Maguire-Drew

The reality is if JMD was the athlete that Harry is, he wouldn’t be anywhere near us. Think a role similar to yesterday and the playoff final is perfect for him, coming on against tiring defenders and using that extra quality he has to create/score chances. He’ll be a valuable player this season.

Ultimately, JMD has now scored 6 goals in 18 appearances since he joined (12 starts, 6 sub appearances).

That's a strike rate better than the majority of strikers at this level (or even National League), before even considering his assists from set pieces and open play. Not too shabby.

JMD's contribution in a town shirt is excellant especially as an impact sub , no player likes the supersub tag but i really think as defenders get tired & we are chasing or trying to turn a draw into a win he is perfect for that role , also would like to add can see wearne quickly becoming a big fans favourite looks like we could have found another mcatee in this lad

Quoted from ska face

His goals & assists per minute must be through the roof. Almost always seems to have a hand in something when he plays.

Just been checking this and his involvement in goals, if you count “pre-assists” (i.e. the pass immediately before an assist) is absolutely unreal.

Dagenham 2-3 (debut): pre-assist
Chesterfield 0-1: nothing
Halifax 1-1: goal
Halifax 0-1: nothing
Altrincham 2-0: goal
Bromley 1-2: goal
Borehamwood 0-0: nothing
Solihull 1-2: pre-assist
Dagenham 2-1: 1 goal, 1 assist
Chesterfield 4-1: assist
Weymouth 0-0: nothing
Stockport 2-1: assist, pre-assist
Kings Lynn 1-0: assist
Torquay 2-1: nothing
Maidenhead 3-1: nothing
Eastleigh 4-4: goal, pre-assist
Notts County 2-2: 2x pre-assist
Solihull 2-1: goal
Orient 0-2: nothing
Northampton 1-1: goal

So in 20 appearances as a sub or starting, he’s been directly involved in 17 goals.

Quoted from ska face

Just been checking this and his involvement in goals, if you count “pre-assists” (i.e. the pass immediately before an assist) is absolutely unreal.

Dagenham 2-3 (debut): pre-assist
Chesterfield 0-1: nothing
Halifax 1-1: goal
Halifax 0-1: nothing
Altrincham 2-0: goal
Bromley 1-2: goal
Borehamwood 0-0: nothing
Solihull 1-2: pre-assist
Dagenham 2-1: 1 goal, 1 assist
Chesterfield 4-1: assist
Weymouth 0-0: nothing
Stockport 2-1: assist, pre-assist
Kings Lynn 1-0: assist
Torquay 2-1: nothing
Maidenhead 3-1: nothing
Eastleigh 4-4: goal, pre-assist
Notts County 2-2: 2x pre-assist
Solihull 2-1: goal
Orient 0-2: nothing
Northampton 1-1: goal

So in 20 appearances as a sub or starting, he’s been directly involved in 17 goals.

I’d be happy to add another assist to that from the play off final. His nutmeg of the ball (purposely) will have given mcatee a split second longer without defenders bearing down on him and might have made all the difference by wrong footing them.

Should've had a goal at Chesterfield too - missed an absolute sitter, very rare for him!

Not saying he's similar or a like for like replacement for Mcatee at all (certainly doesn't have his energy), but while he's out, could we perhaps play JMD in a more central attacking role off Taylor?

Don't know how suited he'd be to it, this is purely going off the fact that he always seems to make stuff happen, his set pieces are great, and he has a knack of scoring goals too. Could him and Kiernan almost interchange positions throughout the game, if they're clever enough to do that?

Dunno, just know it'd be great to get him on the pitch more and we also are well short on forward options at the mo.

I've got to be honest in that I'm not a huge JMD fan, mainly because his work-rate isn't up to it.  Even in the Conference he stood out as looking unfit and off the pace, at this level it stands out even more.

Away at Orient last week he looked like he had played 3 games when in reality he had only come on for a handful of minutes.  

But he clearly does offer something to the team and those stats on his contributions are incredible.  

Seen a few comparisons to Clifton, which I think are very fair.  They may be different types of players and have different attributes but they're effectively competing against each other for starting places.  Clifton's shortcoming is often described as his lack of technical ability, something that if he had would mean he wasn't at this level.  Whilst I think he's worked hard on this and isn't as technically devoid as some would say, it's difficult to technically improve beyond a natural limit.

Maguire-Drew on the other hand has all the technical ability in the world.  Improving his work-rate and fitness should be something he can and should improve, far more easily than improving technical abilities.  Some players are naturally fitter than others, Clifton is a great example of this.  But Maguire-Drew's fitness is well off the pace.  

He's got it within his gift to be a very good player at levels above where he's failing to get a first-team start.  It's up to him how badly he wants it.  At the minute I wouldn't have him anywhere near my starting eleven.  Coming off the bench, he's definitely got something to offer but I'd love to see him put Hurst in a position where he can't fail to pick him.