Haha. Good analogy.
But with the lack of movement in our forward line at times he could be as eagle eyed as a bird of prey and still have no options and just run into traffic anyway.
Transfer Rumours Summer 2025 Transfer Thread…
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Haha. Good analogy.
But with the lack of movement in our forward line at times he could be as eagle eyed as a bird of prey and still have no options and just run into traffic anyway.
The defence has been fine, what we need is forwards who can kick the ball at the goal rather than row Z changing the defenders won't help.
To be fair to him, he’s not the only footballer who runs/dribbles whilst looking down at the ball instead of the pitch in front of them. A lot of it is down to muscle memory and confidence in one’s abilities. Hughes is confident enough to be able to carry the ball out without looking down. He knows where the ball is so he doesn’t have to look at it.
David Amoo and Josh King were like Coyle when they were on loan with us. They would dribble looking down at the ball too.
Again, it's probably easier in that Hughes is usually carrying the ball into space and isn't usually trying to avoid challenges in critical areas.
I just hope we get a bit of dynamism into the attacking play as often it's Coyle who's the only one at least attempting to break lines.
I’ll agree to disagree on that. The squad is only as good as its weakest member(s). We had a very good team and squad under Rosenior. It had its flaws but ultimately players like Coyle, Jones and Slater contributed towards us being in that position. Their recent regression doesn’t negate that.
Or someone who looks at the steering wheel and pedals instead of where he’s going when driving a car.
Coyle getting pelters again despite featuring in a fairly rock solid defence and getting a fair few motm nominations. One of our own and the captain.
Who needs enemies.
Who needs enemies.
The tactics entirely allowed for that though didn't they. 'Keep calm and pass to Seri eventually' meant there was never a need to be more than limited in their defensive duties. It worked for us, but largely due to the likes of Delap who'd pick the ball up on the half way line and drag the whole team up to their goal on his own. Now that we don't have that the whole team needs to contribute to initiating attacking plays. This is where we've been found massively wanting this season.
I wouldn't have said anyone's getting pelters. It simply is what it is. There are areas that players need to either improve upon this season, or we need to tactically absolve the issue like Rosenior did, or we need to upgrade to bring in players that can progress the ball and contribute towards winning games rather than focusing on purely clean sheets and hoping the rest of them further up the field can 'just do something' once the opposition defence is organised and facing us.
Loads of our attackers were making runs this season in early phases that'd almost never get picked out or attempted. The only one who did it fairly consistently towards the end was Amrabat, often after dropping deep to receive the ball. Ideally we'd have players at the back that could create the first spark in possession to negate having the majority drop so deep just to provide an offload option for them.
I’d take issue with the point that there was a lot of movement just no being picked out.
Coyle for the most part receives the ball close to the touchline with a player closing him down instantly, with more often than not no one to pass to. He either has to launch it up the line, pass it backwards or occasionally he dummies it and actually drives forward to the oppo penalty area.
But the idea that Coyle just isn’t seeing all these great opportunities for passes doesn’t wash with me.
How often has it been said that they're just static with no one creating options for the pass? I'd wager more games than not.
We had a manager that built a team around the pieces he had. Not denying that some of the players may have been limited going forward. But they played valuable minutes in a squad that got to 7th. It’s not as if one player dragged this team beyond its capabilities either. We finished 9th on the xG table (appreciate it’s not everyone’s favourite stat) so we finished roughly where we should have.
These players are capable of being in a playoff pushing squad. I think recency bias for some has kicked in considering for large parts of last season players like Jones were getting called “Rolls Royce” as a defender.
Again, this isn't just aimed at Coyle. A lot of the time the reason he's instantly got someone on top of him is because it would go from Pandur to Macca to Hughes to Jones to Coyle... So it's basically telegraphed where we're going. Their team have shifted across by the time he ever gets the ball. Too often slow paced passes, sideways or backwards, that have no threat to them.
This is needed from time to time, to take the sting out of a game, but it's seemingly become our primary function at the back, whether intended or not.
One thing Coyle does do well is surge forward with it. Slater has it in his locker to do the same, but that's really about it.
As for movement, it was every game. Arms getting thrown up in frustration from most of the attackers when the ball never came. We saw it countless times as the season went on. Gelhardt and Pedro in particular used to get really pissed off with it.
Nail on the head, this is what I'm saying. We either need to tactically account for the fact our defence won't play out, and we've seen that its possible because we did it last season, or they need to learn how to do it... Or we need upgrades in those areas so that we're not stifled by this fact, which is partly why we offered very little threat so often this season.
It's not pelting a player to talk about their limits and what we should and shouldn't be doing to accommodate or replace them.
I would sign a winger that is very cheap and won’t cost us a goal or assist bonus- Sinik, also a striker that would not have added costs of big goal bonuses to- Bedia.
See it can be done on benefit money.
Judging by some of his posts Cityzen often looks at neither.I cope ok doing that.
The views expressed in my posts are not necessarily mine.
Just like Walter is going to sign loads of Germans.
Selles is going to sign loads of players from Reading.
The Croatian manager (thought someone said he is Bosnian) is going to sign players from Croatia.