is Hassell going to start the season in centre of midfield.

We tend to focus more on the failures than the successes

Muller, JCR, Souza, Macken, De Silva, Foster and Steele all bought for relatively small fees and all very good Championship players. Im fairly certain Moore and Hume will be added to that list by the end of the season. But emphasis is placed on those that havent worked out for whatever reason. You're only as good as your last signing, it seems.

 

Moore

I'm worried. I think Davey will try and adopt a wing back formation just so he fits in. Unless we're playing against someone like Steve Howard, I think we'd be best to keep Souza and Foster as the centre backs.

 

Pragmatism

One of his better signings (DeSilva) was out, so instead of replacing with a midfielder, we used a defender. So why bother signing any others ?</p>

I'm trying to look at it from the point of view of Cryne underwriting all this.</p>

 

RE: Pragmatism

Andy Johnson may have been signed as the perfect midfielder with plenty of experience, but (and I'm not saying this is true, merely putting forward a scenario) what if that player then turns out to have a bad attitude, not keeping fit, out drinking, won't listen to the staff etc etc.

 

It's funny that

last season everyone thought he was too slow and couldn't pass.

Now he's Ronaldinho.

I'd rather have Togwell in that role but in my opinion niether are that good. However, they could probably do a better job than Hassell.

 

RE: Pragmatism

having heard some of the rumours from</p>

1. 'within the club'</p>

2. 'from the training ground'</p>

Not just a pinch, but a skip full of salt is needed imho. Certain players need more managing than others, but Johnson wasn't a young lad nobody knew about - he's a seasoned professional who I would have thought given Simon's 'contacts' we could've found out in advance about his ahem, 'bad attitude' etc.</p>

 

RE: Pragmatism

I'm assuming that his previous manager didn't give him a bad reference then.

Dear Mr Davey,

I am encouraged that you have decided to give Mr Johnson a job, he was a dutiful and hard working employee at our club. In no way was he a work-shy pisshead, any rumours on that front are purely paper talk. We have decided to drop all the fines owed to us by Mr Johnson for his 'exemplary' behaviour on our pre-season tour of Torremelinos.