Player update

[TheDeeDon]

Underwhelmed by the signing of Marley Watkins.  Have to agree with Rico's assessment that he should have worked more with the abundance of attcking players we do have instead of taking in another similar player.

 

In the league his record is 40 goals in 220 games, which isn't too shabby for a player I wouldn't call a striker and has a fair few assists, but these stats include Bath and Hereford. Did OK for Barnsely, but has struggled a bit at both Norwich and Bristol City.

 

Regarless of what I think, welcome aboard loon.

 

 

[Elgindon]

Also a bit meh for me,but lets see what he can offer.Prove us wrong min.....

[BigAl]

Fuck me

Excitement overload

Alcohol required

Tomorrow is another day 

[RedStarTorphins]

We need an out & out centre forward.

Watkins clearly isn’t that.

So why sign him & expect him to score a lot of goals when it’s proven he won’t? 

Good luck to him.

When it (probably) won’t work out, don’t be getting on the players back... look towards the dug out.

Please prove me wrong though. 

[manc_don]

Huge meh from me .  On paper doesn't seem like he's what we need, but I'll be happily proven wrong.  A few city fans seem to be gutted he's going but understood why he didn't get a game. So who knows.

Welcome aboard.

[Jute]

As others have said elsewhere another square peg for a round hole. Clearly not the centre forward we need to suit our current style of play. Maybe going to change our style of play?

[RicoS321]

2 hours ago, Jute said:

As others have said elsewhere another square peg for a round hole. Clearly not the centre forward we need to suit our current style of play. Maybe going to change our style of play?

We could have done that with existing personnel. Watkins is basically the player Scott Wright should/could be, with Wright having more pace. Exciting player that can drop the shoulder and leave folk for dead and a decent finisher too (nae in a predatory/Rooney type way). Watkins is probably a little more physical in his directness. 

It's not that Watkins isn't a good player, I just think we're doing our own players a disservice.

[ayrshire_don74]

watkins was ok today should have scored but he may do a job , i think we should go back in for greig leigh so hayes can play in his best position

[tup1]

Watkins played well today. Unlucky not to score, sensational save from the hun.

[BigAl]

On 22/08/2020 at 20:46, BigAl said:

Fuck me

Excitement overload

Alcohol required

Tomorrow is another day 

Perhaps a little harsh from me based on what I saw from Watkins yesterday but still not convinced he is the out and out centre forward we currently need though

[RicoS321]

I think it is also important to note that he's much better at football than Curtis Main. One thing Stevie May was decent at, was running into the channels (actually, so was Darren Mackie, he just couldn't control the ball once he got there), and hopefully Watkins will do that more often. There is a place for the ball from defence into the channel for the forward to hold up and lay off. With the pace in our team, it would be a very useful outball. We seem to be a little bit static in the forward position at times, remaining central (or central to the line of play) and coming deep, where moving wide would be preferred. Perhaps it's a result of other teams playing a back 3 against us - or even a very flat back 4 - more often these days, or just a product of us being too slow to get it out from the back (but this could be because of the lack of movement). I find it very difficult to tell on the telly.

[manc_don]

3 hours ago, RicoS321 said:

I think it is also important to note that he's much better at football than Curtis Main. One thing Stevie May was decent at, was running into the channels (actually, so was Darren Mackie, he just couldn't control the ball once he got there), and hopefully Watkins will do that more often. There is a place for the ball from defence into the channel for the forward to hold up and lay off. With the pace in our team, it would be a very useful outball. We seem to be a little bit static in the forward position at times, remaining central (or central to the line of play) and coming deep, where moving wide would be preferred. Perhaps it's a result of other teams playing a back 3 against us - or even a very flat back 4 - more often these days, or just a product of us being too slow to get it out from the back (but this could be because of the lack of movement). I find it very difficult to tell on the telly.

I generally think it’s mainly your final point, we’re far too slow with the ball. It does seem like our players are quite static at times but I not sure if that’s just them or their instructions. 

[Jute]

First of loan deals going out. 
 

https://www.afc.co.uk/2020/09/04/miko-returns-to-arbroath/

With his contract being up at the end of the season got to assume that he will be away next summer.

 

 

[LA-Don]

Certainly hope dean Campbell goes out on loan, he’s now fighting with mccrorie Ferguson Ojo and mcgeough for minutes. Given what we are paying them I fully expect them playing ahead of dean. Will be a good move for him, needs to be playing.

[Ten Caat]

Not too surprised about Virtanen. Tbh if he couldn't dislodge a clearly in-decline-for-over-2-seasons Logan and a clearly "McInnes doesn't rate and possibly had no input into his signing" Hernandez then it was obvious he had/has no future with us. Suspect Anderson will be next out the door in similar circumstances to a club at a similar level.. Campbell should definitely go out on loan too, but he definitely does have a future with us. Should be able to get a loan at a higher level than the other 2 into the bargain....St Johnstone might be a good fit?

Ideally we should be looking to punt Bryson too but cant see anyone being remotely interested given that he struggles to stay fit for longer than 6 weeks at a time

[BigAl]

Michael Ruth signs contract extension  and is promptly lent to Arbroath for the season.

[manc_don]

22 hours ago, BigAl said:

Michael Ruth signs contract extension  and is promptly lent to Arbroath for the season.

Wonder if he’ll end up the same as shankland, Rodgers and the many others. Virtanen is a funny one, wasn’t he highly rated? I’m surprised they’re letting his deal run out

[BigAl]

10 hours ago, manc_don said:

Wonder if he’ll end up the same as shankland, Rodgers and the many others. Virtanen is a funny one, wasn’t he highly rated? I’m surprised they’re letting his deal run out

Think the issue there is that we wouldn't have foreseen the signing of McCrorie

[Jute]

Bryson allegedly to be freed this week. Apologies for the source.

https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/sport/football/football-transfer-news/craig-bryson-set-aberdeen-departure-22643824?utm_source=whatsapp&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=sharebar

[Ten Caat]

Wow that's a bonus getting him out the door. Even if we have had to pay him say until the end of December it's a good deal. It's a pity it didn't work out but he's just unable to keep himself fit for any length of time to be any use.

I think he's being a bit optimistic that anyone else will take a chance on him. On the evidence of his time with us, the only sensible deal a club could offer him would be on a pay-as-you-play basis. 

[Slim]

We don’t seem to have much luck with this type of signing, the experienced Scottish player coming back from down south.

Bryson, McNamara, Hartley, Rae, that blonde-haired Ex-Hun central midfielder whose name escapes me, all varying levels of pish and extremely poor value for money.

[ayrshire_don74]

The financial vandalism from Mcinnes continues probably shelled out 200k plus on wages etc for this injury prone charlatan

[RicoS321]

24 minutes ago, Slim said:

We don’t seem to have much luck with this type of signing, the experienced Scottish player coming back from down south.

Bryson, McNamara, Hartley, Rae, that blonde-haired Ex-Hun central midfielder whose name escapes me, all varying levels of pish and extremely poor value for money.

Fuck, I forgot about Stephen Hughes! Hartley was decent for a few months, just couldn't retain his fitness and Rae wasn't totally shite. Robson was good, Anderson too. In reality, we don't actually take too many older players back up the road. Bryson was still a fit guy in his early thirties, there was no good reason for not getting a couple of good years out of him, I think we just got unlucky. I suspect the success of our signings of older Scottish guys is probably about on par with our signing of lower league English pish and Venezualan fullbacks. I think it's fairly important not to get too hysterical about it either like some folk do. Transfers are not an easy thing to get right and you're really hoping for 50-60% success rate, so you're always likely to get some dross. It's important to focus on that (arbitrary) ratio of success, which McInnes has been failing to meet for the last few seasons. Ironically, it appears he has a 100% success rate this season with the transfer kitty limited (I'm discounting Edmunson of course). Hoban, Hayes, McRorie and Watkins have all slotted into our first 11 comfortably so far. The pressure of not being able to spend willy nilly is perhaps a good thing. The club just need to get a better setup in place for scouting and rating players.

[RicoS321]

31 minutes ago, ayrshire_don74 said:

The financial vandalism from Mcinnes continues probably shelled out 200k plus on wages etc for this injury prone charlatan

He wasn't injury prone though. He also doesn't come across as a charlatan at all. Could you not accept that there might be a possibility of bad luck in this instance?

[tup1]

He's been shocking, no value for money whatsoever. Good riddance to him.