Squad for next Season - Page 2 - General Morton Chatter - TheMortonForum.com Jump to content
TheMortonForum.com

Squad for next Season


Recommended Posts

IMG-20220509-WA0017.jpg

I'd have kept Russell and Ledger but can see the logic in letting them go. I can't see any in those being the only two released. How are we supposed to strengthen if we keep literally every attacking player? Oliver getting an offer is wild.

  • Upvote 1

Brian Wake my Lord, Brian Wake

Brian Wake my Lord, Brian Wake

Brian Wake my Lord, Brian Wake

Oh Lord, Brian Wake

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hoping that not all those accept offers but even for someone who wanted to keep the nucleus of the squad together that's far too many being offered considering three of the loanees leaving are three of our best players. 

McLean and Oliver seem like crazy decisions to me. Oliver has been shoehorned in this season to very little effect and McLean would mean keeping two of the slow CBs that Dougie has complained about having to play a back 3 for since he came in. 

Edited by port-ton
  • Upvote 2

Good people will do good things, bad people will do bad things, but only with religion do good people do bad things!

 

32.gif

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Not overly bothered about Russell and Ledger but really concerned that we've decided to offer the likes of Oliver and McLean new deals. Oliver in particular - baffling. 

If they all accept then that's us sorted in CM. Jacobs, Lyon, Blues, Wilson and McGrattan all there - it's an area we really needed to improve and it's just more of the same old. Hmmmm.

Edited by DumfriesTon
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Early days but I can't claim to be confident about that announcement. Asking 3 or 4 players to provide the goals, creativity, pace and defensive solidity that we desperately need is going to require a huge slice of good fortune. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Russell and ledger away is no real surprise they were squad players at best and obviously want to try and get more game time good luck to them both. Oliver is an odd one for me IMO he just isn't good enough and I really don't understand the logic. I think strapp will be away but obviously we need to offer him something. Be interested to know what the wages are for these guys offered new deals doesn't really give us much room to build you would think if they all accept the offer. 

  • Upvote 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Ledger going is the right decision (if we made that decision). He's the weakest of the centre backs and offers nothing moving out from the right back position. Perhaps he and Russell decided to go because they wouldn't have been regular starters. Russell was potentially a good replacement for Strapp if he could regularly play at his best (he was actually pretty decent in most of his games, even if he had a couple of nightmares). Hopefully Strapp stays. The most surprising thing here is that Oliver isn't part of this list. He's not without his strengths, but hasn't done enough to really justify being kept on in any particular role. 

We need to shift McGrattan, Easdale, and Jacobs to justify keeping Blues and Muirhead. That being said, we wouldn't want to put any of our sponsorship deals in danger...

Imrie has perhaps sounded out quite a few players already, and is wary about the quality of players he's going to be able to attract to the club. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Surprised at McLean but guessing the discussions might be around a coaching or community role. Know he's highly thought of so might give us cheap cover. 

Happy to trust Dougie with the rest. There's plenty of gaps in the squad to bring players in (assuming the budget allows) and we've competed with the better teams in the league with the players listed. Obviously there are better players out there but Imrie will know budgets, etc better than us. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

This is a wee bit concerning tbh. No point re-treading old ground over the ins and outs of how the season went as it's been discussed plenty elsewhere, but in short the manner of our survival really was not so convincing that keeping pretty much the entire team is a great idea. If all of those players re-sign, then any new additions are going to have to be extraordinarily good to transform the team into a much more formidable proposition capable of actually winning games and scoring goals on a regular basis.

Offering Oliver a new deal is particularly bizarre, he can have his moments but for the biggest majority of the time he just doesn't offer very much at all and that's been the case across several seasons with him. It's hard to know what his role is even meant to be especially if it's going to be the 4-3-3 Imrie has hinted at; even with a large budget there's no obvious sense in keeping him. 

I'd rather keep McLean than Lithgow if its a choice between two slow, ageing defenders (I actually wouldn't mind keeping McLean on overall, so long as it was as a squad player with other reliable options ahead of him), but since Lithgow is already signed up then the ruthless decision would surely be that McLean has to go although I guess there might be a coaching element to any new deal for him. Not entirely clear what "in discussion" means, right enough.

On that, it's possible that Lithgow may choose to leave as it's very likely he's not going to play very much at all next season if Imrie wants a back 4. You can't imagine he's got too long left in him either, so he may well want to go somewhere he'll be a regular while he still can.

Time will tell what the nature of the new deals are and it might be that they're on reduced terms that are unlikely to be accepted, but if we end up with almost the exact same players in front of the defence it's unlikely that next season is going to be particularly exciting tbh.

Edited by EanieMeany

AWMSC

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Announcing this squad update at the same time as inviting fans to renew season tickets is an interesting decision. Going into next season with potentially more or less the same squad as we ended last season is top banter. I thought the Tele article with Easdale outlining how he intends to be a first choice pick next season was a laugh but this squad update is giving it a run for its money.  Imrie has to have something up his sleeve in players joining and/or loanees otherwise we are all going to be back on here gnashing our teeth at a disjointed squad offering little creativity. Is it really too much for Morton to give the fans something to look forward to over the summer?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

44 minutes ago, EanieMeany said:

Not entirely clear what "in discussion" means, right enough.

It has been rumoured that Gozie wants to go back down south for family reasons and McLean is ancient so might be considering retiring/stepping into coaching.

Discussions needed about their plans before wasting time on contracts.

All the others are easy 'not retiring, likely to stay in Scotland' cases so quicker to move to the contract or bin stage.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

We should push the boat out to keep Strappy! Pity he's out of contract, will be a huge loss to us if he does leave. He'll probably be going to a decent premier league team. Were Hearts not rumoured to be looking at him a couple of seasons ago? Robbie Neilson was nae stranger to a long throw in also! 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Surprised that we are looking to keep most of the squad. We'll really need to make good use of the loan market again to enhance the squad.

There's a storm on the horizon

And for that I can't see the sun

For I'll keep a waiting on the pavement

For the ice cream van to come

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I hope that 'in discussions' means stepping into a coaching role for McLean. 

 

Wish we could shift Jacobs as I don't imagine he is the cheapest back-up.

 

Keeping Oliver is madness. 

 

I assume Easdale's wage isn't coming from Morton tbh so not bothered about him or the other youngsters but they could do with a loan.

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Offering McLean a new contract is as wild as his marking and decision making, which was properly on show against Motherwell in the cup. He is absolutely done at this level. Comes across really well, and been a decent enough squad acquisition over his time here but shouldn’t be anywhere near the starting line up now.

This is a perfect time to really freshen up the back line so hope we make a good job of it. 
 

Slightly worried overall that so many have been offered deals as I would like Dougie to bring in his own next season and hopefully push us on. 

 

 

  • Upvote 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

14 hours ago, so72 said:

I hope that 'in discussions' means stepping into a coaching role for McLean. 

 

Wish we could shift Jacobs as I don't imagine he is the cheapest back-up.

 

Keeping Oliver is madness. 

 

I assume Easdale's wage isn't coming from Morton tbh so not bothered about him or the other youngsters but they could do with a loan.

 

 

I'd rather we just released him than make him a coach and save on the wage. Our budget is clearly tight, don't think we need another 1st team coach. I'm sure between Dougie, Millen and Sutton we have enough coaching experience to look after 20-25 players.

I do wonder if the conversation has taken place with Jacobs around him being allowed to move on if he can find a club.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

11 hours ago, Tubes said:

Offering McLean a new contract is as wild as his marking and decision making, which was properly on show against Motherwell in the cup. He is absolutely done at this level. Comes across really well, and been a decent enough squad acquisition over his time here but shouldn’t be anywhere near the starting line up now.

This is a perfect time to really freshen up the back line so hope we make a good job of it. 
 

Slightly worried overall that so many have been offered deals as I would like Dougie to bring in his own next season and hopefully push us on. 

 

 

We competed with a decent Motherwell side in the cup. Didn't concede in 90 and both their goals came after 110 minutes. Not really a great example of a defender not being good. 

  • Upvote 1
  • Downvote 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...