Most liked posts in thread: Central midfield

Problem is, our other centre backs are all a bit crap. He's actually the best one we have.

 

He played 30 games in 2 seasons for us.

Yeah, to be fair he's spot on. Asking the players to do something they're not capable of is always gonna end badly.

 

Henley/Mellor and TAA, like chalk and cheese.

 

Yep, and that's no criticism of the players (which it's fair to do, but they each have their qualities and are League 2 players for a reason) but of tactics that assumed they could be players that they're not.

Absolutely - the beauty of football is having roles and tactics that can be made to work with all types of players. I'm assuming Stuart will play some form of 4-4-2 diamond or 4-3-3 which doesn't ask as much of the full-backs and potentially frees up the central midfielders' to be a bit more creative - issue being that we had Meredith and Cullen last time and no outstanding replacements for their roles at the moment!

Ha, cheers - I think I may have had an account here with a different address before - or I may be getting mixed up with C&B though.

Absolutely. They also have had Fabinho marshalling the back and Wijnaldum and Henderson stepping into that role to cover his absence. They're also playing a bit of an evolved version to the system other top teams are playing where that defensive responsibility is shared between the middle three and the middle striker plays the #10 role. But this isn't the right thread for that... your point stands that we just don't have the players to carry out that type of tactical approach. Hopefully Stuart and Kenny can find one that is.

 

Stuart says he's asked all the players 1v1 how to get the best out of them so I'd be surprised if we saw Cooke playing a deep role again. Hopefully he will be allowed now to express himself further forward.

 

Corrected for you

 

Akpan infuriates me almost as much as Doyle does. At least Doyle looks like he's trying but Akpan plays like a fecking fairy. For such a big lad he might as well be Jack Payne's size for the amount he's imposed himself on games. Once him and Doyle go I'll be such a happy man.

 

Ffs.

Please no?

 

To be fair Patrick did but only because everyone else was so bad and the game was won for Preston at 0-4.

 

Patrick was our best player did more in 20 minutes than the rest did all night that’s how bad it’s got

 

Is Ismail a left winger? Or can he play there comfortably? Just seems weird how we have signed none at all

 

Something like players with more pace??? Something which he promised to address but hasn't??

 

He has a job to do for the team, however he is told to play. It has to be down to attitude and the ability to create for others, even if not receiving ideal service. Don't see how GB could be blameless in his contribution either.His job is to get the best out of his players. Incidentally, he harps on about trusting in players he has worked with previously and that plan seems to be a no-goer to me and to the team.

 

You must have been sat near me , it was embarrassing.

 

I don’t get the clamour for a “Midfield enforcer “ against Cambridge we had 60% possession but created very little what we need is a player to get forward and create not sit back at the edge of his own box and make short square passes. We have the firepower we need someone to load the gun

 

I think we need both type of players. The league games have shown that we've nothing in the way of creativity in midfield, nobody who is willing to pass the ball forwards or drive with it. But when we come up against the better sides who is going to be the defensive midfielder? Because not one of them can make a tackle.

 

The reason we're packing out the midfield and are set up to keep it tight in the first place is because we don't have a midfield enforcer. This is having an adverse effect on our attacking play as A) Our more attack minded players are subject to more defensive roles and B) our best attacking player has to sit out.

Bring in a proper DM and we won't need 2 or 3 players doing a one man job. This will free us up in other positions, give the likes of Palmer more license and provide great flexibility with formation.

 

Doyle is well past his best and on the Same trajectory as Aaron the non goal scoring machine McLean was I'm afraid

 

Can’t remember the last time we had a team which included so many players that get some right stick Don’t disagree by the way, we just seem to have a lot we seriously don’t care for