Player By Player Season Review - The Strikers

[edson]

Player By Player Season Review - The Strikers

In the final part of his three part review, Graham Clapp looks out our strikers' performances in the 2007/08 season.

Many thanks to Graham for a very interesting trilogy of articles.

[RedM]

Ouch that hurt, just like I thought it would. Again I can find fault with anything.

Just leaves me totally bewildered, wondering how the hell we finished 4th! Thank you defenders especially Basso I suppose.

So our strikers seem to be either old, unfit, or just not up to the job for large parts of the season. Ok with age comes experience, but we aren't going to get too much more out of Trundle and Adebola are we? Brooker is anyones guess, and even if he ever gets fully fit he has almost no experience of Championship football so in that respect he is a season behind almost everyone else at best. I hadn't realised Byfield hadn't scored since New Year either, so it's thank you and goodbye, always looked that way with only a one years deal really.Enoch looks a gonner so there are plenty of spaces to be filled!

We all know it's an area that needs strengthening but as I said before to see it down in black and white really shows how much, and it has shocked me to be honest. I wait with interest to see what will happen, in Gary we trust!

[cheshire_red]

Spot on Graham and the reason we didn't go up in automatic. Other then Dele those strikers let their mainly superb colleagues down.

But bottom line, they weren't up to it by some margin, I can't see any improvement next term unless the injuries stop for SB. We desperately need some quality up there, not just the one but two.

Nicky Maynard would be ideal.

[PhatWill]

I really hope Trundle can kick on next season after a very good last few games for City.

Him and Dele have looked good together. But no doubt, we need to sign two strikers.

[RedRock]

Excellent summary for all positions bar Carey who I'd rank up there with Basso.

No natural goalscorer eventually found us out but so very, very close........

[Rednready]

Thankyou Grahame for your season's contribution. One of the best analyst on the forum.

I would like to add a small addition as the oldest regular poster. Not necessarily the best.

If we had played as we did against Palace in the playoffs from January we would have gone up automatically. I don't like shoulda/coulda/woulda, so lets look at reasons.

We played LJ alongside Elliot for too long. Elliot was by far the dominent partner. At central midfield, GJ signed the aggressive Carle who was played every where but his best position. Then Noble, our best central midfielder when GJ had our team improve from bottom to challange for playoffs, replaced by LJ, no wonder his form dropped off.

I still think we could have done better with Russell, Skuse, Noble, Artus and Elliot. For me, LJ has been adequate, sometimes better, sometimes less. For me, not the answer for promotion to the Premier League.

Without a strong productive midfield our defence had to work on overload, our attack had too little support and little creativity. There can be no arguement, look at our goals for and against !

With Noble, Trundle and Carle, we had more thrust, more aggression. With that, less pressure on our back four. We looked better, played better and produced more chances and attack.

Trundle is an almost man, give me Lita any day. Plummer and Trundle are good for party tricks, but I would love to have the blood and fire of Lita and Brooker. Brooker, please get fit and stay fit, otherwise we need to open the purse. We cannot survive waiting for Trundle to get the ball on his left foot, ditto Adebola, we need a Brooker or Lita type who can hammer from both feet,

Thats about it, however, GJ should give Ribiero and the aging Artus a chance, sooner rather than later. Both have looked a class above when played in reserves.

[garlicbread]

Brooker, please get fit and stay fit, otherwise we need to open the purse.

All good points, but I would suggest we should open the purse regardless.

I would like to see us bring in a striker, a right winger and a centre half.

[Godzilla]

Another excellent article.

[Eddie Hitler]

An excellent, if depressing, read from the boy Clapp.

[ribsbcfc]

my fear is that all teams no we need a couple of decent strikers so transfer fees are going to be silly unless we are prepared to pay over the odds i am feeling rather nervous as to who we can persuade to come to the gate?

[BCFC_Dan]

Top stuff as always.

Since strikers are generally the most expensive type of player to sign it was to be expected that we would struggle to compete in that area.

The good news is that the rest of the team was solid and provides good foundations on which to build. It's possible that we only need a couple of good attacking players in order to compete at the very top of the division.

However, it's also worth noting that some of the other players such as Orr, McAllister, Basso, McCombe etc. had to play way above themselves for the whole season. Whilst they did this admirably we will be left hoping rather than expecting that they can continue to do so.