Elephant in the room

Alex-The-Kid said:
Sorry but his crossing is really poor, premier league wingers will be head and shoulder in that department. Something he can work on though and if he develops that then he stands a chance of making it to the PL himself.
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It really isn’t, the standard of crossing in the PL is just as poor generally.

Yes, he does need to improve but so does the entire team to give him something to cross too.
 
Duffman said:
if you were at the game yesterday and are honest with yourself Jones was awful. He had 2 or 3 good moments in 90 minutes and blew them with a bad final ball / decision. I wouldn’t have him anywhere near the team if we had a half decent wide right player. Like others, his appearances are down to the paucity of talent in our squad. Not a top quality footballer for me.
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How many top quality footballers play for teams hovering around the bottom of the Championship?

We are not a top quality team and we don’t have top quality players.

Jones has to play, hopefully benefit from coaching ,from someone? and build his confidence till we get someone better.
 
Chris_Boro said:
It really isn’t, the standard of crossing in the PL is just as poor generally.

Yes, he does need to improve but so does the entire team to give him something to cross too.
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That’s just not true though Chris, the standard is streets ahead in the premier league as it should be, Isaiah is nowhere near that level, not at the moment.
 
2 Goals and 4 assists (counting the penalty he won) in a team massively struggling for form , mostly playing at right wing back, when we're only about a quarter of the way through the season doesn't suggest to me a player not good enough for the level he's playing at. If he carried on that form he'd have 7 or 8 goals and 15 or 16 assists in a full season.
Edit-just realised weve played miles more than a quarter of the season! Jones is still contributing though, though he is inconsistent like most wingers! I remember Ripley getting pelters from the Holgate..
 
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Alex-The-Kid said:
Sorry but his crossing is really poor, premier league wingers will be head and shoulder in that department. Something he can work on though and if he develops that then he stands a chance of making it to the PL himself.
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I seem to recall all this criticism was levelled at Djed Spence as well when he had poor games for us. We seem to be a fan base that just loves to pile on when players have lean form. Why do we do that? Its lack of patience I think. Jones has clearly shown he is a key player for us. Yes he isn't producing it at the moment but with the right treatment and encouragement he will refind his form. Getting on his back and calling him "non league" achieves absolute nothing.
 
Abel Tasman said:
I seem to recall all this criticism was levelled at Djed Spence as well when he had poor games for us. We seem to be a fan base that just loves to pile on when players have lean form. Why do we do that? Its lack of patience I think. Jones has clearly shown he is a key player for us. Yes he isn't producing it at the moment but with the right treatment and encouragement he will refind his form. Getting on his back and calling him "non league" achieves absolute nothing.
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I never called him non league? I think he will come good but he has aspects of his game that he really needs to work on.
 
People are entitled to their opinions but rubbishing our only remotely exciting player is a nonsense.

“But he’s a rubbish crosser!” How many assists has he got over the last 2 seasons? How does this compare to our other players?
 
starplayer said:
Its not about beating him, its an observation. From SW corner he had opportunity 4 times to pick a free man out and either hit a defender or crossed it into the South stand. I would imagine every fan enjoys watching him do the ‘hard part’ but whats the point of it if the end product is not as good as it should be. I hope he is staying back after training to improve this aspect of his game.
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When on form Jones can go past a defender. He did it yesterday - but as starplayer says above, every one of his final balls failed to find a Red shirt. If he could add a final pass to his game one in every three times he'd be a massive plus. In the second half he was still trying but falling down more often. But he wasn't alone. Giles was one level worse. Failed to even attempt to take on a defender before crossing and the result was... incomplete cross. When we got to the bye-line there was a 100% failure with the final pass. Jones was absolutely blowing before the end and couldn't even jog to tackle back when they broke away.
 
What is the betting Jones gets to the premier league before we do.Him and Watmore are our only threat,the rest are toothless.What needs addressing is that absolutely nothing comes through the middle,stop Jones you've more or less stopped the Boro.
 
First off, not sure the OP understands the meaning of the phrase "the elephant in the room".

Secondly, most wingers in the championship are inconsistent. Nature of the position. If you want a player to run at people, take them on etc they're going to have off days. Or you could just have them take the Downing MK2 approach and play it safe every single time I suppose.

I remember Albert getting pretty much exactly the same sort of criticism from some fans despite him being a key player for 3 seasons.
 
Alex-The-Kid said:
That’s just not true though Chris, the standard is streets ahead in the premier league as it should be, Isaiah is nowhere near that level, not at the moment.
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Yes he needs to improve, no doubt but he's not a million miles away from the standard of crossing that is generally seen in the PL where just as many cross's fail to beat the first man or are overshot.

Every PL game I watched this week had generally poor crossing. Jones has the ability to put in decent balls but it's irrelevant if there's no one on the end, same goes with Giles.

Traore is the perfect example of this, when he had a target in Jimenez, his crossing improved and when he got injured the crossing was suddenly poor again due to noone getting on the end or dragging defenders out of position.

The problem I see with Jones is confidence and not just in himself but that the rest of the team will back him up. He looks caught in two minds when he gets in good positions and ends up doing neither. Again, he's not the only player in our squad playing like this.
 
the_dormouse said:
What is the betting Jones gets to the premier league before we do.Him and Watmore are our only threat,the rest are toothless.What needs addressing is that absolutely nothing comes through the middle,stop Jones you've more or less stopped the Boro.
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you are right about the centre. Crab-like stuff yesterday. The frustrating thing at the minute with Jones is that the opposition are not stopping him. He is beating his man. At the minute though the end product makes that bit of skill pretty much pointless. If just one of those opportunities to cross / pass led to a goal scoring chance then he’s had a good game.
 
Jones is a decent player for this level. He's not perfect or he'd be in a higher league. He has the ability to run with the ball and get into positions to make crosses. Sadly, his crossing is poor but he also has no targets which makes it seem even worse.

The fact Jones manages to get into so many positions to cross shows how good he is because as our only attacking outlet he gets double/triple marked. It's exactly the same as when we had Traore as our only attacking outlet.

He's never going to be able to cross a ball like Giles does but Giles is never going to be able to dribble like Jones can. I think Jones can be coached to be better at crossing easier than Giles could be at dribbling.

The team is rubbish so Jones as our only attacker is going to look rubbish as well. He's not in the best of form but be has potential to be our best player again. A bit more balance in the side would help him massively.
 
r00fie1 said:
Its "big picture" time:
NOT time to call out individuals in a period when none of the players is performing consistency to the standard we know they can.
The consistently inconsistent performances by the whole team highlights a pattern of TEAM failure and approach - not just individual performances.
To understand why the team is failing - more regularly than winning - we have to look at Team Management, Recruitment and the Competence of those in charge.

Its beyond "worrying" now - Ive posted elsewhere that a magic wand would find it difficult to get a tune out of our "squad". But that`s not because they are all average and thick - that goes back to a system where we havent yet reached November - when Warnock was sacked in 2021 - and players have been Managed, trained, instructed and "coached" by THREE different Managers [including Caretakers] in under TWELVE months!

The "Elephant in the room" is the Club itself!

We have a mish-mash of a squad with promising young players, established seniors, loanees, those towards the end of their careers and bit-part players. Each has their own aspirations: for some it is to get the best deal at the back end of their careers. For younger players they still aim for the top. For those who have been here for a decent period - they will know how to keep their heads down to avoid the flack - when yet another "messiah" arrives.

Finally: our recruitment has been absolutely crap. We`ve had more loanees in recent seasons than I can remember over 40+ years. [I`m sure someone will tell me different] - but this highlights a big problem: loan players are on loan from other clubs for a reason - they dont fit in or arent up to scratch. Either way, you cant build a cohesive unit constructed out of spare parts from all over the place and keep the core of the squad happy. Just look at the revolving door since Neil Warnock arrived: can anyone list all the players we`ve had on loan since 2019? Its frightening!

fmttmboro.com

Boro "ins" and "outs" since 2019. Frightening (!) .....

Just take a look at these stats* and see what you think. For me, its raises many questions - particularly about recruitment [?!!] and inconsistency. * You can also access appearances / squad stats / minutes played / substitutions / starting eleven / goals, etc Source...
fmttmboro.com fmttmboro.com
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Well said Roofie, you're spot on, especially when your on about loan players, they just don't buy into the club in my opinion.
 
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