Seen a few people saying 'if only we had a striker that was a combination of Bayo and Rajovic...' in recent weeks and would just like to point out we already have one on the books. Ashley Fletcher is as little of a goal threat as Bayo and as terrible in all round play as Rajovic. Bring him home.
Who would we get then though? Not sure anyone is going to get us playing an exciting brand of football each week tbh. And who knows what the squad will be like last season. I think people have enjoyed most of the football under Cleverley than under Ismael but most will know it's not going to be entertaining all the time. Yes we did seem to pass around the back too much at times in the first half - or rather passed it straight to Hull players!
We are crying out for a Danny Graham, Heider Helgusson, Mattie Vydra, Marlon King, Troy Deeney, type of striker, there must be at least one that we can afford out there, surely.
So how many goals did we score from Semas crosses ? Zero I suppose that was Lewis's fault also ! Changing the LB and expecting a different outcome from a strikeforce that can't score is the definition of madness
We proved ourselves that you don't *need* a 20 goal a season striker to get promoted out of this division (all you need is a record-equalling defence!), but in the last 3 seasons we've had in the Championship, the highest scorer we've had hit 13! Think the days of picking up someone like Deeney for £500k are over (perhaps there might be someone out of contract like Graham was?), even Helguson's fee of £1.5m isn't insignificant for us these days, think the most likely route to getting that elusive reliable striker is a loan from a Prem club
Lewis did put in 2 good crosses in the first half, I'll give him that, but Sema did more in the shorter time he had, it's just nobody was in the right areas for him or scuffed whatever chances came their way
I'd take him over a lot of other mid tier managers we'd be in the offing for. We aren't likely to attract the quality of manager who'd be considered top tier for this division currently (To tout @LouOrns, Diego Martinez for example is one we've had links to in the past) and I don't trust our recruitment to find better than Cleverley as it stands.
You are absolutely bang on the money but as I have said it is a case of a different LB but the same attacking problem
I know that this is a little left field but would an older head who has taken a team out of the Championship on a relative shoestring being in the background offering advice to Cleverley as a no.2 the way forward ? . Was that person at The Vic yesterday ?
I’d say there was still too many in the first half. Hoedt foul for the penalty, Andrews with a silly mis-control letting Phillogene past him in an otherwise non-threatening situation, the Hull player left totally unmarked in our 6yd box who could only backheel straight at Bachmann, plus at least once we did that parting of the waves thing where suddenly an opposition attacker has the freedom of our D. Seemed to tighten up in the second half though.
The first 70 minutes really wasn’t. Even Cleverley said as much. ‘Flat for an hour’ he described it as and that he wants to see the ‘desire of the last 20 minutes from the start against Sunderland’.
Probably our worst defensive performance under Clev that, I think they were all lucky that Bachmann saved their bacon with a fantastic performance, but the good thing is that the number of brainfarts is definitely on the way down, they were pretty regular in the last few games under Val
Well a game lasts 90 minutes doesn't it, and besides, if Sema is going to play, then that will be a big boost to us just as him coming on was a boost to us yesterday
When your owner decides to furnish his agent associates with £5m for a player as poor as Bayo you can’t have nice things.
The major key point with Tom Cleverly is that he KNOWS the players, their strengths and weakness, he has made us harder to beat which is extremely important for a start, given time he may well get us winning. If they get Carlosneverheardof in as manager everything goes back to zero, he would need to understand the players and visa versa. Tom deserves to manage us next season!
If Cleverley is to be the permanent manager he has to get the team playing the way they did against Leeds, i.e. in his image. That night was a revelation: “Where has this team been all season?” So we know they can do it, but the first ten minutes yesterday was as slow, dull and unambitious a start as we have seen in any game under VI. That has to stop.
I've posted the likely obvious answer many times on here, but clearly it goes in one ear and out of the other. Why do you think the seeminy otherwise fairly frugal Pozzo happily hands millions to Bayat?
What you suggest is a possibility I guess. I’m just not dumb enough to accuse Pozzo of it on an internet forum like you are.
Lol, but you're smart enough to post this about Pozzo on here: "In my opinion Gino Pozzo is poison in human form. A ghastly individual, and his corrosive influence seeps into the fabric of any organisation he is closely associated with. He also surrounds himself by like minded individuals who magnify the impact as they seek to self enrich. The poor host is powerless to fend off the combined attack and simply decays. Where once stood a wonderful football club lies a festering pool of pus, consumed by the parasites within it. The club these days is a lifeless grey shell, unable to recover or even make a token attempt to fight the enemy within." .... Plus, saying something appears likely is not a direct accusation - I acknowledge that it may still be incorrect somehow, and I also don't believe whatever arrangement there could be will actually be illegal. However, what is certainly foolish is to continually and repeatedly post in a way which completely ignores that it is "a possibility" as you recognise here; all the while getting your knickers in a twist over a reading of things which could well not be the case.
Except they really wouldn't "be meaningless" though - as you point out, even having a 15 to 20 goal striker is far from a guarantee of even making the top half of the table! On it's own it's obviously not a miracle solution.
I wonder what their problem is, are their systems entirely built around their star men? Luckily in our case we have a number of players with a ping on them to bail us out sometimes when we are struggling
I think safer to observe and comment about what the club do rather than speculate why they do it. I honestly don’t have a clue why this bizarre club does half the things it does over the years. I just know they do it.
But in our case it would have made a huge difference. 17 Draws turned into wins 10 Odd goal defeats turned into draws ....
There's a hell of a lot of assumptions baked in to that comment lol. Maybe that striker takes goals away from the goals our midfielders and other strikers have scored? Maybe the striker mostly scores goals where we're already winning anyway? Or when we're already too far behind to make a difference? Maybe the striker scores lots of goals but also gives the ball away even more meaning we also concede more? etc. etc. etc.
Do you think that we would be in a better , worse or same position in the table if we had Ighalo or Vydra up top ?
You're trying to change the terms of the discussion now - not all top goalscorers are an Ighalo or Vydra for one thing. But also consider that Rajovic still currently has a marginally better goals per minute record for us than Vydra did in his full season here... All things being equal it would obviously be preferable if you have a striker who is better than the one you currently have, but having a regular goalscorer does not guarantee anything or that you'd necessarily leap up the table a huge amount. Further to my point above - despite Plymouth and Blackburn having Whittaker and Szmodics respectively, we've still scored 1 more goal than them both as a team this season. Us adding a 20 goal per season striker would not automatically mean we'd do a hell of a lot better eg if the team did not play to their strengths, they took goals away from others, our defence was poor, we did not give them good enough service, they were as inadequate in general play outside the box as Rajovic currently is etc.
Not trying to change anything All the scenarios you mentioned " giving the ball away " "only scoring in a big victory" etc are what the current incumbents do currently . And for the record Bayo has only scored in 2 matches since early October. How can any team carry that type of "striker" ? Secondly , if we have scored more than Blackburn and Plymouth with their prolific strikers then that only proves my point that the back 4 midfield etc are carrying our strikeforce .
....and worst of all we have a 6 goal a season striker and our LB is carrying the can for this . Utter madness .
I would like TC and his team to remain in charge next season even if the club does change hands. He has a plan and if he is allowed to bring in a few of the players he wants we can judge him properly. Has done a good job so far picking up points against the majority of the top 7 teams. A win in one of our last two fixtures would be very nice though.
