Lack of Action Man

Was having this chat recently. He is surely deserving of a call up on current form.

Whether it is common or not, that type of transfer activity doesn’t inspire much confidence to the fans that the club are/were giving this season “a real go”.

This 100%. Signing players in the January window that won’t be available until the following season? Yeah, that really inspires the fan base that were a dynamic and ambitious club (not).

Spot on!

Are they his signings? Or are they players that Tinnion has proposed based on our “system” that Manning gets a day in? Mbude might be an exception to that, given the Man City link. Either way, it doesn’t inspire confidence does it…

Spot on.

Not sure what to make of city at the moment really. I was there to savour the 5-0 victory, which let’s not lie - was excellent. Yet today I was offered a game for my local amateur side. I went and played instead, and have to say I enjoyed it more than I would’ve done going to AG. Probably says a lot that the 5-0 win wasn’t enough to motivate me to come watch today, and find something else to do.

Whilst rattles, whistles and peaky blinder-esque flat caps have gone the way of the dodo, somehow (despite the truly awful taste) Bovril persists on the terraces of UK football.

This has all the makings of the Tony/Anthony Rougier moment again…

On the subject of shirts, those of us who ordered a heritage shirt must be hearing about a ready for collection date soon? Also if you were one of those who snapped up the GK jersey before I was able to - I will booooo you

Radio Bris interview, he’s already waffling about behaviours and attitudes. Great performance tonight, but LM makes it really hard for me to like him with his FA handbook media speak

Mbude is in danger of slipping into…

100% “pressure off” but at the end of the day winning breeds confidence and confident players perform. For the moment, LM is proving me wrong. Long May that continue!

This is looking likely to be another good performance, another 3 points and probably another clean sheet. All in all, I’m pretty chuffed. Well done Liam - this is much more like it. Keep it up. Disclaimer: Blackburn are woeful.

Still in the game: Luke Ayling.

Agreed

In short, yes they are. Ian and Mark culpable of this, whilst Neil, Tom and Dave P seem to be a bit more representative of the level of concern I’d say that a lot of fans have about the general mismanagement at the club from top to bottom. Ian had a lot of air time in the most recent episode, as a result he seemed to have the biggest opportunity to control the narrative of the pod. Personally I’d like to see Tom back asap and more contributions from Neil who I rarely (if ever) find myself disagreeing with. The pod is certainly enhanced by both of them being present on the panel.

Same!

2 wins from 2. 2 clean sheets on the bounce. Dare I say it? Is this the beginning of something?

It is also possible to appreciate what a deeper lying midfielder does without getting a massive hard on over it? At risk of using a Keane-ism here, but many of the roles/tasks MJ is picked for are ultimately “his job” I.e. that which is expected of a player in that position. We are fortunate he is very good at executing them, and filling that role. But I maintain he isn’t the type of player, or rather operates in a position, that I can write an overly enthusiastic post about Nothing to do with the pervading “modern era vs old school” football argument for me. And FWIW Kante and Makelele were class.

On this point, I do agree. If it was a choice of keeping MJ or JW, then it’s MJ for me (provided we go out and get that dynamic attacking midfielder to complement him - assuming Twine does not stay).

Not at all. If you read my subsequent contributions to this thread you’ll see I’ve addressed that in a subsequent post. I cannot deny that it’s a valuable contribution to the team but it ultimately isn’t what gets me out of my seat and excited/entertained. So for me personally, I struggle to get overly enthused or wax lyrical about MJ. He’s a good player, and he’s undoubtedly valuable to the style of play we want to achieve. However, I hope Twine is the advanced midfielder we’ve been lacking, and that the combination of them both will get me out of my seat, excited.

Agree. If buts and maybes isn’t it. But yes, I do miss the raw dynamism of Alex Scott in our side.

I see his role and what he brings. It just doesn’t cause me to get overly fussed by it Perhaps I have a tendency to favour the more advanced lying midfielder, for their creativity and ability to run at defenders. Having said that, as deeper lying midfielders go the best I have seen at AG (in recent memory) in a red shirt is easily Paul Hartley. Such a shame we got him at the end of his career. But he was a prime example of someone who kept things ticking over and was capable of spreading the play and getting us in on goal.

Didn’t mind him. Played a pivotal role in the team of that era. Complemented our style at the time nicely. Think we benefited massively from having him and Freeman though. Elliot deeper, keeping things ticking over. Freeman pushing forward running at defenders or playing that killer pass. Maybe that’s the issue now? We lack not the Elliot-type player (MJ) but the Freeman-type one.