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Hodgey

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  1. That’s the exact team I would pick except Edozie for Brooks so Arma goes back to right wing and hopefully finds some form - Brooks coming on early. I get the Smallbone criticism and on a one for one basis and on form you would go Aribo, but for me it’s about how the midfield complement each other and Smallbone adds to a midfield where one breaks up play and the other drives aggressively forwards but loses the ball a lot. For me it’s between Aribo and Stu (and Rothwell) and I go Stu.
  2. I’m really hoping the club are looking at this as a ‘assume he’ll never be fit and as good as he was, anything else a bonus’, ie we should be looking for another striker pre season. We should have learnt a valuable lesson with M Svensson which for me started our decent down the divisions. worked with Ings, didn’t here - those are the risks…
  3. Hodgey

    Che Adams?

    Anyone else notice he is suddenly using his left foot - 2 left foot goals in two games !. Every other season he would have tried to run round both those shots to get it on his right. Be annoyed if he’s suddenly become a two footer striker just before he’s off.
  4. I do wonder if some of our difficulties in getting a striker is understanding what we want. That’s not an Adam Armstrong style player - he struggles playing up top but has looked excellent as an ‘inside forward’. What is clear is that RM wants a player with the style of Ross Stewart (not seen enough of him to know how he plays). Extremely hard position to get in Jan, so can understand the focus on a right winger instead - which we also need as all our wingers perform and prefer on the left
  5. Strange way of looking at it. Pretty sure Bazuna isn’t worth more than the £12m we paid for him, Bree has already done it at this level last year so good signing if we did it now, but a dreadful one in the Prem. The other 3 yes - our loans have been good - but we are adding value to 3 players for other clubs and if we don’t go up at least 2 of those won’t be here (hence the need to buy players wisely - not continually piss it up the wall) Our transfer business (buying players) really hasn’t been good in my opinion - either poor players, injured players or players not ready for the level we signed them for. You could certainly argue Lavia - but he does look a bit injury prone. Outside of that I’m really struggling for successes over the past 3 years. I guess Livramento - but we didn’t see much of him
  6. I think overall having a pop at our transfer business is fair. Yes we’ve used the loan system well but given we have little money we’ve spent £20m on a very questionable left back, an injured striker and a city kid who isn’t ready (didn’t learn that lesson from last year). Honestly - I don’t think we would be any different position wise if we hadn’t signed any of them. £20m is a lot in this division and we should be spending it much more efficiently
  7. Not sure about this - have those 3 significantly improved or found their level ?. I still wouldn’t trust Bazuna or Armstrong in the Premier League , they are clearly good Championship players - have they actually improved ?. Same with Bree - he was one of the best championship right backs last year so has he really improved ?. I’d go Edozie (end product), Bednerak (genuine senior player now) and S Armstrong (fitness and attitude). Bazuna would be 4th choice - he’s definitely got more confidence playing for a top side in the division and is improving , but I fear we’d see just as many errors in a struggling Prem team. its a good debate though !
  8. Does anyone know what kind of striker thrives in a RM team ? I know Piroe did but didn’t RM suggest he’s more a support striker and he was happy with Armstrong doing that ?. I genuinely don’t know what style of striker would thrive as our one up top - I don’t know enough about Stewart to know what type of player he is. My instinct is that a highly mobile striker with close control and link up play is probably more suitable than a classic finisher but interested in others opinions.
  9. Hodgey

    Danny Ings

    If you look at it another way - if there is a £1m loan fee and we cover £100k a week with an obligation to buy if we go up then you are looking at £3m. i can see that appealing to all parties. Given there is £100m plus on offer then that doesn’t actually seem like too much of a gamble - it’s probably less of a gamble than finding a younger £5m striker and hoping he can do it. Plus by season end you would hope Stewart and Mara would be in a better place if we don’t go up.
  10. He can’t play the lone striker role - that has been one of the major issues. RM has created a role for him that plays to his strengths but really pleased for him as attitude and effort were never the issue.
  11. Is it correlation or causation ?. Looking at the facts he played half the terrible game against Leicester, half the loss to Ipswich, he also wasn’t on the pitch when we scored winners against Bristol, Hull, Millwall and West Brom. He was great against Leeds and I’d argue was the winning difference there, the rest ? Honestly not convinced if he didn’t play in any of them our results would be any different. And that is the problem for me - Tella was the winning difference against Sheffield Wed and Plymouth on his 3 games for us - that is the impact we need.
  12. The problem we will face, nice problem though it is, is that it’s highly likely we would go up with Leeds and Leicester, whilst Shef Utd, Burnley and Luton will all go down. We are so far behind the other Prem teams that we would arguably be in the strongest Prem league in terms of depth ever. THB would be bought so that solves one problem, it’s possible ABK returns and starts fulfilling his potential. Baz may finally be ready for Prem football, KWP is quality, and I think Alcaraz will be that level. Outside of that we have real quality issues - Downes maybe, if we can buy him. Don’t believe the Sulimana hype and can see us selling him in Jan. You don’t need a team of amazing players, but you do need a core so we would need to find a high quality left back, def mid, att mid and 2 strikers. Realistically you would need a £200m transfer budget minimum to stay up - and unlike last season not just waste it….you would need a 100pc hit rate. Having a relegation season with low expectations will be more fun, we may upset a couple of clubs and unlike last time we won’t have thrown it away by doing daft and idiotic things.
  13. He’s clearly frustrated, and Adams question was basically interpreted as the team don’t score enough and still look prone to conceding, which is true and something we all know. He especially didn’t like the Bazuna praise countering that he had ‘very little to do’ again true, but many times we have still conceded from few shots. What I liked about this was it demonstrated that despite our run, he knows we should be better. I guess the concern is, and he must be thinking this, whether it’s his tactics or players not executing responsible.
  14. A friend is a city fan and I randomly went with him to their 0-0 vs QPR. Dreadful game but they looked very sound defensively. Their new manager just picked up his first win so their tails will be up. I’m expecting them to sit back and hit us on the break. Sadly think this will be similar to Rotherham / Huddersfield - we’re going to need to be a bit more inventive if we want a comfortable win.
  15. Couple of things jump out from that - Adams is amazingly our second most productive player despite downing tools, Sulimana not even on the list….
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