Left Wing

I noticed yesterday that the formation was very fluid. I also noticed that nobody seemed to be playing in front of Dawson. This left a lot to be done for somebody who has no pace, but he did ok and even skinned their winger a couple of times! I thought for a split second he might bring on Brady for McLean and we could have both wings flying, but alas, twas not to be.

Actually, on the topic of McLean, I wasn't really impressed with him yesterday. In fact that's probably his worst game of this season. He regularly gave the ball away (although the whole team was guilty of that) and his first touch was appalling. Now I know this isn't the usual Aaron, so I hope he sorts it out before the Boro game, but I was talking to the people I was with and the general concensus was "Yeah but he works hard and runs about." Well, so do I. In fact you could take any Conference North player, stick him in the team and tell him to run around for 75 mins and he would do just that. Running around and working hard are what footballers should be doing anyway, what makes them stand out are (among other things) their technical ability (which for whatever reason McLean didn't show us yesterday, even though he has lots of it), their off the ball skill and their footballing brain. Hope it was a one off from him, but if we were to bring in a new striker, you know he would be the one to bite the bullet.

 

The thing with McLean is, he has a very high work rate and will run all day long, however he lacks the technique and vision you'd expect from a good Championship striker. He's a League 1 level striker who's not good enough to make the step up to the Championship. All in all he was a bad buy by NP, £1.2m (or however much) flushed down the drain which could've been blown on a better much better striker. He's a little bit like Craig ***an in some respects.

 

Works hard, frustratingly mediocre.

 

Exactly what I think. Rich man's ***an. I don't see why Billy Sharp is so unobtainable, if Donny rejected those offers in the Summer, why is it they will definetly reject them in January? If we bid £2.3m (which if we sell our fringe players - Harper (100k), Oli (750k), McShane (500k), Ghilas (600k), Kilbane (100k), Simpson (600k) and Atkinson (60k), we should easily be able to afford.) it could be accepted, plus we could send Cullen or Garcia the other way on loan as a makeweight.

 

Dream on we have been trying to shift that lot for 2 years why do you think we Will get fees for them now. Money off the wage bill would help more with them leaving for free. Sharp would be good though but maybe out of reach. Think about where we have come from in the last 2 years

 

I was going to put a thread up about Mclean. He is a real trier but it just isnt enough. His apologists always says his work rate makes him an important part of the team, as if there are no other footballers who can run about. He seems a smashing lad and nothing like ***end temprement wise and everyone wills him to do well. But it isnt a one off with his first touch, its always been that bad. A few times first half he tried first time flicks that didnt come off, just hold it up. A player who can hold it up for us will help us dominate games even more and create loads of space for Koren to run into and shoot.

 

I'd love to have Sharp, but there's no way we'll receive anything for McShane, Ghilas, Kilbane and Oli if they go in January.

 

I'm not so sure. If they're really wanted then we will get a fee. They were just example figures, but if we got them off the wage bill we could do some re arranging of funds. I don't understand why people are saying he is out of our reach; if a PL team comes in for him fair enough he might say no, but there is so much more to it than that. We are 4th, going great guns and are looking to go up with a well structured, well facilitated club. If he lives in Doncaster it might appeal to him over a move to Southampton (who will probably fall away). If he goes to a PL team, will he get into the side over players who are already there? Probably not. He'd walk into our team, get more than he's on now (without breaking our bank) and he's well within our price range. It's not about if we can afford him, it's whether he'd want to come to us. And in my opinion, he would.

EDIT: RE OLM and The figures quoted - thinking about it, if said players left on a free, would the money saved on their wages for the season total up to something around what I predicted? I'm not sure what they're on, but I'm guessing it's more than they should be.

 

Oli, McShane and Ghilas are all on over £15,000 a week therefore if they were to leave the club buying would have to pay them quite a high wage which would mean they wouldn't be able to afford paying a fee as well. We'd also be happy just to get all three off the wage bill. The same applies to Kilbane, who although isn't a massively high earner, if coming to the end of his career so no club would willingly pay money for him.

 

This is what annoys me, on another thread a minority including myself are saying Fryatt misses far too many chances and we are 'miserable ****s' or something. Yet when it's McLean we can have regular bitching threads, he had a quiet game, K. He also had a very good run of games immediately before that and had shown a very much improved ability to hold up and control the ball.

The consensus with City fans is that Fryatt will always be more skillful than McLean but McLean runs more. I don't think either are true, Fryatt misses easy chances because he lacks skill and is actually a very similar player to McLean in many ways. They're both workhorses but you're only allowed to say it publicly about one of them.

 

Whilst McClean didn't have his best game yesterday, he did make some nice passes and touches through the centre. Whilst the consensus is 'running around' isn't enough. Every team needs a water carrier, with McClean in the side I think we're a more effective unit. He's the first line of defence, he never gives opposition players respite, he wasn't the only player to have a number of poor first touches yesterday. I think it was an instruction to hit passes at speed to up the tempo, a number of players failed with a heavy first touch due to the pace of the ball.

I think we're a better team with McClean in it, than not in it. The formation Barmby is playing means the attacking players are all swapping positions, some real fluidity when it starts ticking.

 

I agree with a lot of this, it seems like Mclean has one really crap game and that gets picked on but Fryatt was average in a few games till Pearson went

 

If you go on pure goalscoring Fryatt wins hands down but maybe on workrate and application Mclean is the winner- I think they are a good pair for now even though I'm sure Mclean wont be up front when we get a new striker in. Every player has a really crap game sometimes, because Mclean isnt technically great it probably stands out more but at least he is involved a lot

 

Perhaps McCleans unselfish work rate has created more goal scoring opportunities for his team mate up front?

 

i dont see any issue with the left wing (politics aside that is) and with the NEW flexible and mobile system that NB has introduced post NP its all working out very nicely thank you very much. another win and who cares if Mclean scored or not ? his work rate is 2nd to non and makes chances for others. as long as the team wins i dont care if the tea lady scores the goals.

 

He is a good outlet though - wins the ball from goal kicks and allows the team to maintain possession. Not really sure who else would do that job

 

My worry is when Koren is unavailable we may struggle. This is where we need more attacking depth in our squad and a new striker brought in. When the new striker is brought in, it will surely be McLean that is dropped.