sandmanExtended-Phenotype Think we have bigger problems to solve than which very decent keeper to play.
Agree with that btw. It's just the double standards that are applied to them by the likes of Hoop Blah and Ian Royal that I have a problem with.
No double standards, I just think the weaknesses that McCarthy displays (and if you read what I've posted I do agree that Federici's kicking is better than McCarthy's) have less of an impact on his position as our first choice goalkeeper than the areas where Federici is the lesser keeper.
sandman Once again Hoop Blah despite your attempts at appearing to be reasonable you are replying to a pre conceived idea of the poster rather than the point they are making.
Hardly, I'm just pointing out that you being a dick about Federici all the time (amongst other things) diminishes the credibility of your other post and certainly reduces the chances of me bothering to reply to one of them (not that you'll be crying over that of course)
sandman Obviously McCarthy is not going to distribute it badly all the time and when he doesn't have to think about where he has to place it and to find a player he can get it quite far. Being able to get it over the halfway line doesn't necessarily mean he has improved his kicking even you could probably kick it over the halfway when you're not busy being a tosser. I'd rather look at who he is finding with his kicks and it is more often than not an opposition player.
I think you're the one using preconceived opinion to compare their kicking. So much of the effectiveness of a keepers long kicking depends on the quality of the opposition defenders and the ability of his own team to win the ball that your judging of it is almost impossible to be otherwise.
Unless you know what McCarthy (or Federici) is aiming at or been told to do with his kicking how can you judge his ability. If you watch him warm up you can see his ability to put the ball where he's aiming isn't too bad (I'd say Federici and Bibbo's is better though).
sandman If I was playing a game as you put it I would have denied that McCarthy played well at all on Saturday as you and others so regularly do when Federici plays and has a good game. Then again, this is a trend when it comes to home grown players on here. Case in point Hector was pretty poor on Saturday, including a mistake that put Huddersfield through, fair play he was out of position but he has played there before in the SPL against the newly crowned Scottish Champions so it's not entirely new to him. If Akpan had played like that then you and others would have got the pitch forks out. Hector gets the "he's young and inexperienced" excuses whereas Akpan who is just a year older and is playing his first season at this level doesn't.
Obviously Hector gets a bit of break because it's one of his very few appearances in a Reading shirt and he was playing out of position. We haven't spunked money on bringing him in as a Premier League player and then seen him turn out quite a few sub-par performances.
As it happens Akpan got lots of praise and consideration when he first came into the side. Possibly more than Hector got because we knew he was thrown into the deep end. His credit and the patience shown to him has dwindled with the passing (the irony) of every poor performance, bottled tackle and basic error.
sandman I don't see why that even when McCarthy's manager has said this season that he needs to work on his kicking that I get abuse for saying the same thing. You might want to dismiss kicking ability but if he wants to be the player that so many insist he's going to be then he needs to improve on it because the likes of Valdes and Neuer prove that the top keepers have to have ability with the ball at their feet.
I've already agreed with you that McCarthy's kicking needs work on. The difference between Adkins and you is that Adkins has rightly stoof by the keeper he's made his first choice, for valid reasons, instead of dropping him for a weakness of relatively low importance.
