If everyone is fit....who starts?

[Cobbler78]

If our whole squad is fully fit, who makes your first 11?

Mine is

..............Ingram............
Moloney.Taylor.Pierre.Buchs
...............Poole.............
..JJOT...Grimes..McGuggan
............Crooks...............
.............Long..................

It’s a bit narrow, admittedly, but you’d hope the full backs, would provide that especially with 5 in midfield.

This leave a 2nd 11 of the following, which is as good or better than a lot of what I’ve seen in 20+ years

................Cornell...........
Phillips.Barnett.McGiven.Smith
Hoskins.McWilliams.Foley.Powell
............Waters..Rico..............

Which leaves Bowditch, Kasim, Hanley, Revell and Coddington as very surplus to requirements. Imagine if we could trade those 5 players for 2 top end wingers.

[threeinabed]

no pace and no width - good luck with that.

[DrillingCobbler]

I asked this question on here on 29/10, this was my team then and it remains the case…just.

A few points:

1. Like I said then, McGugan holds the key for us up to when the transfer window re-opens. He is a different pedigree to every other player in the squad, and we have since seen flashes of that against Sc***horpe where he ran the show for the first hour and then the other night when he scored a wonder goal.

2. McWilliams. Simply has to play. He's consistently one of our best 4 players (when he plays) and is rapidly improving. We need to find a place for him in the team every week whilst he maintains his performance levels. If thats in midfield if we are short or at right back in place of BM, then so be it. But he has to play.

3. JJ and Crooks. When one of them plays we are an 'ok side'. When neither of them play we are useless. We don't know how good we will be when they both get to start but that could be a 'game changer' for us.

4. Powell/Hoskins…nothing in them now. Whilst Powell offers us more natural width, Hoskins is the more tenacious one of the two. But with a fully fit squad there is not room for both of them.

5. Our best formation, home or away, is 4-3-3 or 4-2-3-1-1.

6. The only central striker at this point in time who Id persist with his Long, even though his scoring record is appalling. He's only scored in one game! BUT he brings more to the party than Rico or Revs. If we go two up top then we leave out much better players behind them and the team becomes less balanced. Chasing a game its fine, but not from the start.

7. We need a proper winger to compete with Powell and a very decent forward asap. Theres at least 5 or 6 players we do not need and whom will not get to the level required to make us successful in this division.

8. I see zero point in looking at any other positions until next Summer; fix the obvious and see how it goes.


Matt Ingram

Sean McWilliams
Aaron Pierre
Ash Taylor
David Buchanan

Lewis McGugan
John Joe O'Toole
Matt Grimes
Matt Crooks
Sam Hoskins

Chris Long

Subs:

Cornell
Regan Poole
Brendon Maloney
Sam Foley
Marc Richards
Billy Waters
Daniel Powell

[WasRambo]

I asked this question on here on 29/10, this was my team then and it remains the case…just.

A few points:

1. Like I said then, McGugan holds the key for us up to when the transfer window re-opens. He is a different pedigree to every other player in the squad, and we have since seen flashes of that against Sc***horpe where he ran the show for the first hour and then the other night when he scored a wonder goal.

2. McWilliams. Simply has to play. He's consistently one of our best 4 players (when he plays) and is rapidly improving. We need to find a place for him in the team every week whilst he maintains his performance levels. If thats in midfield if we are short or at right back in place of BM, then so be it. But he has to play.

3. JJ and Crooks. When one of them plays we are an 'ok side'. When neither of them play we are useless. We don't know how good we will be when they both get to start but that could be a 'game changer' for us.

4. Powell/Hoskins…nothing in them now. Whilst Powell offers us more natural width, Hoskins is the more tenacious one of the two. But with a fully fit squad there is not room for both of them.

5. Our best formation, home or away, is 4-3-3 or 4-2-3-1-1.

6. The only central striker at this point in time who Id persist with his Long, even though his scoring record is appalling. He's only scored in one game! BUT he brings more to the party than Rico or Revs. If we go two up top then we leave out much better players behind them and the team becomes less balanced. Chasing a game its fine, but not from the start.

7. We need a proper winger to compete with Powell and a very decent forward asap. Theres at least 5 or 6 players we do not need and whom will not get to the level required to make us successful in this division.

8. I see zero point in looking at any other positions until next Summer; fix the obvious and see how it goes.


Matt Ingram

Sean McWilliams
Aaron Pierre
Ash Taylor
David Buchanan

Lewis McGugan
John Joe O'Toole
Matt Grimes
Matt Crooks
Sam Hoskins

Chris Long

Subs:

Cornell
Regan Poole
Brendon Maloney
Sam Foley
Marc Richards
Billy Waters
Daniel Powell

Good post. Pretty much my opinion also

[everbrite]

Good post. Pretty much my opinion also

Would include Powell based on recent performances.

[guest2995]

              Ingram

Moloney. Taylor  Pierre  Buchanan

             McWilliams.   JJOT

Crooks.                                Grimes
                   McGugan
 
                    Long

Powell , Foley , Poole , Rico , Coddington subs

Hoskins next in line

[threeinabed]

only 5 subs!?

controversial

[Benji]

no pace and no width - good luck with that.

Barcelona have pretty much got away without width or pace.
What's the point in having fast wide players if they're not good enough to beat their fullbacks, their crosses are poor and we have no quality strikers on the odd occasion a good cross comes over. Would feel more confident of scoring goals with McGugan, JJOT, Crooks, Grimes, McWilliams and Poole in the side.

[threeinabed]

Barcelona have pretty much got away without width or pace.
What's the point in having fast wide players if they're not good enough to beat their fullbacks, their crosses are poor and we have no quality strikers on the odd occasion a good cross comes over. Would feel more confident of scoring goals with McGugan, JJOT, Crooks, Grimes, McWilliams and Poole in the side.

I would argue that if you watched Barcelona live, you would be surprised at how quick some of the players are!?

also, this is league one, we don't have players of a similar ability to Barcelona - the one thing you can't coach is pace, and the one thing defenders can't find a way to deal with is pace.

[just.reading]

and the one thing defenders can't find a way to deal with is pace.

What nonsense! Courtney Herbert was rapid, he was pretty well handled by League Two defenders.

[Gen.Disorda]

I'd love to see the reaction on here if jfh played that many people out of position 

[Benji]

I would argue that if you watched Barcelona live, you would be surprised at how quick some of the players are!?

also, this is league one, we don't have players of a similar ability to Barcelona - the one thing you can't coach is pace, and the one thing defenders can't find a way to deal with is pace.

It's all relative we don't have players of Barcelona's ability but we're not playing teams with Real Madrid's ability either.
I just think at present with the players we have if we were going for pace & width, while it would allow us to break from deep you would be relying on the 3/4 strikers and fast attacking players to create and score the vast majority of goals and if you look at the players that fall into that category (Revell, Richards, Long, Powell, Bowditch, Walters, Hoskins & Hanley) I don't see it happening.
The other option is to try and keep possession better, play higher up the pitch, be more compact, pass through the opposition (have already seen McWilliams show he is capable of this) late runs from deep from midfielders (JJOT & Crooks) and long range shots from the edge of the box (McGugan & Grimes)
There is no ideal solution, I guess with the defence recently looking pretty good you have to look at the most probable way of scoring goals.

[threeinabed]

What nonsense! Courtney Herbert was rapid, he was pretty well handled by League Two defenders.

anyone who has played saturday or sunday football against him will know he wasn't that rapid - and you still have to use it the right way.

you can't coach pace, but if they already have it, then you can coach them to use it effectively.

i would argue its easier to coach someone quick to be effective then to try and get a footballer with ability to all of a sudden be able to use blistering pace.

[guest2995]

The dilemma is that your best eleven players are not necessarily the best team .
You could argue that neither Powell or Hoskins are among the best eleven players but you might need one of them to give balance .
On the plus side , our midfield on paper is one of the best in the division ...... if they are all fit and firing ( big if). We just need the formula .

 

[guest3103]

                    Ingram

McWilliams  Taylor  Pierre  Buchanan

 Crooks    JJOT   Grimes   Powell
                 
                  McGugan
 
                     Long

Defending : 4-4-1-1
Attacking : 4-2-3-1

JJOT swapping with McGugan depending on match situations. Maybe Crooks and Powell swapping at times.

Until we sign a proper right winger I wouldn't mind Moloney pushing Crooks.

[Dr Feelgood]

Ingmeister

McWillmeister
Piemeister
A. Taymeister
Buchmeister

McGugmeister
O'Toolmeister
 Grimmeister
Crookmeister
Hoskmeister

Longmeister

[CallMeJoe]

Hmmmm...something tells me that despite the Dallas Cowboys Star, the good doctor is possibly Germanic, as there seems to be a heavy tilt toward the  Meisters.
I actually couldn't give a starting 11. I worry about Centre Backs and Strikers

[Cobbler78]

no pace and no width - good luck with that.

True, but any worse than playing with 2 sh1t wingers? My point remains, this squad with 2 top end wingers would be a match for most teams in this league.

[Wolvo]

anyone who has played saturday or sunday football against him will know he wasn't that rapid - and you still have to use it the right way.

you can't coach pace, but if they already have it, then you can coach them to use it effectively.

i would argue its easier to coach someone quick to be effective then to try and get a footballer with ability to all of a sudden be able to use blistering pace.

Asamoah and Sabin were pretty rapid. Also easily handled by defenders.

[everbrite]

Asamoah and Sabin were pretty rapid. Also easily handled by defenders.

True, bit harsh on Sabin tho'.