menzinho

It does make me laugh that some fans on social media think the recruitment team are just sitting on their hands waiting for an agent to ring them. Like pretty much every other professional club over the summer we will be in the thick of trying to add players to the squad. I guess the biggest problem with wanting to sign a good player is that 99% of the time of other clubs will want to sign him too. There were rumours that we had offered Kian Spence a contract but he chose to go to Rotherham instead. And sometimes some deals are worth waiting for, it could well be right now we are at the very end of deal for a top target that we've spent a month or so on. As for the trialists, I know one of them is Ben Stevenson and I wouldn't be against him signing. The issue is we are stacked in centre-mid so we'd have to move someone out before brining him otherwise as @McPie rightly says it leaves little room to bring other players in, and right now it's attacking players that we need.

Other than say going back to lock Alan Hardy in some sort of room so he couldn't complete a deal to buy the club... I’d go back to the pre-season match when Jimmy Spencer got injured. That damaged that season more than we realised and I think his career goes the other way if it doesn't happen. I’d imagine I would just appear on the touch line dressed in white like an angel, I’d catch the attention of Jimmy and warn him of a career damaging injury that is going to occur if he plays…

Other than Platt, Bedeau or JJ who else is likely to start every match? Right now those 3 for me are the only other serious candidates. I don’t really have an issue with Palmer being captain right now. Before he joined us in the National League he already had played over 200 matches in the EFL, he’s a lot more experienced than I realised and besides the freak ACL injury he never seems to be injured. I'm not sure the scream and shout approach is as effective these days either, I do think Matt is a tad quieter but when he speaks if what he says is useful and right that is of more value than someone shouting with little substance. I know that Norburn has been a captain at most of his previous clubs but will he be fit enough to start the season as our first-choice CM? It could well be that halfway through the season Robertson and Norburn are our starting midfielders, then we might have a problem.

It feels like for the first time in a long time we are being a bit hammered by bad news; losing Bass, Jatta’s travel visa, the long delay in releasing the home shirt and now this. I saw Ryan Bowman got a 42-month match ban but that was for over 6000 bets and he was betting on matches he played in. No idea if you can bet on youth team fixtures as those were the only matches Macari would’ve been playing at the time (plus a short spell at Dundalk which you could bet on). I agree football has a big gambling problem. It’s somewhat ironic that the FA are happy for footballers to essentially be walking adverts for betting companies. It’s even worse at Stoke though, they might as well rename themselves to Bet365 FC.

I’m not getting carried away as I think any EFL coach will look and sound good when you can snip up a whole training session into 5 minutes! That said I’ve been impressed with all of Martin Paterson’s interviews and even though this is just a snippet you can see his intensity and drive to do well. I think it was Kameron Muir who was confused by the term "hundreds and thousands" but to be fair he is only 15! I’m trying to remember what I was doing when I was 15, embarrassing myself in front of girls and avoiding thinking about my GCSEs at all costs... A world away from training with a professional football team! It’s super impressive that he’s out there with the first team squad. I think we are pulling out all the stops to impress him in the hope when other clubs inevitably come in for him he’ll hopefully stick around for a bit.

Not sure Jatta would've helped much by the looks of it, but yes very strange he wasn't involved, he needs to get some match-practice.

I’m not overly fussed about results in pre-season, it’s about getting fit and trying to put into practice new things from training. That said to go 3-0 down inside the first 10 minutes and look so off the pace is bad. I’ve never seen a player lose their head in a friendly before, that was shocking from Cotter. I actually thought it was real nasty and needless challenge, zero attempt to get the ball, he just studded him right in the back of the ankle (and then ran off like a bit of a coward). It’s a friendly too, worst thing he should've done was to pull his shirt to stop him. That was like watching opposition players against us last season at times and I don’t want to see us turn into that. Stuttgarter Kickers aren't at the same level as both Darmstadt and 1FC K, so hopefully we can end our time in Germany with a bit of positivity.

It's hot in our apartment at the minute, the building is pretty much in sun all day, which is great in the winter but when there's no breeze it's hot in the summer. Luckily it has a balcony which is north facing so it evades most of the sun! I've been camped out there most of the evening, catching up on the Notts news and swatting off the wasps that have reappeared in numbers this year! Last year I feel like I wasn't troubled by that many.

When he signed, given his age it was likely he was probably thinking after 2 years that would be it, I think even he'll have been impressed about how well he did for us in the past two seasons. There's kind of no telling how long you can play for when you are coming to the end of your career with some players the drop of is slow but for others it’s significant and quick. I remember Hayden Mullins and Gary Jones, they started the season looking ok, but half-way through they really started to struggle and by the end of the season they could barely run! I still think him playing for even 25 matches would’ve benefitted us but I get it doesn’t make sense to spend a large chunk of the wage budget on a player who will need to have his minutes managed. Also Paterson doubled down on the high press in his last interview, it’s clearly going to be a big part of how we play next season. This doesn’t play to Didzy’s strengths, sure the willingness and desire to run was there but it's only going to get harder for him and you do need a forward line with a bit of pace to have an effective press. I wish him all the best at Barnsley and hope if this is his last season it's a good one and he doesn't regret not calling it a day after leaving us.

With the addition of Sonny I make that 6 CBs for 3 spots, I thought we'd possibly change to a back 4 the fact we've called him a "central defender" in the first sentence of his announcement makes me think a back 3 is still "plan a". It gives us plenty of cover and all the players are quite flexible both Ness and McDonald could play in the middle, we saw McDonald play at RCB last season and Macari can even fill in at LCB if needed. Seems a very sensible signing too, already experienced League 2 and recently signed a new contract at Man Utd so they clearly rate him. The big bonus for us is he’s under 21 he doesn’t technically have to be registered to the squad list so it means we still have 2 more spots available to sign more experienced out-field players in positions we really need… Attacking midfielders!

Grant is a total enigma to me. Here we have a young player that has now played over 150 EFL matches, that doesn't happen if you are bad but at the same when I've watched him he seems to struggle to have an impact on matches. After Crowley was sold that attacking midfield spot was there for the taking really, but he didn't do enough to claim it. His numbers were poor too, 4 goals and 3 assists for an attacking midfielder, especially how we play with so much of the ball on the floor is bad. Whitaker came in and scored the same number of goals in half the matches and Bedeau had the same number of assists as him! That home play-off match where he had 3 big chances and missed all of them sadly summed up his season. I think our attacking midfield options are significantly weaker this season, we need some real talent here because I don't see Grant being a 10 goal/assist man next season either.

It’s a pretty tough situation for the academy graduates, like James Sanderson, the step up from their B team matches to League 2 football is big and unless you have an academy player who is really special it’s going to take a bit of time before these players can adapt and become proper members of the first-team squad. Part of me thinks it’s something the board need to put into place, and say we will be looking to play 1 or 2 academy players each season. And by that, I mean trying to involve them in a good number of matches, 20-25 for example, not just appearing on the bench to get the last 5 mins every so often, that won’t help their development. The issue is it will make the team that bit weaker, definitely in the early stages the academy grads are going to be adjusting to the speed, physicality and step-up in skill-level. It's a tough balance to strike, especially when your goal each season (at least whilst we are in L2) is to be promoted, but ultimately if no players do come through and become part of the team it makes the academy almost pointless.

It's better than last season's away shirt but a plain orange shirt with a logo on it did set the bar pretty low. I quite like the pattern, it's something at least. I don't mind the colour, I just hope it doesn't start to blend in with the grass! Given the socks have the yellow it would've been good if we were able to weave that into the shirt more, I think that would've added to the design. No idea when the Puma deal ends but it would be nice to be have a kit deal that gives us a touch more freedom to be creative than seemingly bound by pre-made designs.

Didn’t Jatta have to miss the trip to Germany last season too? Surprised we didn’t get some tips to avoid it this time round. No idea how it's happened but it really isn't ideal for him. Not only missing the first team training but 3 matches, that’s half of our pre-season matches! And it’ll be hard knowing that his teammates will have a bit of down time and freedom as well, he’ll be missing all the fun and camaraderie of an away trip, I’d be pretty miffed if I was him. I have no idea about the ins and outs of obtaining visas but I find it odd Mai Traore has been able to travel and Jatta hasn’t though, surely their scenarios are the same?

I think a couple of trialists were identified by those at the match. One was Ben Stevenson, a midfielder formerly of Forest Green, Portsmouth and Cambridge. Matt Hall a younger keeper who came through Southampton’s Academy and then joined Bristol Rovers (but only played in the Trophy). And the last one could’ve been Romaine Sawyers, not 100% sure though. No idea if they’ll be travelling to Germany with the team.