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Yorkshire  Canary

Squad Assessment

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I am being brutally honest here whilst being delighted with the points gained to date. I think the defence and midfield are easily top 6 in this division. I think the strikeforce struggles though and as a whole they are probably bottom 6 in this league

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Errrr... I can kinda see where your coming from.  I''m not sure if the strike force is quite bottom six but I would agree in maybe a bottom half strike force.  Jackson I think is very good and will score lots of goals.  Holt and Martin are bottom half with Holt being bottom six.  And as for Oli, League 1 is probably where his career will be based around.

 

As for the midfield and defence, I don''t think we are quite as good as you say good.  Our first choice back four is probably top six material (R.Martin, Ward, Barnett and Drury), however I don''t think we have that much strength in depth in defence.  And the midfield, well we have some very good midfielders such as Korey Smith, Wes Hoolahan, Andrew Crofts, Andrew Surman who are all capable of a top six side but, we also have players such as Lappin and Fox who are probably more bottom half players.  I''m not quite sure where to put McNamee.

 

I think they key with our team is that they suit each other well, they know their roles well (which is down to Lambert and Culverhouse) and all want to play for the club and most of all Paul Lambert which means they give 100% every game which is not true for many clubs.  A bit of fresh blood in January with the boards backing and we have a very good team.

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Holt has 5 goals and 5 assists this season (according to ESPN), from 13 starts and one sub appearence.

Jackson has 4 and one assist from 7 starts and 6 sub appearences

Martin has 3 goals from 13 appearences, 9 starts 4 as sub.

So I don''t see what the problem is with Holt, IMO him and Jackson are a perfect little and large combo. Jackson is the one i''d want to be in and amongst the golden boot contenders whilst Holt chips in with goals and assists.

Funnily enough thats what they''re doing right now, we''re sitting nicely in 4th 6 points off top yet our fans are saying our players who''ve got us into the top 6 arn''t good enough for the club to be there.

 

 

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Sorry but I simply cannot agree.

Our strikeforce is at least mid-table.

Holt has 3 goals in 7 league appearances and 2 goals in two cup appearences. That''s 5 goals in 9 appearances this season.

Becchio in comparison has 6 goals in 13 appearances in the league and cup this season.

The leagues top scorer is Chris Iwelumo who has 8 goals in 14 appearances. Mackie has the same number of goals but in 13 appearances.

Jay Bothroyd actually has more with 9 in 12 appearances.

Jackson has a not so good ratio due to the amount of appearances made as a substitute but if you consider starts to goals he is also pretty good.

So read into that what you like but Holt is scoring roughly one in two - Iwelumo and Mackie are slightly better than that at the moment but my argument would be look at the teams they are in.

QPR, Cardif and Burnley - all teams littered with premiership experienced players and who have played together for at least a season.

If you want my assessment of our squad - it''s probably not far off what I would have said when Worthington was last in charge, some good solid players for this level of football but scratch the surface and we start to struggle.

Gill can do a job for us but I think you would find it hard to find any team at this level that would consider starting him or Tudor-Jones for that matter. Askou looked good last season but is he good enough? I think alongside Ward he would do ok but as a regular starter? Is OJ?

You look at Cardiff right now, they can pick and choose from Bothroyd, Chopra or Bellamy as starting strikers. All three have played premiership football and have already more than proven themselves at this level.

I think we have a high mid-table to top six team. I don''t see us catching Cardiff or QPR right now for various different reasons, and especially depending on what happens come January when we could loose Barnett. But mainly because we don''t have the depth of squad they do.

Somwhere between 3rd and say 10th I think - but it is shaping up to be a very close season in terms of the play-off spots. 4 points seperate 5th and 16th at the moment.

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Lambo - not sure the appearances stats are right for Holt. We have played 13 league games and 2 cup if my memory serves me right - and he was out for at least a couple of those.

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Like I said mate, they''re from ESPN so i''m not certain how right they are. If yours are the more accurate fella it backs up what we''re saying better though so it works for me haha.

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Well that''s a baffler, my stats are from wiki, yours from espn and the clubs official ones have him down as having only four goals in 12 games 1 as a sub?!!!!

Oh well.

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[quote user="Yorkshire Canary"]I am being brutally honest here whilst being delighted with the points gained to date. I think the defence and midfield are easily top 6 in this division. I think the strikeforce struggles though and as a whole they are probably bottom 6 in this league[/quote]

The original post really doesn''t make a great deal of sense.

How can you say our defense is EASILY top six when they seem to self destruct at times (Watford, Leicester, Hull, Palace, Donny). If you''re including Ruddy in that, then no chance. He''s not commanding enough to be a top 6 keeper at the current time.

How is the midfield EASILY top six whereas the strikeforce are bottom 6. Most strikers are only as good as the service they get and isn''t that supposed to come from the midfield? I don''t recall our strikers missing a lot of chances as I don''t recall the midfield creating a lot of chances for them.

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I think that the back four are good, ceetainly top half. (Worryingly Barnett is due back to the Baggies in January, and from what PL has been saying we cannot afford to buy him.) If Whitbread ever returns, we ought to be good, and Nelson might just about be championship material. Certainly if Barnett goes, we shall not be as good at the back.

The strikers are not prolific, with only Jackson semingly able to make things happen by his pace. I have doubts about Holt and Martin, for different reasons.

Our present problems are in the midfield. We shall be better when Surman returns, perhaps our best player, and like others I rate Crofts. We have endeavour and commitment from Korey, but little more, and Lappin and Hooly are iinconsistent. We lack wide men who can take on and beat a fullback (like Macnamee), and tackle back (unlike Macn.)

In terms of top six standard, Ward/Barnet are surely there, and Surman and Crofts, perhaps Jackson eventually, and that''s about it.

Unless we can find some money, and buy in January, I can''t see us achieving top two, or even top six. In which case we shall be looking for one or two good Bosmans in the Summer, and PL doing his sales act again.

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