It's amazing that we are even in a position to discuss this. It's a testament to how well we have done ! Sent from HTC Sensation XE
Chicken and the egg situation. PL will decide where we are weak and buy accordingly and that might be because he thinks somebody here is not up to it and has to go. The numbers game remains the same and I do not think that it automatically follows that if he buys a striker he has to sell one already on the books. I'm sure that he will look at it on the basis of ' I need 5 reinforcements so 5 of the existing squad will have to go ' and he will know in advance which 5 it will be so that McNally can sell them if a bid comes in.
lambert will already know what he needs and will therefore aim to bring in those players first before he gets rid of too many players. i tend to agree that chris martin will leave and leon barnett too, assuming bids come in for them which i think they will as they are both good players, just perhaps not quite good enough for this level.
No one has mentioned Hoolahan as a possible exit. As much as I admire his effort and "left foot" I think that at Premiership level he is caught in possession far too often. Once Howson and Ryan Bennett are settled in,Hoolahan becomes surplus.
Bennett is a centre back, but regardless, in a balanced squad, you need cover in every position. So, either Howson or Wes in the hole behind the striker/s ?
i don't think hoolahan becomes surplus but i do think he will need to up his game considerably to play regularly
Barnett,Wilbraham,Chris Martin,Korey Smith,Adeyemi,Ball,Dawkin, All wont get into the first team next season so we should sell and get people who can push for first team place's.
Doesn't Adam Drury already have a pre-contract agreement to join the Posh? I'm sure someone wrote that on a thread about the Bennett signing.
But the last four on that list are developing/academy players. Are you seriously suggesting we should abandon our policy of bringing young players through the ranks
i personally don't feel there will be a massive overhaul. i think there will be two or three additions, maybe one or two more depending on how much overall movement there is in the transfer market but i think the summer will be all about tinkering with what we have. obviously, the further up the division we can finish the more money he will have to play with but i fully expect him to aim for more of the same. young, talented players who are looking for a chance in the premier division. i can see a few leaving but nothing substantial. too many changes too quickly can lead to problems.
Think this is one of the problems with football clubs in this era. The players we have got us into as good position, and now we want to axe a load of them and bring in some "bigger names". Football is a business and our players have excelled at their work, but we would rather sack some of them than give them a promotion. Ok, Drury, Wilbraham, Lappin, Crofts are not big players in the team anymore. But they may well hold alot of influence on the training pitch/dressing room. For example, Holty is good mates with Wilbo and Drury, if they both leave in the summer Grant might quickly become miffed off with someone like Morison and his performance level drops. Subsquently everyone elses level drops. The Squad is quite and interesting dynamic,and Lambert has always used it as such. You always heard him talk about how big Matt and Gill and Michael Nelson were around the club. The atmosphere of your working enviroment makes a big difference to your performance. The best individuals do not always make the best team. Its alright to say theyre professional footballers they get paid enough they should play with whoever they are told to play with. But in reality they are human and players have alot of influence. If the "group" isn't right then the performances on the pitch wont be as good. Thats why the players are over performing, the atmosphere at Colney is buzzing and everyone always wants to play for the team. Think fans easily forget that all we see of a club is 90 minutes on a match day. We do need to sign new players in the summer. I just think it sounds abit like some fans would still be as air headed as to still follow a QPR model if they were in charge. Bring in the names and disgard the less talented footballers. Doesnt work.
There has to be progression though. I don't see us buying any big players (i.e anyone over £5m) for at least another 2 seasons after this one, as the club quite rightly want to expand the stadium and pay off some more debt. However, with a 25 man squad situation going on, we can't afford to keep a couple of players just because they're good behind the scenes, so we will need to improve our squad on a yearly basis.
this is also partly correct. a bit of tinkering here and there, steadily improving the squad whilst maintaining the feel good factor is going to be tough but lambert is capable! indeed he is already doing that with the additions of howson and bennett. its been mentioned before but some people just assume we can dispose of players such as drury and wilbraham... they may not be major factors in the first team but they are in the dressing room and timing is going to be key as to which areas we improve and when. thank god we are in a position where we can build slowly but surely unlike qpr who have thrown a cheque book at it at are hoping for the best!!
If Lambert lets anyone go, we all know that it will not only benefit the player, but more importantly NCFC. Nelson was massive in our dressing room, but Lambert knew he wasn't going to fit in long term, so did the decent thing and let him go. So, if Drury, Wilbraham or any other big player behind the scenes goes, we must all remember that if Lambert lets them go, he knows they can be replaced. Maybe less senior players will make a natural progression through the dressing room and will become leaders.
It's been Fox at the base of the midfield and Crofts on the right. Which I think has worked very well over the last couple of seasons.
Why not? It's worked ok for us so far this year hasn't it? I agree with everything NSATP (who should now surely be called Norwich Stare at The Champions League) says in his superb post about the strength of the squad as a unit rather than a collection of good individual footballers who may not gel as well off the pitch. For me the main reason we went down last time around under Worthy was the fact we lost nearly all our big characters. Players such as Iwan, Malky and Paul Crichton wouldy admit themselves they probably weren't good enough to hold down a regular place in the first team squad, but the input they had around the club was massive and taking the heart out of a successful squad like that was ultimately our downfall. I think whether people like Lappin, Wilbraham and Drury leave will largely be influenced by whether they themselves ask to move on in order to gain first team football somewhere else, like in the case with Michael Nelson when he left. Lambert won't want to lose his big characters as this as been one of the major factors of our success in the past couple of seasons, but being as honest a professional as he is he also won't want to stop anyone from moving to secure more minutes on the pitch. I'm sure he could find a place in the 25 next year for people like Simon Lappin and Adam Drury who may not play much, but having them around the club will still be a huge positive to everyone else in the dressing room and the club in general
So are you saying that, if we had say 23 players that were rotating on a regular basis and 2 players that were there if we were desperate due to injuries (there is no doubt that Wilbraham and Drury have only been picked recently because we have had a shortage of defenders and Vaughan has been injured) you wouldn't want those 2 players replaced with better players just because of their roles in the dressing room? As I have said who can say that any players that have only come in during the last year or so will not progress up the dressing room and become big influences? As has been said, Nelson was a huge influence in the dressing room, but when he left there wasn't a negative effect. Pilkington, Johnson, Tierney, Ruddy and Howson all seem to have the sort of character that could replace those of Drury, Wilbraham, Lappin and co.
