Summer Rebuild - Your Preferred 5 To Go?

[andrew1957]

In answer to the original question and assuming the financial situation is as dire as many believe I think we will release ALL the out of contract players - although I do hope we can find the money to make offers to Jake Taylor, Ugwu and Hector.

I think we will be forced to sell our saleable assets McCarthy (5M), McCleary (3M), Gunter (2M) and ALF (2M) - assuming there are any takers. I very much doubt we will be able to offload Pog or Drenthe. Nor will there be takers for the likes of Akpan, Blackman and HRK (who are better than many here say and we could be relying on as mainstays of the first team next season). The one I would be very sad to see go would be Obita and so I am hoping we retain him or at least hold out for a very large (club record) fee.

I think that we have to accept that there will only be one or two inward signings at best and that we will largely rely on the Academy to fill the gaps.

So I expect the squad next season to be something like -

Goalkeepers - Fed, Andersen and Henly

Defenders - Obita, Cummings, Kelly, Pearce, Morrison, Hector plus Academy youngsters

CM - Williams, Guthrie, J.Taylor, Karacan, Akpan

WM - HRK, Drenthe, Blackman plus Academy youngsters

Attack Pog, Samuel and Ugwu plus maybe our sole inward signing.

I think we will be in a relegation fight next season - but only time will tell. The only positive is that many other Championship squads will also be weaker next season as FFP starts to kick in. For example if QPR fail to go up one can only see a car crash.

[Ian Royal]

Completely agreed with SCIAG on the strikers front. Ugwu is pacey but doesn't seem to have an awful lot else about him, and Samuel has regressed alarmingly as a prospect over the last 18 months. Will be (pleasantly) surprised if either make a significant impact for us.

Cardwell on the other hand is a player I like. His movement is intelligent, he's oddly quick given how bulky he is, and has good quality when it comes to bringing others into play. He's impressed at both U18 and U21 level, and at only 17 is still 4 years behind Ugwu and Samuel in terms of development. A massive prospect.

Of course there's Tanner too, but I suppose you could argue he's more of a no. 10 type player than a striker..

Watch out for Josh Barrett next year. Could be better than them all..

Agree with this too from the few games I've seen (none of Samuel). Ugwu looks a player who's just not quite there in terms of what it takes to step up. He might develop it. Cardwell looks a complete package, just needing much more experience.

[RoyallyFcuked]

1. Adam Le Fondre - Hold up play is poor, distribution is poor, has no physical presence, quite clearly wants prem football, most of his goals have come from the spot, his arrogance isn't really needed in the team and could get a few million out of him.

He scored 3 penalties, the same as Pogrebnyak. Since when is 20% 'most'? The rest is at least slightly subjective, but IMO quite wrong.

How am I quite wrong, he very much does not like heading the ball, he doesn't ever seem to put any pressure on defenders, clearly has little physical presence, wants premier league football, is arrogant, could probably sell for a few million. On the penalties, yeah ok fairplay, but I really don't see what he adds to the team, except from shirt sales from 9 year olds thinking that he is a God

Sorry but that is just wrong. Hoofing the ball up to Le Fondre is not going to expose his qualities, and he actually does notch a few headed goals despite not being the tallest. His hold up play isn't actually that bad, especially when the ball is on the floor; when we actually pass the ball around he links up well with the midfield.

This season and last he has done well to score as many goals as he has with poor service and often limited game time. With the right strike partner, good service and the right style of football he could score 25+ goals in the Championship.

[SCIAG]

Completely agreed with SCIAG on the strikers front. Ugwu is pacey but doesn't seem to have an awful lot else about him, and Samuel has regressed alarmingly as a prospect over the last 18 months. Will be (pleasantly) surprised if either make a significant impact for us.

In fairness to Samuel, he has been injured for the best part of half that time.

[Snowball]

I think ALF is still class in a 442, but needs to be in a good partnership, like the way Hunt-Long worked so well.

This season he's never really been in-favour and apart from the last three games I thought
his body-language made it look like he knew the manager didn't want him.

But in this "crap season" he scored "only" 15 goals, but that was a goal every 151 minutes

Pog's 13 goals were 1 every 239 minutes.

Alf's CAREER goals per minute is 161 and it's 153 in The Championship and 126 in The Prem



I think this manager could improve his team-play. ALF did well in those last three games. If we could get 5M, I guess we'd take it,
but if we do lose him, the right team will have him scoring 20+ next year.

[kwik-silva]

I think Pog and Alf in partnership is probably one of the best in the division if they ever manage to click. Recently we seem to have been playing it into Pog's feet/chest a bit more, rather than head, and that seems to have helped