Official Summer Friendlies thread | Page 14 | Vital Football

Official Summer Friendlies thread

I really don’t like scapegoating players but Murphy did himself few favours today. The only sub-par performance on a day full of good ones.

Hopefully Brereton comes back raring to go or we have someone in mind to bring in.
 
Haven’t seen him much, but by all accounts he’s going to have to prove himself when he comes on for the last 10 minutes. Aitor isn’t stupid, he’s given him the opportunity to prove he has something to offer, and he’s been found wanting.
 
why we got two friendlies threads? Over now anyway. Brilliant pre season in so many ways. Premiership here we come. You reds
 
Soudani and Grabban are hefty buggers...they will hopefully cause a Few headaches when the ball comes into the opposing sides box
 
Criticism of Murphy is very harsh! He put in a hardworking performance and created space for the attacking midfielders to move into very well in my opinion.
Fox was even better than last year and is looking good for building a partnership with Dawson.
Osbourne is proving the know-it-all pontificating types wrong at left back!
The movement and passing in midfield was something to behold at times...and best of all we have cover for all positions (except right back) and there is going to be massive competition for places.
Very positive!
 
InvincibleBrianMan said:
Criticism of Murphy is very harsh! He put in a hardworking performance and created space for the attacking midfielders to move into very well in my opinion.
Fox was even better than last year and is looking good for building a partnership with Dawson.
Osbourne is proving the know-it-all pontificating types wrong at left back!
The movement and passing in midfield was something to behold at times...and best of all we have cover for all positions (except right back) and there is going to be massive competition for places.
Very positive!
Click to expand...

OSBORN.
 
Lots of people on twitter are praising the apparent new choir of music for when the players run out, while others are demanding that the team cannot run out to anything other than Born Slippy.

I've never really understood the attachment to that song. My memory is of it being the music the players ran out to in the Platt and Hart era- hardly a golden age of memories
 
Osborn played very well and in fairness does the attacking side of the full back role very well because it gels with his attacking instincts.

My worry is that last season he was targeted as a weak link by opponents. He was run at, turned, faced balls iver the top and in behind. Sometimes he did ok but he never looked a natural.

On Saturday he wasn’t really exposed to that side with Bournemouth more interested in getting 90 minutes into players legs.

Hopefully AK has worked on him and we see a player who is comfortable dealing with targeted attacks but we will only know for sure when he first faces someone decent.
 
That is my concern also. Benny looks like he is growing into the position and improving all the time. But however much he improves, he is always going to struggle aerially. Especially when he is targeted at the back post. I suppose we have the option of playing Robinson against the big powerful teams.
 
Yeah for me he is still a midfielder masquerading as a full back. Some games it will work, others it will be a disaster.

Ideally we would bring in another left back and leave him to fight for his place further forward but this looks to be one of the compromises for building up other areas of the squad. Hopefully it pays off.
 
I recall Fox suggested that with the benefit of a full pre-season, Osborn could be turned into a fully fledged left back.
 
Especially if we are looking to play with two deeper CMs then there is a real onus on the fullbacks to provide attacking threat. I'm confident that what Ben offers going forward, along with his awareness and engine will more than compensate for being short...

It's a learning process for him, but of all our players he's shown the greatest ability to adapt
 
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