I have mixed feelings about O'Shea, he was by a mile our most consistent player last season and very rarely made mistakes. He's agressive, front foot and for his size wins a hell of a lot in the air. Physically he's up to PL standard. On the ball though he's okay but perhaps an area if he's going to establish himself he needs to improve especially as a number of teams now the CBs are the players who have most of the ball. It was noticeable last season how generally we were better on the ball when Woolfenden played and how that also helped midfield to have more control. I think we'd be okay without him in the Champ next season and in a strange way because of what I've highlighted we might be better without him as we're likely to have more possession it's if we get promoted. This is the problem though and he is the epitome of this because you can be a dominant team in the Champ with certain type of player then after being promoted you may well need completely different players in order to stay up in the Prem.
I'd rather we got a decent right back in. At the beginning of the season I thought Tuanzebe would oust Woolf as our main RCB and that he would be one of our better players, and he was good, but didn't get to play enough through injury. Personally I think he should play CB, and probably should have all season if available, but then we went and got O'Shea and Axel got pushed out to right back. This was to the detriment of having any real attacking threat or overlaps from that side and several players had to play there throughout the season. Injuries really did blight our season, and there was a fear of attacking that got worse as the campaign wore on, but the chopping and changing at the back was overly excessive and not really necessary most of the time.
Winning the player of the year proves nothing more than being selected every week. Our defence was miles off the level and how anybody could say any of our defenders deserve any credit for that season is beyond me. I think Clarke, Woolfy, Burgess, Townsend might’ve been our best back four but we didn’t get to see those combinations often. O’Shea and Greaves both looked stronger in the full back positions but as a central partnership it was Laurel and Hardy stuff. O’Shea offers nothing with the ball at his feet either. I’m sure if he stays he will be first on the team sheet and he might do well - the Championship is much more forgiving.
Rarely made mistakes? He does well in the air but when the ball is on the deck, positionally he’s hopeless. Occasionally there was a game of head tennis but mostly the Premier League is about football on the grass.
I've thought central defence in terms of personnel has been probably our strongest area the past few seasons. I've said for some time that I don't think simply getting better CBs in will improve out defensive situation, if it's a priority for us we need to look at tactically how we play as we leave the defense exposed both at full back last season very much LB because of Davis poor ability defensively, his want to get up the pitch and lack of covering by Cajuste, previous seasons it has also been at RB with Clarke being positionally poor. Also we lack numbers in central midfield. For me if we're going to improve defensively we need to look tactically (potentially also with new players) how we improve those areas ahead of the CB positions. It'll be interesting to see if McKenna does this because we can probably get away with it in the Championship but definitely not the PL, so will our tactic change with a view on what might work better if we get to the PL again.
You have a coach you admire yet you feel you have a defender who is hopeless and the team is better without him. Is McKenna hopelessly out of his depth that he can’t see what you are seeing or is the defender following instructions which makes his positional sense look poor to the spectator
McKenna’s already proven he’s not hopelessly out of his depth. The Premier League is brutal and nine out of ten errors are punished. It’s not about carrying out instructions and nobody doubts effort - it’s about focus, concentration and delivering against the best players in the world who exploit your weaknesses. You can’t afford for any of your backline to drop their level.
It wasn’t a dig at you, it was posing the question is he being asked to do something he’s not comfortable with by the coach or something that highlights a weakness rather than play to a strength. We all blame players but we’re not privileged to what they’ve been told to do by the coach. I’ve zero idea if O’Shea is a decent players or not and I hate being linked to relegated teams players. I’d say he just about divides opinion. On social media I was surprised at the love Leif gets, I think he’s awful, he can’t do anything a defender is supposed to. I beg to differ on McKenna - What do you think he’s done that proves he’s not out of his depth in the PL He’s the best to get you back up I’ll grant you that but he’s signings were shocking, you all complain about team selection, tactics were obviously wrong as you couldn’t beat an awful Southampton or Leicester. I don’t see anything what can be attributed to a positive when it comes to PL and McKenna
I suppose that’s because you are probably forming your opinions mostly off Match Of The Day highlights and punditry rather than watching 3000 minutes plus over the season.
It was a simple question, what has Mckenna done that shows he could be a success in the PL You feel O'Shea is awful, why did Mckenna continue to play him then
I'll always defend our transfer targets last summer. Granted it was all done far too late and we were always playing catch up with integration (which I don't think we ever actually achieved) but the targets were all realistic. Our standout signing was one of many of the championship all stars we signed. Relegation was always assumed so we were essentially building a promotion chasing squad. Unless premier league teams want to take a gamble on "failed" players then most of our squad won't get many better offers... And if they do we can hold out for a tidy sum. Like others, I think there were some bizarre chopping and changing in addition to the injury enforced ones that disrupted the building of partnerships. But if my theory holds out, integration would largely be complete by time we kick off.
If you don't have any clue about what the answers to these questions may be then there's little point debating it.
You said “McKenna has already proven he’s not out of his depth”. You supplied nothing to back up that comment. P 38 W 4 D 10 L 24 GF 36 GA 82 Spent £152m
As I thought, zero to back up your statement Man United players when he coached them: Kieran McKenna's time at Manchester United was marked by some players questioning his coaching style, particularly his ability to connect with the senior squad and his perceived lack of intensity in training. Sources within the club suggested that McKenna was "out of his depth," and that his coaching methods were more suitable for the youth academy where he had previously worked Like I said, his level is Championship
