Lets hope that squad numbers don't count and u get to play less means like Gaskell walmsley jones and makinson won't play much

Josh Charnley?

But I'd rather have Goulding and Charnley over Turner and Gardner. I'd rather have Tomkins over Wellens/Hohaia. That's the point I was making.

In the halves they look weak, but so do we considering what happened last year. At least we have youth on our side and hopefully Brown can get them back to how they played in 2011.



I said Meli was one of our better performers - don't be so defensive over him!





I've posted numerous times about being excited for 2013 - I was just making the point that on paper our backs let us down, and they did so at various points last season. There is lots of room for improvement and there is potential there.

Sam Tomkins, James Roby, James Graham, Zak Hardaker.

They were all eased into first team action though. Jones was thrown in (and has done very well).

I actually think his [i2nd season[/i syndrome came towards the end of the season. He wasn't doing anything wrong, but not as much was going his way.
I'm looking forward to seeinghim next year.

Tomkins I'll give you, I think Hardaker's tough time will come this year when he's playing a full year as the No 1 full back. I think both have benefited from positional changes that allowed them more freedom in attack whilst excused certain defensive mistakes that would have been questioned more had they stayed in their initial positions. Roby and Graham had the benefit of being in positions where they were able to be rotated when they were struggling, bar that their second seasons were nearly ten years ago and I don't remember them fully.

You've also picked 3 arguably world class players and a potential one, I'm not sure Jones is at that level (though he may turn out to be). IMO second season syndrome is a product of youth players being found out to an extent, what worked for them initially is noted and defended, and it's whether they are able to change their games and get past that which decides what kind of player they are going to be.

Offside Monkey may well be right, Jones's difficult period may have been the back end of the season when he was found out a touch. I just hope that if he does go through a period of difficulty next year the fans stay off his back in a way that some didn't when Foster went through a similar period.


Didn't Charnley go through a period where he struggled badly defensively especially under the high ball? He does appear to have worked through that to an extent, and I'm not sure second season syndrome actually lasts an entire year