Harry Cornick

[cidercity1987]

1 hour ago, richyy66 said:

The quicker Conway gets back the better. Wells Conway Sykes is the best we have played all season. Form dropped off since the injury of Conway.

Wells Conway Sykes have never played in a front three together

[redsquirrel]

cornick needs a goal or two to boost his confidence.  once they come im hoping we see a different player

[mozo]

Given where we are with this season, I'm happy to play Cornick in the front man role for the rest of our games. 

If that's what he was brought in for, let's get him up to speed with it and see what he's capable of.

Also, I'm slightly concerned with the level of expectation that we're putting on Conway. He's being spoken about as though he'll come straight back in and score goals. 

We need to remember that Conway is still a young lad learning Championship football, and he himself had a relative goal drought this season. 

[GrahamC]

6 minutes ago, mozo said:

Given where we are with this season, I'm happy to play Cornick in the front man role for the rest of our games. 

If that's what he was brought in for, let's get him up to speed with it and see what he's capable of.

Also, I'm slightly concerned with the level of expectation that we're putting on Conway. He's being spoken about as though he'll come straight back in and score goals. 

We need to remember that Conway is still a young lad learning Championship football, and he himself had a relative goal drought this season. 

That’s fair.

Also worth pointing out Wells is going through a serious goal drought himself, aside from his back to back penalties, (not dismissing those by the way, both were excellent & had to be scored) he’s only netted once in his last 19 games.

You could argue we don’t create as many chances as we did when we had Semenyo’s pace & strength, but if you do so then you have to say that’s the same side Cornick is trying to make an impression in.

Conway is definitely our jewel in the crown but as the season is going to fizzle out in terms of relegation/playoffs this is a great time for him to return without real pressure.

Edited March 20, 2023 by GrahamC

[mozo]

10 minutes ago, GrahamC said:

That’s fair.

Also worth pointing out Wells is going through a serious goal drought himself, aside from his back to back penalties, (not dismissing those by the way, both were excellent & had to be scored) he’s only netted once in his last 19 games.

You could argue we don’t create as many chances as we did when we had Semenyo’s pace & strength, but if you do so then you have to say that’s the same side Cornick is trying to make an impression in.

Conway is definitely our jewel in the crown but as the season is going to fizzle out in terms of relegation/playoffs this is a great time for him to return without real pressure.

It stands to reason that creation of chances must be the problem. What else could explain the current goalscoring stats of Bell, Wells, Cornick, Weimann and even Mehmeti and Sykes to an extent?

And ironically these players themselves are part of the problem as they're not collaborating effectively in the final third. Whether that is tactical, execution, or a bit of both I don't really know.

[mozo]

Also on the topic of goalscoring, we're back to looking weak on attacking set pieces again. Winning corners doesn't fill me with hope at the moment and free kicks aren't much better.

Losing Atkinson hasn't helped as he was our biggest threat in the air. 

[GrahamC]

52 minutes ago, mozo said:

It stands to reason that creation of chances must be the problem. What else could explain the current goalscoring stats of Bell, Wells, Cornick, Weimann and even Mehmeti and Sykes to an extent?

And ironically these players themselves are part of the problem as they're not collaborating effectively in the final third. Whether that is tactical, execution, or a bit of both I don't really know.

Think so, for all the stick Martin got on here, the WSM partnership really worked as all 3 had complementary skill sets plus the absence of Naismith in midfield hasn’t helped, either.

James is a very good player but isn’t going to carve a side open with his passing & we can expect to lose Scott this summer so the addition of someone who makes a goal contribution from midfield as well as provides his creativity will be key.

[Davefevs]

56 minutes ago, mozo said:

It stands to reason that creation of chances must be the problem. What else could explain the current goalscoring stats of Bell, Wells, Cornick, Weimann and even Mehmeti and Sykes to an extent?

And ironically these players themselves are part of the problem as they're not collaborating effectively in the final third. Whether that is tactical, execution, or a bit of both I don't really know.

Supply is also a factor.  Naismith, whether he plays at the back or in midfield is pretty key to get the ball forward, but importantly, through the middle of the pitch, and even more importantly, quickly.  Without him, we tend to have to go through wide options.

Add in Pring playing CB that’s another avenue lost to create…and some of Pring’s freedom comes from Atkinson, either through Big Rob bringing the ball forward, or teams stopping him, allowing Pring more time and space.

Lots of little knock-on effects.

I’ll say it again, whilst formation has some say, it is not the be all and end all.  It’s players.  And we are missing some key ones.  A month or two back, the formation change was the angle to attack “stubborn Nige”.  How do you square that circle now we’ve lost three out of our last five???

[Henry]

I think all our strikers look better in a 2.

Whilst the 443 has looked okay, I don’t think we’ve been as effective upfront since changing

[mozo]

55 minutes ago, Davefevs said:

I’ll say it again, whilst formation has some say, it is not the be all and end all.  It’s players.  And we are missing some key ones.  A month or two back, the formation change was the angle to attack “stubborn Nige”.  How do you square that circle now we’ve lost three out of our last five???

Just on this bit buddy, the call for a formation change in my opinion was also perfectly valid and the fact that I kept hearing players referencing the formation change as a positive makes me think it was one element of our change of form.

Playing King in a three was in my opinion a worse idea than switching to a back four. And even if you disagree, I think both our arguments are perfectly reasonable.

[Northern Red]

Don't think it's any coincidence that our attacking has dropped off since Naismith has been out. Same thing happened when he was injured prior to World Cup.

[Charlie BCFC]

4 minutes ago, Northern Red said:

Don't think it's any coincidence that our attacking has dropped off since Naismith has been out. Same thing happened when he was injured prior to World Cup.

Completely agree, even when Williams was in midfield we got by but creating chances in open play was a huge problem. As much as I think King can do a job, giving him 4 starts in 14 games is a huge ask

[Bris Red]

Its still too early to truly pass judgement on Cornick IMO. He still looks way off the pace fitness wise, no two players are the same and it can take others longer to get up to speed.

The bottom line is even if Cornick doesn’t ultimately reach the levels that are required and turns out to be a bad signing at least financially it has been of low risk. He was signed for what 3-400k l reportedly? And he won’t be on wages of anything more than 6-7k a week IMO. 
 

Not every signing is going to work out and IMO the vast majority of Pearson’s have been good so far on a shoe string budget. I think we have to look at this signing for what it is, a low risk punt that may or may not work out.

Edited March 20, 2023 by Bris Red

[1960maaan]

I've not been impressed so far. Looking at reports it made sense, high intensity hard worker. Never had a great goals record, so signed as support or 2nd striker ? I think he may be trying too hard, some of his pressing has looked directionless, but keen. He will obviously need to learn our triggers and plans, when we come back from the break will will hopefully see what we have bought. This 2 weeks will give time for recovery, time for injured to come back and time to work on the training pitch instead of Play - recover - play - recover . 
It has felt to me like Nige is playing Cornick and Bell to give them chance to play themselves into the team. You know what you get from Nahki and you know he's professional enough not to kick up a fuss. From April 1st we will see how good he can be, so Hurry up Harry.

[Spike]

20 hours ago, richyy66 said:

The quicker Conway gets back the better. Wells Conway Sykes is the best we have played all season. Form dropped off since the injury of Conway.

Conway in the middle, Mehmeti on the left and Sykes on the right is what I want to see, Conway is much better running alongside players to get into scoring positions, with those two either side of him I think we'd look very dangerous but I still maintain our biggest issue is that when Mehmeti gets the ball in a dangerous wide position and cuts inside we don't have a midfielder looking to be on the edge of the box for a simple lay off pass so Mehmeti either feels forced to try to shoot or to go back wide, he's really dangerous out wide, he just needs that player to support him when the chance isn't opening up, I think Conway would offer him more in that situation. 

[Davefevs]

2 hours ago, mozo said:

Just on this bit buddy, the call for a formation change in my opinion was also perfectly valid and the fact that I kept hearing players referencing the formation change as a positive makes me think it was one element of our change of form.

Playing King in a three was in my opinion a worse idea than switching to a back four. And even if you disagree, I think both our arguments are perfectly reasonable.

Yes, and I think Nige would prefer it too…he just didn’t think he had the players (and the mentality of some) to do it earlier.

Imho, the growth of Vyner, the psychology with Atkinson…meant they didn’t need Naismith or King “babysitting” them.

We saw the return of both Naismith and James after the WC break too, plus Antoine finding form following injury and sporadic appearances.  It all fed into the melting pot to improve us.  Plus shows that certain players are very important whatever formation we play.

I wasn’t challenging your opinion and saying it’s wrong at all, just that some think putting blobs onto a pitch in a given formation is all-defining.  And some also seem to forget how well we played early season in a different formation.  I just prefer to look at other reasons…

[Super]

Some of the comments are ridiculous. Yes clearly we haven't seen the best of him but lets not write him off yet.

[Red-Robbo]

4 hours ago, mozo said:

Given where we are with this season, I'm happy to play Cornick in the front man role for the rest of our games. 

 

I'd rather we tried to win them.

The Luton result was forgivable; Swansea wasn't. When our starting line-up play so badly, we give ourselves a mountain to climb and I can't blame the subs for coming on to a generally blah atmosphere. 

390 minutes roughly now for us and Cornick's never had anything better than an occasional decent pass and one shot on target where he should have scored (or squared it). While I'd agree that others have also had poor games recently, they've also had some very good games since January. Cornick has just been mediocre throughout. Never terrible, but never that good either.

Even with Conway injured, we aren't short of attacking options, so I'd rather Cornick was dropped and spent the next three months getting his fitness back, perhaps popping up in U23 games for competitive practise - that motivated Wells when he was similarly out-of-form. Then let's see how he looks in the close season.

We're trying to sell season tickets here in a difficult economic climate for everyone.  A run of uninspiring games and maybe a poor 18th place finish or whatever is hardly going to win over the waverers. 

The abuse that HC comes in for on social media is ridiculous, but I think there's no way he should be starting games for us. For now. 

 

 

[Riaz]

Havent been impressed so far - but i'm reserving judgement until he has had a pre season with us and given a run in the side.

[Steve Watts]

I'm bemused a little by the comments of "he needs a pre-season to get fit etc".  He's had a pre-season with Luton, who looked extremely fit and energetic against us, so he's already been in that environment and started only a third of Luton's league games before signing for us. That tells a story in itself.  He's managed 1 goal and 3 assists in 20 matches.  He does look unfit, but you have to ask why he's become unfit when he's been in an environment where his teammates seemed perfectly equipped for the Championship. 

I don't like writing off players too soon, but I don't think it's unfair to say he has a lot to do to win fans over.

[Davefevs]

10 minutes ago, Steve Watts said:

I'm bemused a little by the comments of "he needs a pre-season to get fit etc".  He's had a pre-season with Luton, who looked extremely fit and energetic against us, so he's already been in that environment and started only a third of Luton's league games before signing for us. That tells a story in itself.  He's managed 1 goal and 3 assists in 20 matches.  He does look unfit, but you have to ask why he's become unfit when he's been in an environment where his teammates seemed perfectly equipped for the Championship. 

I don't like writing off players too soon, but I don't think it's unfair to say he has a lot to do to win fans over.

Because he had an injury.

[GrahamC]

6 minutes ago, Davefevs said:

Because he had an injury.

Also he has only started a third of their games because Morris & Adebayo were being picked ahead of him.

People need to realise Luton are 4th, we’re 14th, so signing their squad players (whatever your opinion of this particular player) is not exactly revelatory.

[maxjak]

35 minutes ago, GrahamC said:

Also he has only started a third of their games because Morris & Adebayo were being picked ahead of him.

People need to realise Luton are 4th, we’re 14th, so signing their squad players (whatever your opinion of this particular player) is not exactly revelatory.

As it revealed something hitherto unknown..........personally i would rather have been kept in the dark?   I will not jump on the Bash Cornick bus, but I will be astounded if he is a regular in the First Team next season..especially as Pearson stated " I will will not sign players just for the sake of it, they have to be better than what we already have ? "  I look forward to seeing who he is better than?

Edited March 20, 2023 by maxjak

[GrahamC]

14 minutes ago, maxjak said:

As it revealed something hitherto unknown..........personally i would rather have been kept in the dark?   I will not jump on the Bash Cornick bus, but I will be astounded if he is a regular in the First Team next season..especially as Pearson stated " I will will not sign players just for the sake of it, they have to be better than what we already have ? "  I look forward to seeing who he is better than?

At this stage in his career (12 Championship goals in 30 starts 8 sub appearances last season) then I’d suggest that he was certainly better than Sam Bell, but I don’t think that’s the answer you’re after & 320 minutes spread over 3 starts & 7 sub ones is clearly plenty for you to have made a definitive decision.

As has been pointed out by others he actually replaced Chris Martin, who is 34 & now on the way down, but again that’s not the answer you’re after, is it?

[Cidre Monita]

30 minutes ago, maxjak said:

As it revealed something hitherto unknown..........personally i would rather have been kept in the dark?   I will not jump on the Bash Cornick bus, but I will be astounded if he is a regular in the First Team next season..especially as Pearson stated " I will will not sign players just for the sake of it, they have to be better than what we already have ? "  I look forward to seeing who he is better than?

Martin in the context of how the team is evolving, and the age of both players. So the mystery was quickly solved. 

[maxjak]

16 minutes ago, Psychopomp said:

Martin in the context of how the team is evolving, and the age of both players. So the mystery was quickly solved. 

He is 5 years younger than  when Martin joined us.....and I am not holding my breath for a similar impact.   Anyhow, I meant present players....and NOT former ones, as is obvious in my statement/

[Son of Fred]

32 minutes ago, Psychopomp said:

Martin in the context of how the team is evolving, and the age of both players. So the mystery was quickly solved. 

If the only context is that he's more mobile & younger than Martin then that's not enough,it really isn't.

[maxjak]

50 minutes ago, GrahamC said:

At this stage in his career (12 Championship goals in 30 starts 8 sub appearances last season) then I’d suggest that he was certainly better than Sam Bell, but I don’t think that’s the answer you’re after & 320 minutes spread over 3 starts & 7 sub ones is clearly plenty for you to have made a definitive decision.

As has been pointed out by others he actually replaced Chris Martin, who is 34 & now on the way down, but again that’s not the answer you’re after, is it?

I see Cornick as a gamble, who cost very little.   If he performs, he will become a useful squad player, but if not, he will be moved on.   What everyone knows, is that we need is a physically strong, tall and skillfull centre forward, who is capable of bringing in other players by holding up the ball.  We were not going to sign that type of player in January, as that crucial type as an option is a Summer signing, and hopefully a candidate or two is already in our crosshairs?   I feel sorry for HC, as Pearson hasn't done him any favours by playing him when he is not fully fit and not up to the pace of the Championship, which is not his fault?   So he is being judged and condemned by many, when he is not ready, and it is not doing Cornick any favours IMO ( Sorry, I repeated myself!!).   I am not sure where is his best position, and i do not see him as a long term solution.......but i am hoping to eat plenty of humble pie, when he proves to be a masterstroke.  Still i cannot feel too sorry for him, as he was gong nowhere at Luton, and couldn't get in the side (Yes I know about his injury)......and whose front two are just the type of forwards we SHOULD be looking at.....still I am sure       HC got a good signing on fee?    Good Luck to him, I wish him well .   

Edited March 20, 2023 by maxjak

[maxjak]

9 minutes ago, Percy Pig said:

Keep shifting those goalposts Max!

I am happy with my statement and opinion (HAVE being the operative word....not FORMER)....can i help it if people are incapable of reading plain English?............Ha!

Edited March 20, 2023 by maxjak

[mozo]

13 hours ago, Son of Fred said:

If the only context is that he's more mobile & younger than Martin then that's not enough,it really isn't.

Totally agree. I'm happy to give Cornick a chance (and I obviously think the social media derision is daft, but really who pays attention to shit like that anyway?!), but... 

The question should be, is he the right signing for City, not is he better than Martin. I'm hoping the answer to both is yes, but we won't know for a while.