Strikers

[joepoolman]

As expected United sign John Campbell, and in the same day sign 20 year old Wes Burns on loan from Bristol City

I feel that the signings of Hoban and Campbell are justifiable, however Burns does not appear to be any better than James Roberts, and will presumably be given some of Roberts' hard earned, well deserved game time. To be honest signing more than one striker seems strange to me when you have the top scorer in the league and a very promising young player.

We now have Hylton, Roberts, Hoban, Burns, Hoskins and Campbell for the rest of the season, as well as Barnett for another month, and we play a formation that only uses one out and out centre-forward! Is someone on their way out?

http://www.oufc.co.uk/news/article/oxfo ... 06368.aspx
http://www.oufc.co.uk/news/article/oxfo ... 08104.aspx

[Myles Francis]

It does seem odd to bring in more strikers when creativity seems to be the bigger problem at the moment. That said, I'd make the following observations regarding the strikers and how I see them.

Hylton - pretty much the first name on the team sheet at the moment and our only consistent goalscoring threat. However, likely to be used more wide right in the 4231 formation.

Roberts - has made a good start, but currently injured for a month or thereabouts. Also, we need to be careful with his development. Whilst others may take "well deserved" game time from him, that's not necessarily a bad thing. Personally, I think getting 15 first team appearances from him this season would be about right. He will have ups and downs in form, and will need spells out of the team to regain some of his confidence with Dev Sqd appearances - similar to what has happened with COD.

Hoban - can't appear until January anyway, but by all accounts this boy could be special.

Burns - from comments made by Bristol City fans, he DOES appear to be better than Roberts, with some saying that he appears to be Championship level already. Even if not, as a youngster needing development, he makes an ideal replacement for the periods when Roberts is out of the first team. Also, I understand he can also play the wide right position.

Hoskins - I have doubts over his long term fitness, to be honest. Very much an unknown quantity, but I'm not expecting much.

Campbell - making a huge step up in class, and I think that's reflected in only giving him a contract until the end of the season. Will be some going to make much of a first team impact.

Barnett - if his loan is made permanent or extended, I'd be astounded.

So, as a real stab in the dark for a line up on Saturday, and assuming we play 4231, I can see COD and Hylton as the wide men, Burns in the middle of the three, and Barnett up front.

[Geoff]

This would be my stab at Saturday's line-up:

Clarke
Riley, Mullins, Wright, Holmes-Dennis
Whing, Howard
Burns, Hylton, O'Dowda
Barnett

I think with Howard in the middle we would have more chance of connecting with the forwards. I would put Hylton as the middle of the three because a) he would be more likely to score from there and b) he might last longer without running out of puff, which he sometimes does.

[joepoolman]

Roberts - has made a good start, but currently injured for a month or thereabouts. Also, we need to be careful with his development. Whilst others may take "well deserved" game time from him, that's not necessarily a bad thing. Personally, I think getting 15 first team appearances from him this season would be about right. He will have ups and downs in form, and will need spells out of the team to regain some of his confidence with Dev Sqd appearances - similar to what has happened with COD.

I agree that Roberts probably shouldn't play every single match, but with the amount of forward players at the club already meant that it was very unlikely that we'd need him to play a large amount of games. Now you'd think that he may struggle to get to the 15 games, and a major reason for that would be the signing of Burns. Obviously while Burns is at the club I'll support him and I hope his time here is very successful.

Hylton - pretty much the first name on the team sheet at the moment and our only consistent goalscoring threat. However, likely to be used more wide right in the 4231 formation.

It surprises me that it seems to be generally accepted that Hylton will be used as a right-winger now as I feel when he plays there all his energy is used getting up and down the wing, and he doesn't get in the box nearly enough, which is where we badly need him.

[Myles Francis]

It surprises me that it seems to be generally accepted that Hylton will be used as a right-winger now as I feel when he plays there all his energy is used getting up and down the wing, and he doesn't get in the box nearly enough, which is where we badly need him.

I would say "resigned to the fact that..." rather than "accepted". I think sticking your leading goalscorer out wide is an utterly wrong decision.

[Brahma Bull]

We have Roberts out for a good 3-4 weeks and we must not rush back Hoskins. Take Hylton out of the equation and we don't have any goalscorers or anyone who has stepped up to the plate. We therefore needed some blood up top.

Despite my fondness of Barnett, he may well be going back circa the 15 December. That leaves Hoban who can't play till the start of January, Campbell, Hylton and Burns. Hardly a plethora of strikers for the management to utilise during the busy December period. Junior has been bombed off. Howard's contract is up in January.

Come January and you'd expect Tyrone will be going back to London Road and we need three good attacking players to fill the four positions up top. Burns is regarded as a pacy wide attacker too. Clever business.

[OUFC4eva]

Michael Appleton confirmed last night that Tyrone Barnett
will go back to Peterborough after the home game with
Bury on December 13th.

[Jimski]

Just in passing, I don't like this business of playing Hylton wide rather than up front. It takes away a lot of the effectiveness of our best goalscorer, and seems a very odd thing to do.

I think it's ok to sign these strikers given Barnett is on his way shortly. I won't be too sad to see him go, and I would rather he was on the bench until then, so that we can start to build a team around players who are actually staying long-term.

[joepoolman]

Appleton interested in bringing Barnett back! If we resigned Barnett we really would have a ridiculous number of centre-forwards.

Barnett has played and scored well in the last two games, at time when he has needed to put himself in the shop window, but has been poor for the majority of his 3-month spell, given how many forwards I think Appleton has to leave Barnett now.

[Kernow Yellow]

But how many strikers do we have that a) aren't injured and b) have some league experience?

Approximately one I think. Now it's true that the injury list might look a bit healthier by the time we could re-sign Barnett, but it might very well not. And he's certainly more experienced than all our options bar Hylton and Hoskins.

On paper it might look like we have an embarrassment of riches up front, but in reality I'm not so sure...

[Mr T]

...and c) Not cup tied!
Reckon that leaves just Ashby & Humphreys to play up front at Tranmere next week?
Barnett will be back at Peterbrough, and is Hylton injured?

Now if we had a defender like Harry Worley who enjoys playing up front, then it may be worth going to Prenton Park for the novelty value team selection alone!
I reckon Raynes with his heading ability would be a good target man; can't be any worse than Peter Crouch!

[Kernow Yellow]

and is Hylton injured?

I hope not - I thought he was our only forward that wasn't! Where did you hear that?

[Brahma Bull]

As some of my posts on different fora suggest, I am a big fan of Barnett.

Too many people were quick to judge him on his goals only. The bloke has brought a different dimension to our play. He gets little recognition for his hold-up play, his creativity (and how sad that our midfield seem unable to do it as well as he does), his aerial ability or his retention of the ball once in possession. As a result he has to drop to get the ball, regularly found dropping from the main striker to that number 10 role/central midfield. Once he has sprung the ball out wide to Riley or Tariq, he then has to bust his guts to get up top - again because no one else occupy's that space. He simply cannot do everything.

I predict we will miss him massively from the start of next week both in a creativity sense and a goal-scoring one. He is far too good for L2 and is suited to L1 and as we are building a side to compete in L1, his signing seems quite important.

[slappy]

...and c) Not cup tied!
Reckon that leaves just Ashby & Humphreys to play up front at Tranmere next week?
Barnett will be back at Peterbrough, and is Hylton injured?

Now if we had a defender like Harry Worley who enjoys playing up front, then it may be worth going to Prenton Park for the novelty value team selection alone!
I reckon Raynes with his heading ability would be a good target man; can't be any worse than Peter Crouch!

how about Raynes at left back and THD up front?
This 'lack of strikers' also ignores Potter who is a forward.

[Old Abingdonian]

I do suspect that not every comment about Barnett is to be taken at face value. At the end of the transfer window, it seems Barnett's agent tried to 'play' Oxford into either a (bigger) fee or a better deal than we wanted to give him. There is more than a suggestion that Barnett's recent performances have been better because they were his last opportunities to attract the attention of other clubs. So perhaps MApp is calling Barnett or his agent's bluff, saying: "By all means try to get a better deal, but if you can't and the grass on the other pitches is not a lot greener, OUFC would still be interested - on our terms."