I very much agree, Bedford, but to be precise Wes had the most assists with 10, whereas Pritchard and Howson had 7, as did Jerome. Jacob wasn't far behind with 6 and Josh had 5 from only 9 starts. IMO, Howson's main contribution is his influence on the game, which doesn't get headlines. His distribution of the ball and positioning in his 'box-to-box' role provide both stability and creativity to the midfield. Without him next season we would struggle to get into the top half of the table. Pritchard should be at the core of our attack next season because, unlike Wes, he is two-footed and that creates huge problems for the opposing defence. Like Wes, he still loses the ball too often by trying to do too much, but that will improve as he progresses. He also improved his defending as the season went on and in the final run of games he was like a terrier when the ball was lost (are you listening SW?).
So that Turkish club are leaking goals and they want to sign Bassong to stem the tide? Errrrrrrr ok. It begs the question, have the looked at our stats or his over the last few seasons? Wtf?
They'd be better advised to buy him, then loan him out on a weekly basis to whoever they're facing that weekend
Pritchard had 3 less assists but id say from a lot less game time. We need to be keeping our best players, getting rid of Naismith, Jarvis, Wildschut and McGovern (which should complete our first team clearout) and then build with hungry gems from lower leagues.
Pritchard had 3 FEWER assists!!! Probably with around 50% of the time on the pitch. As I've said MANY times, there are lies, damn lies and STATISTICS!!!
About the same number of games overall, but Pritchard did have fewer starts (I'm not going to go into minutes played). Howson had more games than all of the others for his 7 assists. I did go on to say that Pritchard should be our first choice at AM next season with the reasons for that as well as why I want Howson to stay. I wasn't meaning to be critical, it's just that I think players do deserve credit for what they do well and IMO all of our attackers did well, it's just a pity that we didn't defend as well. You can dismiss stats if you want, JMF, but they are far more objective than opinions and if a claim is made, it should be true. I did know about Jerome's 7 assists (something he seldom gets credit for), but I was amazed to learn that Josh had 5 assists in only 9 starts. Next year could be a big one for him as well.
According to the Mirror, Howson is available for transfer. Yeah, their reporter is in fact on our board of directors so would be ITK.
Who is their reporter, GE? HITC has revived the Tom Adeyemi rumour with at least a logical argument attached. Rosler managed Adeyemi at Brentford and then signed him after he moved to Leeds. The link is logical, and on a free it could make good sense. Tettey, Adeyemi and Thompson at DM would seem to fill that position, though SW may feel that Godfrey could cover there as well. That would leave more money for defensive strengthening, which must be the priority. The EDP has also suggested other potential free transfer possibilities, of which Fryers and le Fondre seem possibilities if wages are reasonable, though le Fondre is now 30. http://www.edp24.co.uk/sport/norwic...ch-city-could-be-in-for-this-summer-1-5026133
Excellent work from the EDP, suggesting 2 "free agents" who were offered contract extensions by Brighton yesterday. Zeki Fryers has played so little first team football in his career that I'm not sure I'd be comfortable trusting him as a first choice LB, but as backup to Dijks then maybe. He was clearly promising at some point but appears to have stagnated for several seasons.
I was thinking of back-up to Dijks, DH, but SW may feel Toffolo fulfills that role. Archant reporting has descended to blog level. Loads of off the top of the head opinion and little fact.
Fryers - maybe, Bong (great name) - possibly. Le Fondre - fits the "small striker" tag but I'd rather not have him at Carrow Road - hardly sets the world on fire wherever he goes now.
Pretty much how I feel, OCF. I seem to recall that le Fondre had the knack of scoring late goals after he came on as sub, but perhaps that was some time back.
I remember him being a supersub in a dire Reading team around 2013 that didn't make much of a fist of Premier League survival. He had a hot couple of months then, but 6 goals in league 1, and a single championship goal this season, are hardly the stats we want from a 30 year old striker.
If Howson goes to another Championship club for like 3-4M I'll be livid, and would totally sum up our board and club the last few years. I am behind clearing out a load of these players, because it's just stagnant. There are however, players we have to keep and build a new team around. Jonny is one of those. If he went to a Premiership club for like 8 million or something, I'd think "He's served us well, he's a class player, we should let him follow his dream with a bigger team." If we do a Johnson and sell below us, a player who was important to us....I would just despair.