If you expect me to answer all the replies that's not going to happen. Stated my thoughts am interested in others opinions.
Either with or without a No9 I honestly think teams have worked us out. They are stopping our wide players and that's us ****ed. Yes we would be a different team if Stewart was fit but even then so much of our attacking play came from the wings. TM has to adopt a style of play with the players he has, we are still playing as if Stewart was in the side. To play Neil and Pritchard as your 2 CMs against Stoke then your team selection really has to be questioned. It amazes me that the lack of a No9 still gets raised when we concede 5, I said 2 games ago it will be the stick that is used to beat speakman with after every defeat even if we conceded 5 or 6 goals. Surely with the attacking players we have in our squad TM can come up with a better system and selection than what was on display yesterday
Getting a free agent in regardless of age for 3 months won't break the bank, and wouldn't be adverse to the overall transfer model really as they wouldn't be on the books come the summer.
I'd like to think that the club are taking a long term view on this and are easing players such as Ekwah into the first team
Ekwah signed for us because his best mate Alese is getting to play in the first team and that's exactly what he wants too. Now is as good a time as any - as long as it is done right
Maybe this thread should be merged with the striker thread as it’s been hijacked and seems to be going over the same stuff again, and again, and again, and again!
This discussion is getting a bit daft now. We are thin up front with Gelhardt as our only centre forward but most of that is down to bad luck. I thought I'd watch a few videos of Gelhardt to see what he's about as I didn't feel I knew enough about him. He's a very good, very capable centre forward in those videos. What he clearly isn't, is the kind of centre forward who can play with his back to goal. I'm usually reluctant to dig out a manager but, that being the case about Gelhardt, the onus is on Mowbray to adapt his tactics to work with that kind of centre forward. There is no law saying that you have to play with a back to goal CF. We shouldn't have signed a carthorse to knock it up to. That would be breaking the model for no good reason- not when the coach should be adapting his approach to accommodate the CF we do have. So far, I've been happy with Mowbray but if he's reaching the point where he feels he can't work with the players he's got then he should leave. That's part of the point of the model- no one is bigger than the club.
striker is a massive problem but don't think having one yesterday would of changed much poor from minute go plus we've now scored in every game we've played in in 2023 keeping clean sheets is also a real problem 1st goal yesterday was something like 3 passes and it was in the back of the net referee or not, that should never happen
I don't think it is at the point where he can't work with the players we have, well other than the strikers but thats not his fault really. We have loads of tricky wingers and a single number 10 so he is having to bank on these to get goals somehow. Unfortunately they are all pretty weak physically and its become a case of chuck them on and pray they can nick a goal or two. What I hope Mowbray has realised however is that Pritchard in a midfield 2 with nobody to hold up the ball ahead of him just doesn't work. Again he is not physical enough and we get overran in midfield. Also Amad cannot play as a lone central striker but unfortunately neither can Roberts, Clarke or Gelhardt. I really don't know what the answer is as he has tried to play all of them in different positions now without any success.
Aye we were crying out for that against Stoke and you could see it pretty early on that they were bossing in midfield.
Yeah, playing Pritchard in CM is a strange decision. He should be playing in the 10. Its not like there aren't other choices for the two CM positions. I have to disagree about Gelhardt. He can play up front on his own. We just can't expect him to hold it up- we have to find another way to get it to stick in the final third. He looks like he needs balls into the channels or over the top to run on to.
I thought 2 things regarding that. 1. TM thought you useless tw*ts you will stay on and suffer the boos at the end 2. TM is already planning changes for the next game inc Ekwah, Ba, Lisjadi (spelling) and did not want to risk them getting injured. Was fkn annoying though.
It smacks of desperation (we ARE desperate) and it's a bit of a "**** you" to Speakmann and KLD. So I think you are right I'm old enough to remember Paul Warurst (Sheff Wed) and Ian MArshall (Leicester) being centre halves converted to centre forwards with amazing results (albeit in the short term) We of course are Sunderland and converted a centre forward (Lee Howey) into a centre half **** it, when all else fails.....fresh tactics. Stick O9 up there v Norwich and see what he can do
Not good enough, it was utterly essential to get at least one striker, we failed horribly At any level of football, you need a striker on the pitch TM has been put in a very difficult position
I'm sure it's only hypothetical but I could see him doing a decent job up top. Certainly wouldn't be bullied if anything he'd be the one doing the bullying. Got more of an eye for goal than you might think and would defend from the front manfully. I remember there was one game he was used as an AM, no idea when it was, and he had a very tidy game. Played some nice intelligent one touch football and it caught my eye.
