Barnsley (A)

[Tonge moor green jacket]

9 hours ago, worthy10 said:

I know we should say this of any player, but GT gives absolutely everything, every time. But for all of that, he is clumsy and crude. I think mid table div 1 is the peak of his level IMHO

He isn't the best technically, but likes to move the ball quickly. Given the opportunity i.e. with good movement up front, he does slide through some excellent passes.

Also better when he has the freedom to press further up the pitch and break down opponents' play.

Slow build up doesn't suit him, and he's never going to be receiving the ball in tight areas, killing it stone dead, and then twisting and turning away from his man.

Similarities perhaps to Jules' style of play. 

If the team is on it, then he doesn't need to be the one trying to do.

What is noticeable, is the number of yellow cards he's not been getting recently. 

A change maybe since SS has had time to work with him. 

[Domcarey1]

It’s been said many times on here before but yesterday we, once again, watched a player that has everything needed to get out of this division (mentality, guile, shithousery, leadership). It’s a shame he was captaining our opponents……

[Bertie]

If anyone on here had had £1m to spend would you have gone for Randall or Connell? Epitomises what went wrong.

[Stig]

2 minutes ago, Domcarey1 said:

It’s been said many times on here before but yesterday we, once again, watched a player that has everything needed to get out of this division (mentality, guile, shithousery, leadership). It’s a shame he was captaining our opponents……

Thing is, we say that but Barnsley are doing worse than us.

But I would have Connell back in a heartbeat. Plus I'd happily take Jalo, Humphreys, Phillips and Russell off them

[Spider]

Just now, Bertie said:

If anyone on here had had £1m to spend would you have gone for Randall or Connell? Epitomises what went wrong.

Yep

Evatt and his team assumed we could style our way out of this fucking turgid division.

Brum have managed it (but even then they have a few lumps in their side) but it’s only doable with £20million to throw at transfers and wages.

Gonzo was spot on. We need players who have the ability to boss a third tier midfield with their physicality and cuntishness.

randall. That signing really does sum up how delusional we’d become about “the system”

[Cheese]

 

[paulhanley]

When Rioch came to Bolton in 1992 we won three of our first give games then drew 1 and lost 5 of the next six. A very similar thing happened when Big Sam arrived in 1999. It is very early days and SS has his first transfer window upcoming. I would bet good money that he thinks the same as us in terms of the flaws we have been seeing week in and out for a considerable period now. 

I had lost patience with Evatt. I have loads of it for SS. He has one hell of a job on unpicking the mess Evatt left and he needs to turn us from flat track bullies in to a far meaner machine. I think he will do it.

[Whitesince63]

8 hours ago, Wanderlust said:

You may believe I’m wrong but you clearly don’t know anything about it, and yet you have an opinion - an opinion that has been echoed by many ill -informed people on tinternet. Fact is Managers serve Directors and when a Director’s role is specifically to recruit as in this case, it’s a stretch to lay the blame at anyone else’s door, especially to justify a personal grudge.

I’d be disappointed if Evatt hadn’t been allowed to have some input into recruitment but ultimately it wasn’t his money to spend and it wasn’t his decision who to spend it on.

Evatt has a wide unprofessional streak so it was no surprise then that once he knew he was gone, he publicly stated that the players weren’t good enough - which comes across as a backhanded swipe at Markham - and it looks like he was right seeing as SS is no better.

What we have is a massive headache for Sharon and the Board.

Surely it’s the manager who decides what he needs in the team and and the football directors job to find prospects. I’d imagine it’s then a joint discussion between manager, FD and board who they go for and how much they pay? I can’t see any way that Evatt had players forced on him that he hadn’t agreed with. 

[Whitesince63]

57 minutes ago, Bertie said:

If anyone on here had had £1m to spend would you have gone for Randall or Connell? Epitomises what went wrong.

Neither, I’d have signed Joe Powell on a free from Burton as Rotherham did. These players are about and other teams seem to pick them up but I’m not sure our technical way of recruiting actually highlights them. Maybe the old fashioned way is still the best way?

[CambridgeBWFC]

48 minutes ago, Cheese said:

 

It does not sound very complementary to Rico there. 

It is what it is, had to go three against there forwards to match them physically, but still had to change to a back 4. 

[RUREADY2ROLL]

2 minutes ago, CambridgeBWFC said:

It does not sound very complementary to Rico there. 

It is what it is, had to go three against there forwards to match them physically, but still had to change to a back 4. 

Putting Rico into the starting 11 was ridiculous and Rico was complete garbage and shouldn’t wear the shirt again.

it was an embarrassing performance and we were as bad as we have been all season; booing at half time and signing your not fit to wear the shirt was acceptable 

 

[woolli]

33 minutes ago, Whitesince63 said:

Neither, I’d have signed Joe Powell on a free from Burton as Rotherham did. These players are about and other teams seem to pick them up but I’m not sure our technical way of recruiting actually highlights them. Maybe the old fashioned way is still the best way?

You wont get out of this league playing nicey tippy tappy football, its not how it works in this league. We are desperate for some physicality in midfield and up front, im sure SS already knows what needs addressing.

[W.cramp]

49 minutes ago, paulhanley said:

When Rioch came to Bolton in 1992 we won three of our first give games then drew 1 and lost 5 of the next six. A very similar thing happened when Big Sam arrived in 1999. It is very early days and SS has his first transfer window upcoming. I would bet good money that he thinks the same as us in terms of the flaws we have been seeing week in and out for a considerable period now. 

I had lost patience with Evatt. I have loads of it for SS. He has one hell of a job on unpicking the mess Evatt left and he needs to turn us from flat track bullies in to a far meaner machine. I think he will do it.

Something I always remember rioch saying ' you can never have enough strikers'  look at us now !   

I know the tough tackling midfield is needed 'and am pretty sure ss will sort that after his comment of 'it took us 30-35 minutes to make a tackle' but up top is where you win games and that must be priority 

[little whitt]

2 minutes ago, W.cramp said:

Something I always remember rioch saying ' you can never have enough strikers'  look at us now !   

I know the tough tackling midfield is needed 'and am pretty sure ss will sort that after his comment of 'it took us 30-35 minutes to make a tackle' but up top is where you win games and that must be priority 

HE Rioch was saying that Friday Night 

[Farnywhite]

11 hours ago, CambridgeBWFC said:

We have seen what he can do, but we have then seen shit teams/formations that have been as bad, if not worse, than evatts tenure, and that is a concern. 

He as to go through the process of realising  there not good enough.
He probably thought looking from the outside they probably need a bit of confidence and a few tweaks her and there and sorted

. Now he is seeing the frustration every one else as seen going back over 12 months. Better he sees it now and as the summer to mull it over

just hope he doesn’t come up with the plan B evatt did in the summer 

[Lostock Whites]

The whole management of the club has been disastrous this past 12 months.

The recruitment strategy has been woeful. We've not only signed players based on FIFA stats but also players with severe injury records.

I know clubs have injuries during a season, it happens, but the amount of injury prone players we have is seriously concerning.

Mendes Gomes, Forino, Dempsey, Tutu, Toal, Forrester, Santos, Adeboyejo, all not bad players but have hardly been able to get fit all season, then Evatt/Markham decide to leave us with a departing gift of Etete which just epitomises their whole recruitment strategy.

At the end of the day, Sharon's personal loyalty to Evatt has cost us this season, we all know he was well past his expiry date. The fact we even decided to give him a final window to save himself, spending millions on useless players, getting rid of our top striker, all to be sacked the week after.

Schumacher has been left to pick up the pieces. I kind of feel sorry for him. As he mentioned from the outside looking in, when he joined he said the club is full of talent and in a strong position. But what he has now found out is there is a much deeper underlying problem at the club, which I don't think changes until he can bring his own players in and get rid of the rotten disease left by Evatt. 

 

Edited April 13, 2025 by Lostock Whites

[deeane Koontz]

Good luck SS clearing this muck out in the summer.

We've a squad full of absolute fairies with not an ounce of grit between them.

That Randall January signing was just the icing on the cake of moronic fanny transfers.

The striker situation is really infuriating. We had options last summer.  What we're left with is purely out of self harm.

 

 

[paulhanley]

51 minutes ago, W.cramp said:

Something I always remember rioch saying ' you can never have enough strikers'  look at us now !   

I know the tough tackling midfield is needed 'and am pretty sure ss will sort that after his comment of 'it took us 30-35 minutes to make a tackle' but up top is where you win games and that must be priority 

The scary thing is we need to tighten the defence as well. Look at the goals conceded column. We really are some way off were we need to be in every department. 

[Whitestar]

CBA checking stats but is SS record now worse than Evatt's???

[1969]

1 hour ago, Lostock Whites said:

The whole management of the club has been disastrous this past 12 months.

The recruitment strategy has been woeful. We've not only signed players based on FIFA stats but also players with severe injury records.

I know clubs have injuries during a season, it happens, but the amount of injury prone players we have is seriously concerning.

Mendes Gomes, Forino, Dempsey, Tutu, Toal, Forrester, Santos, Adeboyejo, all not bad players but have hardly been able to get fit all season, then Evatt/Markham decide to leave us with a departing gift of Etete which just epitomises their whole recruitment strategy.

At the end of the day, Sharon's personal loyalty to Evatt has cost us this season, we all know he was well past his expiry date. The fact we even decided to give him a final window to save himself, spending millions on useless players, getting rid of our top striker, all to be sacked the week after.

Schumacher has been left to pick up the pieces. I kind of feel sorry for him. As he mentioned from the outside looking in, when he joined he said the club is full of talent and in a strong position. But what he has now found out is there is a much deeper underlying problem at the club, which I don't think changes until he can bring his own players in and get rid of the rotten disease left by Evatt. 

 

Agree with this except for the Dion bit,he was not the same after his injury but we should have replaced him instead of getting Randell 

[dusan nikolic]

2 hours ago, paulhanley said:

When Rioch came to Bolton in 1992 we won three of our first give games then drew 1 and lost 5 of the next six. A very similar thing happened when Big Sam arrived in 1999. It is very early days and SS has his first transfer window upcoming. I would bet good money that he thinks the same as us in terms of the flaws we have been seeing week in and out for a considerable period now. 

I had lost patience with Evatt. I have loads of it for SS. He has one hell of a job on unpicking the mess Evatt left and he needs to turn us from flat track bullies in to a far meaner machine. I think he will do it.

I totally agree regarding the mess S.S has inherited , it may take him a season to sort it out to be fair . There are limited players out of contract and lets be honest how many clubs are going to pay for most of the others , that's if the players are willing to leave .

Regarding the teams all 3 have inherited i think Bruce and Big Sam took over teams that had a lot of quality at that point and both showed 3 signings or so could dramatically change the seasons fortunes , Bruce did it with what was basically Neal's team and likewise Big Sam would probably have done it also regarding Toddy's , ( Eidur's injury and a corrupt official aside ) , i'm not sure S.S inherits the settled sides they did , no doubt there are quality players here but the squad is so disjointed , we have Collins and Mcatee and Sheehan and Randall who are 2 cheeks of the same backside and other than that we are soft as shit all through the team . I also think Dion being here still would have given us more points on the board and the January dealings were bizarre to say the least . But we aren't out of it yet but i think the injuries of the last few games will be the final nail in the coffin.

 

[Farnywhite]

1 hour ago, Lostock Whites said:

know clubs have injuries during a season, it happens, but the amount of injury prone players we have is seriously concerning.

May be we get so many injuries especially hamstrings is because the players don’t train properly they were accused of tossing off by evatt . Hopefully now SS will be about it might change but we do have a few that basically will never be right and always in and out tutu  with is knee for example 

[onefinfrandsen]

44 minutes ago, paulhanley said:

The scary thing is we need to tighten the defence as well. Look at the goals conceded column. We really are some way off were we need to be in every department. 

The one thing ss will get is patience from Sharon. The squad needs stripping back and building up again. Every confidence in ss getting it right, it just may take longer than we’d all hope for.

[Farnywhite]

12 minutes ago, onefinfrandsen said:

The one thing ss will get is patience from Sharon. The squad needs stripping back and building up again. Every confidence in ss getting it right, it just may take longer than we’d all hope for.

18 contracted players next season we might be able to sell  one or two but SS is stuck with the vast majority for next season 

[FrancisFogarty]

We're just a well supported third division team that took on an unemployed manager. With our budget it's going to take more than half a season to sort out.