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Centre back..

Centre back..

budgierustler

budgierustler

Joined
Apr 27, 2006
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Lurking in the shadows
Interesting to see in what order the new manager rates the 4 centre backs. For me, it is an area we need to strengthen in quickly before the season starts.

Huntington...under-rated in my opinion but needs a footballing centre back with him
Boyle....improving but not first choice in a Championship side yet
Spurr....experienced but lacks pace
Davies ...a bit of a surprise package in pre season but I fear he will be exposed particularly in the early games.


1. Huntington
2. Boyle
3. Spurr
4. Davies

Im struggling to pick a partner for Hunts in the first game unless we sign someone!

Thoughts?
 
I think he will go with Davies, he clearly rates him and he has looked OK in the 2 friendlies I've seen him in so far.
 
Neil seems to like Davies, I think he'll start the season unless we sign someone before the opening day.

It's too early to have a real opinion on Boyle & Davies and Spurr has never had a proper run as a centre back with us.

Huntington is the only known quantity with Clarke out.
 
budgierustler said:
Interesting to see in what order the new manager rates the 4 centre backs. For me, it is an area we need to strengthen in quickly before the season starts.

Huntington...under-rated in my opinion but needs a footballing centre back with him
Boyle....improving but not first choice in a Championship side yet
Spurr....experienced but lacks pace
Davies ...a bit of a surprise package in pre season but I fear he will be exposed particularly in the early games.


1. Huntington
2. Boyle
3. Spurr
4. Davies

Im struggling to pick a partner for Hunts in the first game unless we sign someone!

Thoughts?
Click to expand...

Theoretically no reason why spurr shouldn't challenge Huntington for a spot. Both have similar strengths and weaknesses and spurr has spent more of his career at a higher level. We've seen that he struggles a little when filling in for the odd game but improves with time on the pitch. Could well be a surprise this season if the chance falls his way.
 
Looking forward to the game tonight to see our new boys and Davies. Tonight might just answer the question but I suspect some loans (at least) will be one their way.
 
simo said:
Theoretically no reason why spurr shouldn't challenge Huntington for a spot. Both have similar strengths and weaknesses and spurr has spent more of his career at a higher level. We've seen that he struggles a little when filling in for the odd game but improves with time on the pitch. Could well be a surprise this season if the chance falls his way.
Click to expand...

Agree, he was a regular for Sheff Wednesday in this league at centre back I think.
 
It is a struggle to pick a defensive partnership with what we have at present there is very little pace which ever option is currently available.
I would go with Hunts and Boyle but Davies has been impressive in our friendly games.
We do need to strengthen our defence and in my opinion with two more players.
Spurr for me is far too slow and not dominant enough in the air.
 
Spurr has trained hard in the summer and lost a lot of weight....therefore he is physically fitter and maybe a quicker than he was.
To date he has won more headers in friendlies than any of the others and his distribution is as good as Ben's - only Ben is two footed.

Its between those 2 for the LEFT CB role and between the other two for the Right CB role... Hunts has the experience and height - but not the footballing ability.
Boyle appears to have more strength than Hunts and a better ball player....

I expect Boyle and Spurr to start tonight and maybe Boyle and DAvies to be the No 1 pairing against WEds.... But lack of height across the whole team is a big concern.
 
rorschach said:
Looking forward to the game tonight to see our new boys and Davies. Tonight might just answer the question but I suspect some loans (at least) will be one their way.
Click to expand...

Agree a loanee CB

If we could get a (Pickford, Mcgeady) magnetude

player - could be worth his weight in gold!

IMO We should aim for only one position

First place - untill (if) that becomes impossible
 
As it stands Huntington and Davies I think will start Vs Sheff Wed.

Boyle and Spurr to play tonight and a good performance from Spurr might swing it in his favour. He does offer the extra experience over Davies.
 
I suspect he'll go with Davies and Huntington unless we can sign someone quickly. I just can't shake off my concerns about our defensive capability though, which I'm finding hard to reconcile given that I don't actually think any of our players are 'bad' (a pleasant change from days gone by). I wonder if it's related to the slight mismatch I can see in the overall quality and depth of our respective attacking and defensive units. Our attackers are so much more exciting than they have been in the past with a great deal of pace, dynamism and flair. Defensively I think every single option we have other than Cunningham gives us some cause for concern. It's not that they're not Championship standard, just that I can't see them commanding a regular place in any Championship team that will be in or around the top 6. Hopefully I'll be proved wrong.
 
I do think we need to sign another CB, at least until TC is back from injury but I'm not too worried with what we've got - players like Hunts now will have a further year's experience of championship football under their belts from last season which can only have improved them, and seemed to me to be as decent as anyone we saw visit deepdale last season, even many of the big time Charlies at the bigger clubs in this division.
 
Hitman31 said:
I suspect he'll go with Davies and Huntington unless we can sign someone quickly. I just can't shake off my concerns about our defensive capability though, which I'm finding hard to reconcile given that I don't actually think any of our players are 'bad' (a pleasant change from days gone by). I wonder if it's related to the slight mismatch I can see in the overall quality and depth of our respective attacking and defensive units. Our attackers are so much more exciting than they have been in the past with a great deal of pace, dynamism and flair. Defensively I think every single option we have other than Cunningham gives us some cause for concern. It's not that they're not Championship standard, just that I can't see them commanding a regular place in any Championship team that will be in or around the top 6. Hopefully I'll be proved wrong.
Click to expand...

we must bring a CH with the new style I don't think Huntington will be up to the job so we should sign one now and possibly RB CM + a Striker all experienced but I would guess it depends on Hugill.leaving.
If things go.badly first 5 games which are as tough as u can get it could be a very long season.
 
Hitman31 said:
I suspect he'll go with Davies and Huntington unless we can sign someone quickly. I just can't shake off my concerns about our defensive capability though, which I'm finding hard to reconcile given that I don't actually think any of our players are 'bad' (a pleasant change from days gone by). I wonder if it's related to the slight mismatch I can see in the overall quality and depth of our respective attacking and defensive units. Our attackers are so much more exciting than they have been in the past with a great deal of pace, dynamism and flair. Defensively I think every single option we have other than Cunningham gives us some cause for concern. It's not that they're not Championship standard, just that I can't see them commanding a regular place in any Championship team that will be in or around the top 6. Hopefully I'll be proved wrong.
Click to expand...

we must bring in a CH with the new style I don't think Huntington will be up to the job so we should sign one now and possibly RB CM + a Striker all experienced but I would guess it depends on Hugill.leaving.
If things go.badly first 5 games which are as tough as u can get it could be a very long season.
 
Conversely, it's the forwards I am more worried about. Look how many we have going forward who are unproven or inexperienced at this level - Doyle, May, Maguire, Horgan, (Barky had a very brief purple patch which he will do well to repeat throughout a full season), Harrop we have not seen enough of, which leaves us with Robbo and Hugill unless I've forgotten someone. McGeady out of the equation. Compare that to what we already know about our defenders.
 
At the end of last season it was glaringly obvious the two priorities had to be, a good dominant c.h. and a tackling centre mid. The change of manager has brought with it a vastly different approach with, by the sound of it a much more attacking outlook. This in my opinion will be welcome, but it also makes those two positions even more important. Not to have them sorted by the opening match would be very poor and sadly would leave us open to another very poor start, we need to hit the ground running, the powers that be know this and should have learned from experience. If they have not, talk of making a challenge and looking to improve will sound very shallow I.m.o. Lets hope its not the case and something gets done and we can make a decent start.
 
It does concern me that we don't have a commanding CH like we have had in years gone by - we need some Mawene / St Ledger type leadership back there in the heart of the defence...........
 
I suspect that the route to an experienced CB was always going to be via the Loan system. At this stage of the pre-season most teams are doing what we are doing i.e. assessing what they need vs what they have got. Also most good players are backing themselves to make their respective starting 11s. Based on that it is probably only after 2 or 3 games or towards of the window that the right calibre of loanee is likely to become available. I agree with Budgies assessment and hop that Spurr can challenge for CB. It's encouraging to hear that he seems leaner and fitter because my thought turn to Fulham away whenever anyone mentions Spurr who in the first half especially, was terrible and definitely targeted by Fulham as a weak link at Left Back. Understand what many are saying about Hunts limitation with regards to ball playing, but like many other "typical" centre Halves we have he only has to roll the ball forwards a few yards to the likes Pearson to get us passing forwards. Don't forget most teams in our division will have a "handful" at centre forward and we needs lads with the strength, tenacity and aerial ability of Hunts to combat that.
 
At the Newcastle game Hunts played on the right of the back 2 not on the left like he did all last season with Clarke. This seemed to mean more out balls went through the middle rather than out to Cunningham on the left. This brought Pearson and DJ in to the game more as they were receiving from the back and Newcastle didn't seem to follow them to collect the ball.

Cunningham went forward more and received the ball higher up the pitch and got more crosses in (which I think lead to our goal). Davies seemed calm but I do worry about his first few games. Another Sheff Utd 1st half could be harmful.
 
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