Yep.. just one more thing that makes me think our recruitment team & scouts have absolutely no clue what they’re doing. (Alongside a teenager in goal, letting Romeu go when Lavia was injured, strikerless window, giving Djenepo & Theo a new contract, etc.). It’s all well and good scouting players like edozie and Lavia, but we need to integrate these great youngsters with a balanced squad.
He was: https://www.dailyecho.co.uk/sport/20851958.fresh-lavia-injury-put-impending-romeu-transfer-ice/ Lavia got injured in the Chelsea home game, Romeu left a few days afterwards.
Thought Romeu left earlier than that. But the club's error wasn't allowing Romeu to leave, it was that he wasn't replaced.
CB is the position we have most depth and no glaringly obvious weakness in personnel. So weird that is the position being talked about. Well I say weird, weird to everyone except NJ who I assume wants another CB because he is desperate to play a back 5 even though it doesn’t suit us. Given the glaring holes we have elsewhere CB really should be bottom of the list.
hard to see what we would gain by bringing in another CB. Harder to see what recalling bednarek will achieve apart from destabilising us further.
Bit of both really. When it became obvious we weren't going to replace romeu like for like, then we should have pulled the plug and kept him. The deal to let him go wasn't that far along that we couldn't back out.
I'm sure Romeu, being one of the best professionals we've ever had in our club, would have dealt with it, knuckled down and cracked on regardless. It was just a monumental **** up.
I have just read the Echo piece and it doesn't say defence is a priority, all it says is that it is a position we would like to strengthen. I would hazard a guess that NJ would like to strengthen every single position, as would each and everyone of us. I would expect the manager to be pretty vague, saying 1, 2 or 10 signings, no point in letting everyone know exactly what your after, keep your cards close to your chest and all that. He would be stupid to not consider any of our loan players that have a recall clause, and he would be stupid to pay attention to fans opinions of Bednarek or Stephens. If he thinks they can do a job, get them back, easiest signings to make after all. I personally would recall Tella as he could be a good option, but that is it. I would then sign a DM and a top striker as the priority and see what else we can do while getting rid of some players, Theo and Armstrong spring to mind.
I think that the standard of coaching needs to have been improved in the summer. Too many players out of form anfd little progress with youngsters - the latter having been an issue for a long while. The likes of KWP and JWP have been poor this season. Salisu has not been consistent. For me, the lack of goals from both Adams and Armstrong has it's roots in coaching. Armstrong never seems to be in threatening positions and it is not surprising he does not score goals. When he first played for us, he looked like he had potential. Not sure he will come good for us and is the most likely player for us to move on. If you had asked me in August, I would have argued that replacing Romeu and getting a decent striker would have seen us right. (Especially as Diallo has not stepped up to replace Romeu.) I expected a mid-table position. The fact that we are at the bottom islargely down to the coaching. This squad should be playing better. I have heard that Ralph was not talking to his playing staff in 2022 and I think most people on here believe it was time for a change. Unfortunately I am not seeing anything from Jones to suggest that his coaching abilities are any better than Ralph's. There is not change whereas a better coach like Benitez would have had an impact on this squad. I think that SR made a massive mistake appointing Nathan. Not convinced he is going to last and I do see his appointment having a negative impact on our recruitment. Probably the worst appointment by the club since Pellegrino with the potential to be as bad as Poortvliet. If we fail to steamroller Forest tomorrow, the atmosphere will be toxic.
Armstrong's issue is that he has winger instincts, without any of a winger's on-ball skills. Basically always has been, and this was one of the big concerns raised before we signed him: he took a comical number of shots for Blackburn from areas where you don't actually want your striker to be. It's easy to say "well, tell him to do striker things, then" but his off-ball movement is really very bad for a player with his pace; he makes very few runs where he could be played in were someone so inclined, and he's rarely in the right places on crosses because his natural inclination is to move toward the ball, rather than anticipating where space might be. He fundamentally doesn't understand how to do striker things, and at age 25 I don't think you're really going to coach him into being one. In the right setup (as part of a front two in a Championship side) he'd be able to find those pockets of space near the edge of the box out and rack up goals by taking a stupendous number of shots, but PL sides don't give you the same opportunities. He's currently averaging fewer shots per 90 minutes than Perraud, our left back, which is bad when you are historically a really bad finisher, and Armstrong is a really bad finisher.
