Presumably Loft is guaranteed a goal against his old club? I mean, that’s how it works when our former players come back here, so it’s only fair it works the other way round.
Before you start taking pot shots at me, you should be questioning Cox. By all means it will take him time to realise his best 11 and to stamp his own mark on the team, but, to play your best players out of position hell bent on shoehorning them into a system everybody else bar Cox and Lillis realises doesn’t work, it annoys me…as it has to plenty of other fans.
Try asking yourself why he’s doing that. He’s no fool, there must be a reason for it. Give it some thought, I’m sure he has.
I think the Orient chairman was saying that because they’re being chucked out of the competition because they had tested their players (and had positive results) whereas he’s saying if he hadn’t tested anyone, they’d have had their game on the TV, so where’s the incentive for them to test?
There is no proof whatsoever that Swann has been choosing the team. Where he is guilty is in choosing poor managers.
I agree with the first point but who would you list as a poor manager?
Wilcox – won promotion, for all his flaws.
Robbins – had his moments and has done excellently elsewhere.
Alexander – ditto.
Daws – who knows from barely 10 games?
McCall – not great but not terrible.
Hurst – was showing some promise before leaving suddenly.
None of them are particularly exciting appointments but they’re not awful. I would argue all of them should have been given more time, apart perhaps from Robbins.
From what I’ve seen, Eisa is quick with a cracking shot and Gillead is slower with a good range of passing: based on that, both could well shine in their “new” positions, given a bit of time. But I could be wrong, so could Cox.
I would just ask why Cov is doing this, does he feel that moving these players will help make up for shortfalls in other areas of the squad? We all know we’re short of midfielders and none of the fit strikers are particularly quick.
But if it doesn’t work, I’m sure Cox will shuffle the deck again in a couple of games, you just have to give these things a bit of a chance.
Cox hasn’t exactly got off to a flying start but I’m willing to give him time. What I can’t quite fathom or give him much time for is playing people out of position or not playing them at all. Eisa and Gilliead were two of our very few positives from last season but so far this season they’re yet to play a single game in their actual position. Move them back out to the wings and start actually attacking teams like Cox professed he would…not pass the ball about nicely at the back making your possession stats look nice with no cutting edge (been there before haven’t we??).
Could it be that he thinks he can get more out of them by putting them in different positions? Remember when Gareth Bale was just a reserve left-back? Didn’t Cristiano Ronaldo spend his early days on the wing, not scoring many goals?
3 games and you’re already an expert on what he’s doing wrong? It’s a wonder you’re not manager WG.
You know how everyone was saying “give him time” at the start of the season? Well, guess what that means? You might have to wait a few more games until you form your judgements. There might be reason in his “madness”, there might be reasons why certain players aren’t being picked.
Time will tell. My suspicion is he’s desperately trying to make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear.
I was supposed to be seeing family from the north-east this weekend, that’s had to be shelved sadly. Now I see the government are floating the idea of a full national lockdown in October for a couple of weeks. Not great news.
Does it feel right to keep trying to play sport and diverting valuable resources in these circumstances?
It’s not Tottenham’s or Liverpool’s obligation to ensure Macclesfield pay their tax bill; live within your means and budget accordingly.
Maybe not directly but it doesn’t help that the Premier League refuses to share TV money properly, or that rules are consistently changed to suit the big clubs, like the EPPP scheme which undermines the academies of small clubs or the introduction of B-teams into the Football League Trophy. The list is a long one.
But the Premier League isn’t solely to blame, if Football League clubs were more united and less willing to bend over for a few pennies from the Premier League table, we wouldn’t be quite so badly off now. But there is no solidarity between clubs, everyone is solely out for themselves.
However, my point around self governance remains the same. Bury knew roughly their yearly turnover, yet they rode along with a madman’s spending spree when Beckford and co rolled into town. In no other walk of life would you get away from running a business so recklessly
Very fair point, so why don’t we govern clubs more strictly? Why do we allow owners to run up such appalling debts? The league could and should impose much tougher rules to stop them doing that but refuse to do so. Make owners post a bond each year to cover costs if the club runs into financial problems. Keep a much closer eye on finances during the season and react quicker if problems are occuring. Stop any one owner having overall majority control. These things are all possible!
I think fans have to accept some blame for the problems too, with all our endless demands of “showing some ambition” (translation: spend more money), thinking that we need to “invest in January” (translation: spend more money) or “be competitive” (translation: spend more money). It can’t keep going on like that. We need more solidarity between fans of rival clubs, for the good of the whole division, rather than just hoping that the axe will continue to fall elsewhere.
Wigan and Bolton have won the same number of FA Cups, I think.
To be fair, Wigan look a lot more likely to be salvageable than Bury were last year. After all, the club was running well before the current owners put them into admin.
The real scandal is how dubious owners are allowed to run these proud, historic clubs into the ground.
September 11, 2020 at 1:20 pm
in reply to: Turan#194553
Justin Walker was quite a good player, at times, though nothing like as good as he thought he was. Watching the re-run of the 1999 Wembley final, I was surprised just how much work he got through, he was more of a ball winner than a passer in that game at least.
The Walker I was trying to remember was a player under Knill who ended up at Gateshead I think. Turns out his name is Josh Walker, my mistake.
I think Mark Gavin was let go after a driving ban – can’t remember if it was for drink-driving or something else but it was enough to send him on his way.
I presume, BS, that they need to wait a couple of weeks so see if there’s any noticeable increase in cases in the areas where the trials have been conducted. Also, you need more than just one experiment before you can draw any proper conclusions.
Anyway, the big question is, if you are one of the few hundred allowed into GP, will you still be leaving games early to avoid the rush?
September 11, 2020 at 9:42 am
in reply to: Turan#194537
Was it Grimsby who used to have red numbers on their black-and-white stripes and no “box” for the numbers? Felt like looking at an optical illusion or a magic eye picture!
You are forgetting that what started out as a competition to benefit L1 & L2 clubs now exists to benefit the Premier League. Of course it would not get cancelled.
Exactly. For their huge youth team squads which they’ve amassed in part thanks to the EPPP scheme which ripped the heart out of lower league academies. The competition is a joke but many clubs like ours will, sadly, be even more desperate for the few pennies from the Premier League table.
No season long video pass in the uk as when crowds are allowed back saturday 3pm games won’t be available anymore.
I see. On balance, I think the 3pm Saturday black out is still probably beneficial for clubs like ours but it would have been interesting to run an experiment on it this year, given that I suspect a number of fans won’t want to return to grounds this season, even when they are allowed to.
September 8, 2020 at 11:37 am
in reply to: Ifollow#194450
A tenner for tonight’s mickey mouse cup game? No thanks.
To be honest, a tenner to watch a single game of football, with only a couple of cameras and occasional commentary issues, is not exactly the deal of the century for any game.
How much does Sky cost for the whole month? £30? £10 feels quite a lot. I might pay a fiver (although watching a Scunny game online leaves me pretty cold).
Can you get a season-long subscription or do you have to sign up game-by-game?
The only masks to are effective are those carbon filter ones which properly filtrate the air. Wearing a normal dust/face mask is more harmful, less oxygen and more breathing your own breath/carbon dioxide is downright daft.
I know I shouldn’t bother but it’s important to point out that this is complete bollocks.
