some will say its only pre season

Quoted from chaos33

Yep fair enough mate.

I do actually think that the 4-5-1 variation can be a useful tactic for us in certain away games next season, but think we are in need of an improvement at centre back and centre mid in order to make it pay for us. Have we looked difficult to break down in any of the pre season games?

If the back 4 is so dodgy without Toto I'd have thought he would have tried at least one full game with 3 centre backs in a  3-5-2. Gowling's lack of pace and Pearson's number 4 bus turning circle would at least have a bit more cover then. Looking at the other experiments I'm surprised he hasn't given this a proper try against decent opposition.

Quoted from Grantley

I know that. I'm just saying that people shouldn't look at pre-season as to how the season will pan out. Heck, there's 7 new guaranteed new starters when the season starts. Was that situation avoidable by Hurst? Yes. But it was painfully obvious that the new needed an overhaul. Last season, as a team, we were painfully slow and relied a lot on a single tactic.

I'd also argue that had Gowling, Pearson and Mckeown not been so terrible yesterday, the game would've been a lot tighter and people would have looked at it differently. I'm yet to see Dan Jones play, so I'd like to see what adding some pace to centre half brings.

Thought Pearson played well and swapped with Gowling in order to match their big lad up front who was bullying Gowling, Two mistakes that are not normal in our defence by Gowling and Macca were the difference between them winning 3-1 and a 1-1 draw.
TBF they were better than us possibly because they played more as a unit,  as you do with playing together longer and are use to each others moves etc.
We all know we need a target man who can hold the ball up, ala the Lump, and we will get one sooner than later, this season unlike last season teams will be more skillful and untill we have a settled team we are not going to have it all our own way.
Maybe just a few changes to many at the end of the season hasn`t helped with the team spirit we had last season,  and I`m sure it will be re kindled again this time around soon.
In my opinion we have brought in some good players this season that are yet to perform as a team, plenty of time yet remember as the thread title says its only pre season

The way our defence has looked in pearson gowling and boyce as the centre backs theres not much pace there now toto has done one either.

I like the sound of a 433 better than the 4321 , we have players better equipped for that so i hope starting gainsborough we have a look at that , bolawinra has been our best player imo and he joined half way through..

I really like the look of..

Macca
andrew
gowling
boyce
davies
mcallister
disley
vose
browne
bolawinra
bogle/jackson take your pick.

Our players are much more suited to that and i hope he abandons this 4231.

Quoted from jonnyboy82

The way our defence has looked in pearson gowling and boyce as the centre backs theres not much pace there now toto has done one either.

I like the sound of a 433 better than the 4321 , we have players better equipped for that so i hope starting gainsborough we have a look at that , bolawinra has been our best player imo and he joined half way through..

I really like the look of..

Macca
andrew
gowling
boyce
davies
mcallister
disley
vose
browne
bolawinra
bogle/jackson take your pick.

Our players are much more suited to that and i hope he abandons this 4231.

That's nearly a 4-2-4. Vose, Browne and Tombola don't look capable of defending to me - that's why he'll play Mcalister and Summerfield.

Quoted from zorro_is_a_Mariner

it will take tine to gel.

FFS it doesn't matter how long they have to gel (two weeks in reality) if the correct recipe isn't there gelling (into a good side) just ain't gonna happen.

We have no goalscorers and I don't believe for a moment that Hurst has anyone in his sights - it is OK to criticise him again now isn't it after all its weeks since we beat Forest Green and he got his own back publicly after the game. If he thinks he's going to go through this season on the strength of last he is mistaken. I'm not convinced he did enough to keep Amond and it may well cost us dearly.

Bolarinwa has looked a threat though. Much more so than Chambers. Hope he gets game time, and that Hurst is prepared to be aggressive and attack minded when appropriate, which must be for most if not all home games. Nothing to fear!

To be fair it has been a big change in players, we do look to have more technical footballers, more pace, but we seem to have lost a bit of edge.
They may well really click as we go into the season, a few of them still look a little unfit.
One big positive is some genius in the upper has come up with a song for Bolarinwa to the tune of La Bamba, hope it takes off.

Ok so theres gelling thats still needed understandable considering the number of players thats join.  They soon get used to each other.   So I've heard a lot of negative but there must surely be some positives too.  Like Tom B.....i like the look of him, and Summerfield.....at last someone who can shoot from distance......cant remember the last time we had a midfielder that did that.  We have quite a bit of pace in the team as well as some intelligent players and im sure it'll all come good come the first game of the season.  PH still has a couple more players to bring in.....one must be a target man.

It's a bit unrealistic to expect much cohesion from the players at the present time.

Hurst can't possibly know what his best XI is from the squad he's got, and presumably there's still a couple more to come in.

I doubt we'll see the best of this squad until at least ten games into the season.

One prediction I will make - we're going to miss Toto.

New league, lots of new players, possibly a new playing system, so i think we need to give it a dozen games or more to develop and see where we are. Hurst has never managed at this level but he has (eventually) managed to get all his teams to the right end of the league and has got them all out of their respective leagues in the right direction. I think he seems the type to take the long term view of squad building and doesn't go for the quick fix.

The pre season friendlies last year were by a squad that had been built over time with tweaks along the way and we now have an almost entirely new squad, which will take a while for Hurst and Doig to get their ideas over to. I expect we will be signing another striker or two yet and possibly one or two others. A lot of us have doubted Hurst in the past and he proved us wrong, so i'm going into the season with an open mind.

Remember Slade had done really well at non league level and found his first season in the league with us a challenge. We played great football and didn't get the results, so he changed tack and went more direct, which brought about a big improvement in results, if not in playing style. Think we need to give Hurst and the squad time to find their feet.