end of the following season talking about how much of a step up it had been & that he was nowhere near it fitness wise.
We've been spoilt at centre half over the years. Pinnock is the closest I've seen to Futcher, who just shades it for me as all his games were at second tier level. Both players should have played for England. I have no idea if Pinnock was ever approached before committing to Jamaica, but if he wasn't it was pretty negligent.
But the defenders who were playing infront of him were shocking we were conceding for fun. Just saying how it was no digging anyone out. Didn't we then sign matt Mills on a free and play him and he was awful too. Posters on here was saying we had wasted 500k and the spreadsheet had signed him not hecky etc.
I'd still put De Zeeuw above Pinnock as good as Ethan was for us De Zeeuw was unreal and just shades it for me.
I didn't spot Pinnock's talent nearly as quickly as many people on here. I thought he was a good centre half but many people on here were gushing about him. I decided, at the next home game, I would make a concerted effort to watch everything Pinnock did. He was absolutely unbelievable. It wasn't just a case of not putting a foot wrong, every single thing he did was perfect. Unbeknownst to me, someone else on this BBS had thought and done the same, witnessed exactly the same immaculate performance and wrote it up on here. I went to most matches home and away that season and carried on watching Pinnock. He didn't make a mistake for about six months. He wasn't quite as classy as Futcher but he was very close. He was also much, much faster and wasn't nearly as prone to doing something completely mental.
I'd have loads above Pinnock, who was a bit lapsy daisy for us to say the least and always had a daft error in him by switching off. Far better than we have ATM though! De Zeeuw, Mawson, Stones, Shackell in his prime to name a few who I'd rather have. Good player and developed eventually but suggestions of England international quality, no way.
I think South Riding coined the term "Futcher's acts of random madness". They made me love him even more.