EssexVilla

Don't see the problem tbh. Ok, he wasn't at the level we were expecting last season but he still created Gabby's sitter and the westwood/weimann chance. On another day/in a better team he'd have created 2 goals and everyone would be singing his praises. IMO opinion peoples hopes have been overexaggerated amdhis good play is disregarded in the expectation that everything is perfect. In a better team he would look significantly better. Still at least it may allow him to stay with us for another year.

Hmmm yet to see him play yet by and large I trust andyclarkes opinion about him from FM from past experience about players. Don't see why other posters would doubt that considering past records and other information. Just because one poster who has seen significantly more youth games and has in turn made more significantly outrageous predictions shouldn't put fans off being mildly excited for an academy prospect coming good for the club. When those predictions are made in conjunction and with support of andy I feel inclined to suppport them because of the stellar job he has done in effectively showing many players to come through our academy.

Aye precisely, but it's hard to differentiate between genuine problems which cause families to move and moving to get to a 'better' club. In his case it seems obvious that he has moved to get to a more prestigious club and we seem ill-compensated fir that but I imagine it is hard to create legislation which fits the majority of events and implements a truly fair system.

Emirates.. Ethiad etc. Personally i dont really care what the grund is called if it means we get some cash to improve the team. Its just a name and people will call it whatever they like Slippery slope though. Where is the line drawn? How far away is the next step of colours being changed? The possibility arises of that the club becomes a ghost of its former self and where does that leave the supporter? Do we support the 11 players payed ever increasing amounts or the club itself? People say the supporters are the club but there has to be something tangible and constant for us to follow and selling the naming rights to the ground is a step further away from that for me. I'd be quite happy on the other hand to sell rights to names of stands (holte end excluded) albeit thats operating in a far less lucrative market.

Never liked Bresnan. Every part of his game is average, got a bit lucky with the start of his career with england and now it seems he's undroppable. Can't believe we threw that game away today, don't really know what cook was thinking bowling stokes at the end. Overs should've gone to bopara/jordan. Hope Rankin's alright as well, in his last over he was looking like something resembling the bowler he was at the back-end of the summer.

Eh? What would be the point int that? The reason given for him not playing is that he wouldn't be up to speed with the premier league. Playing another season in Denmark is hardly gonna help with that whereas training week in week out with premier league players (even if many aren't up to scratch) might aid in some way.

You sure about this? I've been notts county twice, once this year once last year, and it cost me a tenner and £15. Both times were sat in the away end.

On Haddin, I think the Captain (Cook) carries some responsibility in that the bowlers just bowled too short to him. They should surely have changed that between them. That's what I felt as a spectator, who actually went to watch the Ashes. Much of the rest of your post is fair enough IMO. I was trying to get across that Cook wasn't blameless. You're right, we did bowl too short to Haddin which is possibly one of the faults that can be put on his head. A lot of people seem to be blaming him for plenty of things which I don;;t think are entirely his fault.

but even in summer it was criticized by some for being too negative compared to Clarke and as he won he seemed to get away from the flak. His field placements really were uninspiring and their lack of plan for Haddin was shocking. He played well but its not like he is a top class batsman or a mystery player they havent seen before Even when England were playing well with Strauss field placements were negative. England's gameplan was to strangle the opposition and force errors. Very rarely would the sort of field placements clark has had to use be needed before. Now though, the teams have adapted and the majority of England's player are getting old and have possibly burnt out. England need to adapt and Cook will hopefully do that. Expecting him to come up with innovative field placements to get in-form batsmen out with out of form bowlers this early on in his captaincy is unrealistic. As for the lack of plan to get Haddin out, surely a large part of the blame for that must be on the management? Theyre the ones who have the time and resources to find flaws in his game whereas cook quite rightly should have been looking to his own form. If the plan wasn't working and cook failed to adapt then there would be problems with his captaincy but blaming him for a complete lack of plan seems harsh to say the least.

Not sure if Cook's captaincy has been harshly judged by many. There's only so much you can do if the players aren't performing. Apart from broad none of the other bowlers could keep it tight for a period for any consistent length of time, especially the spinners. Without being able to build pressure you're always going to struggle to take wickets.His poor performance with the bat wouldnt have been as exposed if other batsmen had been pulling their weight. As for Carberry I don't think he's the answer. Struggled to play his natural game. If this was his debut series and he was a bit younger I'd be all for giving him another go but at his age he isnt going to dramatically improve and if he does he still probably wont be around for the next ashes series.

I think the touch was bad enough that it was no longer a clear goal scoring opportunity. But the touch is directly impacted by the challenge. There's 2 possibilities when the ball is there to be won. The 1st possibility is that the stoke player doesn't make a challenge, Weimann is then through on goal in a clear goal scoring opportunity. The 2nd possibility is that the stoke makes the challenge fouling weimann. This illegally stops weimann the goal scoring opportunity. The touch is irrelevant due to the impact the fould had on it.

**** hell it's only stoke. They're just as bad as we are. Their back 4 is awful apart from shawcross, walters is crap, nzonzi and whelan are worse than delph and westwood, crouch and kozak seem pretty similar and their other players are cheap from abroad in the same mold as tonev etc. This is definitely wiinable albeit probably gonna end in a draw.

Luna is absolutely terrible. Not an improvement on bennett at all. He just cant defend, gives them all the time in the world to cross and we get punished for it. Feel a bot sorry for Benteke as well, he may have been poor the last few weeks but 3/4 times hes peeled off jones and would be clean through if gabby/albrighton/el ahmadi had slipped him in. Sylla has been useless, offered absolutely nothing albeit the other two havent offered much more. We need vlaar back quickly as the defence just looks awful without him.

Tymal Mills isn't ready to play for England. He doesn't play that often for Essex. They only like to play one left armer and they think Topley is better. He's a project to work with though, anyone who can bowl 90+ is worth working with. Haven't seen that much of Rankin apart from a few games for England and Ireland. He's looked good from what I've seen although I think he struggled in the warm up games? Think one of them or Finn needs to play though as England look stale and one-paced. This attack struggles when it isn't swinging which it never really does in aus. Dunno how bresnan keeps getting a look-in. Such an average player, even on this wicket he was bowling low 80's when jimmy and broad were touching 90.

Throwing on 3 obvious subs which every man and his dog was saying he should do? No not for me Cardiff game then