Pembele

He just needs regular games now, come back from a long term injury and still has youth on his side. Hopefully we see the player that he was at PSG.
 


TheBronzeBummer said:
He hasn't signed a bad player yet, wor Krissy.

Pembele and AA in pre season will be intriguing, amongst others.

So many questions;
Does Watson go out on loan?
Is Rusyn a wide man, a striker or a bit of both?
Can Aouchiche become pivotal this season?
Do we lose Hume?
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Hemir is absolutely useless
 
Him and Styles looked well suited to the formation and both are clearly WB's, not FB's. I enjoyed watching him, decent all round game against a tough opponent. With a bit more confidence he could be a goal threat, has the pace to get past defenders and sprints back to defend.
 
Oily Oily Oily said:
For his short 2 minute cameo he won more balls up there than Jobe last night. He looked a lot more athletic as well, looks like he’s dropped quite a bit of weight. Keep telling myself there’s a player in there and he will burst onto the scenes next season 😂
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There’s definitely a player in there, we saw it pre-season. The problem is that we needed a replacement for Ross Stewart in the summer.

Instead we signed a 19 year old who needs more time to develop. I also think the type of striker he is generally flourishes a little later so he’s very much a long term project expected to perform immediately - Drogba never scored more than 7 goals in a season until he was 25 for example.
 
He was absolutely blowing by 55 minutes. Two players booked to stop counters when he gave it away and a few other times where he had the energy to get forward but not back.

Looked decent though, but not sure he'd be a full back.
 
MadMackem10 said:
The biggest problem with Speakman’s approach to the transfer window isn’t that he’s signing crap - yes granted a couple will turn out to be. But instead he’s signing players 18 months before they are ready to play consistently at this level. You can get away with it if you have a couple more experienced players to carry them at times which is our biggest area of concern but not something impossible to fix.
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In my opinion the logic was that we'd always go through this difficult phase where we look like a team of inexperienced kids - but we'd only have to do this once. Big change was needed to get to this position to shift out the old plodders (likes of Max Power etc) and that meant recruiting a load of younger players (as we've done). We're now at the stage where a few of those lads will have been here a couple of years;

Neil - over 100 games
Patto - over 100 games (i think)
Ballard - experienced at this level now
Hume - will hit 100 games next season
etc.

Next season we will be at the stage where a lot of the young inexperienced lads will actually be relatively experienced in the championship. We'll have got through that stage of initial development and will now i think be looking to add 3-4 young lads each season to help us kick on and add to what we've got. It won't need the big overhaul we've had in previous windows

Yes, we'll have to replace Clarke , but other than that i don't think we are that far away from being a solid play off contender again.
 
Thought he'd be further along than he appears at this point, control and passing looks very shaky and little commitment to get back.
 
Nathan Gunn said:
In my opinion the logic was that we'd always go through this difficult phase where we look like a team of inexperienced kids - but we'd only have to do this once. Big change was needed to get to this position to shift out the old plodders (likes of Max Power etc) and that meant recruiting a load of younger players (as we've done). We're now at the stage where a few of those lads will have been here a couple of years;

Neil - over 100 games
Patto - over 100 games (i think)
Ballard - experienced at this level now
Hume - will hit 100 games next season
etc.

Next season we will be at the stage where a lot of the young inexperienced lads will actually be relatively experienced in the championship. We'll have got through that stage of initial development and will now i think be looking to add 3-4 young lads each season to help us kick on and add to what we've got. It won't need the big overhaul we've had in previous windows

Yes, we'll have to replace Clarke , but other than that i don't think we are that far away from being a solid play off contender again.
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Exactly. I think one of the biggest mistakes (or perhaps naivety) was not communicating this properly when 'the 5 year plan' was originally communicated. Instead, we got 'we are Sunderland and we are not happy with the playoffs', then everyone looks at it and it doesn't match what is happening on the pitch or in the transfer windows. Had it been along the lines of 'We are going to sign young players with high potential ceilings, that may take some time to develop but will position us very well as we approach the next 2-3years, we will be in a very healthy position in terms of squad by then, while doing it sustainably. We appreciate this might take a bit more time than people want, but we feel it's the best thing for the club considering recent history', people may have been a bit more accepting and patient to go on the journey.

We are a highly passionate and therefore emotional fan base and quite rightfully so, who demand high standards, so fundamentally I think there is a misalignment currently in expectations between the club and the fan base that causes a lot of discontent.
 
Grumpy Old Man said:
Did a cruciate while at PSG. He was still in the rehab phase when we signed him.
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But he'd played for PSG since his cruciate injury. I think he's just being very slowly introduced, along with Hume being obviously more ready than him. I think Pembele could go either way but last night was the first bit of promise we've seen from him. Can he play as a traditional full back?
 
Have to say i never comment on the match thread when the team is announced, but i did last night when i saw Pembele and Styles were playing, thought it was a massive negative !
But fair play, yesterday they both played their part in the clean sheet.
 
Oily Oily Oily said:
For his short 2 minute cameo he won more balls up there than Jobe last night. He looked a lot more athletic as well, looks like he’s dropped quite a bit of weight. Keep telling myself there’s a player in there and he will burst onto the scenes next season 😂
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Not so much last night because he barely played, but every time he comes on he looks better than when he starts. We should loan him out to L1/L2 next season, get him 30+ starts.
 
He’s going to have good games and bad games. Probably best not to big him up or crucify him but that’s just my unpopular view.
 

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