Collins seemed to get worse as the season went on. It might just be me but his reactions seems to be slow. You often see him throw out an arm last second to try and divert a shot. He doesn't seem to anticipate shots at all. That might just be his style that's unconventional but it doesn't look right.
I'm not too concerned if we start with Collins and Wilson as our keepers net year.
Collins makes some very good reflex saves. I think he can eradicate the mistakes hopefully. Still young
Collins makes some very good reflex saves. I think he can eradicate the mistakes hopefully. Still young
Think I’m with @SBT here. There’s a few more impactful positions we need filling first. If a player comes up who fits then I’d do the deal, but I wouldnt prioritise over CB, LB, CM or AM, or probably even backup RW and ST.
The lauding of Collins was always a mystery to me. His weaknesses haven't just appeared recently, they've been obvious all along, and he's never looked more than a reasonable Championship keeper. He hasn't been better than Wilson in my eyes.
Will be very pleased if we bring in a genuinely commanding player for this vital position.
Will be very pleased if we bring in a genuinely commanding player for this vital position.
A more impactful position than the one between the posts of our goal?
Yeah.
If the other ten are doing their jobs it’s probably the least important position on the pitch in terms of whether we succeed. There’s a reason the best keepers seem to play in the lower ends of the table, a team pushing top six is generally more worried about their opponents goal than theirs.
I think if you’re Rotherham or us in the 90s, then a keeper gets you 10+ points a season. At the top end it’s maybe 5 tops IMO.
All i can say without actually saying it as its not fair on the bloke, was if it was to happen to one of us we would be the exact same and lose our heads completely. Don't harbour any blame at all towards him and how he was during that period. Just unfortunately remains to be seen wether or not he's mentally back at another club
There are some good loanees knocking about, Sheffield Wednesday signed a GK from BHA on loan and he was a success.
The loan market could be a good option here.
Personally, I don’t think Collins is ‘finished’. However, his April was pretty bad and if we’re letting Wilson and Moore go, we need a GK. As with all new signings from now, they’ve got to improve in what we have.
Eh?
Robins has been through 3 keepers in 2 seasons, he's plenty ruthless. Some stability would benefit us, can't be good having our keepers constantly looking over their shoulder.
Seems like a top bloke. Noticeable at Wembley how we was one to commiserate Sheaf, always gets positive reviews from team mates as well.
Hey, maybe he fancies a go a GK coaching? Can’t be any worse than what we’ve got.
I don’t think any position is less important than any other.
So we need to prioritise signing new players for those positions where we are weakest, that is goalkeeeper and left back. Obviously if Sheaf goes CM is next and then more depth virtually across all positions.
If a new keeper comes in they have to be #1 from the start.
Exactly and that goes for most signing we’ll make this summer too. We’re not signing players to be backups.
If I was Wilson, I would be absolutely furious that Collins took his place (after an error) and since then, Collins has made more mistakes than a ventilated condom.
Granted our defence has been weak this season, and the expensive signing of Kitching continues to dismay, but Wilson got kicked out of net for a lot less than Collins.
We need a proper number 1 regardless, and time to break up the Barnsley trio.
Granted our defence has been weak this season, and the expensive signing of Kitching continues to dismay, but Wilson got kicked out of net for a lot less than Collins.
We need a proper number 1 regardless, and time to break up the Barnsley trio.
Quite obviously, yes. How often is the best team in the division the one with the best keeper?
Put it another way - we just finished 9th with a keeper who most seem to think is barely L1 standard. How did we manage that?
Yeah I get that but at the end of the day we just need a quality team to make it into the prem. I’d rather be cut and dry with it than faff around hoping players will improve.
We’re in a great position with certain players contracts and the general ethos of the club atm, personally I don’t think we should be spending another 2-3 seasons clinging onto players that we should have ditched long ago.
Like most of your comments this makes no sense. Who are we clinging on to exactly?
But it could be argued that we might have made the top 6 with a better keeper.
Collins was all but throwing it in the net fun at times the last few games and gifted so many goals at the end.
I think a very good keeper can make all the difference.
Exactly, you only have to look at Villa as an example. When Martinez doesn’t play they struggle.
Agree completely. Experience such as that also organises defences at set pieces. Collins is clueless in this regard.
I think it’s very easy to make that argument, because anyone in the stadium can spot an obvious error from a keeper. So it stands to reason that better keeper = better results, that’s an obvious observation (and one I agree with). My problem is in making it a transfer priority, given that:
a) It’s very hard to sign a foolproof keeper on the cheap (see Collins, Moore, Wilson and more or less everyone before them)
b) You don’t win titles and promotions through having a great goalkeeper, you win them through having a great squad. And if we spend the millions required to get us a top Championship keeper, he’ll be staring at an understaffed defence, midfield and strike force for however many years he’s here - and probably picking the ball out of the net regardless as a result. There’s no way we should be spending £2+ million on a keeper when you can sign players like Torp, Sakamoto and Thomas for the same price.
How much would they cost, and which new signing from the squad do you drop to find the money for them?
We need a better keeper, I don’t know how you see the lack of sense in that. I think it makes less sense continuing to play someone that’s not good enough than buying a quality keeper for £1-2 mil and starting afresh next season. Rather than swapping keepers every few months during the season we should stump up the cash for someone that’s clearly decent and go with that from the start.
None of us have any idea what can be done behind closed doors but we should be looking to ship off Wilson and keep Collins as a back up. Going forward I think buying players from league 1 teams is not going to get us to the prem, we need reliable, quality players and I really don’t think Collins is that.
I completely respect your argument there but I really do think we need to buy quality this season. We should be looking to buy a LB, two CMs, a CB and a GK at the very least. We’re in profit from last season and if Vik moves and we end up selling Sheaf then we absolutely need to buy top quality across the board. I’m personally not keen on keeping hanger-ons, I think we’ve seen the likes of Godden, Allen, Palmer etc just aren’t the quality you need to get out of the championship. I don’t mind Collins, he does a job, but I think no one in our league would be looking to sign someone of his low quality (in my opinion anyway).
Abolsutely, We need at least 4 nailed on first team starters to be signed this summer.
"just sign a championship quality keeper for <£2m" lol
Top keepers in the Championship:
Cooper (Plymouth) - came up with them from L1
Hermansen (Leicester) - £5m from Brondby
Gunn (Norwich) - £5m from Southampton
Rushworth (Swansea) - loan, spent last season in L1
Bachmann (Watford) - free, when they were in the prem
Notice any patterns here...?
There's a strong argument that the keeper is the most impactful position. It certainly isn't one that can be taken that lightly you can afford to have someone in there who drops a clanger every game.
What pattern? A keeper that came up with the team, two keepers that cost £5m, a loan and a free. That isn’t a pattern, two of those cost a fair whack, three of those didn’t, there’s no correlation there. My point is we need to buy quality, if it costs £5 mil it costs £5 mil, if costs £1 mil it costs £1 mil. I’m not arsed where they come from we just need to be relying on better than Collins and Wilson. If we have a strong defence and a keeper that has a strong presence then you’d think we’d concede less goals, surely?
