Is playing at left back so different to playing at right back? Obviously right footed player is generally preferred, but if for example all your right backs are rubbish and you have an embarrassment of riches on your left, is it crazy to suggest playing Greg Leigh there?
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LeftSideLarry
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You are Karl Robinson and I claim my £5.
Sheik djibouti
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That's why I'd advocate Leigh in front of Bennett. We'd be back up to quota in no time
Scotchegg
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Yes
Wandering Yellow
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In the summer I think we should buy a right back to play right back.
Sack Des and sign Gorgeous Baldock, and watch the season ticket sales rocket.
Sack Des and sign Gorgeous Baldock, and watch the season ticket sales rocket.
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You'll be insisting that he's not injured next. No room for that kind of radical thinking around here.
Oh good, a debate about our right backs. Hold my beer.
Neither full back survived selection after Tuesday. Stevens out entirely while Leigh dropped to the bench. I can only presume Stevens’ omission might have more to it than tactical plays and good on Des if so.
Reality is we haven’t got a balanced right back at the club, nor have we got one that excels in either extreme (attack or defence) so what we have is a weak link whoever plays there.
It’s beyond question that Stevens is the better footballer that rarely makes an error on the ball but I think we’ve seen enough of him to see he doesn’t have the same understanding with Moore that Long does and defensively he’s completely unpredictable. Some days he’s on it, other days he looks like a classic OUFC shoehorned winger. So is his delivery worth it over the defensive risk? Not in a Des Buckingham system.
Long is a league two right back. His lack of pace and desperate limitations on the ball belong at a lower level and whilst I think it was right to include him on Saturday, it won’t be long until teams start to target him again. But at least he gives a toss and reliable to put his head where it hurts.
The Stevens experiment hasn’t worked, though I don’t think Manning not Des have played to his strengths. His assist at Charlton showed us where he needs to be.
We need to go and get a couple in the summer and our primary choice needs to excel at something and bring some pace either way. Tired of seeing us so lethargic on that side allowing wingers to have the time of their life. Imagine Owen Dale or Murphy against Long or Stevens? Bloodbath.
Is Djavan still free?
Neither full back survived selection after Tuesday. Stevens out entirely while Leigh dropped to the bench. I can only presume Stevens’ omission might have more to it than tactical plays and good on Des if so.
Reality is we haven’t got a balanced right back at the club, nor have we got one that excels in either extreme (attack or defence) so what we have is a weak link whoever plays there.
It’s beyond question that Stevens is the better footballer that rarely makes an error on the ball but I think we’ve seen enough of him to see he doesn’t have the same understanding with Moore that Long does and defensively he’s completely unpredictable. Some days he’s on it, other days he looks like a classic OUFC shoehorned winger. So is his delivery worth it over the defensive risk? Not in a Des Buckingham system.
Long is a league two right back. His lack of pace and desperate limitations on the ball belong at a lower level and whilst I think it was right to include him on Saturday, it won’t be long until teams start to target him again. But at least he gives a toss and reliable to put his head where it hurts.
The Stevens experiment hasn’t worked, though I don’t think Manning not Des have played to his strengths. His assist at Charlton showed us where he needs to be.
We need to go and get a couple in the summer and our primary choice needs to excel at something and bring some pace either way. Tired of seeing us so lethargic on that side allowing wingers to have the time of their life. Imagine Owen Dale or Murphy against Long or Stevens? Bloodbath.
Is Djavan still free?
Steve Gilbert
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Bennett has played right back a fair few times so could certainly do a job there.
Problem is that Leigh has been so off it compared to his early season form.
Injuries have finally caught up on Long and in a back 3 he is ok but his lack of pace lets him down in a back 4.
Stevens is technically better but I find his passing so erratic and he seems to give the ball away more than he should. He also isn’t great when 1 on 1 with a winger.
Right back is a key area in the summer where improvements are needed.
Problem is that Leigh has been so off it compared to his early season form.
Injuries have finally caught up on Long and in a back 3 he is ok but his lack of pace lets him down in a back 4.
Stevens is technically better but I find his passing so erratic and he seems to give the ball away more than he should. He also isn’t great when 1 on 1 with a winger.
Right back is a key area in the summer where improvements are needed.
Joey
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I've lost track of the amount of times I've mentioned it and I wonder if some think it's a bit of a joke. When fit he absolutely walks into our current team, he's better defensively than either Long or Stevens and going forwards it's not that he's in a different league, they're barely playing the same sport.
He doesn't seem to have a club now still, I wonder what he's up to. If he wanted a club at our level across Europe I can't imagine it would be hard to find one. Maybe he's giving the gymnastics another go.
I thought he was great and considering where he came from and the time at which we got him, I felt he applied himself particularly well and just got on with things. I’ll always look at that Arsenal game to argue back at anyone who felt he was defensively poor and since we’ve struggled to find anyone better, it shows he was more than capable. A combination of him and Dale is mouthwatering as Dale has that will to track back and help and both have the pace to recover.
I thought he was a very underrated signing even if it was more luck than judgement. Expensive no doubt. One that got away IMO.
Osei Yaw
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I really liked Anderson, he was a rare bit of flair and excitement in an otherwise terrible season. A great player for sure, but we need to be careful of just targeting players because we've heard of them. Surely there are other players in Lazio reserves we could go for?
I think the sentence that you used to describe Stevens would actually fit perfectly for Djavan as well:
".......and defensively he’s completely unpredictable. Some days he’s on it, other days he looks like a classic OUFC shoehorned winger. So is his delivery worth it over the defensive risk? Not in a Des Buckingham system."
For every Arsenal game - where he was brilliant - there was a game like Wycombe away, where he went completely AWOL. He had all the necessary skills, but most of the time he had no defensive discipline.
Better than Long or Stevens? Yes. But in the summer, we should be looking at finding someone who is better than all of them.
If you're going to play a system with a back four and no destructive central midfielder, then your full-backs damn well better be able to defend week in-week out.
Joey
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I always thought he was hung out to dry in this game. No backup in front of him and they scored down his side on a counter attack where he'd have been outnumbered anyway. From then on it seemed fair game to label him as a liability defensively, especially as Robinson alluded to it himself which seemed to give carte blanch to some posters to agree. It's interesting that this is always the game that gets referred to when asserting he was ropey defensively, both Long and Stevens have been caught out several times more this season. Not saying he's a League One Kyle Walker and defensively rock solid but he was no mug and I don't recall many wingers causing him the problems we see pretty much every week at the moment.
So his manager never, ever should have come out and hung him out to dry. That was just Robinson being an A*****e.
But the reason that it's always mentioned is because his defending was horrible that day. He was badly out of position for the first goal, and failed to either make an aerial challenge or track the runner for the second.
He had all the skills you need to be a great League One defender. But he did lack positional disclipline - and in our current setup, we can't really afford for our full backs to be playing wherever they fancy. Plus, I can't imagine he was cheap.
Steve Gilbert
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Do you not understand how this forum works? Next summer if not in January fans will be calling for us to resign Browne just because they know who he is.
It's why some fans would still have Jack Midson back...
Maybe something in that. But I think Des is trying to implement a very similar type of football to Robinson which can be a bit all or bust which heaves pressure on player’s ability to recover and fill in spaces that get left. Manning by comparison had everybody playing such disciplined roles that actually the likes of Stevens and Long (less so) appeared pretty competent.
My biggest gripe when we had Anderson was how Robinson never tried to organise the necessary contingency plan when Djavan went on a mazy. Anderson was capable of beating a press on his own but for that he needed freedom and insurance from the midfield which was never there. Des would have the same problem unless Matete played since I think he’s the best reader of danger we have in that area. Matete with Anderson and Dale would be brilliantly balanced and frightening on the attack.
These mercurial players can win you games but they’ll lose you them too if you don’t have a plan. Anderson was a victim of a thoughtless coach (though I still rank him as one of our best players in that dire season), but he was a fantastic footballer for this level and our best run of the season before Manning came in and shut up shop was with him as a regular which I find no coincidence.
Scotchegg
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Our best run this season was with Sam Long as right back. But I guess that is a coincidence in your view?!
Agreed - other than I think the defensive prowess of Matete is a little hypothetical and currently unproven. Is he great at filling space? Maybe, but we haven't seen it yet!
Peak Alex Gorrin though, for sure. If you're going to have a nutter at fullback, you either need someone like him to fill in (as he did when Chris Cadden was briefly here.....despite him being more winger than fullback, we only conceded 5 goals in his last 16 games at the club!) or you need a boring, rigidly disciplined winger (as MacDonald was for Baldock).
werthersoriginal
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I think Anderson was better at defending than his detractors say, but worse at attacking than his fans claim. He’d go on a run from the back and we’d all go oooh how skilful, then he’d lose it once he crossed the halfway line and we’d be immediately in danger. Part of that was probably because others didn’t fill in for him as you say, but I think also that teams had worked him out.
