The Times Fancy us

[STFC_Gazzza]

Blimey thats a bit negative. We will certainly struggle for goals without cox, but not badly enough to go down. I'll agree about the defence though. No clean sheet during pre-season untill tonight spells a slightly worrying tale

Does it? When Parkin left we struggled would be same if we lost Cox.... Saying that the team that season was considerably worse all around... Our defence as it stands will leak goals whilst we will not score as many. Cox's goals wouild be the difference between going up and down IMO.

[Rich Pullen]

Heaven forbid  that one of our other strikers actually step up to the plate though. It's sad that we can safely assume our other strikers will be rubbish.

[Reg Smeeton]

Does it? When Parkin left we struggled would be same if we lost Cox.... Saying that the team that season was considerably worse all around... Our defence as it stands will leak goals whilst we will not score as many. Cox's goals wouild be the difference between going up and down IMO.

 It was pretty obvious we were in trouble the season we went down, I predicted it myself, contrary to opinion it's not something I do every season....given reasonable fortune we should be safely mid table this season.

[suttonred]

Thing is with the defence we've swapped it virtually every half, whilst MM tests the fitness and works out the best ones. I think we'll be fine at the back, and very dangerous going forward. A lot depends though if any players come in before september, another 2 goods ones and we'll be top 10 at worst.

[STFC_Gazzza]

If paynter gets a string of games together finding the net it could be different. Cant see Peacock or Sturrock scoring goals if Cox was out although I do have a bit of faith in Joyce.

[leefer]

I havnt been to one friendly match and havnt seen one in 3 years....i save my dosh for the real thing,i just dont like any sport that isnt competative,in fact i think our defence will do the biz but really wish we would get another quality striker to go with Cox.

[Rich Pullen]

Relegation year had too many loan signings - far too many. I'm happy that we've not done 6 out and 10 in - I'm also hoping the bond between the players will be good and their understanding on the football pitch will be better as a result of it.

[suttonred]

We,ve got one, unfortunately he's normally on the treatment table!

[Arriba]

i dont get the doomongerisms(not a real word but you catch my drift)
we have only lost comminges of any note from a half decent last season.and have gained timlin and nalis. plus hopefully a fit corr will come to the fold this term.
we should be looking up not down this season.

[Bogus Dave]

But a defence that was dodgy at times hasn't been rectified: if anything its been weakened. I dont think it will be bad enough to get us relegated, but it will be our achilles heel

[DV]

442 are usually pretty close, i remember the season we went down they predicted us for 23rd, everyone was shouting 'we've got thorpe and cureton, we aint going down' etc etc. shall see what yhey say!

I believe myself and reg thought we would go down that season.

Infact opening day away at Barnsley. Michael Pook starting left wing. I turned to my mate who I had gone with and told him we'd get relegated.

Anyway, I agree with Arriba about the doommongerism around here. We've lost 1 first team player and gained 2 more thus far.

We've got arguably our best two players (McNamee and Cox) for a whole season.

IF Barry Corr can get fit it will be like having a new player

PLUS we wont have to change manager next season and have a transition period during the season like we've had for the last 3 seasons.

If we hadnt of changed managers last season we would have finish top half. If we hadnt of changed managers the season before we would have won League Two as we were easily the best team there.

[Spencer_White]

If we get Betsy, then our first choice front 6 would be Cox, Corr, McNamee, Tmilin, Easton and Betsy. That is a very nice set of front players.

Cox top scorer is worth a bet. Each way to go up is never really worth it anyway.

We are long odds on reflection of how we played second half of last season. Players should be ashamed of some of our performances then, especially away.

[Lumps]

If cox stays healthy we will stay up.... if not. I think we are buggered. Cant see goals coming from anywhere else really. Our defence in the 2 games I have seen has looked pretty unstable.

That'll be in the pre-season games  I take it, with a back four that changes at least every 45 minutes and generally includes at least one first year pro or triallist. Generally that does lead to a bit of instability.

[reeves4england]

I'm not worried about relegation at all this year. I wouldn't like to predict where we'll finish, but I'm expecting us to make the top half and will be very surprised if we are any lower than 15th by the end of the season

[Mplanney]

I believe if we keep relatively injury free, we could obtain a top 10 finish.  The squad is definetly improved from last season, even though we had Macnamee, Kanyuka, Timilin in Jan, there weren't fully fit, but now will be. 

There are a number of reasons for my predictions:

Malpas also changed the style of play which took some getting used to and as we improved a played better football, most of the players seemed to excell from that, I noticed as the season ended Peacock seemed to score more or much more likely to when we play passing football.

The player camp seem pretty happy with the Management team as even some of the players told there maybe surplus want to stay.

I also like the way we are holding out and only trying to get in players that are an improvement on what we have rather than getting in numbers for the sake of it, gotta be better for the long term.