M_Afro

He is a prime example of how our transfer system is floored. We seem to look for bargain players who we think we can improve but ultimately they have floors in their game that we cannot address. Cash and Watkins are fine athletes. They are strong, relatively quick and they can run all day. They do however have massive technical floors to their game. The opposition do not have to work hard at all to get the ball back from them. It’s like taking sweets from a young child. So often the ball gets played out to Cash and he is instantly pressured by one/two players and we lose possession. Even when he takes the ball in space, his distribution is poor, as is his decision making. We then have other players like Emi/Phil/Ings/Bailey who are technically good enough but do not have the physical capability to be effective in the league. I read someone else on another thread suggesting that Chambers may get selected at right back ahead of Cash. I would also pick Young ahead of him at the moment. He is a championship winger trying to make it at a big PL club. You can’t fault his effort but he is out of his depth.

We can’t just keep buying more players. We need to work with what we have for the rest of the season and use January as an opportunity to move some players out. If we can get high quality in January, who will make a difference, then fair enough but otherwise I would wait. I would genuinely consider offers for all of our players except Emi 1, Carlos, Digne, Boubs and maybe Mings, If we can shift out any of the rest and use the wages/transfer fees to rebalance our squad, then we should consider decent offers for anybody else. I would not trust Lange to recruit any replacement either. Let him focus on the sales and leave purchases up to the manager. I would also like to see us utilise more of our younger players too. Lots for the new manager to ponder.

This guy has such an appalling success rate for signings. He needs to be shown the door! I’m struggling to think of a single signing that you would consider a massive success. Martinez is maybe the only one.

I just can’t see what everyone else sees with this guy. He is so wasteful in possession. He occasionally sets one up for us but In between sets up 3 or 4 counter’s for the opposition! My goodness our transfer dealings have been poor.

This looks like it’s happening now which is made all the more incredible by the fact that I backed him at 12-1! Unbelievable Jeff!

Three Year Plan. I like it!

This guy was so good today. I have criticised Villa players previously, for lacking football intelligence. This guy is a very smart footballer. I’m really looking forward to seeing what he can do with a run of games.

I think he is right about this though. Still not sure what Lange does. Whatever it is, it doesn’t seem to have any tangible benefits.

I live in Leicester and have loads of City supporting mates. Most of them are still behind Rodgers and think that he will turn things around. There are two key factors at play apparently. Firstly, the funding has been pulled and Brendon has been told to cut his cloth accordingly. This seems to have demotivated him a little and is certainly not what he signed up to originally. He wants to be able to compete in the top half of the table but understands that this will now become harder and harder due to the financial constraints. Secondly and this is total gossip from one of the Dad’s from my son’s school. Apparently the rest of the players are unhappy that Vardy was given a new contract. They don’t trust him following Wagatha Christie and it’s caused a split in the dressing room. This is apparently the reason that Schmeical left in the summer. Rodgers is a smart manager who knows how to get his teams playing to their maximum. He took over a faltering Leicester team and got them performing almost straight away. I wanted him as our manager when Dean took over and when he was sacked. I really think he is a great fit for us. I think that he wants it too (more speculation).

I remember Gerrard talking about this last season and he said that there is almost always an option to recall a player. Therefore……….you are probably right!

Watkins is never going to be a good finisher. He’s never going to have a great first touch. He’s unlikely to ever play with his head up and link the play effectively. He’s too old now to develop those things enough. He will always work exceptionally hard for the team. He has decent pace and decent strength. Presses the defence well and can work the channels effectively. If he plays, we must play to his strengths. Otherwise, don’t pick him. The biggest problem is, that his strengths are the weaknesses of Ings and vice versa. If you could combine the two, you would have a top player. I think we need to choose a team, formation and tactics that best suit our collective and then pick it consistently. That means you either play Ings or Watkins but not both. In my view, that means we pick a team to press from the front, which means Watkins starts.

Could this guy benefit from a new managerial set up? He does bring much needed energy and physicality to our midfield and is pretty much the only midfield player we have who is effective at regaining possession. People argue that his distribution is poor but none of our midfielders can pass the ball so is he really any worse? When Gerrard first came in, this guy was a massive part of our early success. He then got injured and despite Gerrard name checking him as a massive loss, he never ever restored him to the team. With Doug and Boubs both missing, is now the time to bring him back? I would start him on Sunday.

Whatever formation we play moving forward, if the new manager does not pick Fred, Morgan, Chambers et al, can we all just accept that 3 consecutive managers not picking them is evidence enough that they are actually not very good! It will also be intriguing to see what happens to Emi 2. I know that he is the fans favourite but I am far from convinced by him. Can a new manager find a way to get him in the team and performing well on a regular basis. I only see him working as a right sided attacker in a 4-3-3 but that would require the other two forwards to have real pace.

I really like Marco Silva. He has plenty of experience in our country now and his teams are really well set up and play good football. He wouldn’t be my first choice but we could do a lot worse than him.

Can’t wait for the first Matty Cash long throw in

I think that one of the mistakes that the club made in appointing Gerrard was not listening to the fans. There were a vocal minority who were vehemently against him from the start and a larger group fairly agnostic about the appointment who were fairly quick to turn when things didn’t improve. That makes it very hard to gather any momentum. Conversely, when they appointed Dean, the fan base were united for the first time in years. The advantage that this brings in terms of performance and results cannot be underestimated. The owners cannot choose a manager simply to appease the fans but they should take care to gauge public opinion before offering the job to anyone. We need unity from the start because we are in a relegation battle as it stands. Any new manager will need some patience.

Is he just a yes man to Purslow? I always thought it to be an odd appointment for an ambitious club. We need an innovator. A leader. Someone to push the boundaries. Lange is too subservient to Purslow and latterly Gerrard. Not the right man in my view.

He is awful. Like, really bad. Another absolute fortune blown on another chancer. We may as well get Mike Bassett to manage us because until we sort out our recruitment, we will continue to be awful.

I think this is good for him. Nobody can throw the “teachers pet” insult at him anymore. Hopefully it will free him to show us his undoubted talent

No way Purslow and Lange survive this. One will be gone by this time next week. Maybe both!

It will be Rogers or Frank I reckon. I think Rogers would be really good for us to be honest. Frank would be another massive risk though. Let’s hope we avoid that one.

This is spot on. Since Jack left, we have been an utter shambles. Spend some serious money on a competent manager and a competent DoF. Let them then decide our football philosophy and buy players to suit that. Literally everybody else can leave. We must have the highest number of coaches out of all PL teams. Clear the decks completely.

I switched off after 20 minutes so haven’t seen the red. Is there a chance it could be over turned?

This is the worry now. Who the hell are we going to get next?

Lots of our players are far from good enough. Cash, Konsa, McGinn. Ramsey, Watkins and Bailey are all regular starters and there are loads of better players, in their respective positions, who are earning less than ten grand a week in the championship.