What If----------

[Southcoastffc]

Premier league quality is not just about technical ability, it is also about athleticism/stamina (if you're lacking in the former you really need to make up for it in the latter). There's a reason Warnock has been playing a defender at striker so often time, he new he didn't have the quality so improvised with someone who had the physical attributes to do a job, especially away.

Of our team that got promoted, only Fredericks, Targett, Cairney, Sess and Mitrovic were PL starting quality.

People who think Stef Jo or MacDonald were good enough are just wrong.

In your opinion.

[filham]

I'd like to know if Mawson has been really fit at any point during his time at FFC, and if he has been deemed really fit then what we purchased was not the player who played pre-surgery.

Yes, it makes you wonder how medicals can be effective with dead line day signings.

[filham]

We spent £100m on what was almost a new team and got it wrong.
I think that following relegation a lot of players will be leaving, not just a few loan players, so we will be forced to bring in new faces this summer, will the new faces be up to Championship standard or will we be facing another relegation season.

[itombomb]

Premier league quality is not just about technical ability, it is also about athleticism/stamina (if you're lacking in the former you really need to make up for it in the latter). There's a reason Warnock has been playing a defender at striker so often time, he new he didn't have the quality so improvised with someone who had the physical attributes to do a job, especially away.

Of our team that got promoted, only Fredericks, Targett, Cairney, Sess and Mitrovic were PL starting quality.

People who think Stef Jo or MacDonald were good enough are just wrong.

In your opinion.

And that of our two managers this season (and other managers/scouts who never looked at them - McDonald had a full year in the PL as a youngster and didn't get back into it).

[Denver Fulham]

Putting aside arguments about other positions (like whether Christie would be OK at RB), we had four crucial positions to upgrade over the summer -- LCB, RCB, LB and DM.

LCB was supposed to be Mawson, but he was purchased injured, struggled and then has been injured again. Basically a zero.
RCB was supposed to be Chambers, and he looked terrible in his few appearances there. He's resurfaced as a patchwork solution to DM (more on that in a minute)
LB had some very good names floated about, we didn't get any of them, and landed on Bryan, who has been perfectly nondescript and a downgrade from Targett.
DM was supposed to be Anguissa, and that's been a fiasco of lineup fit, performance, effort and injury issues.

There's no way to survive being wrong on all four of those, let alone some of the other things that have gone wrong on top of them. We're playing a worse back four than we had in the Championship (same two center backs plus sometimes Le Marchand, and two worse fullbacks) and our defensive midfielder -- even though Chambers tries -- is bad for this division.

That's it in a nutshell. We either picked the wrong guys or they were hurt and have been terrible for the most part. Can't stop shipping goals when you have no defensive spine.

[Woolly Mammoth]

I'd like to know if Mawson has been really fit at any point during his time at FFC, and if he has been deemed really fit then what we purchased was not the player who played pre-surgery.

Yes, it makes you wonder how medicals can be effective with dead line day signings.

and its all coming out in the wash.

[colinwhite]

The excellent article about the amount of loan signings being at the root of our problems should be read by one and all.Football london publication,its on this site somewhere.Forget who the journo is,sorry.