Gary1906

You’re not seriously suggesting that Placide is a better keeper than Ripley?!?!?! You’re entitled to your opinion of course, but for me I’d rather have Ripley any day of the week. He was fantastic for us when he was here. Record number of clean sheets and all that. Johnny flatters to deceive in my opinion. Ripley would be a cracking signing if we could get him.

Might be the perfect time to get him back.

Maybe it was a case of Ripley being really good, but you’d have to say that he didn’t carry that form into playing for Burton or Bury especially.

I don’t think Ruddy or Wilson were very good to be honest. Johnny is a flamboyant keeper, pretty good with both feet, but I don’t think he’s very good either to be honest. Better than the other two though for sure. Can’t really blame Nash if the defence is giving the goalkeeper too much to do, and I think Johnny was left exposed too often by just bad defending. Maybe a defensive coach would be a good appointment. Going back to Nash though if you are placing a direct parallel between how each goalkeeper performs to the ability of the goalkeeping coach then you would have to say that he did a cracking job with Connor Ripley. I’d look at getting him back to Boundary Park if at all possible.

Connor Ripley back at Boundary Park would be what I would be striving for. Johnny has been pretty good and entertaining at times but Ripley was on a totally different level for us the season before. Ok he hasn’t been the same at Bury but we’ve seen his class first hand and he’s the best goalkeeper we’ve had for years. I’d be pulling out all the stops to get him. League 2 football might be the stumbling block though, as it probably will be for a lot of decent players that we might look at.

RW said last week after the Southend game that he had to play Benyu because he was the only central midfielder that he had with Fane being unavailable. If its been a choice between those two then I’d pick Fane every time personally. Benyu offers nothing at all, neither does Pringle as far as I can see. It’s all about opinions.

Or Benyu last week and some of yesterday. I’d have Fane any day if it’s choice between them. I agree that we need to be doing a lot better than Fane but Pringle and Benyu have brought absolutely nothing to the team. At least with Fane you have someone who will show some enthusiasm and put a tackle in. The other two have just been total crap!!

Suspended by the owner?? If so, what a stupid thing to have done. Shot yourself in the foot there Mr Lemsagam. Nice one!!

He’s just disappeared out of the squad though without any explanation, unless I’ve missed it. I’m just curious to know what’s happened.

Does anyone know what’s happened to Fane? Various rumours about him either being suspended by the owner, injured, or dropped. Anyone know for sure though? I know he divides opinion on here - to say the least - but I actually think we’ve missed him in the last two matches.

Anyone who thought Kusunga was a god might just be clinically insane though! ???

Each to their own. FFS!!!!

I meant stability and continuity instead of changing the manager every season along with half the playing staff. Or change things again with no guarantee of success again, and a complete overhaul of the players again. Same old, same old. Give the guy a chance, he’s not even had one full season in the job yet! He’s had to learn the ropes as he’s gone along, manage through the transfer embargo, and all without an experienced assistant manager. Give him a full pre-season, with financial backing to strengthen the squad, and an experienced assistant alongside him, then judge him after that.

Unemployed for a reason!! Ha Ha

Personally I’d stick with RW next season no matter what division we are in. The club needs some stability and continuity. He’s a rookie manager who took over the club when they were in a desperate situation and were rock bottom of the league. He will be honest enough to say that he’s made mistakes but he’s new to the job for goodness sake! Of course he’s going to make mistakes. He wasn’t helped by the transfer embargo fiasco in January and Paul Jewell let him down badly as well. He deserves a proper crack at it next season with a strengthened squad, and an experienced assistant manager alongside him.

Personally I’d stick with RW next season no matter what division we are in. The club needs some stability and continuity. He’s a rookie manager who took over the club when they were in a desperate situation and were rock bottom of the league. He will be honest enough to say that he’s made mistakes but he’s new to the job for goodness sake! Of course he’s going to make mistakes. He wasn’t helped by the transfer embargo fiasco in January and Paul Jewell let him down badly as well. He deserves a proper crack at it next season with a strengthened squad, and an experienced assistant manager alongside him.

I can’t understand why RW thinks it’s going to be productive hoofing the ball up to Doyle when he’s always going to have a big centre half clambering over the back of him and we virtually never gain possession from that. Surely we should be playing to Doyle’s strengths, as in playing him in behind the defence and giving him goal scoring opportunities. His strike rate this season has been excellent and missing chances doesn’t seem to put him off, always the sign of a proper striker. I think it shows just how much we miss Davies when he’s out of the team. They had a great partnership going earlier in the season. Personally I would pick AAH while Davies is out. He’s a target man and Doyle would probably be better suited playing alongside him. Perhaps bring Nazon on as an impact sub when the defenders are tiring. Our midfield is dire at times though and I’ve no idea how that can be sorted out with the personnel that we’ve got. Thought Johnny, Hamer and Edmundson were - on the whole - excellent last night. Nervy end to the season, hopefully we’ll be ok. Need to find a way to start scoring again though.

It’s his fault and his fault alone though that he wanted to get on the pitch! I didn’t even think that it was a particularly contentious penalty. What an idiot he was. Hope he’s banned and fined. Unfortunately the club will probably get fined as well though.

I agree regarding Johnny, Edmundson and Nazon but I thought Gardner was poor to be honest. I’m usually a fan of his but he didn’t have any influence as far as I could see. McEleney is just not at the races yet, he really needs to up his game. Fane was ineffective yesterday as well. In short the midfield need to buck up and work as a unit instead of four individuals.

I heard that Paul Cook at Wigan didn’t get on with Byrne either, and Blackburn fired him off pretty quick as well. There’s a common denominator somewhere in all of this.

Hope not!!!

I have a few observations...... Fane: Shouldn’t really be getting anywhere near our team but unfortunately we don’t have anyone else prepared to do the tackling and the dirty work for the more talented midfield players. Must look for an improvement next season if we stay up. Byrne: Wouldn’t be surprised if he’s gone by the end of next season. His attitude appears to be very poor especially if things don’t go his way. If he misplaces a pass he usually blames his teammate for not being there. At Wigan he went missing - granted he wasn’t on his own there, but it showed him up as not being as good as he probably thinks he is. Its all very good coming on as a sub and being angry. He made a big positive impact when he came on, but he has to think about why he was dropped in the first place. I’m not a Man Utd fan, far from it, but I don’t remember the likes of Roy Keane and Paul Scholes being dropped very often. They seemed to have the right attitude week in and week out. Byrne looks like he tests any managers’ patience and previous managers have got rid. I wouldn’t be surprised if Wellens does the same ultimately, if he feels he can’t trust him. Pringle: Can anyone tell me what he brings to the team because I just can’t see it.

Ha Ha, it’s true, I’ve lost patience with him. I did point out his failings in my previous post but he sort of won me over with his ability to break up play and the fact that we don’t seem to have any tacklers in midfield, I did think he was worth his place. He’s not been doing it lately though and we certainly can’t afford to carry him now.

You know what I mean on the whole though?

I went to the game. Wigan - for their part - probably played like they’ve played in most of their home games. They looked confident, like they expected to win. We on the other hand never got to grips with them, didn’t put tackles in in midfield and our defence were constantly turned and put under pressure. I felt a bit sorry for Davies and Doyle because they were feeding off scraps. We have so many options up front but our midfield and defence are not playing well at all so the strikers are getting very poor service. Gardner is the only midfielder who achieves any sort of consistency in my opinion. Byrne is nowhere near the same player that he was when he was on loan, Fane is simply not good enough. His weight of pass is abysmal, he can’t head the ball, even his tackling isn’t as effective nowadays. We’ve simply got to be able to do better than a player of his ability. Wigan away is one thing, and it’s true that we won’t ultimately be judged against that level of opposition, but Portsmouth at home was also very poor. We need to be a LOT better on Monday. A defeat against Blackpool at the same time as a couple of teams seem to be gaining some momentum could put us in a very tricky position. RW needs to find some answers soon, and get the team playing with some pace and power. Give the strikers some opportunities, they’ve proven that they can score goals if provided with the chances.