AspRover

Big Loan as in Make or Break time, last chance saloon etc.

I think Markanday has been a bit screwed by circumstance in that I really don't think he's a winger - but in the no 10 spot (where I think he has the attributes to be better than some on here are giving him credit for) he's perpetually behind Sammie, Dolan, then probably Siggy and now Ohashi, so he just won't get the games there. I also think that he probably lacks the physical attributes to be very successful in the championship. I suspect that he'd tear up league one or two, and probably would have a pretty good career (even a top flight one) in eg. Spain, Portugal etc. Right here and now though, he's absolutely surplus and its not doing him or rovers any favours. Reminds me a bit of Ruben Rochina. Regarding Big Mak vs Gally, in recent seasons a fully fit Gally was averaging 7 or 8 goals, Gueye only needs to equal that and be on half the wages (and ideally stay fit) and he's an upgrade. I do suspect that he's the sort of player who's main goal contributions will be making space on the pitch for Wiemann, Ohashi, Dolan and Sigurdsson etc. though, but that said he already looks a decent threat from corners and free kicks.

you can only beat what's in front of you but still good to see the likes of Buckley, Siggy, Vale, Duru and the new lads putting in a decent showing. Maybe they are a bit more up for it than we thought.

How's Vale looking? Did he learn to run a bit in Scotland?

I mean arguably it's pretty clear he doesn't, he's averaging a goal every 15 minutes in the last two games! (I do take your point though)

If Sammie gets a hattrick do we sub him off? Even if it's on 30 something minutes?

So this Sammie guy seems pretty fit, eh?

My Bournemouth supporting mate did tell me that they were in for Sammie, but later clarified that he was winding me up and hasn't heard anything beyond someone floating the name on their forum as a 'maybe we could look at this guy, he'd be cheap' kind of thing.

Probably not, I meant it more in a they skim through the results in bulk when they are forced to for some reason. They see one name a lot - big price tag.

My current theory is that Venky's look at the results and scorers but nothing else. This is why they keep doing this thing of putting an arbitrary 'won't sell for less than' value on our top goalscorer (£15m for Armstrong, reportedly £20m for BBD and the reports from Ipswich are that they are now doing it with Sammie) but seemingly on no-one else. I also think it's why they sanction selling our keepers so readily - we concede goals most games, so the keepers can't be any good. Also why they won't spend on keepers - they've gone through a bunch and we still conceded so obviously it's a position that doesn't make much difference...

That'd explain six goals conceded

Big Mak did certainly, Ohashi not so much

Tell you what, I'm willing to bet that Big Mak and Ohashi are better than Ennis and Telalovic

you had to say it didn't you

It cannot be overstated, we have made a triple attacking sub and all three of them have scored. I can't think the last time that could have been possible. I still think we are in trouble overall, but credit where it's due. Get a GK and we might be OK.

Ohashi looks to have good movement. All the new lads have looked decent tbf

Sub him off now, no sense risking an injury (not serious)

Wiemann scores goals...

That was predictable 1:1

Triple attacking sub? We haven't been able to do that in a while

I know Trav has said he sees himself as the anchor player, but having an actual anchor player there in Tronstad frees him up so much...

I posted a couple of days back that Sammie on the bench is a good compromise - bring him on if we are chasing the game 2nd half, if we're winning don't risk him.

Another day closer to the season opener and Sammie seems no closer to leaving - do we stick him on the bench? Second half sub if we are losing/drawing and need a goal? I appreciate not starting him to minimise injury risk concerns but after a certain point we can't afford to leave him out of the squad entirely. I'm pretty sure he will have kept himself fit, won't want that to be an issue that hampers his move, and I think a less than match sharp Sammie is still our most potent goal threat.

Realistically Sammie isn't going to refuse to train, he'll want to hit the ground running in the prem and it doesn't look like the club is actually blocking any moves, just doing a bit of haggling. If he's not on the training pitch he'll be doing indoors fitness work or something.

My memory of that game is that he looked an absolute bomb scare for the first five to ten minutes after coming on but then settled down and did quite well. I remember a marauding run down the left after a neat bit of ball control.