Hope the lad does , just don't understand lack of game time in league 1 to then suddenly being ready for the championship
Would agree. Currently the squad looks light in a few areas: I know the likes of Gooch and O'Nien can cover a few positions but I'd be looking for a keeper, left back, centre half and a striker as a bare minimum
Not sure we need to replace Defoe and McGeady - neither of them really figured last season and we already have 4 wide players. Defoe was always a "luxury" signing who turned out to be absolute turd, but we never needed him as long as Stewart and Broadhead were fit
I think a lot of that is down to Finding the system that worked at at the time. With no time to work with the players he has to go in and get it right for what was needed. Now he’s had time to Work before a season with no current “ship to steady” things may be different. Just speculating mind
Scott with his finger on the pulse as ever IMO if we wanted Rudoni that badly we wouldn’t have lost out to Huddersfield.
Re: Rudoni I always hate the narrative we often take that if a player we are linked with goes elsewhere then "we obviously weren't in for him". It's pretty arrogant. It will often be true but not always, and we have to accept that sometimes players will choose other clubs and it will sometimes be for good, genuine reasons. However in this instance I'd be willing to bet money on the fact that Rudoni was our number 2 choice in that position behind Clarke, and we were bidding for him in case Clarke didn't come off. It doesn't seem too coincidental that as soon as we announce Clarke, Wimbledon suddenly accept an offer. It's almost as if we told them we're not in for him any more so there's no point holding out. I know they're not exactly the same style of player, but they're similar positions. And we don't need to be spending much more money on that kind of player when we have Pritchard, Embo, Clarke, Roberts, Gooch, Dajaku and perhaps Neil and Diamond fighting over 2 or 3 attacking midfield positions.
Agreed. IMO the only players we will be focusing on immediately now are GK and Striker. A fourth centre back that can also play left back would also not go amiss. That's perhaps the 3 players Bob referred to previously. This is why I'm strangely relaxed about transfers. All three positions we NEED to fill are frankly for backups / squad options as I'm happy with what we have as first choice. Beyond that we are likely looking at wanting outgoings before we sanction incomings. Or perhaps definitive news on whether Huggins will be back before Xmas. I share the concerns others have with Evans, Matete, Winchester, Neil and O'Nien being our midfield options. Personally I'd like to see a new statement centre midfielder coming in that essentially makes Evans redundant. But thats possibly the fan in me rather than the pragmatic football manager in me. I also am slightly concerned that we haven't really IMPROVED our team, other than arguably Ballard. That perhaps isn't a bad thing as its pretty clear Neil has this team playing well together. And cohesion is massively underrated in football. So easy to just come in and rip it up to try to improve. Can't remember the last time we tried to have continuity in our playing squad.
If we'd signed Rudoni he would've started on the bench. He might be a guaranteed starter for Huddersfield. Watch him be class now
With the a lot of young lads developing and moving up a league we need to see how they respond. Also to see how Huggins recovers from his injuries. I suspect there is a certain amount of keeping powder dry for January when we know more about the squad. Where we think we want to spend may look very different in a few months time.
Just playing devil's advocate here but maybe the squad doesn't need that much adding to it. Remember we played QPR and Arsenal in the cup and didn't really look out of place against either - except when Arsenal had that purple patch when Broadhead went off and that was with Johnson's all out attack. Yes we seen to be a bit light on certain positions but you have to hand it to the recruitment team up to now - whisper it quietly but they've done ok
The day I get a huff on because we havnt signed a player from Wimbledon is the day I stop watching football. At this stage I have full confidence we will get the players we want.
Just part and parcel. We clearly wanted him but stuck to our valuation. No issues with that if a club values and pays out a higher package.
