Independent Leyton Orient Forum

Don’t have a problem with Ross. He has been sold a pup. Lost our two best players and replaced them with two inferior players .Not knocking Angol as he has done fine but hard to argue he is better than Koroma. Wilkinson is clearly no Bonne. No funds released to buy a really good quality box to box midfield player. When we finally get the fanfare that a new midfield player is coming in, it’s a loanee kid from spurs who don’t get to play. One of our best players and our leader last season, Macanuff Injured. Going up a division you improve your team not weaken it. We are weaker than last season. That’s a fact.

Chief crazy horse wrote: ↑Sat Sep 07, 2019 6:27 pm I worried about the pace of this division from last season. Our defence and midfield is so much lacking in this department that even an experienced manager wouldn't have made much difference.This was indeed a big wake up call today.

An experienced manager wouldn’t have gone back to the same formation and personnel that wasn’t working a few games ago.

We have a squad who can finish mid-table. Ross just isn’t the man going forward. We can kid ourselves that he is and wish him to do well but he is tactically all over the place, the players aren’t really playing for him and he isn’t going to get the best out of them

We'll never know if the summer of poor recruitment was always on the cards due to budget or a direct effect of the loss of JE but it is pretty clear to see the lack of investment in the playing side, along with selling our best assets has left us weaker whilst going up a level.

Last season we had a weak CM lacking a midfield enforcer. We didn't get one in summer and Marsh looks nothing more than a cheap bench warmer.

Upfront we had no quality options outside of our main pairing. We sold both of those in summer then showed weakness and indecision with Alabi to still leave us devoid of options.

As it stands...

Bonne > Wilkinson - not really cutting it and looks more like he should've been the Alabi replacement
Koroma > Angol - shows potential but needs a decent partner and formation to create chances for him
Lee > Wright - fair swap, performed well so far but Clay isn't hitting the levels required to make an effective pairing
Lawless > Marsh - waste of time loan signing as it stands. Play the lad or send him back to Spurs if he truly is no better than Gorman
Simpson > Dennis - would be a decent swap if not for the fact he's needed out wide due to McAnuff's injury and in reality will end up as his replacement
Grainger > n/a - initially thought no loss but seems Brill is struggling so we may need a new pro keeper after all

That's just replacing the ones who left. Still missing that combative CM that hasn't arrived in nearly 2 years now. Unbelievable really.

Alabi needs to move on as he has no future here. Must bring in a better quality striker to challenge Angol & Wilkinson.