| Questions 23:48 - Aug 27 with 1714 views | Leadbelly |
If Humes, Cowling or whoever is not dictating how the team is set up, why do successive first team coaches repeatedly set us up to play negatively when it so obviously doesn’t work and certainly doesn’t get the best out of the players?
And why does our significant group of recruitment “experts” continually recruit players who seem unsuited to the negative way we keep playing?
And when we are crying out for some additions at full back and up front do we keep signing loan players for a crowded midfield when all they will do is warm the bench?
And Nouble…why? |  |
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| Questions on 10:10 - Aug 28 with 1631 views | durham_exile |
LB wrote, “If Humes, Cowling or whoever is not dictating how the team is set up, why do successive first team coaches repeatedly set us up to play negatively when it so obviously doesn’t work and certainly doesn’t get the best out of the players?
And why does our significant group of recruitment “experts” continually recruit players who seem unsuited to the negative way we keep playing?
And when we are crying out for some additions at full back and up front do we keep signing loan players for a crowded midfield when all they will do is warm the bench?
And Nouble…why?”
So LB my thoughts:
We have nothing to fear except fear itself so said Roosevelt. The simple truth is that we have been advancing backwards for the past 13 years. Relegation from the Championship saw a steady decline in League One and then since relegation from League One in 2016 we have struggled consistently, flirting with the ignominy of the loss of our League status (again) for the past two years.
The managers during that time have been (some more than once):
Aidy Boothroyd
John Ward
Joe Dunne
Tony Humes
Richard Hall
Kevin Keen
David Wright
John McGreal
Steve Ball
Hayden Mullins
Wayne Brown (BDH)
Roughly one per year.
Your question is why First Team Coaches set up negatively. Well Robbie Cowling has been Chairman over this period so he has had a major say in appointments and tactics. Yes I know he ploughed much money into the club but his lieutenant Tony Humes has had a major say in team affairs too.
Despite my rose-tinted specs each season the optimism quickly dissipates into acceptance that we are going to struggle but why. Well, we have never been well served with Strikers since Jamie Cureton the last Colchester player to score more than 20 in a season. So, the clamour for a striker has been consistently made for 13 years.
We must face facts that the clubs transfer policy and lack of a war chest (Financial Fair Play rules etc) will have a major impact but we must also face facts that perhaps the players don’t want to come.
The stadium despite criticism from certain quarters is one of the best outside the Championship. 10,000 all seater but our Home average attendance has declined to 2,813 last season. The academy and the facilities at Florence Park are excellent. Only half the stadium was full for the visit of Premier League side.
We bring great youngsters through the ranks and then inevitably sell them on because of our policy as a selling club.
Every season we lose on average two quality players and never quite manage to replace them. I’m not talking here about mismanagement of certain players but simply selling our stars to Peterborough or similar club every year!
The mindset is to set up defensively but when the shackles are removed the team plays some exciting attacking football. No really it does. Last season at Salford we were outstanding and there are other examples but they are too few and far between.
I asked the question recently where has the form from last seasons last 8 games gone and TS replied by saying that all the teams we played were effectively on the beach. I was lucky enough to watch live most of those games and the team played with confidence, positive energy and scored some tremendous goals. The old maxim you can only play the team that lines up against you.
Looking at the squad I am absolutely sure that we have sufficient quality at Goal Keeper, Defence and a myriad of Midfield experience and skill. It is the bete noire of the Striker where we are still weak.
Freddie Sears has not carried on where he left off last season. Big John Akinde, despite a 2.5-year contract is simply not able to play 90 minutes. WB made a point by giving him 96 minutes on Tuesday. I would imagine that since then he has been enjoying oxygen tents, ice baths and so on to restore his strength before he can play again. Sadly, Big John should only be used as an impact player perhaps maximum 25 minutes per game.
Has Samson Tovide run over black cats and walked under ladders because WB is simply not playing him, but our dearth of strikers means that he should be given plenty of playing time.
I have left Big Frank to last because LB has asked specifically about him.
I watched him at Stockport here he was simply awful. Playing down the right he failed to influence the game in any respect. Last Tuesday he was given 13 minutes and looked the part with some incisive play on the Right and toward the final third.
But yesterday in common with so many others he failed to deliver the goods. I can only imagine that he is one of the chosen few who receive favourite status from the management.
Midfield players are recruited like they are going out of fashion. We now have so many to choose from:
Cole Skuse
Alan Judge
Noah Chilvers
Ossama Ashley
Alex Newby
Gene Kennedy
Emyr Huws
Marley Marshall Miranda
Luke Hannant
Chay Cooper
Charlie Owens
Dan Chesters
In fact, a whole team and I haven’t included two youngsters who have not played yet for the first team but were excellent in the Youth Cup last season.
Skuse, Chilvers, Newby and Marshall Miranda are probably the best but then Owens and Chesters have also joined the party.
So, we know that the mindset of the club is to play defensively and to allow the opposition to boss possession (although bizarrely we had more possession than Tranmere yesterday) and that is fine providing when we have the ball we use it effectively.
WB has more players than ever before but he is unclear of his first XI, he does not play a settled team, he is too defensive and he fears losing, but sets up to lose. Fail to plan, plan to fail.
Already 4 defeats suggest another year of struggle. Are there two worse teams in the league again this year. Hartlepool and Rochdale are the early season strugglers along with the U’s and others but we cannot rely on those teams failing and where are the 48 points coming from to achieve safety this year.
I truly believed that we could achieve 75 points this season. Already that almost looks a forlorn hope.
So, what is the answer, sack the manager, NO definitely not at present we need stability and consistency BUT we do need a striker and before 1 September, so no pressure.
Humes is going nowhere, so we must work with what we have.
What I would like to see is the players given a degree of free rein so that they can play to their strengths.
Hornby
Tchamadeu Chambers Dallison Clampin
Skuse Chilvers Marley Miranda Newby
Sears Tovide
Options for Keeper — O’Hara
Options for full back — Coxe and Kazeem
Options for Midfield — Chesters and Owens plus Huws and Judge
Options for Striker - ??????????
Two youngsters to break into the team — Ryan Lowe and Frankie Terry
I don’t know whether that answers your questions LB but like you I am incredibly disappointed by the form over many years not just this season and we simply do not seem to be making any progress. Hartlepool is now a relegation six pointer in September!!!!!
Up the U’s — the only way is up!
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| Questions on 14:10 - Aug 29 with 1534 views | bwildered |
Sadly LB , we cannot answer such questions due the the behind close doors policy in the running of the club.
Everybody denies such tinkering in playing style, but a constant recruitment of another manager from within the system, seems not to let those in charge to imprint their own styles of play, but this they acknowledge when accepting the role, one presumes.
Has we all know the style was imprinted has a policy of the pathway of the academy to first team, with top marquee signings and Academy players making up the selected Xl .
Seems both ends of this spectrum is not delivering a winning combination, seniors and juniors both struggling to deliver winning performances consistently.
In larger clubs the recruitment manager just drops players into a squad, which the coaching staff then have to accept, but surely in a smaller club with restricted budgets this should and cannot be the case ?
The gap between the academy players making the jump into the first team is quite large due to the recruitment of PL and Championship players to supplement the squad, rather than our own grown, who have only progress to Isthmian L1 eg Maldon or Sudbury level standard and U23 games.
Sadly the club cannot get a winning mentality in consistency of winning, or winning performances, which if addressed is the key in being successfully climbing up the table, alas this and luck you cannot buy. |  |
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| Questions on 19:39 - Aug 29 with 1489 views | noah4x4 |
Humes out!
Simples….. |  | | |
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