| Smell The Coffee 19:24 - Nov 18 with 16311 views | Boss_Hog |
I think it is time that we all sat up and faced a touch of realism. That realism, I'm afraid, is that we are in a relegation dogfight and nothing I have seen since August is able to convince me otherwise.
Firstly, I have every faith that Keith Hill will turn around the current situation. He is far and away the best manager we have ever had, has the experience, knowledge and ability to rectify our faults but he has a very big job ahead of him and some serious decisions to make.
Defensively we are woeful. We conceded 3 today but it could easily have been 6. We are naive, lacking confidence and only Harrison McGahey could walk away from today with his head held high. The situation at left-back is worrying beyond belief with both our options nothing short of absymal of late and our left-sided centre-half hasn't been good enough for many years now. He makes basic mistakes all the time, today his calamitous defending should have cost us a further 2 goals and he worries me both on and off the ball every time I watch him. In years gone by he would easily have been good enough for our side, now however we are trying to compete at the top end of League One.
Replacing the likes of Allen, Lund and NML was always going to be an impossible task. We have replaced them with cast offs that no other clubs wanted and expecting KH to work miracles every time is asking a lot. I know where we belong in the footballing pyramid but can we realistically expect KH to keep over-achieving with rejects from other clubs, some of whom are below us in the footballing structure? It is a big task, perhaps too big in 2017 with the current bunch we have on the pay roll.
At present I firmly believe that KH doesn't know his best team and system to play them in. I have struggled to see the appreciation of Hendo in midfield full stop, he is our best centre-forward and needs to play there. I know that we lack creativity and pace throughout the side but however we line up, I feel that Hendo needs somehow to be at the tip of it all. The same is true of Matty Done, not able to function properly in midfield and therefore arguably needs to play through the middle.
KH has arguably his poorest ever squad for a League One campaign. I'm sure he doesn't need the likes of me to tell him the task ahead, however he will need to make some huge decisions on players if we are to pull through the other end and survive relegation.
With the current bunch, I cannot see us scoring enough goals as even with Hendo and Done in attack, we completely lack any form of creativity to provide a platform for them. Calvin, as much as we love him , scores very few and creates even less and therefore we don't have that spark anywhere across the middle of the park as I see it now. Jordan Williams (Barrow) has been a huge dissapointment and we need an injection of flair from the loan market at the earliest opportunity the rules permit. The Directors need to back KH even more than they have ever done before, let him go out and bring in a couple of players who will help us at the top end of the field and relieve the pressure on the defence.
So all-in-all, not a good day. I honestly didn't feel that relegation was an option until today, now however I am beginning to fear we have a long and hard few months ahead. I just cannot see the light at the end of the tunnel at present and like all the travelling faithful today, I need to see something that changes my pessimistic outlook.
Up The Dale! |  | | |  |
| Smell The Coffee on 07:09 - Nov 21 with 1823 views | kiwidale |
| Smell The Coffee on 14:54 - Nov 20 by ParkinsGimp |
Good post Kiwi, after having a go at the likes of me for telling people to smell the coffee all season.
Our form as I quote 49thSeason is " We haven't won away since 13th April, we have only won 4 away in the last 12 months.
in the last 34 games, (17 this season and the last 17 of last season) we have won 8, drawn 15 and lost 11.
Lambert could come out of retirement easily . Unfortunately I am with Chaff and a few others I dont see Hill sorting this out. His arrogance knows no bounds, he has signed these poor players in the hope one or two turn out to be gems. Hasnt worked this time.
Its going to be a long hard season.
Despite what the keyboard mafia on here think I am as pained as any Dale fan to see us perform this way. We are all feeling it and have tried to get behind the team on the pitch. I just hope we come across 4 worse teams than us this season and survive and forget about this nightmare. I know one up the road who are infinitely worse than us , but strangely they do have the class of players to get them out of it, just not performing :-) |
Fair enough PG, you have been telling us all season to smell the coffee, that we are shit. Now is the perfect time to say I told you so. You were right but, you said it last season when you were wrong and the season before when you were wrong, Your criticism is not balanced all our players are not shit not conference level Hill is not a shit manager the players are not shit however the performances have been poor and needs to be addressed quickly, Time is on our side but I would hate to go into the last month of the season needing 8 points from 4/5 games because right now we wouldn't do it. | |
| This is not the time for bickering.
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| Smell The Coffee on 09:55 - Nov 21 with 1697 views | Scunnydale |
Wow. A post-loss Dale-related thread that was a good read! Well done everyone!
As someone who rarely gets to go to matches, it was good to read reasoned arguments and a respectful discussion without it descending into name calling or wanton slagging off of players, staff, board members etc.
Genuine thanks. |  | | |
| Smell The Coffee on 11:02 - Nov 21 with 1635 views | finberty |
| Smell The Coffee on 19:57 - Nov 20 by TVOS1907 |
Surely, as fans, we can discuss anything we want about our club or other clubs.
'Pointing the finger at bury', as you put it, is a completely separate issue from our own form and prospects, which have been discussed and dissected at length much more frequently on here and will no doubt continue to be. |
I'm not saying we can't, TVOS, of course we can. I'm as intrigued as anyone else on here as to how that particular ship keeps afloat.
It's the self-righteousness that occasionally seeps through that concerns me a bit.
The poem of 'The Body of George O'Day' (aka 'The Body of William Jay') springs to mind, that's all. |  | | |
| Smell The Coffee on 12:27 - Nov 21 with 1576 views | Boss_Hog |
| Smell The Coffee on 11:02 - Nov 21 by finberty |
I'm not saying we can't, TVOS, of course we can. I'm as intrigued as anyone else on here as to how that particular ship keeps afloat.
It's the self-righteousness that occasionally seeps through that concerns me a bit.
The poem of 'The Body of George O'Day' (aka 'The Body of William Jay') springs to mind, that's all. |
Sorry but cannot agree at all about Done not being ar$ed. As others have said, his work rate on Saturday was fantastic and he didn't give them a minutes peace on the ball.
I just feel he needs some support. For me that means playing Hendo up top, which either means playing 4 across midfield (we don't have two good enough widemen at present) or 3 at the back which I would prefer.
I would therefore play:
Lillis
Daniels
McGahey
McNulty
Rafferty
Camps
MJ Williams
Bunney
Inman
Hendo
Done
I also rate Andy Cannon and he'd be in my starting XI if fit. Some of those in that side are simply not playing well enough at present but I can only pick from what's available and therefore McNulty and Bunney are included under duress lol. | | | |
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