Season long loan Could this mean a certain Curtis Davies will be joining us ? http://www.nottinghamforest.co.uk/page/NewsDetail/0,,10308~2874296,00.html
Personally, I think it's a strange move. I would have thought we would have played him in the cup games etc. as a starter, and was good backup to Bennett and Turner. If he was young enough not to count towards the 25 then I think it's a stupid move...anybody know if he does count?
Big mistake in my opinion. We will now have to buy another central defender and he won't come here to be sitting on the bench. If we buy, say, Curtis Davies then Bennett will be marginalised and not get the experience he needs and Ayala will not want to come back at the end of the season to be 4th choice next year.
Not sure we need to buy another CB - we have Turner, Bennett, Ward, Barnett and Rusty (if necessary) - why spend valuable cash on another CB to sit on the bench or in the stands when that cash could be used to buy someone like Naughton who has now become available and is playing in a position where we don't have such depth in numbers.... hell, he can also play at CB if required too (remember Bolton)....
There was a bit on BBC earlier today saying AvB has got 5 players surplus to requirements, one of which is believed to be Naughton!
I hope we do not get under way with only 4 CB's !!! Remember last season they dropped like flies and we ended up putting Rusty in as a last gasp emergency!! How can Rusty even be considered as a CB when he's the only proper RB we have?!! There must be a big signing coming in, and i would think it will be Curtis Davies.
Bit unfair on a young and promising centre back. Must be pretty frustrating as a footballer to pick up injuries so no doubt he will be trying his best to remain injury free Interesting to see how he does, I think he will do well. Be even more interesting to see how him and Ward do together. If Ward goes.
Diddums, I bet the poor little lamb will be heartbroken at what I wrote (can you see what I did there?)
Interesting theory especially when you bear in mind that last year we often had 3 centre backs out injured. On another thread the majority opinion appeared to be that Ward was not good enough to be 4th choice CB - you seem to suggest that you would be happy for him to be a permanent feature until at least January if Turner or Bennett picked up a long term injury in Sept. If Rusty is to come into the equation for CB we would need another right back as at the moment Martin is the only fit experienced right back on the books but when Whittaker is fit do we need Naughton and Martin as well especially as we only have Tierney in the left back slot. I stand by my original line of thought that we should have kept Ayala as cover, with Ward, for CB, let Whittaker and Martin fight out the RB slot and buy a left back to provide cover/competion for Tierney.
Haha So it's okay to criticize Ayala's injuries? but not to criticize Ward's weaknesses as a player? That's sort of my point and why I said the diddums comment originally.
I suppose if Ward leaves that would definitely pave the way for another centreback. Would look like Barnett would probably be 4th centre back. TO be fair Barnett has had a good pre season, looked good against MK Dons other than a dodgy back pass that he got away with. And heard he also played very well against Peterborough
Considering he only played 10 games for us and was therefore injured for 75% of the season I think it's actually a reasonable comment to make. He suffered hamstring problems the season before when at Hull and from what I've read about him his entire short career has been blighted with injuries thus far, possibly one of the reasons Liverpool moved him on. I wasn't criticising him, just suggesting that if next season is anything like the last couple then he won't be available that much. Let's just see how many times he plays for them next year shall we? I maintain that Ward looked as good as Ayala when he played last season and the only mistakes I can remember him making that cost us goals were against world class players who earn 100k+ a week so if you're going to go on and on about how poor he is on the basis of that then from where I'm standing your comments are far more unfair than mine particularly as mine are actually based upon FACT
It's not just about the mistakes his made it's more questioning his ability. Ward will struggle against mobile forwards we're playing in one of the best leagues in the world we're merely suggesting improving on what we have, to hold the defence together in this league we will need more mobile defenders which is a FACT.
