Most surprising player this year. (1 Viewer)

[TomS91]

O'Hare for me. Gone from not guaranteed a start in L1 to indispensable in the Championship. Improved his output significantly.

 

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[bawtryneal]

Ostigard. My player of the season.

 

[Greggs]

DaCosta has looked better each game. Decent back up for a fully fit Fanakaty next year.

 

[Hobo]

For me it is not a player. For me it is a squad that had setbacks but dug in together and showed tremendous togetherness and spirit.

They showed fanastic inner belief when rolling a boulder uphill.

Worst post ever on this forum was saying Robins had lost the dressingroom.

I have supported club since 1960's and never known a more together squad apart from 1987. But I think a bottom 6 battling season is tougher than a glorious cup run season.

 

[BornSlippySkyBlue]

I’m gonna say Eccles.

He had a great game v Gillingham followed by a loan at league 1 level which I didn’t think he was ready for.

He’s come back and performed well at u23 level even adding some goals to his game.

It seems he will be a genuine option in the squad next season and I hadn’t expected that from him

Eccles has surprised me this season from the little I’ve seen of him. Hadn’t seen him play much before, and hadn’t been hearing Ponticelli levels of expectation from those that had, so to see him looking assured and confident in his minutes since he returned from loan is great to see. Hoping he can kick on and be a first team player for us next season.

 

[shmmeee]

Eccles for me. A lot classier than I expected.

Got to be honest, most of the squad disappointed. But that’s more down to me underestimating the difficulty of the league than overestimating the players.

 

[Gregbant]

Osti, just immense!

 

[SkyblueTexan]

Pleasantly surprised by Hamer for half a season and then just plain surprised how he’d not met the expectations he’d set for us the rest of the season. Still very pleased with him and think it’s a case of how grueling this level can be.

Expected more from Sheaf at the start of the season and thought all the other signings like Hillsner and DaCosta would play a huge part in our season. Guess we know how that turned out.

Injuries, suspensions and stupid mistakes/penalties have also been an unwelcome surprise.

 

[SleepyGinger]

McCallum, o’hare and max are the main ones for me. Slightly disappointed with Dabo this year but happy to put it down to the stop start nature of his season. Juries still out on Walker.

 

[Magwitch1]

Looking back the surprise for me isn’t one player but the squad as a whole it is how well we did up to the the end of January when you consider, main players Rose, Dabo, Kelly, Godden, Walker, were all out most of that time plus new signing DaCosta injured & having to play McCallum still a rookie really at right back and only had Max up front with his dodgy knee then add those silly suspensions plus Marosi’s horror injury & considering our championship inexperience how we kept out of being entrenched in the bottom three is a bloody miracle.

 

[Sick Boy]

McCallum, o’hare and max are the main ones. Juries still out on Walker.

Wow.

 

[Sky Blue Pete]

Mcfadzean the last 6 weeks and probably Wilson

 

[procdoc]

I’ll echo the others that said the entire squad. Only Fadz had played regularly at championship level. We signed a few unknown quantities along with a few players with potential. We then lost our two main strikers, our best right wingback, our Captain, our best centre half from the league title winning season, and our number one keeper.

We relied on a keeper who’s never been a number one anywhere, a striker who is probably lower league one standard and a right wingback that can barely speak English.

The fact that we secured survival with games to spare, despite being one of the favourites to get relegated and missing key players for the majority of the season is a miracle. Credit must go to every single player and the management team for getting enough results to keep us above the relegation zone all season. Incredible effort

 

[mrtrench]

McCallum, o’hare and max are the main ones for me. Slightly disappointed with Dabo this year but happy to put it down to the stop start nature of his season. Juries still out on Walker.

It must be an important decision if they've appointed several juries to assess Walker.

 

[mrtrench]

I’ll echo the others that said the entire squad. Only Fadz had played regularly at championship level. We signed a few unknown quantities along with a few players with potential. We then lost our two main strikers, our best right wingback, our Captain, our best centre half from the league title winning season, and our number one keeper.

We relied on a keeper who’s never been a number one anywhere, a striker who is probably lower league one standard and a right wingback that can barely speak English.

The fact that we secured survival with games to spare, despite being one of the favourites to get relegated and missing key players for the majority of the season is a miracle. Credit must go to every single player and the management team for getting enough results to keep us above the relegation zone all season. Incredible effort

And despite all that, playing at best maybe 8 or 9 of our first choice 11 all season, the general sentiment is that only two or three of our players are Championship quality.

 

[Brighton Sky Blue]

I’ll echo the others that said the entire squad. Only Fadz had played regularly at championship level. We signed a few unknown quantities along with a few players with potential. We then lost our two main strikers, our best right wingback, our Captain, our best centre half from the league title winning season, and our number one keeper.

We relied on a keeper who’s never been a number one anywhere, a striker who is probably lower league one standard and a right wingback that can barely speak English.

The fact that we secured survival with games to spare, despite being one of the favourites to get relegated and missing key players for the majority of the season is a miracle. Credit must go to every single player and the management team for getting enough results to keep us above the relegation zone all season. Incredible effort

Spoke to someone yesterday who said winning at Stoke wasn’t particularly impressive, then I mentioned 3 years ago we were 3 leagues apart and even this season their spending is likely 4-5 times what ours is. Michael O’Neill was salty about fielding youngsters but he still had a bench of players who’d walk into our first team

 

[KersleyDigs]

Wilson (who saw this coming? Our number 1 in The Champ?!)
Kelly (didn't realise just how important he would be to our defensive game at this level!)
Biamou (is a real handful at Championship level which I wasn't expecting...)
O'Hare (stepped up with ease, POTS. He was an impact sub a lot in L1)

 

[shmmeee]

Don’t get the “O’Hare was a impact sub” stuff, he started 18 games and came on in 11, of the last 10 he started 8 and of his first 12 he started 8.

We rotated a bit mid season but he was always a first team player and started more than he didn’t.

 

[Magwitch1]

O’Hare is the one I have my fingers crossed for next season if he can add goals to his game, we will have one hell of a player. He should have atleast a dozen this season.

 

[Bertola]

Don’t get the “O’Hare was a impact sub” stuff, he started 18 games and came on in 11, of the last 10 he started 8 and of his first 12 he started 8.

We rotated a bit mid season but he was always a first team player and started more than he didn’t.

I think it's easy to cast him as that, as all of his goals last season were off the bench, so he seemed a bit of an impact sub... but I agree, he was a crucial part of our starting line up last season

 

[shmmeee]

I think it's easy to cast him as that, as all of his goals last season were off the bench, so he seemed a bit of an impact sub... but I agree, he was a crucial part of our starting line up last season

I mean he certainly had the biggest impact from the bench, but there’s a meme developing that he’s pushed his way up from not in first team contention to Championship starter that just isn’t born out in the data.

 

[HuckerbyDublinWhelan]

A friend of mine (neutral) watches the U23s a lot and has been saying for a while that Eccles is going to go far. He’s usually spot on with his player opinions