Choose your XI

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YorkieLancsHampyLondoner

YorkieLancsHampyLondoner

Well-Known Member
Feb 1, 2011
11,749
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The transfer window has just slammed shut with the squad we have at this moment. Who makes your XI?

Loach
Hewitt
Chambers
Smith
Cresswell
Edwards
Skuse
Tunicliffe
Murphy
McGoldrick
Marriott

For me, it's time to shake things up. Murphy working hard wide left, Tunicliffe has looked sharp, Hyam and Skuse are too similar. Loach, Hewitt and Edwards are the weak links but the best options we have in their positions IMO. Most of all, we've got a deadly young striker and we should be flaunting him.
 
Crikey good job you aren't manager!!!!

I saw Marriott vs Chippenham, along with Lawrence wondering just how good either of them were, and whether either were anywhere near the first team. Based on that, and other bits and bobs I have seen, Marriott is NOWHERE NEAR ready and certainly not the answer!

Murphy LM, in a 4-4-2, are you on drugs!? I mean, seriously, what have you been taking!?!

Mine, would be the following.

Gerken - he's a good keeper, and Loach needs to be dropped
Hewitt
Smith
Chambers
Cresswell
Anderson
Turnicliffe
Skuse
Tabb
McGoldrick
Taylor ( first 45/60 due to fitness )

Worried by our options out wide and upfront in particular at the minute. Ideally, I'd like to see Tabb play centrally, though unsure if he's better than Skuse/ Turnicliffe. I'd rather us go with two proper wingers. However, at times I am not sure how good Cressy is as a full back, however I guess if I'm stating Hewitt is fine with a winger infront of him, Cressy surely is. Edwards for me is a complete waste of time due to not ever beating a man, and Anderson we don't know about too much yet. They are our ONLY proper winger options, bar the young lad we signed for £20k and Carson who appears to be game over with Mick.

Unsure where Wordsworth fits into things, another back from injury recently. Need him in the squad surely, though heard he didn't play very well v Cardiff youth. Needs to do more perhaps!?

Upfront worries me no ends too. McGoldrick I'm happy enough with, he'll score a few, set a few up. I'm NOT Murphy's biggest fan of all time, fine in a squad rotation role, no more for me. That leaves Nouble, who DOES have ability. Only issue is, how often is he going to score!? Not very me thinks. Taylor is still on the long road back from recovery, and we're unlikely to see the best from him for a while.
 
Well Westlake, I've seen Marriott once only around this time last year and he was on fire, he can't be any worse than our forward options. Murphy has been very effective when he's played wide left... so I'm not sure about the aggressive response?

Anderson, Taylor, Tabb haven't impressed me so far, but there is a strong argument for dropping Loach, although I'd rather back him and build him up.
 
so if McCarthy ever decides to play Murphy wide left this season should we call the doping police in???

I think I'd change formation more than anything but nothing appears to be ideal atm tbh, I just don't see how we have a overly balanced side in a 442.I think we need a formation which utilises our fullbacks going forwards:

433/4321

-----------Gerkin
Hewitt, Chambers, Smith, Cresswell
---Tunnicliffe, Skuse, Tabb
------Taylor-----McGoldrick
----------Murphy

442 (diamond)

-------------Gerken
Hewitt, Chambers, Smith, Cresswell
-------------Skuse
-----Tunnicliffe---Tabb
----------Wordsworth
------McGoldrick, Murphy

or if we do stick to 442 for me this is the most balanced side, even if not a very good one;

---------------Gerkin
Hewitt, Chambers, Smith, Cresswell
Anderson, Skuse, Tabb, Murphy
-------McGoldrick, Nouble
 
Gerken

Berra
Smith
Chambers

Hewitt
Skuse
Tabb
Tunny
Cresswell

McGoldrick
Alan Lee, lol, we need a target man
 
I did put !! in there, so it was half a jokey reply.

Just not convinced Murphy wide left is going to achieve much, and personally don't think Marriott based on the Chippenham game is ready.

I hope he doesn't go the way of young Ronan Murray, who I thought had potential!
 
Spanish said:
Gerken

Berra
Smith
Chambers

Hewitt
Skuse
Tabb
Tunny
Cresswell

McGoldrick
Alan Lee, lol, we need a target man
Click to expand...

Actually think that could be decent, we certainly could do with an Alan Lee of 5 or 6 years ago, not sure what he's like now, although I'd still say he'd do more than some of the others in our team. He would've been busting a gut to get on some of those crosses from Cressy the other day and whilst Murphy and Nouble aren't bad in the air, we really could do with someone to really attack the ball in the box.

My only concern with this formation is that, whilst we have 3 good CB's, we only have 3 defenders who are actually CBs and also that formation requires I think 'footballing' CBs and I don't think they are and they certainly wouldn't be under Mick.
 
Westlake33 said:
I did put !! in there, so it was half a jokey reply.

Just not convinced Murphy wide left is going to achieve much, and personally don't think Marriott based on the Chippenham game is ready.

I hope he doesn't go the way of young Ronan Murray, who I thought had potential!
Click to expand...

I don't think Murphy is ideal out there tbh but out of all our options think he would bring the balance to the side.

Murray was ok but nowhere near as good as that bloke who went to Huddersfield.. forgotten his name
 
GK - Gerken

RB - Hewitt
CB - Chambers
CB - Smith
LB - Cresswell

RM - Anderson
CM - Tunnicliffe
CM - Skuse
LM - Tabb

AM/F - Taylor
ST - McGoldrick
 
" Murray was ok but nowhere near as good as that bloke who went to Huddersfield.. forgotten his name "

Yeah true, we could do with Gary Roberts the winger back ;)

On a serious note, that has just got me thinking. How good was Roberts with us, thoughts!? Delivery tidy I thought?
 
Westlake33 said:
" Murray was ok but nowhere near as good as that bloke who went to Huddersfield.. forgotten his name "

Yeah true, we could do with Gary Roberts the winger back ;)

On a serious note, that has just got me thinking. How good was Roberts with us, thoughts!? Delivery tidy I thought?
Click to expand...

Oh yeah that was him...he was half decent, we've done alot worse since, I'd do alot for us to go back to the team he was in Roberts, Garvan, Legwinski, Walters pretty good midfield there. I saw they highlighted him on the football league show the other week, said he was one of if not the best player in league 1 but he got released from Huddersfield and Swindon so must be something amiss
 
I cannot recall us often having Walters/ Roberts out wide, I thought we had Quinn/ any central midfielder possible wide left under Magilton!

I did like Alan Quinn, I wonder where he is these days.
 
Westlake33 said:
I cannot recall us often having Walters/ Roberts out wide, I thought we had Quinn/ any central midfielder possible wide left under Magilton!

I did like Alan Quinn, I wonder where he is these days.
Click to expand...

Quinn came in I believe when ME came in, was the first ME signing I believe (when it all went down hill). Roberts was in favour pre ME but think we got rid pretty quick after that.

I like Quinn, thought he was underrated, but was just used in the wrong position, should've been used centrally, scored one of my favourite goals in the past 10 years (passing movement and finish all class):

[video=youtube;jpDQGg30AxU]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jpDQGg30AxU[/video] (watch around 45secs)

Thought he was decent could never understand why Norris got played over him, I mean Quinn had both tenacity and a bit of footballing talent Norris only had one of those!! He used to play in the triangles Magilton you could see visibly coached his players to do. I think he pretty much retired after he left us, think he had had alot of injuries and problems with his fitness.
 
I'll go along with Hoppers' team.
I'd like to see what Taylor, Anderson and Tunners have to offer as starters. Instead of starting out defensive in games we could try and go for it a bit more and then if we get a lead you can change for more defensive players.
 
I think deadly young striker may be going ott somewhat.

Havent seen Gerken in the flesh, other than as an opposing keeper and I cant say i have much of an opinion on him so for the keeper position I am not fussed
Defence - speaks for itself really. we could bring Berra in but again not too concerned.

Midfield - I dont like Edwards at all and i dont like Tabb out wide. I dont mind two holding CM's if we can exploit the opposition through the wide players but its something we dont do enough of.
The problem for me is our rebuilding is not complete. MM has done well so far but we still dont have great options in all areas of the pitch. LW and a powerful striker are particular shortfalls for me.

Going back to the earlier Westlake/ PTC conversation. Before the ME takeover it was often Billy Clarke & Walters as wide men with Couango and Lee up front. Roberts didnt feature as regularly that season from memory. Individually not all great players but was probably my favourite line up in recent years. After the takeover we generally played Quinn over Clarke and eventually pushed Walters up front when we signed Norris and played in wide right.
 
Can I just add the to conversation, the transfer window hasn't slammed shut, it's got 4 more days to go!!!

Yes I really liked that team that we played under Jim, when we had the good home run. It was build on a shoestring but had a great balance to it and some really good players but hard workers aswell, think it was the closest we got to the Burley days and that was when Jim put a team out to play to our strengths rather than putting a team out to stop the oppositions, I really dislike teams when they do that, which is why I've always been a luke warm to Micks style of play
 
I dont think that stability is a bad thing after the last few seasons, mind you I was not one of those suggesting we were looking good for promotion this year so I suppose it depends on your starting position. MM obviously knows his way around the championship and although the style has hardly been exciting then at least I now go to games without the feeling of 'are we about to get humiliated again' which was often the thoughts under PJ or 'God another boring defeat' before RK games in charge. What I would like to see now is 1 or 2 flair/ players whereas at christmas we were mainly thinking along th lines of a brand new team. We now have the majority of this and havent spent a penny.
Along similar lines, - if we all have FFP to take into consideration can anyone answer how Forest spent 2.5m on Wilson from Celtic and signed Mackie from QPR. How come they have cash to splash that the rest of the league doesnt? - a couple of million pound players could really get our season going
 
tractor bhoy said:
I dont think that stability is a bad thing after the last few seasons, mind you I was not one of those suggesting we were looking good for promotion this year so I suppose it depends on your starting position. MM obviously knows his way around the championship and although the style has hardly been exciting then at least I now go to games without the feeling of 'are we about to get humiliated again' which was often the thoughts under PJ or 'God another boring defeat' before RK games in charge. What I would like to see now is 1 or 2 flair/ players whereas at christmas we were mainly thinking along th lines of a brand new team. We now have the majority of this and havent spent a penny.
Along similar lines, - if we all have FFP to take into consideration can anyone answer how Forest spent 2.5m on Wilson from Celtic and signed Mackie from QPR. How come they have cash to splash that the rest of the league doesnt? - a couple of million pound players could really get our season going
Click to expand...

Oh I completely agree, he's just not my style, in football and in most sports I like teams/players/managers who look to be on the offensive and take the initiative and entertain, I'm not for one minute suggesting we get rid of Mick, that would be stupid, we would be screwed with the squad we have if he were to leave IMO. The trouble is when you play direct/stifling/defensive football or a workman like team when you loose playing that way people get on the teams back alot quicker, look at Stoke Pulis has been briliiant for them but the minute they have a slightly poor season they're on his back because the style of football seems pointless with out the points (like what i did there?).

It's great we actually seem to have a team again (albeit a poor one) rather than just a collection of players, all bar one is a loan, it's a fairly young team and money is being spent on the academy and I do like that the club is trying to be prudent and with a little bit more money we could done a little bit better certainly, although we said that under Magilton and we spent over £20 million and 5 years on we're left we a worse team than when we started.

I'm certainly not arguing stability is a bad thing but putting a team out to stop the opposition playing or playing to your strengths being a bit more attacking doesn't for me affect your ambitions of where you finish. I'd accept a top half finish as progress particularly as we finally seem to be getting our house in order but then again after last season where the league was so tight I wouldn't imagine there'll be many points between relegation and playoffs again.

My concern in the matches I've seen is when we're drawing or winning we look okay, we look solid and are actually keeping the ball better than last season (Skuse makes a massive difference) but when we fall behind (this season we've been unlucky with some of the goals we've conceded) and we have to attack or tack the initiative to get back in the game Mick looks a little clueless and the players he's brought in don't really have much about them to change the game, I mean the past few games we've been dieing for a player like JET to bring on and mix it up abit but we just don't really have that anymore.

I'm sure we'll be fine this season but Micks style always frustrates me as I always think if he wasn't quite as set in his ways (don't get beat, 442 etc) he could do alot better, he's a good manager, great man manager but for me this is the reason why he's never made it as a very top manager in the PL
 
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