it's really bugging me that you quoted me about 6 or 7 times, and somehow my name in the quote doesn't have a capital letter? How did this happen?
I agree, it has always been the case in football that if anybody manages to run past a couple of players with the ball the critics go wild. John Barnes anybody? At top level all players should have such skills. I am more interested in players that display a 'football brain' and know how to use the ball when they have it.
The Townsend bid has been turned down,apparently we are going to bid for Schniederlin again,but the Goons want him as well
with £17 mill being our final offer, supposedly. I get the idea of giving Poch what he wants, but it seems excessive for a position where we have so many similar players.
Given that currently the only bid we know of for him is £10mill I'd say it's unlikely his value would drop much, especially since we got £8mill for Livermore. There are clearly areas for Townsend to improve his game but I don't see why he can'd become a quality player. Even if he only became a "good" player then he's still well worth keeping as an English player who has come up from our academy.
"He's already a "good" player imo. I'm just not sure he has the head for better." He does. His current ego just needs to be told some positive home truths.
Townsend just needs to calm down and work on his decision making, in my opinion. He's got the ability, but he always seems to be so desperate to impress that he tries to do too much, either running at hordes of defenders or shooting from miles out. He knows that he's not in the first XI and it has a big, big influence on how he approaches each game. Is Jay Rodriguez a big improvement on him? I don't think so, but he bagged a load of goals under our current manager last season.
When you start talking about 'working on his decision making' I worry. I don't think it's possible to really alter this process in a footballer when by the very nature of the game these decisions need to be instinctive. You can improve with practice for sure, but at this top level that will never be good enough. Lennon for example has improved his centres. He always had the sense to do it he just needed to improve his delivery. Townsend does not seem to understand when he needs to pass the ball, when that ought to be instinctive. He has been playing football for years FFS how long does it take?
Haha, even if I change my username to a lower case letter, you lot are all gonna do the opposite and replace the quotes with a capital. I'm screwed!
