Darragh Lenihan

A fully fit Lenihan walks into this team at left centreback. He’d be by far our best option in that position. Rav and Fry are great options on the right but Rav struggles on the left and Fry has no left foot at all so has never been risked there. Edmondson is a level below the other 3.

His leadership qualities and ability to do abit of dirty work is also massively needed. The idea of binning him off before the season is finished is quite frankly laughable.
 
Priv said:
A fully fit Lenihan walks into this team at left centreback. He’d be by far our best option in that position. Rav and Fry are great options on the right but Rav struggles on the left and Fry has no left foot at all so has never been risked there. Edmondson is a level below the other 3.

His leadership qualities and ability to do abit of dirty work is also massively needed. The idea of binning him off before the season is finished is quite frankly laughable.
Click to expand...
A half fit Lenihan limps into the first team
 
You could argue we miss McNair more than we miss Lenihan.

Let’s be honest, we haven’t signed the quality we need at centre back. The decision to allow Clarke to leave because we couldn’t give him football while we’ve signed and then played an inferior player to both him and Fry to play in his position is a massive, massive red flag for me.

As has been said this week, the way we play continuously exposes our defenders but we sort of got away with it a bit more with Smith at right back instead of Ayling because Smith is a much better defender and loves a one-one-one battle. He didn’t cross the halfway line much and played his position.

Lenihan at the start of last season was just as exposed as Rav, Fry, Clarke and Edmundson have been in this one.

Carrick doesn’t seem to know - or place much emphasis on - getting that balance between an open, expansive football team that’s organised at the back. I think whoever we play back there has got their work cut out. We would probably benefit from Lenihan being back fit again but probably not as much as we really think at this moment in time.

We are such a shambles at the back that Lenihan alone can’t fix it. It’s got to come from the head coach and, let’s be honest, it’s almost certainly not going to.
 
viv_andersons_nana said:
You could argue we miss McNair more than we miss Lenihan.

Let’s be honest, we haven’t signed the quality we need at centre back. The decision to allow Clarke to leave because we couldn’t give him football while we’ve signed and then played an inferior player to both him and Fry to play in his position is a massive, massive red flag for me.

As has been said this week, the way we play continuously exposes our defenders but we sort of got away with it a bit more with Smith at right back instead of Ayling because Smith is a much better defender and loves a one-one-one battle. He didn’t cross the halfway line much and played his position.

Lenihan at the start of last season was just as exposed as Rav, Fry, Clarke and Edmundson have been in this one.

Carrick doesn’t seem to know - or place much emphasis on - getting that balance between an open, expansive football team that’s organised at the back. I think whoever we play back there has got their work cut out. We would probably benefit from Lenihan being back fit again but probably not as much as we really think at this moment in time.

We are such a shambles at the back that Lenihan alone can’t fix it. It’s got to come from the head coach and, let’s be honest, it’s almost certainly not going to.
Click to expand...
I can’t see Lenihan setting up the opposition in our box or firing in one of their crosses for the winner.
 
viv_andersons_nana said:
You could argue we miss McNair more than we miss Lenihan.

Let’s be honest, we haven’t signed the quality we need at centre back. The decision to allow Clarke to leave because we couldn’t give him football while we’ve signed and then played an inferior player to both him and Fry to play in his position is a massive, massive red flag for me.

As has been said this week, the way we play continuously exposes our defenders but we sort of got away with it a bit more with Smith at right back instead of Ayling because Smith is a much better defender and loves a one-one-one battle. He didn’t cross the halfway line much and played his position.

Lenihan at the start of last season was just as exposed as Rav, Fry, Clarke and Edmundson have been in this one.

Carrick doesn’t seem to know - or place much emphasis on - getting that balance between an open, expansive football team that’s organised at the back. I think whoever we play back there has got their work cut out. We would probably benefit from Lenihan being back fit again but probably not as much as we really think at this moment in time.

We are such a shambles at the back that Lenihan alone can’t fix it. It’s got to come from the head coach and, let’s be honest, it’s almost certainly not going to.
Click to expand...
Yes, it’s not necessarily the personnel at the back but the way we play.
 
viv_andersons_nana said:
You could argue we miss McNair more than we miss Lenihan.

Let’s be honest, we haven’t signed the quality we need at centre back. The decision to allow Clarke to leave because we couldn’t give him football while we’ve signed and then played an inferior player to both him and Fry to play in his position is a massive, massive red flag for me.

As has been said this week, the way we play continuously exposes our defenders but we sort of got away with it a bit more with Smith at right back instead of Ayling because Smith is a much better defender and loves a one-one-one battle. He didn’t cross the halfway line much and played his position.

Lenihan at the start of last season was just as exposed as Rav, Fry, Clarke and Edmundson have been in this one.

Carrick doesn’t seem to know - or place much emphasis on - getting that balance between an open, expansive football team that’s organised at the back. I think whoever we play back there has got their work cut out. We would probably benefit from Lenihan being back fit again but probably not as much as we really think at this moment in time.

We are such a shambles at the back that Lenihan alone can’t fix it. It’s got to come from the head coach and, let’s be honest, it’s almost certainly not going to.
Click to expand...
I wanted us to offer McNair a new deal to be fair. I thought he generally did well under Carrick and was more suited to our style of play than any other CB at the club.

Fair enough he was a high earner but I think he would have been willing to take a wage cut and stay if we'd really reinforced to him that we wanted him to stay. It wasn't as if there was a host of clubs competing to sign him in the summer.
 
Tired Alan said:
Do we really think a 30+ defender who’s been out for 18 months is going to come in and save the day? Really?
Click to expand...
I've not seen anyone say that they think he will save the day? But if he can come back soon, he will initially provide cover for the 4th CB spot.

If he gets a bit of game time and is potentially the player he was before his injury, he could provide some much needed steel and bite for the run in.
 
Low_Key said:
thinking on it. maybe we let clarke go because we know the lenihan is going to be fit some time in the next 3-4 weeks
Click to expand...
Nothing against the player but seriously if you’ve seen Clarke play then you know why they let him go.
I give my head a shake when I think that Paddy McNair was released.
 
Overall Clarke was a poor signing given his wages as well as a 2.3M transfer fee. Our defensive buys apart from Tommy Smith (pre-injury) and RVB have been poor.
 
He was originally a midfielder converted to centre half, hence he's much better on the ball than our others, has leadership and experience, exactly what we miss. I agree he's not a better defender than the others but I also wouldn't say any worse so in terms of that should make a big difference. Problem is all of that time out, what effect has that had on him and will he be the same player. We severely lack pace at the back and while he was never quick, he was quick enough. That might not be the case after such a lay off.
 
parmoboy said:
I wanted us to offer McNair a new deal to be fair. I thought he generally did well under Carrick and was more suited to our style of play than any other CB at the club.

Fair enough he was a high earner but I think he would have been willing to take a wage cut and stay if we'd really reinforced to him that we wanted him to stay. It wasn't as if there was a host of clubs competing to sign him in the summer.
Click to expand...
McNair was criminally underrated by a lot of our fans. Very good distribution and bar the occasional rick, his defending was a lot better than some gave him credit for. Handled Gyokeres really well.

There were plenty who were more than happy to see him moved him and plenty who had him as their boo boy.

I agree, he'd walk into this side.
 
newyddion said:
I think it's both.. the way we play is intensive and means that we need two players for every position.

We do need another right back in the mix and we do need another defensive midfielder in there
Click to expand...
Seems particularly negligent we didn’t have a centre half or right back lined up in January, especially if we knew Tommy Smith was about to retire and planned to sell Clarke.
 
Otto42 said:
Seems particularly negligent we didn’t have a centre half or right back lined up in January, especially if we knew Tommy Smith was about to retire and planned to sell Clarke.
Click to expand...
If we were bringing a right back in.. Luke Ayling could have slid into the the centre back department..
 
festa5 said:
McNair was criminally underrated by a lot of our fans. Very good distribution and bar the occasional rick, his defending was a lot better than some gave him credit for. Handled Gyokeres really well.

There were plenty who were more than happy to see him moved him and plenty who had him as their boo boy.

I agree, he'd walk into this side.
Click to expand...
Just found this thread. I started it around this time last year.

Interesting to see that many were in agreeance with me that we needed to offer him a new deal.

fmttmboro.com

McNair

We've got to offer him a new deal in my opinion, he's so underrated. I think he's generally performed well under Carrick and is suited to the way Carrick wants us to play. I'd actually look to sell Fry in the summer and then I'd be happy for us to have McNair, VDB, Clarke and Lenihan as our CB...
fmttmboro.com fmttmboro.com
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top