Needs sold. Everything I hate in the modern footballer, all bark no bite. Doesn't work hard, is arguably the slowest player in the squad in a straight line, can't jump, tries to beat his man 3 times and then loses it, can't pass, can't cross, can't shoot. Roberts just walking back into the team after injury has happened multiple times this season and straight away our team gets worse. Our best run of the season came with Ba on the right flank, Roberts comes back in undeservedly and we go on a run that gets Mowbray sacked. Good win at Cardiff with Ba, AA and Rigg rotating fluidly in the final third, Roberts comes back in for no reason against Blackburn and puts in one of the worst performances i've ever seen in a SAFC shirt. Ba being dropped from the squad for this waste of a shirt yesterday is a disgrace.
You can just tell from looking at his career what type of player he's going to be. All the talent in the world but has never kicked on. He's the same player he was when City bought him 9 years ago.
Ba is our long term guy but could the plan be to try to get some eye-catching performances from Roberts so we can move him on more easily in the summer? I'm possibly over-thinking this but have my suspicions.
Whilst I’m not disagreeing at all about Robert’s, he’s gone from having an almost psychic connection with a teammate, who was also probably one of the top 5 in the championship last season, to where we are now. Last season Roberts and Amad were utterly unplayable. This season he looks, as you say so far, totally unmotivated. I’ll give him some respite fir Mondays performance, as it was first back after a lay off, but not fir the attitude I saw!
cheers again RTB... improvement finally but still lacking a 'cutting edge', performances basically had to be better than cardiff as they certainly could not be worse. i don't have a problem with young lads having the odd off day in fact it is to be expected but i do have a problem when they have the odd 'on day', too many games they look as if they simply cannot be bothered, ekwah is a prime example, he has the talent and when he puts his mind to it he can deliver a man of the match performance but too often the game seems to pass him by...he is not alone in this. pleased with the game though, some good signs from all the players and was good to see alese back with a good subs performance, roberts needs to go away and get his head in the right place, back to basics really and start again as he has the talent but needs to learn/relearn how to deliver the end product otherwise he is just a 'ball loser'. dodds wanted a reaction and got one but i feel we will see plenty of different starting line ups now, nothing left to aim for so may as well get the lads plenty of game time. giving my MotM to ekwah with onien/ballard running him close but i feel he showed the biggest reaction.
Reflecting on the performance/result nearly 24 hours on and I definitely feel more positives than negatives. Had we stunk the place out and scraped a lucky 1-0 I'd feel worse than I do about our performance yesterday. Rigg looks at home at this level and once we figure out his best position he should be a fixture in the team. Great to see Clarke back, so let's enjoy him for the last 5 games and not worry too much about what happens next. Alese looked sharp on his return and a massive upgrade on Hjelde who looks Jake Vokins & Calum McFadzean levels of ****e. Ekwah probably saved his best performance of the season directly after his worst. I'm not totally sold on him yet, but I have sympathy with him and Neil as they've been hung out to dry by the club refusal to replace Evans. Said it a million times already - huge summer ahead
I think he's a centre back being asked to play at left back. He looked far better alongside Ballard in the QPR game
No where near good enough on the ball or giving it out. Had flashbacks to Flanagan whilst watching him yday
Hjelde is a centre back covering at LB. You can see he is a lot less comfortable making forward passes than Aji and our other options.
Hjelde will be a good squad player for us, hes had to get thrown in due to the injuries but i think he will be a good player for us in the future Hopefully cirkin is fit next season as with him n Hume we have 2 of the best fullbacks in the league Hjelde long term position is CB
