S-Clarke

What a horrible post

People always conveniently miss out those...

If our plan is to really have 50% of our team from the youth team, then we need to stop selling them! But financially I don't think we're as rich as some of us would like to believe. We're stable and secure I'm sure of that, but I don't think we have an endless put of billions.

It was the worst I've seen us since those days, for sure. We've been pretty spoilt for the last 3 years.

Can't really disagree with that. We had a couple of chances, but it would have been harsh on Lecister if we'd have got anything. But again, that's what will happen when the spine is ripped out of any team. Fonte, Lallana, Chaplow, Lambert.... Rip out Giggs, Vidic and Rooney out of the Man Utd team.......they will struggle. TBH though I'd not have been too bothered if we'd have shown a bit more effort, but we were dead out there.

He's fine as a squad player at this level. The better players are required up front and out wide. That's where we need to focus our attention.

Hammonds chance was massive....and you forgot Connolly too... through on goal and passed it to the keeper. A bit of conviction there and it was 1-0 and a totally different game.

He's had more good games this season than bad. He was out of position tonight and against weaker teams you could probably just get away with it, but tonight he was shown up as being out of position. But he's done a job this season when called upon IMO - have no worries when he's on the team sheet and I think he's much better than L1.

Starting to doubt anything that's on there these days!

He'd be perfect, exactly what we need up top. I'm just intrigued into what another poster said in another thread (i.e Sharp was in the stands)

phew...I'd rest him for Milwall either way though.

Really? come on.

Bit harsh, it was his first appearance for us. It didn't help that the team shape around him was poor, and he wasn't provided with anything to work with - other than long balls up field. What is he supposed to do with those? He did look a little lost at times though, but that's because we seemed to lack drive and any shape today. I don't think he should have been thrown straight in like that, but I'm sure we'll see better moments from him.

Nope. Was he in the stands then?

Interesting. Thought it was a £3m release fee? Not sure he'll move though. If he turned down Leicester then we haven't got a chance. (and he's already turned us down once..)

I think people are being harsh on De Ridder, he hasn't been given a real run in this team - and he always has a bit of spark and energy about him when he's on the pitch. I thought he was our best player over Christmas, when he played 2 games back to back... The team setup and ''feel'' didn't hep him a single bit today though, any half decent player would have struggled to look good.

I did feel that as well. Certainly didn't sound like he'd given up according to some people on here. I think it's typical Nigel, keeping his cards close to his chest and playing up the positives he can play up - i.e the players we have coming back. That doesn't mean we won't see more. let's wait and see.

Kingsland? There was a guy near me that blamed Guly for everything.

Nice post. You're right though, any team without their spine is going to be weaker - and when you have such poor replacements for them it's going to be even worse. In the first half of the season when we had everyone fit, the team tonight is pretty close to our reserve team. That's how stretched and depleted we are at the moment. So let's hope we get over these injuries quickly, get players back fit and get the spine back into this team. I still feel we need better backup though as the ones we have clearly aren't good enough.

Nice and honest from Jos - let's hope it's not just hollow words and we see a reaction to this.

The ''committee' which I think includes NC, Reed and one of our scouts. (NA Obviously has input too)

You make some good points trousers. The squad IMO has over achieved and we lived on the momentum generated from last year, especially at home. Now we've become unstuck at home we've started to slide, that's all that's kept us at the top. I'd be gutted to finish mid-table now though, it'll seem such a waste of a first half of the season and it's not the sort of feeling you want going into a new season. Because I think all the players would now see it as a failure if we didn't finish top 6. I just feel we need to grab the massive opportunity we have, because we may never ever get to 50pts at this tage again - which is why I'd love to see us add to the squad. They need help.

From the outside looking in, it does seem we waste alot of time on players that are never going to come here. Same happened in the summer with Rodriquez, and similar again this window with Hooper. It's great to read and to see the ambition, but and the end of the day if they never actually join it's just hollow words. You'd hope some research would have gone in beforehand to work out what Celtic would listen to offer wise.

To be honest I think they've worked their absolute arses off, this window and the summer window. The fact seems to be that we will not pay the prices clubs want. We're not after squad players/reserve players anymore, we're after teams established first team stars - so the selling club dictate the situation and put a price on the players head that is above what we value them, as we would do in our situation. Sometimes though you need to loosen the strings and just go the extra mile to get that 1 player that could make the whole difference, but based on the last 3 windows I don't think we've got the real 'clout' to do that and Cortese isn't the sort of guy to over spend. That's my take on it anyway, but I certainly don't think we've been sat around doing nothing.

This. Spot on. We struggle to play the way we want to play when he's in the side. Always has been the way. He's not a bad player, don't get me wrong, but he's not got the ability on the ball to be able to play out from the back with the assurance of someone like Fonte for e.g.