Young lads develop by playing alongside better, more experienced players. You’re spot on there has to be balance and at the minute there’s none whatsoever, it’s young lads being thrown in with other young lads. It’s not hard to have a look around world football and look at the best teams and see what the average age of their best Xl is - I can guarantee none are anywhere near that of ours.
You keep this squad together though and each season that passes, their average age increases. They mature together and hit their peak at approximately the same point. As time goes by, some players are sold to keep generating income and younger players come into fill their places, who will learn from the older heads in the squad. I think we have to consider the point we're at now, the starting point of the process and there is a lot of development still to go.
I think that's the problem I see with a striker and CDM , if your only playing one in those positions, do you play experience to help the team now or inexperienced to develop and benefit the team in the future. I think other positions say CB, you can play one of each, inexperienced FB would learn playing with experienced CB and winger.
Right, in league one we were playing Neil for experience. Dropped him and got promoted. I think they wanted out of league one ASAP, but are prepared to build slowly here.
I don’t mind the wide players being young lads but there has to be a decent spine and ours is shocking. The fact O’nien is who you’d label as the “experienced leader” of our team is embarrassing in my opinion. Dewsbury-Hall is the 2nd youngest player who started for Leicester last game and he’d be the 2nd oldest for us.. it’s just so far to one side of the scale there’s no compromise whatsoever.
This is a great post, got me thinking. Dont agree with all of it, but love the thinking and challenge. The Dewsbury Hall bit is thought provoking. It does highlight the lopsided average age we have. I am not convinced that is optimum at all. I would have been keen on 2 or 3 lads in their mid to late 20s coming in. Styles though is a good choice for me. I dont agree with you on the spine bit though. Experience can be anywhere on the pitch for me, and influence in a positive way. The spine is where you need quality, because of how much more difficult it is to play centrally. I have a feeling this coming summer will see a subtle shift. I think we will lose Clarke and Neil and bank upwards of £40m. That will create a capability to spend the sort of money needed to get players at their peak. 24, 25, 26 year olds who might still have a sell on after 2 or 3 years. We will be losing some real experience in those two, so will have to adjust accordingly. What I would say though is Rigg needs to play in our spine and soon, so experience in a left back or wide player wouldnt concern me at all. Character is what I want in an experienced player, someone who will influence from wherever. Personally I wouldnt mind an investment in an experienced CF, which is about demanding the ball and not being so passive, but lets see.
I like your way of thinking, so will KLD, lol. If we got £40 million back in That's almost what he paid for the club. So if he sold it for £65 to £70, Million he would have a fantastic bit of profit. That would spoil it for everyone
Yep some strong characters needed for sure, I think we’ll reinvest well and hit the areas we need to. It’s not that I think we have bad players because I don’t at all it’s far from that I just think there’s too much of something and not enough of the other. Young lads in general aren’t walking around the pitch barking orders at their teammates and we miss a bit of that for me. Some aggression and ****housery to go with the brilliance certain lads have. Ekwah been quality at times but Neil would be a much better player with someone like Morsy alongside him doing all the dog work and letting him play his own game properly imo.
We can't influence what happens on the pitch for the rest of this season. For me, it's time to look towards next season . That means giving game time to those who will still be here. Burstow shouldn't play again. Hemir and Rusyn should. We need to start to play the shape we are looking to develop, with the players who will still be here. For confidence sake, we need to play our best players in order to get results and restore confidence, but minutes on the pitch for younger players like Rigg, Watson and Hemir are also important. Once promotion is mathematically beyond us, we need to give more game time to the youngsters, instead of the players who are likely to move on. This model has enabled us to cash in on our current squad and we need to use that cash to strengthen the whole squad This season is almost irrelevant. Next season is all that matters. We've got the basis of a good squad, but it needs to play more games together if players are to develop properly. Next season's aim has to be to get promoted and recruitment needs to reflect that.
Success is reaching whatever level you yourself have wished for your team. (IN my opinion). Like beauty, it is in the eye of the beholder. Some will see getting back into the premiership as success. Others will see that as just a stepping stone. For me, being a modest person, success would be being able to tell a native of a foreign country that I support Sunderland and not getting a blank look in reply.
