Should we be concerned?

[magicdaps10]

Cooper is nowhere near good enough. Considering he's supposed to be an attacking midfielder, his stats are:

22/23: 6 goals and 2 assists in 44 games
23/24: 1 goal and 3 assists in 38 games
24/25: 1 goal and 2 assists in 29 games

Total: 8 goals and 7 assists in 111 games

Admittedly, he's either been subbed on or off in a lot of those games but he had one purple patch under Martin and he's always been too lightweight to compete. Him and O'Brien looked very similar on the pitch (from where I sit anyway), but one could hold his own physically, whereas the other would always end up covered in mud because he was constantly on the ground.

Add to that, he's 26 in December. It's not like he's a youngster anymore, he should be coming into his prime.

If/when we sell him, I'd be very surprised if he went to another Championship club

Cooper is a squad filler. His age and time here should be seeing him as one of the first on the team sheet just as Fulton should be-same category.
This is where the club need to be ruthless.

 

[Itchysphincter]

Barnet in the 1996/97 season.
Good season that was. I remember going down to Torquay and we lost 2-0 I think, we were sat 23rd in the league after that result. We played Wigan shortly after, Wigan were top of the table(I think) with the hype of the 3 Amigos....won that game and had Marc Clode playing Central Midfield due to injuries.

We went on a decent run from there and got into the play off final and lost to a late John Grain goal.

I also remember the freezing boxing day game up at Hereford......absolutely freezing but warmed up with a David Penney goal to take all 3 points.

We went on a gaood run from the end of October IIRC, starting with draws and grinding out results but I think Wigan, Fulham and Preston were the three that were too far ahead to catch. It was John Frayne BTW.

 

[swannage]

L

We went on a gaood run from the end of October IIRC, starting with draws and grinding out results but I think Wigan, Fulham and Preston were the three that were too far ahead to catch. It was John Frayne BTW.

*Frain

 

[ARQS]

Cooper is a squad filler. His age and time here should be seeing him as one of the first on the team sheet just as Fulton should be-same category.
This is where the club need to be ruthless.

I don't understand this though. What sort of player do you think we should replace Cooper with? How much should we be paying in transfer fees, wages etc?

 

[JackSomething]

We should absolutely hope to sign better players and sell the likes of Cullen, Cooper, Fulton. Is that realistic given the more pressing needs elsewhere in the team and the difficulty of finding buyers willing to pay decent sums for players we don't think are good enough?

Not for me. All three of those players will hopefully be outside a strong starting 11 this season, but all will get plenty of minutes and they'll all likely do fine.

 

[Manselton Jack]

Russ tried to get rid of Fulton when we were trying to get the wage bill down & there were no takers

 

[Swans Jack]

Russ tried to get rid of Fulton when we were trying to get the wage bill down & there were no takers

At least Russ had one good idea

 

[Baron Goblet]

Fulton Cooper Cullen

May well play second fiddle but will be a big mistake to think they will not play

 

[LeonWasTheDogs]

In fact, everything that we knew was an issue from the start of the summer.

In fact, everything that we knew was an issue from the start of two summer ago.

^ I’ve just done a mansplaning correction

I’m mildly concerned. That we’re having to use Fulton as an emergency CB before the season starts and have no cover in midfield and no quality up front is a bit of a concern. Let’s hope Sheehan can continue to get more out than the sum of the parts.

 

[Andrew - North Hill]

From where I'm standing, this summer is not looking much different at all, less than a fortnight before the first game and we're still nowhere near as prepared as we should be.

I still think we'll be comfy mid-table this season but it wouldn't surprise me if it's a choppy start.

 

[LeonWasTheDogs]

From where I'm standing, this summer is not looking much different at all, less than a fortnight before the first game and we're still nowhere near as prepared as we should be.

I still think we'll be comfy mid-table this season but it wouldn't surprise me if it's a choppy start.

We're poor, that seems to be the crux of it. Take Ipswich for example during their promotion season in 23/24, they had a turnover of over £37 million. Ours was £21.5 million. That's a club in their first season after coming up from L1 and we can't get close to competing. Smaller ground, crap attendances because we were playing crap football, rubbish commercial income - it all adds up, or rather doesn't!

And then throw in our losses of £17.9 million in 22/23 and £15.2 million in 23/24. Last year our headroom for losses would only have been £5.9 million, which explains why the squad was trimmed and why we can't attract players like O'Brien. Hopefully last year we kept within the PSR threshold of £39 million over 3 years. If so, our headroom for this year should be at least £17.9 million. That should give us some breathing space to invest a little more to try and be financially competitive with the mid-table teams. The question is, can the owners afford it?

 

[Swans Jack]

From where I'm standing, this summer is not looking much different at all, less than a fortnight before the first game and we're still nowhere near as prepared as we should be.

I still think we'll be comfy mid-table this season but it wouldn't surprise me if it's a choppy start.

I have predicted its gonna be a difficult start to the season. We done well with recruiting early and we have been unfortunate with injury. I understand transfers take time and we want the right player, but I'm surprised no incomings has happened. Less than 2 weeks to go, irrelevant if you are a fan or not, Fulton in defense is gonna hurt us.