Transfer Rumours Summer 2025 Transfer Thread…

In Bruce’s first season, we played three/five at the back and had five senior centre-halves in Chester, Hobbs, McShane, Faye and Alex Bruce who all got considerable game time. I think that’s a good balance to have. Four centre-halves if you play four at the back and five centre-halves if you play three/five at the back.

Jakirović prefers to play with a back four but will mix it up with a back three/five sometimes. If we err on the side of caution and sign another centre-half, it gives us Hughes, Jones, McLoughlin, Egan and a new signing.

 

When a team stays up on goal difference then many of the team will be vulnerable. If any player is average and a new manager thinks he as better then they will be replaced. Obviously it’s down to your budget, having to pay players contracts off and contracts for new players. Concentrating on what you think are your weakest positions is priority, losing some of the squad is essential. I haven’t a clue what our budget will be but bringing in a couple of scorers won’t be cheap to start with.

 

The year prior to going up under Phil Brown we finished 21st and then made about 5 transfers to then finished 3rd.

Granted it’s a different era but a lot of this current squad also finished 7th under Rosenior.

 

They were carried by the good players who've since gone on to bigger and better clubs or bigger paychecks. This season has shone the light on that clearly enough.

We either need 5 or so excellent signings again to put us in the position we were in the season before where we add legitimate quality, or instead we start upgrading on our limited players.

 

You don't see how our defensive players hamper our attack when in possession? The majority can barely progress the ball and it kills us, time and time and time again. No wonder we can't attack when they have a full team to try and break through by the time they've dropped deep enough to get the ball.

 

I can see that we are a championship club with limited funds and we have bigger problems at the other end of the pitch.

Obviously with unlimited ffp and unlimited funds there would be potential to upgrade the entire squad, but that's not realistic.

We have proven defenders for the most part. We haven't got fit wingers or decent strikers.

Priorities innit.

 

Maka defo, Jacob isn’t championship level.

 

Jones I think could be worth it. Maka I’d keep 100%

 

Also a great header of the ball

 

Unless you're playing Plymouth away.

 

Coyle would be alright as a 5th centre back on the right of a back 3 for me

 

Got a hunch we probably want an experienced option and a developer on either side at CB. That might see Jones leave for a fee rather than running down his contract.

Slater is approaching his final year too isn't he?

Don't really see us moving to a back 5 the majority of the time as Acun seems to be focussed on bringing in more wingers, not wingbacks from what he's said in recent interviews

 

To play a back three/five well you need the two wide centre-halves to be decent ball-players who can step up in and out of possession. The central centre-back doesn’t have to be as good on the ball but needs to be a composed defender with good awareness. Egan would suit the central role as he’s probably the weakest passer but the most experienced when it comes to defending. Hughes has great passing range already for his age and is important to build-up. The other wide centre-half could be Jones on the right or McLoughlin on the left.

Coyle just isn’t composed enough on the ball to be a ball-playing centre-half.

 

In a back 3 though you can make up for it by carrying the ball which I think makes him a viable back up

 

Get some injuries back and add around five and it’s probably three quarters of a new team so yes I can see that

 

Yeah but Coyle dribbles with his head down. He looks at the ball instead of what’s in front of him. It’s why he often runs into dead ends. If you pay close attention to how he runs, you’ll see what I’m on about. Compare that to Hughes who can carry the ball forward with his head up, looking for potential teammates to pass to.

 

TBF Hughes tends to progress the ball into space, where as Coyle is usually attacking a forward area that's being defended.

 

We don't need to upgrade the entire squad, just the limited players we seem to insist are part of the furniture. If we had a back line that could progress the ball better, the 60+ players we've had in attack positions over the past three years could have yielded so much more rather than having a mountain to climb nearly every time they actually get the ball to their feet.

If we had an Odubajo type character at left back and right back it would make the whole team click so much more and we'd put teams under a lot more pressure. Our wide players and strikers over the past few years would have had countless more moments of Forcing last ditch defending rather than pondering how to break through two walls of 5.

 

The best way to describe Coyle’s dribbling is like someone who looks at the keyboard instead of the screen when typing on a laptop.

 

I think it's also to do with his natural characteristics. One of his strengths is in his aggression. But I think often when you're aggressive, your accessing a kind of fight or flight reactive state, reducing thinking capacity and so it narrows the view of options.