AJ

[White Noise]

Hangeland got stick from people when he first played - oh yes he did. People said he looked slow, bad positional sense, caught ball watching etc. He himself admitted it took him time to adjust to the pace of The Prem.

Murphy has been hammered up hill and down dale since he joined us and will continue to be so until the day he leaves when he will take on a Haynes like mini-aura and we will all talk about where is the next Murphy coming from.

Dempsey has got more stick than anyone in the present squad - and he has been our most consistent performer over the last 3 years.

Gera was quite simply never going to be Prem quality according to several on here but won player of the season last time out.

Davies is the Mr Marmite of Fulham - some of us love him others think he should have been pensioned off years ago.

In fact, whenever any of our squad over the age of 28 have a bad game the reaction is that their pace, legs, hunger and/or bottle have gone.

Human beings are not rational. I think we get more reasoned discussion on here than almost any other messageboard in the country but if football weren't an emotional game we would all have decided to stop wasting money on it long ago.

The distinguishing charecteristic of this board is that people think before they post. They consider the wisdom of what they have typed before they send it and they try and add something new or different to the discussion.

Lastly though, we all see the game differently. I still think Etuhu is lacking in physical presence for a player of his stature and that he could impose himself more on games than he does. There are however, plenty of people on here, whose opinions I respect, who don't see him like that at all. But its what I see when I watch him play. There are a number of good things about his game but that is an aspect I don't like.

As for Pantsil; I have had his card marked since his little twitter outburst after his was first dropped by Sparky. It was very petulant and childish to say goodbye to the fans like that and, even if he didn't intend it as a move to force Sparky's hand, it is not the sort of thinking any sensible manager would appreciate. The question for me is not 'is he a good player' but can he be effective in this set-up and under this manager and I don't think he can. He was great under Roy and played some tremendous games and boy did we miss him after he got injured in the dark side game. That was then and this is now a situation where Sparky said about his OG at the weekend that Pantsil 'got it wrong'. He said that we try and work on eliminating these things and hopefully we are successful. That sounds very much to me like a player who is not getting the message.

Football is partly about speed of thought and decision making and I don't think they are John's strong suits. Playing to a narrowly defined role with defensive help from throughout the team he was fine but Sparky is asking more of him now and I just don't think he has it in him. Lots of good and industrious players fail for lots of different reasons but Fulham don't have the luxury of time to find out what they may be. You are only as good as your last game and if you can't cut it anymore than good bye. Look how many players have left us over the years and gone onto worse things rather than better. Far more of the former than the latter I think.

[MisfitKid]

Here, Here.  Well said WN.   :045:

[Tom]

Here, Here.  Well said WN.   :045:

+1

[NogoodBoyo]

1+1=2
AJ=Good
Pants=Pants
Nogood "neither maths nor English, isit" Boyo

[Rambling_Syd_Rumpo]

AJ hasn't got anywhere near paying back his price yet,he may never.He is playing well,he has got a couple of goals but one swallow doesn't make a summer, he has to play like this for the next TWO seasons before we get our monies worth,but fair play to the lad he has made a start, but  that's all it is :clap_hands:

[HatterDon]

AJ hasn't got anywhere near paying back his price yet,he may never.He is playing well,he has got a couple of goals but one swallow doesn't make a summer, he has to play like this for the next TWO seasons before we get our monies worth,but fair play to the lad he has made a start, but  that's all it is :clap_hands:

It seems to me that he was our leading scorer the season we qualified for Europe [some might consider just that a significant payback on his transfer fee]. It also seems to me that he was our leading scorer the next season until he was nearly cut in half in a Europa League tie. But, if you want to concentrate on all he DIDN'T do when he was injured then, sure, he hasn't done anything for us.

What I see when I watch AJ is a striker who unsettles defenses, is quick to the ball, and who must drive defenders crazy trying to keep track of him. I also see a guy who cost us nothing in the Summer or in January in terms of transfer fees, yet is essentially a new player into the mix.

But then there's that half-full, half-empty thing.

[Peabody]

Or the "how dare they play badly" school of thought

[Rambling_Syd_Rumpo]

all I'm saying is that he is playing very well at the moment,but we need this game in game out before he repays his fee.He's a good player,but because he was been out so many times it's not happened for him yet.This could be it though,an attacking manager,ball playing wingers and mid fielders-could be all set up for him to full fill his promise and he's made a good start-fingers crossed for the lad :clap_hands: :clap_hands:

[MJG]

AJ is working hard and his goal the other day was very brave but he has still a lot of work to do on a consistent basis to justify that price.
But I do think this is the fittest he had been since he arrived and dare I say even quicker.
As for views on other players, they all have plus and minus points and I'm sure we could all post a positive and then negative view on any one player at any one time.

[alfie]

AJ hasn't got anywhere near paying back his price yet,he may never.He is playing well,he has got a couple of goals but one swallow doesn't make a summer, he has to play like this for the next TWO seasons before we get our monies worth,but fair play to the lad he has made a start, but  that's all it is :clap_hands:

I really think we should think when we talk about a players worth, AJ did not ask for £10mill or pay £10mill, that fee is between the buying and selling club, same as Torres yday, being headlined as a £50mill flop.

I just find the whole thing annoying when the player gets stick for not living up to a price that someone else set.

who sets these prices
Torres £50mill
Carroll £35mill
AJ      £10mill

why the selling club of course, and if some manager/chairman agrees to fork out that sort of money, then that is the not players fault.

[Ag]

AJ at 10 mil was never likely to be a smart buy b/c of his injury history, which he has lived up to.  Has he done enough for Fulham to merit the fee?  I'd say no, but now he's looking more likely to live up to it (barring injury) and he's probably accounted for somewhere between 1/2 - 3/4 of it already. 

Now if you choose to blame the player or the club, that's a matter of perspective.  I'm more sympathetic to the club b/c, in my mind, the player accepts equal responsibility for the fee once he accepts it.  That doesn't mean anyone in their right mind would turn down a ridiculous transfer fee, but you don't live in the real world if you don't realize what's going to come with doing so.

[jarv]

The key to AJ being successful now is his fitness. If he gets injured, it is not his fault. Don pointed out he WAS top scorer before the bad injury. As long as he stays fit, there is  no reason why he should not continue his current form. His current form IS AJ's style. That will not change. Bonus points to Fulham's physio room, not rushing him back I suspect.

[Edwatch_Winston_Malone]

what is the measure of success for a striker at Fulham?

if it is 15 goals per season (not unreasonable) then J has a long way to go reach this average at his time here (allowing for braks due to injury).

I for one, do not think he is a 15 goals a season striker

I would not consider his 'running around a lot' and getting 'the odd goal between injury breaks' as suffcient 'performance' to warrant  us not going to the market in the summer to try and get a striker...

[ImperialWhite]

what is the measure of success for a striker at Fulham?

if it is 15 goals per season (not unreasonable) then J has a long way to go reach this average at his time here (allowing for braks due to injury).

I for one, do not think he is a 15 goals a season striker

I would not consider his 'running around a lot' and getting 'the odd goal between injury breaks' as suffcient 'performance' to warrant  us not going to the market in the summer to try and get a striker...

15 seems a little high to set the bar - since our current second highest scorer is Hangeland on 3! (5 if you also include cup games - Kamara).

[richie17]

@finn, again way too simplistic to look at it like that.

Just pointing out the simple facts young Lorkster. Those 3 own goals doesn't happen, we have 4 more points. It is that simple.

I'm inclined to agree with Finn on this.  Think of everything our players do all week, think of how rare goals are.   All this work on shape, keeping men behind the ball, this, that, the other: all geared towards keeping the ball out of the net.   Football is, for all its bluster, about scoring goals and about not conceding them.  You can forgive a forward for misses - it's how things go - but own goals coming from concentration lapses are massive blows to everything the players are trying to achieve.   For the most part they just don't have to happen.   

This is me being uncharacteristically severe on one of our players, but it's just such a cheap way of letting other teams have an advantage.   Add in his other lapses and, for all his quite good other work, you're looking at a disaster of a season.  Football at this level is about the tiny advantages you can attain over opponents, the gaps between successes and failures are so thin.  This season John's handed over a lot of sizeable advantages and it won't do.

[richie17]

I'm wary of AJ because his worth seems stacked up in the things that English fans over-value and others don't value that much.  If he rocked up in Spain would they love him for running really hard after long balls into the channels?   Would they admire his daring scurries down dead ends on the flanks?

He's been really good for the last 2-3 games but let's see him keep it up (with a few goals, now we're an attacking team) for a bit longer.