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Our squad is way to big

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BillLovesRoo said:
For a while now i have thought our squad is way to big for us to actually function properly as a team.

You ask any manager and they would much prefer to work with a core of 18-20 outfield players on a training day.

Then you get to match day and you have no injury concerns, even with 18-20 outfield players you are still leaving 4 players unhappy.

How does that effect moral? How does that effect the actual plan the manager is trying to get accross to the players.

I have always thought at most you should have 18 outfield players for your squad for the season, then you can pad the rest out with kids (21 or under, as they will jsut be happy to be in and around the first team).

If you look at our rediculously unbalanced squad we have the following over the age of 21

Pickford
Stekelenberg
Robles

Coleman
Martina

Williams
Jagielka
Keane
Mori

Baines

Besic
McCarthy
Schneiderlin
Gueye
Klaassen

Bolasie
Lennon
Mirallas

Rooney
Sigurdsson
Sandro
Barkley
Niasse

I havent added the likes of Garbutt, Browning, Pennington etc either

Add to that some of the most talented kids in hte league, who some of them you would say are first team regulars now, and probably to good to go back to the u23s

Calvert Lewin
Holgate
Kenny
Davies
Lookman
Vlasic
and now Banigime emerging

Thats 27 players the manager will be working with on a day to day basis (if everyone was fit) how can you get your plan and strategy accross to them with that number of players?

We all know we need to add a centre forward, centre back and left back to the squad in january that would take us up to 30 players expected to be in hte first team.

We have to be looking at ditching atleast 10 of these lot to get the squad size down.
Click to expand...

Glad you bring this up.

I think the midfield is the main problem here. Too many players for 4-5 positions, and it's all down the the transfer policy this summer. Buying Rooney, Klassen, Sigurdsson all in one window, and then not letting Mirallas to leave despite not playing him (not that I wanted him to leave though, I am looking through the view of Koeman/Walsh).

Why should we worry about this? Because I think having too big a squad (too big a midfield in this case) will have some negative effects. When some senior players are not played regularly, if at all, then:

1. They will be unhappy, which may cause dress room unrest, and affect overall team's morale.

2. Their value will depreciate, in 2 ways. First, their market value will probably decrease. Second, if we need them in a game, they probably won't be at their top form after being left out for a while. So having a lot of players not playing is a waste of resources.

3. Furthermore, in our case, having too big a midfield may also make it difficult for the manager to bed in new signings like Klassen or Sandro. Eg: why play Klassen when we already have Davies... For this reason, I think it is not a bad idea to loan Klassen and Sandro to other Premier League clubs in January to see how they adapt and progress before bringing them back to the squad or selling them at a loss next summer (of course they have to agree to go on loan).

After typing all of this, now I realize this just comes back to a point that has been brought up many times this season: our summer transfer policy messed up with the squad balance, there are too many midfielders but there is a lack of quality in ST and CB.
 
In my view, you need to have a senior player and a 'premier league ready' u21 for each position. However, someone like Vlasic should be classed as senior already, as should Davies + Onyekuru to join next season :o


GK -- Pickford/ ???
LB -- ??? / ???
LCB -- ??? / ???
RCB -- Keane / Holgate
RB -- Coleman / Kenny
DM -- Gana / Baningime
CM -- Davies / ???
AM -- Barkley / Sigurdsson
LW -- Lookman / Onyekuru
CF -- ??? / DCL / ???
RW -- Vlasic / Dowell


Here are the rest of them;

GK -- Robles / Stekelenburg
LB -- Baines / Garbutt
LCB -- Mori / Galloway
RCB -- Jagielka / Williams / Pennington
RB -- Martina / Browning
DM -- Schneiderlin / McCarthy
CM -- Besic / Klaassen
AM -- Rooney /
LW -- Mirallas / Bolasie
CF -- Niasse / Sandro
RW -- Lennon


Looking at the lists, we need

1 GK
2 LB
2 LCB
1 CM
2 CF

We would then have a balanced team, but how do you buy 8 players and sell 21 players in 2 windows lol isn't going to happen!

Shows we are missing quality in key areas + have a massive squad mostly of dross!
 
Coleman - Out long term.
Martina - Only brought in because of Coleman

Williams
Jagielka
Keane
Mori - Out long-term

Baines

Besic - always injured - Very few will buy and pay good wages for a crock.
McCarthy - ditto.
Schneiderlin
Gueye
Klaassen

Bolasie - Out long term
Lennon - Had off the field issues.
Mirallas -

Rooney
Sigurdsson
Sandro
Barkley - Out long-term.
Niasse - Only here due to emergency of no decent striker.

-

Not to mention the youth, Kenny wasn't really fancied by Koeman ahead of Martina but he was covering while no Seamus.

Yes it looks big on paper but take in the circumstances then it's probably about right. After all if Seamus, Yannick and Mori were all fit then we probbably don't sign Martina, Mirallas probs takes off or Vlasic doesn't come in so soon and Jags/Williams would both be back ups or even Mori sold.

Not to mention the whole Barkley situation, and playing in 4 competitions to begin with.
 
whaaaa.gif
 

BillLovesRoo said:
For a while now i have thought our squad is way to big for us to actually function properly as a team.

You ask any manager and they would much prefer to work with a core of 18-20 outfield players on a training day.

Then you get to match day and you have no injury concerns, even with 18-20 outfield players you are still leaving 4 players unhappy.

How does that effect moral? How does that effect the actual plan the manager is trying to get accross to the players.

I have always thought at most you should have 18 outfield players for your squad for the season, then you can pad the rest out with kids (21 or under, as they will jsut be happy to be in and around the first team).

If you look at our rediculously unbalanced squad we have the following over the age of 21

Pickford
Stekelenberg
Robles

Coleman
Martina

Williams
Jagielka
Keane
Mori

Baines

Besic
McCarthy
Schneiderlin
Gueye
Klaassen

Bolasie
Lennon
Mirallas

Rooney
Sigurdsson
Sandro
Barkley
Niasse

I havent added the likes of Garbutt, Browning, Pennington etc either

Add to that some of the most talented kids in hte league, who some of them you would say are first team regulars now, and probably to good to go back to the u23s

Calvert Lewin
Holgate
Kenny
Davies
Lookman
Vlasic
and now Banigime emerging

Thats 27 players the manager will be working with on a day to day basis (if everyone was fit) how can you get your plan and strategy accross to them with that number of players?

We all know we need to add a centre forward, centre back and left back to the squad in january that would take us up to 30 players expected to be in hte first team.

We have to be looking at ditching atleast 10 of these lot to get the squad size down.
Click to expand...

This post was brought to you by the 1970s.

70sheader.png
 
Osamabindiesel said:
The problem is even with this massive squad, Koeman didn't have a rotation. He ran players into the ground and made them unhappy. I was perplexed as to why he went for all this depth in the first place if he wasn't going to use it.
Click to expand...
Perhaps because after the shitty start to the season, partly heavy fixtures, every game became a must win so he avoided rotation...
 
I think some of our senior players found themselves on your ‘rest of them’ list only because they are in poor form (Schneiderlin) or a little too senior (Baines)
 

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