Transfer Rumour Brandon Thomas-Asante (7 Viewers)
- Thread starter Tea & Busquets
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Torquay Sky Blue
Well-Known Member
As the team is still in the building blocks stage(according to MR) here's a thought. If you want to press high, how about him and Bassette paired together. Makes sense as Simms can't press and Wright is reluctant, it might just work .
Offhegoes
Well-Known Member
I think Simms starts Saturday with Wright, if we're playing the 5-3-2 formation again.
shmmeee
Well-Known Member
Haji Wright is a cat, potentially lethal but mostly lazy and spoiled and refuses to perform if conditions aren’t perfect, also has a face a bit like a cat.
TomRad85
Well-Known Member
The watchmaker
Well-Known Member
Imho we could do with obsessing less about the defensive qualities of our strikers. Bassette and BTA pairing would likely be snuffed out by any team that had anything about them unless we find a very different way to play. Reality is that the only time we have looked consistently decent over the last 2 seasons has been when Simms was on it because he is the only big, strong presence we have and as much as some seem to dislike him - we need him back on it.
I'm not sure why people think it is sensible to drop Wright given that he is the joint 5th top goalscorer in the league with a lot less minutes than some. I'm not sure why we sub him off when we need a goal. I like BTA - I do - but we have too many strikers. Maybe we should have loaned the kid but having decided to keep him I'm not sure how we give both him and BTA the minutes they deserve as they serve a similar role.
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Mucca Mad Boys
Well-Known Member
Generally like him but it’s borderline infuriating when he tries to hold onto the ball for two long in our own half and is dispossessed.
Without boring everyone to death, 0 goal contributions from our midfielders in 14 games is why our strikers are firing blanks.
We’re obsessing about how our striker press when our midfielders and wingers have 1 goal contribution between them in 14 games. Especially when Bassette is yet to score a goal… He’s a good talent and his time will come eventually, but it’s not good enough to be the main man.
Let’s start by actually creating good quality chances for these strikers to bury.
The watchmaker
Well-Known Member
It's even simpler than that in my view. Look at the top scorer charts this season. Sainz 8, Maja 7, Brownhill 5, Sargent 4 - what do they all have in common - they will all break 1000 minutes this weekend.
Wright has 4 too but has played less than 700. We are in a real mess right now. Leave your biggest goal threat on the pitch!!
rob9872
Well-Known Member
Agree in the most part with this, the only caveat being our xg is quite high and so if some of those chances had been put away, then likely those same midfielders would have more goal contributions.
Personally I think we all just need not to panic, decide on a team and formation and stick with it. They've not suddenly become bad players, some out of form, some lacking confidence. I'm sure it will turn.
Brighton Sky Blue
Well-Known Member
Is our xG high from taking a lot of low xG shots, or because we really are creating good chances?
rob9872
Well-Known Member
I'm not sure how it works if I'm honest, but I don't think you get much credit for a long range miss whereas a penalty adds about 0.9 whatever the outcome.
Brighton Sky Blue
Well-Known Member
Penalties are about 0.75 I think. My point is that taking 15 0.1 xG efforts gives you the same total as three 0.5 efforts, but paints a different picture of what’s going on.
skybluecam
Well-Known Member
Yawn, terrible take. Been our best player this season.
Mucca Mad Boys
Well-Known Member
In most games, it has been an accumulation. Taking Tuesday as an example, QPR beat us on xG 0.77 v 0.72 (thereabouts) but they did that with double the shots (the source I checked did not include Simms chance that Wright put him through on). Undoubtedly, we created the better goal scoring opportunities on that game.
Anyway, back to your question, there’s been a few games where the xG suggested that we were unlucky to have have drawn/lost. Hence the NTT20 podcast (who backed us this season) said the underlying numbers suggested we’ll turn things around.
Here’s a comparison of 6 players who ought to be our creative outlets. Note how Eccles and Sheaf score so poorly on the per 90 passing stats for xA and passes in the penalty box. There’s other KPIs on there but it’s late and no one needs an essay.
To summarise, we’re not creating good quality chances for our strikers and to strengthen this argument, BTA and Wright are over performing on xG whereas Simms and Bassette are underperforming both should have 1 more goal than they do. Therefore, the issues truly lie behind the forward line.
Players compared:
Rudoni
Saka
EMC
MVE
Eccles
Sheaf
Player Comparison: Josh Eccles vs. Jack Rudoni vs. Ephron Mason-Clark vs. Tatsuhiro Sakamoto vs. Milan van Ewijk vs. Ben Sheaf | FBref.com
Player Comparison: Josh Eccles vs. Jack Rudoni vs. Ephron Mason-Clark vs. Tatsuhiro Sakamoto vs. Milan van Ewijk vs. Ben Sheaf
fbref.com
Here’s Torp’s stats because for some reason it wouldn’t let me select him for the previous link. Genuinely surprising in a positive way and perhaps he needs a run in the team.
Victor Torp Scouting Report for 2024-2025 Championship | FBref.com
Compare Victor Torp to others in passing, goal scoring, attacking, defense and more for the 2024-2025 Championship
fbref.com
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Mucca Mad Boys
Well-Known Member
5th top scorer in the league, you’ve never liked him and never will.
But, hey, 0 goals Bassette is the better signing right now!
I still cannot believe you tried to make that point the other day.
PUSB-We_are_going_up
Well-Known Member
Im gonna share a bit of knowledge about squad building.
So because all the experienced heads (the leaders as such) have left, this means we had none at the start.
Sheaf was selected to be Captain so thats a selected leader, and Bidwell seems to be an emergent leader who seems to be vocal in the dressing room.
A squad needs probably 3/4 leaders in it so players I can see emerging as leaders are Wilson and Eccles at the moment, both being vocal and playing their role in organisation.
Now for the added members of the squad being 7 coming in and 5 going out, yes we have replaced the number outgoing. However those 6 players will be fresh (other than binks) so this means that they will be fighting for a spot and seek to become a regular or important player.
This is known as formation as a team is technically being formed (we have a squad of 26 with 7 players newly signed thats 27% of the squad being new).
Thus with a high turnover there will be fighting for places and current roles within the squad being unknown, and we have seen clashes on the pitch between players that were even here last year and know eachother etc.
This represents storming.
When players roles become more apparent to everyone such as a strongest 11 and rotational players there will be norming and there will be greater focus on working together and playing as a unit as they all know their roles and eventually comes the performing aspect where it all comes together leading to a string of good results and a turnaround in form as there is very clearly ability in these players as we know.
I conclude that due to just over a quarter squad turnover that soon it will click when Robins, the coaching staff and the players all understand everyone’s roles in the squad we’ll see that togetherness re-emerge and lead to better performance and results
So because all the experienced heads (the leaders as such) have left, this means we had none at the start.
Sheaf was selected to be Captain so thats a selected leader, and Bidwell seems to be an emergent leader who seems to be vocal in the dressing room.
A squad needs probably 3/4 leaders in it so players I can see emerging as leaders are Wilson and Eccles at the moment, both being vocal and playing their role in organisation.
Now for the added members of the squad being 7 coming in and 5 going out, yes we have replaced the number outgoing. However those 6 players will be fresh (other than binks) so this means that they will be fighting for a spot and seek to become a regular or important player.
This is known as formation as a team is technically being formed (we have a squad of 26 with 7 players newly signed thats 27% of the squad being new).
Thus with a high turnover there will be fighting for places and current roles within the squad being unknown, and we have seen clashes on the pitch between players that were even here last year and know eachother etc.
This represents storming.
When players roles become more apparent to everyone such as a strongest 11 and rotational players there will be norming and there will be greater focus on working together and playing as a unit as they all know their roles and eventually comes the performing aspect where it all comes together leading to a string of good results and a turnaround in form as there is very clearly ability in these players as we know.
I conclude that due to just over a quarter squad turnover that soon it will click when Robins, the coaching staff and the players all understand everyone’s roles in the squad we’ll see that togetherness re-emerge and lead to better performance and results
PUSB-We_are_going_up
Well-Known Member
No Im just educated in Sports Science including Psychology, so I thought I’d share reason for why performance hasnt been as good as hoped or expected. This season’s excuse will be tustle over leadership and fighting for places (although sometimes it looks like there has been no fight whatsoever or fight to not have the place)
fernandopartridge
Well-Known Member
Is that forming, norming etc?
HuckerbyDublinWhelan
Well-Known Member
You say high turnover but we’ve the highest squad retention in the league. Why aren’t other teams having this issue?
PUSB-We_are_going_up
Well-Known Member
Forming, Storming, Norming, Performing yes, also includes leadership such as emergent and selected
PUSB-We_are_going_up
Well-Known Member
Perhaps they kept their leaders, at which we couldnt as they were passengers when they played. Also the fact they didnt change their whole coaching staff so our regulars are also attempting to gel with them too
shmmeee
Well-Known Member
Yeah. My team lead literally shared a blog on it they’d written yesterday. Don’t think I’d heard it since uni before that.
Mucca Mad Boys
Well-Known Member
If you look at the team compared to 2022/23, what have improved?
Strikers - we improved upon Gyokeres with 2 players and since added 2 more. Last season BTA, Simms & Wright got 46 goals combined.
Midfielders - we’ve lost Kelly, Hamer, Palmer and COH. Replaced by Torp and Rudoni. Hamer’s 22/23 goal contributions outdone all out midfielders combined (or thereabouts) last season.
Defence - definitely improved at RB with MVE. Defence was 4th best in 2022/23 and 6th (or so) in 2023/24. Miss Doyle’s quality and McFadz leadership - I think a Fadz like figure around the team would benefit the current group massively.
The 2023-24 and 2024/25 midfield and defence cohorts have completely unchanged. Last season we lacked quality in those areas and with no signings there, it’s obviously not going to improve.
Brighton Sky Blue
Well-Known Member
Is our chairman meant to be Napoleon in this scenario?
Sky_Blue_Dreamer
Well-Known Member
But the midfielders could create really good chances and if the strikers don't score them, the midfielders won't have any goal contributions.
If you look at our xG (which has flaws) we're actually quite high, which suggests far more we're creating the chances and not scoring them.
Mucca Mad Boys
Well-Known Member
Wright and BTA are over performing their xG whilst Simms and Bassette should have 1 more goal each. Both have missed 1 ‘massive’ (0.5 xG) and Simms has missed 2 ‘good’ chances (0.3 xG) a piece.
Then, contrast that with xA for our midfielders, they aren’t underperforming (0.2-3 below) on that metric.
Combine those two elements and it should be clear that the strikers do not have good quality of chances. The data is pretty clear on this.
skybluecam
Well-Known Member
Where are people seeing that we've created "high" xG?
We are currently 11th for xG created. Much better than our league position obviously, but I wouldn't say it's high, it's very average.
baldy
Well-Known Member
Pussies
fatso
Well-Known Member
He's certainly a pussy in the tackle
Old Warwickshire lad
Well-Known Member
Because it’s all complete and utter bollocks.