On 30/08/2025 at 19:33, jeffers said:

Byers or Headley or both. Personally I can’t understand why he chose Headley over Gordon at wing back. First and foremost a wing back needs to be able to defend in a 3-5-2

Headley has done well breaking forward and even scored a couple of important goals last season. Defensively he does not look safe at all. Very unsure of his position or what to do.

Agree that Gordon has looked the stronger defensively and done well pushing forward too.

LWB is another position that highlights we have a good squad depth but do we really have a GOOD first choice ? That same issue occurs in many positions throughout the team for me.

Ale and Vale summed it up nicely - Gordon much better defensively, Headley much better going forward. Perhaps why 343 with them both playing worked so nicely. Something to consider.

If we're sticking with wingbacks I'm choosing Gordon every game at the minute. Far more well-rounded.

27 minutes ago, Sandyford_Lion said:

yes two players both switch off when we should be defending with our lives to keep a clean sheet. Different game, different players at fault but same result.

It's a weird passage of play that led to the goal. There were groans from the home supporters as it was a misplaced pass which wrong footed everyone, but resulted in the ball breaking to a player who probably should have been further forward. The goal was beautifully finished. Football is imperfect and you'll concede goals like that from time to time. We don't seem to score them though. Curtis has been a little unfortunate in his chances against Birmingham and Reading. You can see the frustration building. Brown should have done better from an unbelievable ball from Ojo. He has to hit the target, and if he does it's almost certainly a goal. I'm hopeful that Brown will show a goalscoring touch in the coming games.

8 hours ago, bobbymanc said:

Brown should have done better from an unbelievable ball from Ojo. He has to hit the target, and if he does it's almost certainly a goal. I'm hopeful that Brown will show a goalscoring touch in the coming games.

Think if he hits that with his right foot then he hits the target.

On 30/08/2025 at 14:04, Guppys left peg said:

Certainly with Hall I reckon any interest would be limited to L2. Being completely lazy the obvious options would be Croz at Tranmere and DC at Rovers. Garrity is a bit more difficult as the big knock on him (and it isn’t unjustified) is his availability.

 

On 30/08/2025 at 14:36, Alan Vit said:

Ben has averaged 34 competitive games per season over the last 5 seasons, so I'd respectfully suggest that it IS unjustified.

 

On 30/08/2025 at 14:43, JoeB2 said:

34 games when we played 46 is not particularly great. It means he's missed 12 a season, which is over a quarter. That's quite a bit of absenteeism. If he's knocked again now then it's getting a bit worrying.

Again, love him a lot and will do forever, but the best ability is availability.  

You might want to have another think about that idea, given some of the Vale midfielders of recent decades who have been reliably available but lacked the other abilities to make their availability count much.

The pace and physical demands of the modern game on a box-to-box midfielder make mid-30s totals of appearances per season perfectly acceptable.

Stevie Gerrard, for instance, in the last 5 years of his English career, averaged 35 games per season.

And, in both cases, that doesn't necessarily mean they were unfit for all of the games they didn't play, but rather were judiciously rested by their management for some of them.

I'm not intending to make this a long argument - my views are that Ben still contributes a great deal to Vale and that his appearance stats are perfectly fine.

16 hours ago, Nippy Naylor said:

Piss Poor is the answer to that question 

Your specialist subject ...

14 hours ago, RayWalkers40yarder said:

ive said it before and ill say it again. there is 0.0000000001% chance of us signing a quality striker this side of january. browns been given the number 10 shirt which says alot. and to get anyone even like tolaj we will be paying over the odds. there is a reason plymouth came to us to grab our striker. they couldnt get anyone else. clubs are reluctant to offload strikers now unless you come in with a BIG money offer. and we just aint gonna do that. 

That is perhaps the reality of it. Besides as you say if we end up paying over the odds, the benefit of the Tolaj transfer which was purely financial is erased. Worse than that if the big signing ends up as crap or injured. 
 

There are some goals at the club, I think the lack of Garrity and Stockley has been a bigger blow than we think. 

2 hours ago, TJHValiant said:

There are some goals at the club, I think the lack of Garrity and Stockley has been a bigger blow than we think. 

I certainly think that. That's why recent departures have had the outsize impact that they have...