Tomlinson "surprise"

Quoted from TownSNAFU5

In the same way that Liam Hearn did not score in his first 11 games for Town.  In those games though he came very close on many occasions.  He certainly gave the clear impression that he knew where the goal was. Hw soon became a confident and prolific scorer for us that season.

Hearn ultimately did very well that season and scored 27 Conference goals whilst Elding scored a dozen, Duffy got 8 and Coulson got 8 more from the wing, yet we finished in 11th place, 11 points behind the last play-off spot and with a much poorer goal difference than we managed last year.

A good indication why you need to consider the defence as much as the attack which is probably why Hurst thinks a Bogle/Amond partnership isn't always our best pairing.

Quoted from Maringer

It doesn't matter who is the 'better' footballer as much as the more 'effective' footballer. I don't disagree that Bogle and Amond have more ability than Tomlinson, but Bogle, especially, has yet to prove he can use this ability against the stronger defenders of the better teams. Let's not forget he's not played against professionals too much as yet so it is understandable that he might struggle at times. I certainly think he's got plenty of potential but we've only seen it in fits and starts so far.

Amond is a different case as I think his movement is so good that I'd certainly have played him more, whether with Pittman, Tomlinson or Bogle. He's a player who won't be too involved in anything but attacking play, but that's probably OK, just as long as the rest of the team can cover for him. Think he missed out a bit due to his injury then Pittman and Tomlinson were doing well as a partnership (two wins and a draw) so he didn't get straight back in. Bogle and Amond together, though? Less than convinced.

Obviously, I'd be very happy to see a Bogle/Amond partnership knocking in goals left, right and centre. However, from what I've seen of them playing together, I can understand why Hurst has preferred to play Tomlinson in the past handful of games.

First part - come on. you're splitting hairs here Maringer. What do you mean 'effective'? Effective at what? Scoring goals? Closing down defenders? Being a nuisance? Setting up chances and causing problems? I repeat - who are the better players? Amond and Bogle are much better than Tomlinson, in essence IMO. And they both carry a far greater goal (and assist) threat, and that is supported by the current facts.

The second bit - I'd say that Bogle is yet to prove that because he hasn't been gven a fair chance to.

For me, Bogle is the type of player who needs to be persevered with. For a manager to show faith and patience in. He's got a 3 year contract and we've paid a fee for him after laying patient seige. Hurst dropped him like hot sh1t! He has proven that he will score goals in differernt scenarios, and that he may also get you a goal out of nothing; with a flash of something skilful or unpredictable.
He looks like he would score 20 - 30 goals this season. Why on earth would he not be playing?!

Amond is simply a much better class of player than both at the moment. A great finisher with both feet or head, and with superb movement, positional play and workrate. They are both not going to have blinding games and score 2 and 3 goals apiece each week, but they need to be backed by the manager. To be persevered with. To be forgiven for an 'out of sorts' game, or a few missed chances here and there because they pop up with a winner regularly, or they score on a frequent basis, and make their own chances, and poach, and all the rest of it. This is how they hone their technique, learn about each other's play, and grow their confidence. Bogle and Amond are great assets in my opinion. We don't need Tomlinson. Hurst has cut his nose off to spite his face because his defence got sloppy and made some repeated basic errors, we conceded a couple of freak or special goals, and our centre midfield dynamic isn't/wasn't strong enough. He panicked and reverted to his default setting.

Quoted from chaos33

First part - come on. you're splitting hairs here Maringer. What do you mean 'effective'? Effective at what? Scoring goals? Closing down defenders? Being a nuisance? Setting up chances and causing problems? I repeat - who are the better players? Amond and Bogle are much better than Tomlinson, in essence IMO. And they both carry a far greater goal (and assist) threat, and that is supported by the current facts.

The second bit - I'd say that Bogle is yet to prove that because he hasn't been gven a fair chance to.

For me, Bogle is the type of player who needs to be persevered with. For a manager to show faith and patience in. He's got a 3 year contract and we've paid a fee for him after laying patient seige. Hurst dropped him like hot sh1t! He has proven that he will score goals in differernt scenarios, and that he may also get you a goal out of nothing; with a flash of something skilful or unpredictable.
He looks like he would score 20 - 30 goals this season. Why on earth would he not be playing?!

Amond is simply a much better class of player than both at the moment. A great finisher with both feet or head, and with superb movement, positional play and workrate. They are both not going to have blinding games and score 2 and 3 goals apiece each week, but they need to be backed by the manager. To be persevered with. To be forgiven for an 'out of sorts' game, or a few missed chances here and there because they pop up with a winner regularly, or they score on a frequent basis, and make their own chances, and poach, and all the rest of it. This is how they hone their technique, learn about each other's play, and grow their confidence. Bogle and Amond are great assets in my opinion. We don't need Tomlinson. Hurst has cut his nose off to spite his face because his defence got sloppy and made some repeated basic errors, we conceded a couple of freak or special goals, and our centre midfield dynamic isn't/wasn't strong enough. He panicked and reverted to his default setting.

Great post again chaos  

Quoted from Maringer

Hearn ultimately did very well that season and scored 27 Conference goals whilst Elding scored a dozen, Duffy got 8 and Coulson got 8 more from the wing, yet we finished in 11th place, 11 points behind the last play-off spot and with a much poorer goal difference than we managed last year.

A good indication why you need to consider the defence as much as the attack which is probably why Hurst thinks a Bogle/Amond partnership isn't always our best pairing.

Yes mate, ss much as I'm debating you on other points I think this is an excellent overall point you make here. I take that on board.

By 'effective', I mean 'effective' at helping the team to win games.

As my post earlier in the thread notes, Hearn scored a hatful of goals in his first season, Elding scored a good few and Duffy and Coulson got respectable totals yet we came nowhere near winning enough games to get close to success that year.

Would we have done better that season had Hearn and Elding not gone for all-out attack and done little bit more defensively? Perhaps.

Would we have won more points this season had Bogle and Amond started most of the games when fit? Perhaps.

Fact is, we've been unbeaten in all 5 of the games which Tomlinson has started, 3 of which were against teams in the top 5. Hurst has obviously decided that he adds more to the team than he takes away. Whether or not he is right remains to be seen, but I don't buy into the idea that simply picking Bogle and Amond will be enough to fire our way to promotion this season.

NO

Quoted from Maringer

By 'effective', I mean 'effective' at helping the team to win games.

As my post earlier in the thread notes, Hearn scored a hatful of goals in his first season, Elding scored a good few and Duffy and Coulson got respectable totals yet we came nowhere near winning enough games to get close to success that year.

Would we have done better that season had Hearn and Elding not gone for all-out attack and done little bit more defensively? Perhaps.

Would we have won more points this season had Bogle and Amond started most of the games when fit? Perhaps.

Fact is, we've been unbeaten in all 5 of the games which Tomlinson has started, 3 of which were against teams in the top 5. Hurst has obviously decided that he adds more to the team than he takes away. Whether or not he is right remains to be seen, but I don't buy into the idea that simply picking Bogle and Amond will be enough to fire our way to promotion this season.

No, again I think its a good overall point you're making. I'm not saying though that it would be enough to fire us to promotion in and of itself, but I really do think it would make a massive contribution if we could refine our defensive and midfield qualities though! You could honestly see Bogle and Amond perhaps getting 20 goals apiece. We've certainly got good enough players in the other 9 starting positions to chip in with a real promotion push on the back of that kind of striking return. We might be unbeaten in all 5 of the games that Tomlinson has started, but we've only won two of them, and he's scored no goals and providded no assists. Not special, and that's being kind. I fancy we might have done a bit better witn Amond in the team.

Just 2 pennorth on Bogle and Amond. Their ability is now irrelevant. By that I mean the die was cast some time ago that they would not operate as a pair and they would only play if someone was injured or as subs.

For them to play as a pair it would have had to happen earlier and by this time they would have played 16 games together. The manager decided he had seen enough to make a decision on that after 3 or 4 games because he was not prepared to alter the way the rest of the team played, or he didn't have the players to alter the way the rest of the team played, to accomodate them. Hence the arrival of Tomlinson. We all thought that he was back up for pittman but we should have taken note of the manager's words when he said he offers something different.

No. Sorry but Bogle/Amond will not happen by choice now. We are just about hanging on to the leaders and Hurst is not going to take any sort of gamble. He's a percentage manager not a brave one. It could have been good. We could be up with FGR or could have been where we are now. But he was never going to change his system and unless something remarkable happens his logic dictates they will be bit players from now on.

Great post Chaos, ive been pro Hurst but really hacked off over all this. My fear is Bogle and Amond both being knocked out their stride and who knows may struggle to get back firing again if and when their chances arrive. Their inability to make a marked difference in their odd occasions from the bench seem to point this way already. They'll soon be lacking match fitness at this rate.

They could come back in and be rusty, a bit duff and some will say 'oh well I told you so Bogle got a lot to learn/can't do it against big teams' etc etc but the fact is before we ripped apart our strikeforce Bogle looked nailed on for getting on 30 goals and Amond 20. They were just building up their partnership and if left alone could have developed an almost telepathic understanding which would rip through defences like a hot knife through butter.

I would have had no problem with rotating JPP in to freshen up if we playing Tuesday, Saturday, Tuesday and even Tomlinson occasionally for tactical reasons against big brutish sides or when expected to be under the cosh (i.e. Wrexham away) -or to bring on to mix it up but to just bin Bogle and Amond like he has is nothing short of criminal and extremely poor management of strikers!

To have Warrington coming out in press eulogising over 'Tommo' while our contracted men have been openly criticised (Amond inability to head, Bogle a whiner etc) just adds to rub me up the wrong way.

I wonder if there has been some kind of spat behind closed doors it seems that way, or we not been kept in the loop on fitness issues. We had Hurst mocking Bogle saying he always needing something strapped up then Amond suddenly was reported out the blue to have previously been injured which didn't add up.

Personally think Hurst should come out in public and explain wtf is going on, be it some propaganda just to get us back on side or the nitty gritty truth. Of course he will feel he shouldn't have to but it's causing that much resentment amongst the faithful he really should be made to explain himself.

At best I hope it's a Hurst masterplan in teaching his contracted front men "right, this is the kind of hard work I demand from you" ala Mourinho to Hazard last year but my gut tells me Tomlinson will play every. single. game possible while here.

As a side note get the feeling that Hurst could end up being detrimental to Bogle's development by trying to mould him too much (-but that could have a thread all of its own so will not go into deeply here) instead of encouraging his natural game with a few minor tweaks. I look at goals -and he already had a hateful.

I wonder who our opposition would dread to be defending against most?

It's nothing against Tomlinson personally, just this has been handled all wrong -great to have a different option but all the work of preseason and team building an understanding to be ripped apart to revert to type... okay we've been marginally better off points wise and it's Hursty's neck on the block if we don't accrue but surely it's the defenders individual errors which cost us so much before which have now settled a bit, Macca back on form etc (but hey Hurst analyses everything much much thoroughly than I, I'm sure).

It just seems so backward and moreover smacks of ambling into the playoffs rather than going all guns blazing for the title for me. I could go on but think I've covered crux of the matter.

Being a bit neutral all of a sudden, on this particular sticking point at least, I can see both sides make dome great points but both come out with not-so-good points and statistics to try and one - up their points for or against. I just about remain pro-Hurst but like I said I'd like for him to come out and explain his reasoning to reassure me I'm right in keeping my faith in him. And not some snide  snappy pop at fans for daring to question him

Quoted from TheRonRaffertyFanClub

Just 2 pennorth on Bogle and Amond. Their ability is now irrelevant. By that I mean the die was cast some time ago that they would not operate as a pair and they would only play if someone was injured or as subs.

For them to play as a pair it would have had to happen earlier and by this time they would have played 16 games together. The manager decided he had seen enough to make a decision on that after 3 or 4 games because he was not prepared to alter the way the rest of the team played, or he didn't have the players to alter the way the rest of the team played, to accomodate them. Hence the arrival of Tomlinson. We all thought that he was back up for pittman but we should have taken note of the manager's words when he said he offers something different.

No. Sorry but Bogle/Amond will not happen by choice now. We are just about hanging on to the leaders and Hurst is not going to take any sort of gamble. He's a percentage manager not a brave one. It could have been good. We could be up with FGR or could have been where we are now. But he was never going to change his system and unless something remarkable happens his logic dictates they will be bit players from now on.

I hope you're wrong. This could be an absolutely massive call IMO.