Disagree, our defence has been the main reason we've been shafted out of promotion for the last 3 years running. I think DJ was blind when it came to defending, quite ironic considering his playing career
It won't matter how good our defence is, if we only have 8 players on the field, it won't do us much good. Or do we play 7-2-1? I also thing our back 5 is better than many think if the 4 (5?) in midfield give it some protection. Until we have 6 midfielders and 3 strikers on our books we shouldn't even look at the back 5.
I'd have to agree with that, over the last few years the defence has taken the brunt of the blame, admittedly sometimes it was the defences fault but most of the time I (and many others around me) thought the midfield did very little in way of protection. Look at our usual midfield the second half of last year, Whittingham (attack minded), Burke/JET (attack minded) Mcphail (bit of both but doesn't do either that well) and Oli (was meant to be that ball-winning player but for me didn't protect the defence enough and gave the ball away a lot). Admittedly we need a new left back but the defence doesn't need as much work doing to it as people think. We have Gerrard next year who was apparetly class at Hull last year .
Yeah really looking forward to seeing Gerrard in a City shirt again. I actually think there is healthy competion amoung our defenders. A left sided-left footed defender would be a necessarily addition. We need to ship out Naylor and Gyepes at once... Not before Gabor has a word with Zoltan though!! Agree with Optimistic, that we need a far more hard working midfield to protect our back five. As with Norwich last year, Blackpool the year before. I quite like to see an adaptable side too. One that is capable of flooding the midfield when without the ball.
I think our midfield has a lot to answer for, light weight, good at playing champagne balls forward to our strikers, but used to go missing when you needed someone to put their foot in and protect the back four, OK our back four weren't necessarily the best, but how many times were they dropped in it by the players in front of them? A lot was made of Bellamy's workrate and how he was prepared to track back to win the ball..............not knocking Craig, but he shouldn't have had to, his energy would have better off being expended in the final third of the field where he could do some real damage..............sort the midfield out and the defence will look after itself.............though LB is still a bit of a worry
Andrew Taylor from Middlesbrough on a free too. Rumours around that MM will go after him (unfounded rumours that is). Malky had him at Watford last year. Left back/Left wing. Former England U-21. Would anyone want him at the CCS?
Well MM knows him from his loan spell at Watford, so is far better qualified to judge than any of us (me certainly) to judge him, all I can find out is he is a youngish (24) hungry player with potential, left sided who cab play LB, LM and on the wing at a push we need someone on the LHS, MM obviously knows and rates the guy, he is well thought of by Boro fans and he is not going to break the bank.....................this looks like the future for CCFC, and the kind of player we will be looking at, our squad is threadbare at the moment we need to sign 7 or 8 players, they are not all going to be £1 million plus players, lets just see what happens
Interesting thing I gather from reading Boro blogs (about Cardiff rumour) is that he's very much a team player who can pass and retain possession very well. MM did say in his press conference that possession football and heavy pressing without the ball is his style. Taylor goal this season... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QvfQSy0L3mU Also, speaking of the topic of the post - Freebies and while on the subject of raiding Boro's squad, Julio Acra's on a free come July 1st. Would anyone go for him? I've always rated him as a good all rounder. Can play DM, CM & LB...
Sniffing around Patrick Viera eh Phoph!? What Viera areas!!? IF we are to spend on wages as we did last year and give promotion another good crack, I think we need to be quite tactical about the order of signings. A champagne signing might enourage big players in, but it might also send a message out to agents that we've got money to burn. We need potential targets to think we're going places, but we need to play our cards close to our chest. Someone made the good point that stalling any Bellamy offer makes sense as we'll save money by not paying for off season time. Man City will be more prone to just off load him the closer we get to the August. Meanwhile the rumour helps us for my above point about champagne signings.
