Ahadme, Dom Ball, TJJ, Aluko, Greig Leigh, Evans are all out, one or two nearing match fitness, a few out for rest of season. Camara showed glimpses of what he can do, lets hope Ahadme can find the net too. We need to win a few and recover our composure before a series of big games over Christmas. Gaffer going to try to get up Suffolk too!
Completely agree, although can't comment on this game but it is a common theme under McKenna we haven't quite got the forward positions to click. For me the 2 10s centrally isn't working at the moment, we've looked far more dangerous with Edwards on the pitch and he obviously takes up a slightly wider position and carries the ball better than Chaplin or Harness. On the ball if Harness and Chaplin aren't scoring I'm not exactly sure what they're bringing to the team at the moment, they're not great ball carriers and neither is their passing as intricate as say Humpreys. And whilst we're often taking an extra touch in the final third rather than getting the ball in the box more often than not, when we do put the ball in early alot of the time Ladapo isn't taking up brilliant positions. Whilst he's certainly a better all rounder than Norwood and Bonne the positions/movement they took up in the box were alot better. Given they generally struggled with goals also under McKenna I think it's more of a system issue than a personnel one. As I've said before given the number of shots and high levels of possession we have you'd expect opposition teams to make more mistakes and give away more penalties against us, but they're not because we're trying to score the perfect goal and how we play also encourages teams to generally sit deep and get well organised, some of our shots have to get through half a team before getting to goal. Whilst saying all this our goal scoring record isn't bad at all but there is also a game management side of things and for me ball retention in the forward positions isn't good enough.
The common denominator is the so called strikers, Jackson for one hasnt performed at this level since he got here over 3 years ago, and with the service Ladapo gets he should have a far better conversion rate than he does, JJ is out for the foreseeable future and Aluko and Evans who can contribute with goals are on the way back along with Ahadme, so its not doom and gloom by any means but i do think we need a proven striker. Some will say thats too expensive but if we miss promotion the cost will be enormous in revenue and our best players going elsewhere and possibly our manager, and then theres the loss of enthusiasm amongst the crowd so gates will suffer also.
Agree entirely FM. Jackson not earning his keep at moment. I am sure the club, staff, investors and KM all have listened to us and will get that striker in January. To miss promotion this time would be a major blow. After all the huge improvements on and off the pitch, they will splash the cash!
To be fair to Jackson recently he’s mostly been asked to play out wide,but I agree, overall he’s never going to be a prolific goal scorer.I also agree it would be disappointing if we were to miss out on promotion because of the final missing piece in the jigsaw.Fingers crossed this will be addressed in the January transfer window, KMc and the owners seem to be getting so much else right.
We, rightly, got rid of Nogood but....wrongly kept Jackass in my opinion. I still have hopes for Gas but honestly see absolutely nothing in Ladapo. I still think either 352 or 442 would suit us better, we look disjointed with the two tens, in my opinion but I'm happy to be shot down
Wherever Jackson has been played nobody has got a tune out of him, he was bought in from a then Div 2 side and hasnt made the step up and after all this time we are not likely to see an improvement in him, if he doesnt go in January he must surely be released at the end of the season when he is out of contract. Ladapo seems slow to read the game and therefore slow to react and get in scoring positions and if the ball is in the air just forget it. As others have pointed out there are players to return after injury and we will be stronger when they do but a proven goalscorer is what we are missing, the good thing is that McK knows what hes looking at and has no doubt assessed every player in his mind so we trust his judgement.
