menzinho

I was just giving some of my general thoughts, @TheSkipper because I don't really have much knowledge outside of the potential obvious choices, but I'm enjoying reading the suggestions from other members. Jack Payne from Colchester would be the perfect replacement for Crowley and potentially even Didzy playing in a No.10 role. I don't think there are many better than him in this league for that position. But I can't see that materialising because we'd have to pay over the odds to get him and I don't think he wants to move out of the M25 circle...

Their owner has finally released a statement but instead of saying how he's working hard to complete a sale he's trying to remove the board of directors... 😯 Didn't realise until I was reading another article that owner of Morecambe was one of the owners of Worcester Warriors, who also went bust with him at the helm. I hate to say it but they look doomed.

Sadly it's all sounding rather ominous for them. Their owner has had amble time to sell, clearly for whatever reason he now doesn't want to but then not continuing to support the club isn't on. I'd say the EFL need to step in here but they are technically in the National League now... Probably makes it even worse because the NL Board was pretty amateurish.

I'm hoping we've learnt our lesson after the Stone transfer, where I think we over-prioritised the ability to play out from the back. I've gone back to the announcement (🤓) when we signed Stone and before even mentioning things like shot-stopping, clean sheets, high claims etc, the board said “It’s crucial that the player is comfortable on the ball and able to distribute well with both feet, while they must also be adept at playing high up the pitch and defending the space behind our back line". I'm hoping we can get someone who is very similar to Bass, he really did improve us defensively. And he was fine playing out from the back, he just sometimes struggled kicking it under pressure. But that was probably his only real weakness, everything else about him was really good.

I don't think he would count as an overseas player because he came through QPR's and then Fulham's academy and he's been part of a few England youth squads. I wonder if our new assistant coached him? 🤔

Clearly a very talented player, he had a loan in League 2 when he was a lot younger and he did well. He's played in the top league in Portugal and Poland so I would've thought he might be aiming a tad higher than League 2. And if it did happen I wonder if it would imply we are going to change our formation slightly next season, because like Kouhyar I'd say he's more of a winger/wide forward.

I’m not too worried, yet, there’s still plenty of time to bring in players and truth be told we don’t need to add massive numbers, almost like the finishing touches now but they are important ones. We have just made it a tad harder with Bass moving on but it's a lot easier to replace players over the summer than in January. I’m confident we’ll get a decent replacement. I still think we are a relatively attractive club to a lot of players. We can actually back up the claim of developing players because we’ve sold a lot them in the last couple of seasons. To us fans it’s always depressing, but for a player it would seem like a wise move. I would be interested to know why we perhaps don’t take more advantage of loaning in young players from Leicester, Derby & Forest. It seems ideal to me, some really good players there, the parent clubs can easily keep an eye on them and no-one needs to worry about moving.

I'm quite glad in a way it never materialised, if the millions/billions were real I think in the end even the massive amount of money spent would've caused us bigger problems in the future, potentially club ending. Imagine if we had Mancini as manager and signed Chrisitan Vieri, Patrick Viera, Roberto Carlos and David Beckham, the wage bill would've been astronomical. Even with a likely full Meadow Lane the losses we'd have made would've been huge and if at any point the owners wanted to leave it would've caused big problems. They'd have been selling a club that's losses would be millions and millions and you'd have to pay for the privilege of it. Can't see many takers somehow. I'm more than happy having watched the likes of Langstaff, Rodrigues and McGoldrick in recent seasons. Hopefully I can add a new name to that list this season..

We are going to be signing three goalkeepers, maybe I’m in the minority here but I’d have thought the youth-team keeper could be used as the emergency and then you’d have a first choice with a back-up who can potentially push him. I'm just thinking about maximising that wage budget, a third keeper seems a luxury to me. No idea about Harry, whether he’s the back-up or back-up to the back up, hope he can eventually make an appearance at some point. I guess we’ll find out how likely that will be come August when first subs bench is announced.

Great news to start the week, the feel-good factor has just dropped another level… Again I get it, Peterborough have probably spent a lot of money to get him, but it’s saddening to lose another great player. We should probably get a topic going called “Who will sell for a lot of money next?”… It’s inevitable isn’t it, when you’re good you lose players and when you’re rubbish you can't get rid of them! You just can’t win. I think he’ll be tough to replace, statistically Bass was the best at claiming high balls last season in League 2 and had the best save percentage. Carlisle's Gabriel Breeze would be my replacement pick, if you look past the relegation he was their stand-out player and his stats aren't far off Bass' either which is impressive considering he was in front of a worse defence/team. That said I can imagine after one good season with us, given his age, he’d be on his way to a Championship club...

I think if you going to try something out your best bet is in League 2. It’s quite a safe league in that there are only two relegation spots and then with three teams going up automatically if you can stay near the top of the table eventually your time will come. So I get why they say now is the time in terms of implementing the new structure. I think had Paterson been appointed a tad quicker it might not have felt like this was possibly plan b/c or whatever, I feel like every time another week passed the expectation levels got higher and higher. Even so I feel the brothers will have dived deeper into Paterson just judging him over 20 matches isn’t always an accurate representation of his abilities. But it isn't just him we've added it’s the first-time since they’ve taken over that a lot of big changes have been made, a lot of new faces have arrived in a short-space of time and we’ve no idea how successful/effective they will be. We could have a great season or equally we could slide down the table, I’ll admit I feel like the latter is more likely too but given how the brother’s decision making in previous seasons has been pretty good I’m happy to see where this new strategy takes us… For now! I don’t think we are that far off it in terms of squad either, I wouldn’t say it’s amazing but it’s a lot better than other League 2 clubs. And my issue last season, especially as it wore on, was more with the style than the players and how we were really quite basic and uncommitted when it came to how we attacked. I’d say there’s a bit of the unknown in terms of if we are tweaking our formation slightly, part of me thinks we are going to have proper wide attackers this season. So far we’ve let Austin, Didzy and Whitaker go and not replaced them...

I was able to get out my bike this afternoon, it was cloudy with a slight breeze so I went a bit further then I originally planned as I thought there would be more sun. I take a little bag with a puncture repair kit and importantly a cool drink, which I did glug at my half-way break. I feel like I’m one of few that is enjoying the warm weather, I’d much rather it be hot then 1° in the middle of winter. Some of girlfriend’s family still live in Spain, most are south of Bilbao and not far from Logroño at it’s been 38°/39° there! Now that would be too much for me, they are a bit more used to the heat but even so that is too much. They can’t go outside during the middle of the afternoon and even early evening because it is just too hot, they’ve said they’ll be relieved when it drops back to the high 20s°!

Surprised he didn’t sign with another League 2 club to be honest, as he’s a good player at this level. I think being able to play in a number of positions sometimes worked against him because he never really got a run in one position. And when he did have a little run at wing-back he did pretty well, but then got injured. I'd rather have him at right-wingback over Gordon to be honest. I agree I can see him doing well for Southend, a really good signing for them.

They are pretty football mad in Brazil and whilst it's a league that's unfamiliar to us in Europe, it's probably the top league in South America (along with Argentina's). His new club Vitoria have an average attendance of 23,000 (double ours and Oxfords) so I think it's a great move for him. I kind of felt he was someone who wanted to play all over the place and was never going to settle anywhere so to speak. I wasn’t surprised when he left us just more so that it was to Oxford and not Oviedo! I think he said he wanted to play in the US too so maybe after a season or two in Brazil he’ll end up in the MLS.

I think he had a pretty solid season (apart from Jatta knocking him off the ball to then score!) and Shrewsbury have now signed Will Boyle who was at Wrexham (and previously Cheltenham too) so that's a very decent CB pairing right there. Cheltenham could well be signing our ex-player Robbie Cundy as a replacement, a bit of down grade in my opinion, I think Cundy is a tad limited and more suited to a team where the style is head and kick it anywhere will do...

Pre-season is now here and we’ll have a new batch of trialists in, but I was wondering, can you remember the last time we signed a trialist and they turned out to be a good addition to the squad? Or equally did one really impress you and you wished we signed him? For example we should’ve signed Haji Mnoga instead of Robbie Cundy! I can remember Nathan Tyson scored a load in pre-season but when the proper matches started he wasn’t as effective. And Bostock technically was on trial but that wasn’t during pre-season, it was November so by then and his options would’ve been limited. And is it risky offering contracts to trialists too? Is it a good way to judge a player? Or can it be misleading if they are trying extra hard to impress over players who are contracted knowing they don’t have to fly into 50-50s, press like mad or try to beat a player every time they get the ball…

I wonder if it'll be expanded in the future, no idea how many rows now are in use for safe-standing but I'd imagine it'll be popular.

Sadly I won’t be going but it’s a great little guide for those fans who are. The Kaiserslautern match is probably the pick of the bunch, a shame the match won't be in the proper stadium but I get that as it's a friendly there would probably have been a lot of empty seats! Maybe still a chance to get some photos outside albeit not quite the same as watching from within.

Third season in a row we've started away from home now though, not a bad start all in all but I don't like the Chesterfield and MK away matches back to back over Christmas! They've just completed the EFL Cup draw and we will face Wigan, away. Not a terrible tie, but we could've potentially got Blackburn, Middlesbrough, West Brom or Sheffield Wed which are more exciting. In the EFL Trophy, Man Utd have been added to our group, I'd say that's upped my interest by about 5%...

It would be strange to announce Sam Slocombe as one of the first-team coaches for him to then suddenly become the and goalkeeper coach. If Steve Collis did depart Sam could step in but I would guess we would bring in another goal-keeper coach. As for Joao going, he most likely would’ve met Martin Paterson in the week for the first time and maybe after this he was unhappy with the sort of role he was getting or he just thought they have too differing views and perhaps won’t work well together, who knows. Regardless, it’s more unanswered questions and something that wasn’t planned. It’s not been the smooth good feel start to pre-season everyone wanted. I do feel the next signing needs to be one that can trigger that feeling of optimism again...

Decent move for him, I think the more he adapts to the physicality of the league the better he will get. If I had to put a bet on I’d say he’ll score and assist more goals than Grant will for us next season. Clearly wanted to be closer to home and I mean this in the nicest way possible but I hope he doesn’t stellar season, that way we won’t feel like we’ve lost out!

Not massively surprising, I think he’ll be a squad player even for them. Surprised that Barrow who had him on loan didn’t want to sign him, guess that's telling in way but he’d probably be happier there given it’s a hell of a lot closer to his family in Newcastle! Still intrigued to see where Didzy ends up, maybe he’ll have a change of heart (I can dream!). Austin, Morias and Cundy are still without new clubs too.

Vardy would have to take quite the pay cut if wanted to come here, he was on £140k per week at Leicester, even if he took a 90% pay cut that would still equate to wages of £14k a week! Again it’s hard to say, I thought MK would do really well last season because on paper it looked they had signed some really good players. They've spent a lot of money again but something wasn’t quite right there and might still not be, I think Crowley only managed 2 assists and 0 goals after he left which tells a story of it’s own. New manager and a pre-season to work with them, should be top 10 this season. I think from the relegated teams Bristol and Cambridge would by my tips to finish top 10. And then you have the mid-table teams who could potentially move up if they can strengthen, teams like Cheltenham, Barrow and Swindon. Barnet who got promoted could have a good season, I wouldn't be surprised if they snuck into the top 10. I think Chesterfield are an easy bet to finish top 10, they'll finish in the play-offs again at least. Wouldn't be surprised to see Walsall fall down the table considering how shocking their form was since February, Grimsby too I wasn't overly impressed with them. Even Salford look set to lose some of their better players and might struggle if they can't replace them.

Pretty much in agreement with @DangerousSausage I've no issue with the idea of a Technical Board but I don't see why Chris and Alex would need to be part of it. As the owners they've got a right to see what's going on but I surely just dropping in and listening and observing every now again is all they need to do. If they think something is really not working they can flag it up to Roberto who is effectively the bridge from coaches to owners. Maybe their data model is like the KFC recipe, allegedly only two people know that. Maybe the Bros are the only ones who know how it actually functions and they deliver it in a to certain way to keep all the key aspects guarded...

Andy Butler, Andy Flowers, someone will get his name right eventually!