We lost 3 1 in the end from Phil Buckingham's Twitter, McLean with our goal. From the looks though McLean missed a couple of good chances, as did Graham. Team was: Jakupovic, Topliss, Clappison, Faye, McElroy, Dixon, Armstrong, Wilson, Jahraldo-Martin, Graham, McLean.
Jesus, he can't even score in an U21's game. But hey, he probably ran around a lot and got into good positions. So he definitely merits a starting place. How low must his confidence be right now?
Sagbo has to be 1st choice at the moment - a goal a game? I hope we managed to send Graham back in January, no doubt he has talent, but he's struggling to find it!
He's hidden it pretty ****ing well since the turn of the year. Sagbo will be first choice, followed by Gedo. If Graham gets anywhere near that team again then it's a shocker. Unless he starts scoring for the reserves. Which he won't.
Whereas McLean did score and in fact has been scoring a lot in pointless games recently. So we should start him right?
Well isn't that the point of the reserves, to give yourself a chance of getting back into the first team? Aaron McLean was told he was surplus to requirements when Brucey came in, did his loan stuff and is now just doing what he can. If he's rewarded with a place in the first team, so be it, I won't complain. If he offers more than DG does then so be it.
Surely you can see that McLean isn't as good as Graham, even despite the revelation that Graham didn't score for the reserves but McLean did?
As you said, McLean has been scoring regularly for the reserves. I'm not saying he should be our main striker, but he's doing more than Graham is. They actually look quite similar, but DG seems to have lost his energy that he had when he first arrived. He needs to get his goalscoring eye back in and if he does, fair enough. He just isn't at the minute and with a team that traditionally doesn't score a lot of goals, I just don't think he justifies a place in the first team when there are others who have been scoring.
Before Graham got injured we were unbeaten in 5. He got injured and now we've lost 4 out of 5 I think? That's much more important than who scores the goals.
Yeah but we've been missing Brady and Aluko as well and I'd say they contribute more to the side than DG does. Obviously picking up points is more important than individual merit, but we didn't lose those games because we didn't score, we lost because we didn't defend well enough (especially Southampton). Even with DG in the side we'd have lost to the Saints. What could he have contributed in those games that would've made a difference, is my question? And if you're answer is anything but 'not much', then I can't in all good faith agree with you.
I agree that Brady and Aluko contributed more but my argument as always is that a striker is not there just to score goals. He's there to play well and help the team win games. Graham was doing that fine even if he wasn't scoring.
That's fine, but he stopped being effective about four or five games in; we only play with one striker, so if that one striker isn't hitting the back of the net we have a problem. Yeah, our top scorer is a midfielder, but they shouldn't be relied upon to score goals because they aren't trained to do that and won't be scoring week in, week out throughout the season. If our main goal threat isn't a striker, why bother playing with one at all?
From the Mail... It was mixed fortunes for Graham as the striker – lacking match fitness and needing the game – showed all his class at holding the ball up and linking play – but failed to score. http://www.hulldailymail.co.uk/Hull...tory-20105570-detail/story.html#ixzz2lCTW9fXh
Well he hadn't been doing that in the last few first team games, so at least he's making some progress.
