No, because most of the time defenders accept that if the ball needs to go it needs to go, rather than ****ing about wondering if it'll look good on telly or not. I can't believe we're debating this. Do you really think there is no occasion when the ball needs to just be booted away from goal?
Obviously there are some occasions when you just have to get rid of the ball, but we definitely did it too often last season. Gerrard and Hobbs are both hoofers, they weren't good together, Gerrard looked way better when he had a ball player with him, both Ayala and Chester did that job well. As for having a strong player up front, Millwall had Morison, Norwich had Holt, Cardiff had Bothroyd, there's plenty of examples of them being effective and I can't see why anyone wouldn't see the benefit of having that option in the squad(I don't see a strong front man and a talented midfield as being mutually exclusive).
We've usually had a big targetman at City - Van of Hessleroad, Burgess, Parkin, Alcide, Whitehurst, Chilton..
Aye, but the players you've mentioned are relatively mobile thus serving their purpose of being able to hassle and harry. The carthorses we've been linked with have never been mobile. No objections to signing someone up front who has more to their game than solely being an aerial threat!!
easy this football lark! Ball playing centre halves. Some creative midfielders and a mobile taller than average centre forward that can play with his back to goal, pose an aerial threat and good with his feet! Easy!
Then there appears to be a misunderstanding in what we're disagreeing about. I've not been talking about the ****e we've been linked with, I've been complaining about people justifying those targets because they're not good enough to solve the problems we have. This thread I've been talking about what the team was missing by way of options. Without having someone bigger up front we're just as one dimensional as if all we do is hoof it, it's just a prettier dimension, but the player signed has to be able to do more than just be a head on a stick or we're left a man down in other situations. Josh King (played up front, not on the left like Preston did) could be suitable, but would be a gamble because last time I saw him in the flesh (preseason last summer) he was still very raw. And QPR spent all season playing one up front, either Helguson or Hulse with 3 midfielders working off them.
I think QPR were forced into that due to Mackie (sp?) breaking his leg? Plus they had Ishmael Miller on loan.
They played 451 all season, Derry (tackling) and Faurlin (playmaking) were sitting midfielders with Mackie (left), Taarabt (free), and Smith (right) the 3 behind the striker. When Mackie got injured he was replaced with Routledge with Smith switching to the left but no change of formation. Miller (knew I'd forgotten someone) came in as well but the preferred tactic was still only one from Helguson, Hulse and Miller (48 league starts between them, 32, 12, and 4 respectively). They were forced into it from day one to accomodate Taarabt, who Warnock told to pretty much do as he pleased.
