Acun Ilıcalı

Coyle's not the issue, his form has dropped in recent weeks but he's far from the issue.

He's just one of those players that will always attract criticism without a lot of substance behind it. I think a lot of it is to do with us signing him for peanuts in L1, they lazily get tarnished with being L1 players. Alfie gets criticism too which always amuses me.

 

No one player is an issue

Its a combination of players all muddled together
Like a **** stew

Cinnamon in a small bit can be alright
A bit too much cinnamon in your pie and it ruins it

 

Who is the issue then? I was told the other day Longman isn’t either ,, apparently Slater isn’t the issue or the strikers … some of them have to be the issue . I’m not saying Coyle is, I just think as a collective these types of guys are a huge part of the issue . Just not that good at championship level . That is the issue in a nutshell

 

They are a big part of the issue
I like them

But only ones who are burying their heads in the sand are saying theyre not an issue

Individually theyre fine

But thrown together, we are bottom of the league

 

Surprised the word scapegoat hasn’t been used more often , usual case for calling it as it is ….. I don’t get it, we are Rock bottom of the league , look like we might never win a home game until the end of time , yet somehow all of our players are decent .

 

I think a midfield where Slater is your best is problematic. Giles (regardless of his reputation and price tag) is just so poor and costs us goals regularly. Drameh doesn't look comfortable out there too.

Pedro is technically good but physically he's miles off it, Bedia is the opposite, physically good but technically poor (I don't think either are acceptable main strikers at this level).

The midfield is the big issue for me though. We've got no 6, Alzate can't stay fit, Puerta is an odd one and I still don't know Slater's best position.

 

There isn’t one tantamount issue. All these players as Kalman pointed out were good pieces to the squad last year as they did the basics right and allowed quality players to change the game. Yes you could get better but fact is a lot of championship teams would have Coyle, Jones or Slater in and around their starting XI bar maybe a handful of teams.

Because of the squad overhaul and the injuries to our only two game changers we are now looking for answers elsewhere. Coyle was great start of the season. Jones and slater were ok. Now they’re dropping form alongside everyone people are looking at the senior players in the squad asking why they aren’t stepping up. Fact is they’re capable players but they’re not ones to change a game and that’s fine normally. We don’t have that luxury right now especially if their performances drop below a 6/10 which as we saw against Cov with Coyle leads to problems.

 

Isn't this a thread about acun?

 

Well, header of thread is the issue. Somehow you guys side tracked a lot from thread, and can't see the thing in front of your eyes.

 

All of those players have been successful at this level. They weren't even vaguely bottom of the league players until Tim Walter. We've had two games under the new manager. So the biggest issue right now is that we haven't had long to get out of the Tim Walter predicament. I've found it a bit strange this season how quickly we seem to have got used to being bottom of the league and almost accepted it as where our squad belongs. I think it's a shocking failure and we should be doing miles better.

 

In Turkiye, who do you support, out of interest?

And equally out of interest, what was your connection with City before he took over?

 

There's definitely a small core of people on here, and it's always the same ones, who will vehemently challenge anybody who questions 'the golden boys' in any way, shape or form - those more limited players that only seem to fit into stoic systems. It honestly baffles me how they'll claim people are targeting them because we had them in League 1, but then they're doing the exact same thing in reverse and popping them on pedestals for very little.

If any player is consistently underperforming for us - (this season that means breaking down our attacks and making mistakes that put us under pressure by and large), then ideally we should be looking to drop them for someone else and give them a go, or in the longer run we should be looking to replace them permanently with someone better. Not one of them is bigger than the club, and in order to progress we will at some point soon need to rip this plaster off and replace certain players that we won't be able sell for big money, but rather sell them in order to improve.

 

its going in circles again

those players were succesful last season becasue their team mates were so much better
a team full of slaters is league one
fact

 

I suppose the arguement is then
It’s not slaters fault but the owners for not replacing like for like ? Losing seri Tufan greaves etc
As others have said no one has 11 top quality in the championship

sir Steve Bruce got us promoted with Jay Simpson as our centre forward!

 

i think the hoghest goalscorer at championship level in our squad is longman
who averages 3 goals a season or so

thats a bjg problem

theres no goals

 

we are the lowest scorers in the league
but for.some
the only reason js becasue of tim walter and in reality our players are 7th
forgetting how good the rest of the team was

 

put one of coyle or slater or palmer or jones etc etc in the sheff united line up and theyd do alright and still be top of the league

but put them all together in one team, and the results are there to be seem

its not one player thats an issue, its lots of lower level players all in the same team
fact

(still think we will stay up though)

 

if memory serves me right, Koren and Aluko were joing top scorers with 9 goals that season werent they, cant be many teams get promoted without a player getting double figures.