There isn't 1 yet, so I thought I might as well get it going. How many days until the papers link us with Upson, now he's a free agent?
I'd hate to sign Upson, one of the most overrated players of his generation along with Carlton Cole. Frighteningly, he seems like the kind of player that Redknapp would sign.
I always thought upson was ****, but then I signed him on Fifa one time and he was, oh wait no he was still ****.
I could see the sense in it, in principle, as he's a highly experienced Premier League centre-half, who's available for nothing. He had an appalling season though and I've never really seen what all the fuss is about, to be honest. Wes Brown's out of contract, too...
Wes Brown would be a good shout. As for Upson, I've never really rated him. He does have premier league experience so might be worth having as an emergency backup, but I'd probably still prefer to have Caulker (sp?) for that.
Wes Brown and Upson are both better than Dawson in my opinion but I wouldn't want us to sign either of them.
I don't rate Dawson, I know i'm in a minority as he always tries hard and is a good role model off the pitch etc. But for me he is good enough for backup but nothing more.
No they are not, that's why I don't want us to sign either of them but I think both are better than Dawson. Gallas, King, Woodgate, Kaboul are all better than Dawson.
I'd agree about Gallas, King and Woodgate, but not Kaboul (yet), Upson or Brown. Somebody on 606 pointed out that Dawson tends to play better when used as a right-sided central defender and tends to play on the left of the pairing when alongside Gallas. That would make sense to me, as he looks very good alongside King and formed an impressive partnership with Bassong in the season before last. No idea why Gallas 'needs' to play on the right, as he's quite two footed.
I also heard about this right sided thing as well. To me Dawson is solid when he plays alongside King but struggles with Gallas or Kaboul. And as King and Woodgate are injury-prone and won't ever feature much, that leaves Gallas as our best centre back and I think he is better paired with Kaboul than he is with Dawson.
Upson has been rubbish all season...oh, hang on...except agianst us!, that aside, he's over 30 yet has no big game experience really, the very thing you look for in older players. He's no improvement whatsoever on what we have imo, total waste of money, I'll be fuming if that happens.
I'd like to see more of Kaboul at centre-half, as he mainly seems to feature at right-back. He's decent there, but I feel that he interferes with Lennon's attacks down that side and doesn't gel as well as Corluka does. It's a shame that Bassong wasn't used more last season, as it he performed well in the previous season and showed a lot of potential. We need a bit of a revamp in the centre of our defence now, what with at least two of King, Woodgate and Bassong leaving. Not sure Caulker's ready to step up yet, either.
Something else just occured to me reading my own post. Did anyone else notice just how many other teams and players saved their best game of the season against us...think about it! All starting with Joe Hart on the opening day.
Our poor finishing probably didn't help with that, though. If a keeper makes a few easy saves early on and doesn't concede, then he'll grow in confidence and get better as the game goes on, in a lot of cases.
Something else just occured to me reading my own post. Did anyone else notice just how many other teams and players saved their best game of the season against us...think about it! All starting with Joe Hart on the opening day. This is like something I asked on 606 before aswell. We always seem to concede goals to the player who hasnt scored in like 3 years. Or a keeper that hasnt kept a clean sheet all season does so against us. Its like theres always these stats that come out. Is it like this for every team?
