I don’t think it’s too hard to get.
We’re in a recruitment bind. We have an extensive academy system with a history of producing quality players. It sure would be nice to have that system help us out here.
Devlin was WS academy wasn’t he?
Anyway, a pretty mischievous way of pointing out that we should have retained a couple of guys. Most are either still at the club or went straight to Europe from the academy.
Devlin was WS before Sydney FC
Volpato was SFC before WS
Cancar was SFC then O/S then back to WS
Triantis was SFC before WS
Simmons was SFC before WS
I thought the post clearly stated it was people in the team in 2017?
Not players who had been exclusively with us?
THB also came from Central Coast, so meh.
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excellent player
I’ll be fucking pissed if we lose him now.
Stockport County lost on penalties in their promotion match against Carlisle. I’m guessing Alfie would be more inclined to stay here now?
I don’t see how this is particularly bad for the club in any way? Any Aussie parents with a talented kid will want to get into our academy. Even if the current men’s coach did any of them dirty in their transition to seniors, he’ll be gone one way or the other eventually.
Not necessarily. He has to weigh up whether he wants to play in the summer again. He didn’t handle it at all well this season, it’s certainly not been his first season here, and he’ll be 37 early next season.
Do stockport want him? Does he want to go back to Stockport?
Numbers I crunched in the Bimbi thread: This season: Wood 0.47 goal involvements per 90.
Sega 0.42 goal involvements per 90. I
Mak (0.55), Lolley (0.49) or ALF (0.87)
We will need the cap money and possible foreign spot at CB to replace Wilko unless we land Sainsbury or buy Degenek or Rowles or another top quality Aussie CB under contract who happens to be happy coming to the ALM right now. Same scenario for ALF. Even if both stay they aren’t 90 minute every game players next season.
Either we bank on Gurd stepping up and get a cheap 4th CB and an expensive foreign striker, or we bank on Wood stepping up and get a cheap backup striker and an expensive foreign CB.
Unless there’s another Aussie striker good for more than 0.5 goals a game who is willing to sign for minimum wage, that is.
This season gone, I thought Wood alternated appearances where he looked lazy and uninterested in doing anything but the glory stuff (ie no chasing back or screening) with a couple of standout attacking moments.
From what tiny snippets I saw, I thought that Kucharsky, while looking like an U16, had more attacking flair, particularly in tight areas, than Wood.
I also thought that Parsons showed much more in his few minutes vs BR at SFS than I saw from Segecic.
And no, I don’t watch NPL matches beyond the edited highlights. However, it seems that the star players at many NPS clubs are former Sydney FC youth players who could not cut it - for whatever reason - for us in the A League. So, I put limited faith in how our youth team players perform at that level if they do not seem ready to step up when given even just a few minutes at the end of A League games.
I have seen way too many of our Youth team stars crash and burn when given a chance in the A League. They need to show, at minimum, massive hunger and desperation to get onto the ball, show for the ball, win back the ball. Anything less than that at eg 80 minute mark , and I am not interested. Add technique and tactical nous and they should get more showings and more minutes.
I didn’t think he was lazy or uninterested. It felt more that he was isolated in those games and we couldn’t get anyone near him to assist so he was constantly up against at least 2 defenders. He looked much better later in the season when he had a chance to be on the front foot and we had a little more control in the middle and attacking thirds. He’s always looked better (so far) with a broken field rather than back to goal against a couple of centre-halves. Which can be said about most strikers.
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Agreed and basically my original point - I’d like to see more of him with our spine intact and controlling games to see what he has to offer.
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For me, this is actually where Wood excelled in the last season, compared to anyone else we played in #9, until ALF found hunger and form again after the international break. I feel like Wood won the ball back or got forward to receive a pass on the counter on multiple occasions throughout the season, and what let him down was that he dragged many of the resulting shots wide.
I don’t think this kind of analysis is very useful, tbh.
For instance, how many of those involvements also involved Le Fondre. How many were in a game state where Le Fondre (or Mak at #9) had already scored.
Too many variables. Not enough sample.
What would you prefer? We don’t use any data in these discussions, and make stylistic assertion that players aren’t “up for it” or “hungry” enough or something?