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Wanderers Ways. Neil Thompson 1961-2021

Dapo Afolayan


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2 hours ago, tomski said:

Some fair points but it’s a bit cultist to claim it’s perhaps all one way.

We know of another he’s not been good with. 

If he just said we had it wrong and I’ll learn that would be fine. It’s the being smarter than everyone else thing that fucks me off. A bit like Dougie was. Even last night he said it takes time to play his vision, which I translated too=we weren’t good enough.

Can be some middle ground on Evatt. 
 

 

Thing is, whether Evatt made any mistakes in his relationship with Dapo or not, once it breaks down, then the player has to go. 

Of course the manager can learn, but he is the gaffer and it would undermine his authority should he let a player "have his way" for want of a better phrase.

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2 hours ago, desperado said:

I know I posted this on the other thread but it’s relevant to this debate as well:

This League Season:

First 23 games - 37 points (with Dapo)

Last 23 Games - 44 points (without Dapo) 

Now I’m not suggesting Dapo isn’t technically a better player than those we have replaced him with. And like @Casino I’m a fan of Dapo.

But we’ve done better in the 2nd part of the season without him. 

It wasn’t working for him, it wasn’t working for us. He was good but not good enough to change your playing style to accommodate or squeeze him like a square peg into a round hole - both of which Evatt tried and didn’t work.

It was a move that worked both ways.

Move on

 

For the first 23 games IE was changing the line up almost every week 

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9 minutes ago, Tonge moor green jacket said:

Thing is, whether Evatt made any mistakes in his relationship with Dapo or not, once it breaks down, then the player has to go. 

Of course the manager can learn, but he is the gaffer and it would undermine his authority should he let a player "have his way" for want of a better phrase.

Liked this but i really dont think they fell out

Dapo got a great offer

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11 minutes ago, Casino said:

Liked this but i really dont think they fell out

Dapo got a great offer

Iirc he didn't want to take it either but we were adamant he was going

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2 minutes ago, Zico said:

Iirc he didn't want to take it either but we were adamant he was going

His quotes dont suggest he was forced out

Maybe hes just protecting evatt

Y know, the bloke he fell out with?

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Everythings better with hindsight isnt it. It was clear as day our attack needed beefing up. We were getting bullied at places. Big Vic was 3rd top scorer in the league and looked to be a real handful. Him, Dan and Jerome were clearly bought in to sort that out and give us a plan B.

Folk say it didnt work and we missed Dapo, but we finished 5th in the league. 5th.

Presume folk wanted a championship winning push after Jan but forget theres other teams in the division with a lot more money and a lot more experience at the business end of the division.

Dapo just didnt fit the way we play and clearly wasnt happy being a super sub.

Our problem at the back end of this season has been our midfield. Tired legs, injuries and going from being overloaded with midfielders to paper thin. You cant lose a players like Kieron Lee from your regular line up either.

Dapo would have unlocked them last night. But its a moot point, he had to leave.

 

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14 hours ago, Casino said:

His quotes dont suggest he was forced out

Maybe hes just protecting evatt

Y know, the bloke he fell out with?

You're the one who said they fell out 

Just seem to recall the story going that the offer came in from Germany but he didn't fancy it and wanted to hold out for something here, maybe even wait till the summer

Whilst I'm sure IE had had enough of trying to fit him in and wanted to cash in and buy someone to fit in with his system 

There was a rumour he stormed off out the ground on a match day around the time, was just a rumour though

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With Dapo, he offered us something different, unique, out of the ordinary. Ability to run at defenders, draw them in, invite them to commit fouls, get shots off. If he was going to go, at least one of those brought in ought to have been seen as replacing that. Vic, who all the money was spent on, offers none of that. A honest grafter who runs channels, holds ball up reasonably well and scores now and then. 

Neither of Nlundulu or Jerome have given us anything we were short of or even more of what we already had. Shoretire was maybe supposed to give us a bit of the Dapo effect but has been nowhere near.

IE and Markham have loads of credit in the bank, and rightly so, but this window has to be a lot better 

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Let's flip this Dapo going was a mistake 

Would we have even got in the play offs if he'd stayed,rumoured to have thrown his toys out of the pram,upsetting dressing room and to be fair not really impressing when played

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1 hour ago, desperado said:

No it’s not.

Amongst all the subjective opinion, that’s a fact. 

And my point wasn’t about Victor being better than Dapo, or Dapo technically being better than all the Jan signings, I said that before. 

But another fact is all those January signings, albeit individually all of them being lesser players than Dapo have been on the pitch and played a part in us picking up more points than we did when Dapo was here.

But I’ll throw a subjective one in seeing that seems to be the trend to dismiss the facts I’m stating. Signings like Dempsey didn’t work out at first, but after pre-season looked much better come August. 

 

The facts your putting up are useless in making the point your trying to make. Dapo didn't start defeats to Cheltenham and Forest Green, Victor & Dan came off the bench and played 10minutes when we beat Fleetwood (when we were 2-0 up). But by your reckoning that's two losses for Dapo and a win for the January boys? 

Dapo/Vic/Dan/Jerome have all been bit part players and largely inconsequential to our results this season. The question is whether any of them could've been more than that if we'd tweaked the system or played them more. The fact Dapo was our Player of the Season last year in League One suggests he could've done.

I'm not writing Victor off. It's a fair point to say we've had signings who looked shite and then came good, we've also had (more) who started off shite and stayed shite. But he'll get a chance next season and we'll see.

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Its not like the manager didnt try.

Played him front. Didnt work.

Played him no 10. Didnt work.

Played him on the other side. Didnt work.

Played him full back. Didnt work.

Lad only wanted to play one position in a formation we dont play and when we did, it didnt work. 

His main impact was off the bench. He didn't want that role either.

 

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14 hours ago, 1969 said:

Let's flip this Dapo going was a mistake 

Would we have even got in the play offs if he'd stayed,rumoured to have thrown his toys out of the pram,upsetting dressing room and to be fair not really impressing when played

Absolutely.

If he'd set his heart elsewhere, then the sooner the better if he's not performing very well.

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Shoretire has been by far and away the disappointment of the season for me. I thought he was exactly what we needed when we signed him. 

Still think there's a player in Victor at this level - but I'll judge him properly next season. 

The Dapo coming in on a free type signings are going to get harder to find the higher up the leagues we go. I don't think IE had much choice but to let him go. 

What we do have is a reputation amongst Premier League clubs about developing young players, and making sure they get game time. 

In the absence of a shit ton of money - that's one of our biggest strengths at the moment..... 

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27 minutes ago, gonzo said:

Its not like the manager didnt try.

Played him front. Didnt work.

Played him no 10. Didnt work.

Played him on the other side. Didnt work.

Played him full back. Didnt work.

Lad only wanted to play one position in a formation we dont play and when we did, it didnt work. 

His main impact was off the bench. He didn't want that role either.

 

All valid points but would it be fair to ask the question on why we couldn’t play (I think undisputed) our best player in a system that works.

He fit in a system last season and the season before.

I think playing him LB wasn’t trying to accommodate him either.

 

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15 hours ago, 1969 said:

Let's flip this Dapo going was a mistake 

Would we have even got in the play offs if he'd stayed,rumoured to have thrown his toys out of the pram,upsetting dressing room and to be fair not really impressing when played

Yep, I liked Dapo & wished him well but he wasn't a 1st choice player & when he got his chances this season , he spent more time running up blind alleys & arguing with referees than the odd good performance like at Accrington.

It will be interesting to see how he progresses in Germany.......here, he became much less effective once defenders had had a look at him & blocked his party trick of cutting in from the left & bending it into the far corner.

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39 minutes ago, Lt. Aldo Raine said:

I think that actual question should be whether we'd have been better off switching our formation back to a 4-2-3-1 to accomodate him wide high up the pitch rather than sticking with the 3-5-2 and letting him go

 

38 minutes ago, tomski said:

All valid points but would it be fair to ask the question on why we couldn’t play (I think undisputed) our best player in a system that works.

He fit in a system last season and the season before.

I think playing him LB wasn’t trying to accommodate him either.

 

Connor Bradley.

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14 minutes ago, gonzo said:

 

Connor Bradley.

Yep. Sits with the choices made by management then. If we can look back and learn then I’ve no issue. Anyone in any work life goes through that. If we learn mind as some don’t 

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1 hour ago, kent_white said:

Shoretire has been by far and away the disappointment of the season for me. I thought he was exactly what we needed when we signed him. 

Still think there's a player in Victor at this level - but I'll judge him properly next season. 

The Dapo coming in on a free type signings are going to get harder to find the higher up the leagues we go. I don't think IE had much choice but to let him go. 

What we do have is a reputation amongst Premier League clubs about developing young players, and making sure they get game time. 

In the absence of a shit ton of money - that's one of our biggest strengths at the moment..... 

Agreed on Shoretire, I thought he looked quality in his 1st couple of appearances, but it came to nothing although as with Dapo nobody quite sure where his best position is and whether he can fit into 5-3-2.  I feel certain he has the ability to make a career at L1 level, just not with us at this stage.  I hope you're right on Victor, just not sure what its based on, comes up short on everything I'd judge a striker on.   

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11 minutes ago, Lt. Aldo Raine said:

He's had a good season but he's not and never would be our player

Oh no, but clearly our biggest threat as wing back. Same as Fossey season before.

Its just how we set up innit. He was never going to change this just to suit Dapo. 

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Just now, gonzo said:

Oh no, but clearly our biggest threat as wing back. Same as Fossey season before.

Its just how we set up innit. He was never going to change this just to suit Dapo. 

Aye

I'm not necessarily arguing he should or should'nt have changed things to accommodate Dapo, I just think it's an interesting one to think about

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Sadly the two players we got rid of in January dapo and Sadler were far better than the 4 we replaced them with . On top of that we are locked into contracts with 2 of them for the next few years 

Edited by Farnywhite
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