Yes it's that time of the year again folks (in football anyway). No sooner have we all said Happy New Year to each other then that window that has been shut since September creaks open and rears its panes (or should that be pain) again.
This window is very slightly different for us Blackburn fans than the last two we've dealt with in that the transfer embargo imposed on us after failing the Football League Fair Play rules has (at least for now) been lifted. That isn't to say that we can suddenly start to spend copious amounts of money, far from it. The talk is of playing in the loan market (in the main or perhaps entirely). The biggest advantage then of the embargo being lifted is the ability to pay a fee (for a loan), be more competitive in what we can offer wage wise and not worry about being 1 or 2 players over a certain squad size limit. Not a lot different but hopefully enough to make possible the signing of some better quality loan players than may have previously been available to us.
The other interesting bit for us is the arrival of a new manager in Paul Lambert. This will be the first chance he has to start to make a stamp on the type of players he may want for the team and get the team moving in the right direction. He has already talked of being more creative and having to be a bit more clever in the way we create for Rhodes. There has also been some suggestion of a recognition of the fact that we have lots of midfielders who essentially do the same job.
Working from the back forwards, my personal opinion is that we are well provided for in the goalkeeping stakes. The defence is much improved (one or two lapses aside) from last season but there is a lack of competition in the right back spot. In central midfield we have Williamson, Lowe, Guthrie, Akpan and Evans who are all similar in style, I would put Evans at the top in terms of offering the team something different and more forward movement. What we lack is in creativity in there, Lawrence (on loan from Leicester) is about it unless you count Chris Taylor who works hard and gets forward. Conway remains our best "creater" of opportunities and for me Marshall has been well under par this season - again there is a lack of competition here. We also lack pace in this department too. At the front, aside from Rhodes (who by his standards is on a goal drought and a half at the time of writing) there is not much to talk about. Koita obviously is still very raw and Brown hasn't shown enough to suggest he is a solution.
For me, I would hope that we look at bringing in someone else up front as a priority who will do the work outside the box and look to bring Rhodes into play. A creative midfielder is also something I'd look at and also bring some pace into the team. If there's still enough to play with, I'd been trying to get competition in at right back as well.
Outgoings wise, there is an opportunity to try and move on any fringe type players if possible and free up some space but I would hope that we try and rebuff any big bids for our better players at this point unless Lambert is convinced it would help to improve the team and that he would then get the funds to put towards buying in players to do the job of moving us up the league.
Blackburn fans shouldn't be looking at this window as being a complete game changer, it's going to take time to get the team the way Lambert wants it but if it paves the way for improved performances in 2016 then that would be a good start.
No comments:
Post a Comment