Tekel Towers » The young team

WeeDude_83 · 12/5/2021 11:00 pm

Tonight we’ve seen meekison, Chalmers and Smith standout.
We’ve got Neilson, fotheringham, Mochrie, Cooney, Freeman, Graham on loan.
Hoti back from loan and has looked good in his fleeting appearances. Glass who is highly rated albeit injured too.

Will we start seeing the fruits of the academy investment now?

Be interesting to see who stays here and who goes on loan/leaves next season!

Arabdownsouth · 13/5/2021 12:31 am

I imagine Kerr Smith will be sold but would like to see Chalmers and Meekison more involved next season definitely. Mochrie possibly but hasn't even been starting for Montrose lately so who knows. Should be interesting next season depending on how much quality we can bring in.

LarsErikKjell · 13/5/2021 9:00 am

Said it before that Freeman, Graham, Hoti, Davidson are all now in their 20s so need to really look to be part of the first team squad at the very least next season if they are going to have a chance of making it at United. Same could be said for Glass but he might just get a bit more grace because of his injury. Might need another loan to get his mojo back.

Morphman · 13/5/2021 10:55 am

Got to say, it's a real conundrum for the transfer window this season. Assuming these young players listed are going to be included then how do we approach the midfield next season? You have Butcher, Fuchs, Hoti, Harkes, Pawlett, Meekison, Glass to fit in to two/three spaces in midfield. With that many faces in CM do you bring in the creative spark we need in midfield or do the club back the young lads and hope that Meekison/Glass are the answer for our woes when attacking? Likewise, Chalmers resolves one position out on the wing and we may need to fit Mochrie in at number 10 where he's going to have to battle Clark and possibly Glass.

What formation do you play to fit all these midfielders, number 10s, and wingers in to the lineup? Who do you get rid of? Butcher, Fuchs, Pawlett are all safe due to new contracts / seniority in squad. Mellon supposedly loves Harkes. Can't see us punting Hoti either.

Great problem to have I guess, the big question for me is how do the club approach transfer policy going in to next season with all these new faces. I can't imagine for a second that any of us would be happy if the club went in to next season with more or less the same midfield, regardless of the potential of our youth.

Finn Seemann · 13/5/2021 11:04 am

Morphman wrote:
Got to say, it's a real conundrum for the transfer window this season. Assuming these young players listed are going to be included then how do we approach the midfield next season? You have Butcher, Fuchs, Hoti, Harkes, Pawlett, Meekison, Glass to fit in to two/three spaces in midfield. With that many faces in CM do you bring in the creative spark we need in midfield or do the club back the young lads and hope that Meekison/Glass are the answer for our woes when attacking? Likewise, Chalmers resolves one position out on the wing and we may need to fit Mochrie in at number 10 where he's going to have to battle Clark and possibly Glass.

What formation do you play to fit all these midfielders, number 10s, and wingers in to the lineup? Who do you get rid of? Butcher, Fuchs, Pawlett are all safe due to new contracts / seniority in squad. Mellon supposedly loves Harkes. Can't see us punting Hoti either.

Great problem to have I guess, the big question for me is how do the club approach transfer policy going in to next season with all these new faces. I can't imagine for a second that any of us would be happy if the club went in to next season with more or less the same midfield, regardless of the potential of our youth.

Hopefully we can free up King's wages and bring in a player that is a little bit further down the line than the youngsters but better than Pawlett and Harkes and more creative than Butcher.

Tangy · 13/5/2021 12:16 pm

Think the problem with the youngsters (and development wise for them, COVID has been a kick in the knob) is i don't think 1 of them is ready to be a 30/40 game per season player (Maybe chalmers)

I'd say that Fuchs is a stick on for a position in the middle as is Harkes with our current line up. Then after that, you've got Butcher & Hoti....which probably is OK but if we plan on playing 3 in the middle, we may need reinforcements.

AM/wide players Pawlett would be our first choice in the middle role but he's incapable of 30 games of 90 minutes. I think we would see one of glass, mochrie or Meekinson with the other 2 out on loan.(Preferably good championship teams and not league 1. Out wide, we struggle. We have Chalmers who is doing well, Aopere who MM doesn't seem to fancy but think we could do with a few more in there.

Shanks and clark have up top nailed on but i'd like to see us get a bit dirty target man. Somebody who can bully defenders as we don't have that in the team just now.

I think the young lads are all talented but we can't throw them in too deeply or they may just sink (Think Stef McConalogue/Winters who were thrown in after Billy Dodds went

13/5/2021 12:40 pm

The Club has invested very heavily in the Academy, ten times as much as it was a couple of years ago.
We need a return on this inversment & can achieve this by winning with kids.
It can be done & if it is we'll be in a very envious position.
I'd rather see the kids coming thro rather than spend money on transfers in that have no guarantee of success.
Ralphie Milne would have been 60 today RIP. He made his debut aged 17 and was never out of the team for the next 7 seasons.
Bite the bullet DUFC, win with kids.

Morphman · 13/5/2021 12:52 pm

Tangy wrote:
We have Chalmers who is doing well, Appere who MM doesn't seem to fancy but think we could do with a few more in there.

Going to court controversy here and say that I think Appere is a Championship player.

Morphman · 13/5/2021 12:56 pm

smedDUm wrote:
The Club has invested very heavily in the Academy, ten times as much as it was a couple of years ago.
We need a return on this inversment & can achieve this by winning with kids.
It can be done & if it is we'll be in a very envious position.
I'd rather see the kids coming thro rather than spend money on transfers in that have no guarantee of success.
Ralphie Milne would have been 60 today RIP. He made his debut aged 17 and was never out of the team for the next 7 seasons.
Bite the bullet DUFC, win with kids.

Not directed at you in particular but what if we start losing with kids? Kids usually start brightly because there's no scouting/footage of them playing. Give it 10 games once teams get a good look at players then judge them. Lets be fair here, M'Well shut down our young players 2nd half yesterday after a few words from their manager.

It's tough to expect that so many young players are going to be at a sufficient level to move us from bottom 6 to challenging for Europe, which is the clubs aim. I wouldn't like to be the one making the decisions I'll tell you that much.

Last edited by Morphman (13/5/2021 1:31 pm)

AlonsMosely · 13/5/2021 2:05 pm

Morphman wrote:
Tangy wrote:
We have Chalmers who is doing well, Appere who MM doesn't seem to fancy but think we could do with a few more in there.
Going to court controversy here and say that I think Appere is a Championship player.

Not controversial, accurate....

Lilley01 · 13/5/2021 2:23 pm

AlonsMosely wrote:
Morphman wrote:
Tangy wrote:
We have Chalmers who is doing well, Appere who MM doesn't seem to fancy but think we could do with a few more in there.
Going to court controversy here and say that I think Appere is a Championship player.
Not controversial, accurate....

I don’t think you can write off a 21 ish(?) year old who’s had a disrupted season. If he takes another developmental leap like the last one, he could be very handy. He’s not ready now to be the main source of output but I certainly wouldn’t write him off.

He’s like the rest of our squad. A 6/10 player that’s capable of 8/10 but also 4/10. If they had higher levels of consistency then they’d be gone. They have the talent in theory. He has a chance to develop, others don’t.

Last edited by Lilley01 (13/5/2021 2:24 pm)

LarsErikKjell · 13/5/2021 3:14 pm

Morphman wrote:
Tangy wrote:
We have Chalmers who is doing well, Appere who MM doesn't seem to fancy but think we could do with a few more in there.
Going to court controversy here and say that I think Appere is a Championship player.

What defines a 'Championship player' ?

Its a really confusing statement. Are you suggesting he'll only EVER be good enough for the Scottish Championship? You must have some eye for a player.

Arabdownsouth · 13/5/2021 4:24 pm

AlonsMosely wrote:
Morphman wrote:
Tangy wrote:
We have Chalmers who is doing well, Appere who MM doesn't seem to fancy but think we could do with a few more in there.
Going to court controversy here and say that I think Appere is a Championship player.
Not controversial, accurate....

He's 21 ffs, players don't peak anywhere near that age. Absolute nonsense, some real experts on here 😂

Morphman · 13/5/2021 5:58 pm

LarsErikKjell wrote:
Morphman wrote:
Tangy wrote:
We have Chalmers who is doing well, Appere who MM doesn't seem to fancy but think we could do with a few more in there.
Going to court controversy here and say that I think Appere is a Championship player.

What defines a 'Championship player' ?

Its a really confusing statement. Are you suggesting he'll only EVER be good enough for the Scottish Championship? You must have some eye for a player.

That is what I'm suggesting tbh, just don't feel he's got the same ceiling as many others at the club. What is his best position for instance? It's been 2 full seasons now and I'm not convinced he's a number 9 or a decent winger.

Only game he really impressed me was Hibs at Tannadice last season in the cup. Its just an opinion, like everything else on this site.

LarsErikKjell · 13/5/2021 6:28 pm

Morphman wrote:
LarsErikKjell wrote:
Morphman wrote:

Going to court controversy here and say that I think Appere is a Championship player.

What defines a 'Championship player' ?

Its a really confusing statement. Are you suggesting he'll only EVER be good enough for the Scottish Championship? You must have some eye for a player.

That is what I'm suggesting tbh, just don't feel he's got the same ceiling as many others at the club. What is his best position for instance? It's been 2 full seasons now and I'm not convinced he's a number 9 or a decent winger.

Only game he really impressed me was Hibs at Tannadice last season in the cup. Its just an opinion, like everything else on this site.

Opinion is totally fair mate but come on. Last season? He was top notch on the first half of the season especially. And this season he played as loan striker in our early away wins at Motherwell and County, think he showed there that he has all the attributes to make it. Just needs exposure and some fine tuning. Mind he was on loan at Broughty United 2 years ago and we all thought his career was done. Silly to write anyone off, especially at that age when they've got 60+ games under their belt too.