Ellis

[ferrarilover]

Bretty, I have absolutely nothing against Saah, nothing at all, in fact, I WANT him to be a legend A. Because he plays for TUFC and B. To show the Cambridge fans that it was not ML who was to blame for their dismal performance in the Conference when he was there.

I say he was useless because he was. He did nothing yesterday. Mark cleared everything and covered for Saah on at least a dozen occasions. Saah's distribution is worse than Branston's. All round, he was absolutely terrible yesterday and, what little he did in the second half, was not good. Sometimes, there's no reason for criticism other than the reasons given in that critisism, this is one such occasion.

Matt.

[Father Jack]

Gullible, I will assume that article refers to the offer from one of our "local" neighbours. If so, it was quite frankly taking the p**s and could conceivably have been to temp him into requesting a move maybe? I am not aware of any other bids submitted during that window and to be honest, the board would have had even more slagging than they got over the (still undervalued in my opinion) Zebroski fee had they agreed to it. Think less (quite a bit) than the reported Zebs fee.

Matt,

Are you really trying to convince me that the only reason Ellis is still here is because it was too expensive to end his contract?

I'm not trying to convince you of anything. Inheriting a playing squad is different to actively recruiting players is it not?
You said

Ellis was wanted by the same man who wanted Saah

I pointed out

he was under contract (as were most of the players) so showing him (or any of the others) the door wouldnt have freed up any money for a replacements

Thats hardly the same as saying the only reason he is here is because we couldnt afford to bin him

No one came in for Ryan Lowe, telling me he's rubbish too?

No one came in with a bid that Bury considered "serious". However dont be suprised if they do (mind you, at 33 is he likely to up his game much to compete at a higher level?)
Just the same as no one put in a "serious" bid for ALF during January or the summer. Yet now someone has and he's at Reading (and at 24, still time to develop)

[Gulliball]

I have never heard of 'local' teams after Ellis. Rochdale and Bournemouth are names I've heard, but as they were never named, it's pure speculation.

But anyway, you asked why no teams came in for him, and more than one higher division club have come in for him in the last few years.

[Father Jack]

I have never heard of 'local' teams after Ellis. Rochdale and Bournemouth are names I've heard, but as they were never named, it's pure speculation.

But anyway, you asked why no teams came in for him, and more than one higher division club have come in for him in the last few years.

I asked

how come nobody came in for him in the January window after all those MOTM performances

[Gulliball]

And yet a team did. Making your rhetorical question redundant.

You apparently seem to know that a higher division team came in for him too, which makes asking the question even stranger.

[tufcbrett]

Bretty, I have absolutely nothing against Saah, nothing at all, in fact, I WANT him to be a legend A. Because he plays for TUFC and B. To show the Cambridge fans that it was not ML who was to blame for their dismal performance in the Conference when he was there.

I say he was useless because he was. He did nothing yesterday. Mark cleared everything and covered for Saah on at least a dozen occasions. Saah's distribution is worse than Branston's. All round, he was absolutely terrible yesterday and, what little he did in the second half, was not good. Sometimes, there's no reason for criticism other than the reasons given in that critisism, this is one such occasion.

Matt.

I just feel in other games ive seen, saah has not been that bad at all and has been the main vocal point that everyone seems to blame.
This is football i spoose everyone sees thing diffrently.

I still feel he has a lot to offer and the season is only 5 games old. Im sure he will be fine, Ling must know how good he really is if he has that much faith in him.

Back on topic with Ellis, he does deserve a chance like any other member in the squad, if he grabs that chance then well done on him.
There has been other clubs after him, but hes still a Torquay player.

[Dave]

It is clear that amongst Torquay fan's Mark Ellis is an opinion divider, the one thing we do agree on is most of us admire his no nonsense approach to defending, however that is not always a point winner.

There are opinions offered by those who go the games regular, some who go to a few, and even those who take from match reports and radio comentry, i am not saying that one opinion is more worthy than another or right, as we all know a player can have one good or one bad game in every five, the best judge's to me are the one's who see the games regular and have formed there opinions over 20 plus games.

Not saying i am right or Father Jack, however i do totaly agree with him on one point, Mark Ellis did have a dramatic loss of form running into christmas and it was right at that time to rest him from the side.

I have have expressed my opinion on Ellis afew times recently i am not going there agin, however surely one thing we can agree on, with the clubs budget being small, a fully fit, confident playing well Mark Ellis can only be a good and healthy thing for the club.

Personaly i am delighted to hear he had a very good yesterday, long may it continue.

[Glostergull]

Trojan67. After listening to this lot argueing about the relative merits or Mark Ellis till my head hurts I think I can forgive your fuax pas. you can come in off the naughty step now. Get dry and give us all a laugh again.

[ferrarilover]

Oh yeah, I forgot that was the original question. How silly of me to neglect to fight the obvious and undefeatable argument that the question asker is as idiot!

Simply because Mr Ellis was MOTM in, say, a half dozen matches, it doesn't automatically follow that offers to buy will be forthcoming.
Equally, just because those offers failed to materialise, it does not take away from Mark's performances.

It is wholly unfair and plain wrong to suggest otherwise.

Matt.

[Father Jack]

Oh yeah, I forgot that was the original question. How silly of me to neglect to fight the obvious and undefeatable argument that the question asker is as idiot!

Simply because Mr Ellis was MOTM in, say, a half dozen matches, it doesn't automatically follow that offers to buy will be forthcoming.
Equally, just because those offers failed to materialise, it does not take away from Mark's performances.

It is wholly unfair and plain wrong to suggest otherwise.

Matt.

That will be the undeniably poor performances from Christmas/New Year onwards then, that resulted in his dropping from the first team I take it?

[ferrarilover]

What will be those performances?

Matt.

[tufcbrett]

If im right in saying, wasnt Ellis dropped because Branno said that he prefered to play along side Robbo as Mark still had slight issues with positioning (which you do find very often with young players) Theres no doubt Mark has the ability to play very well, but its like every other position in the side, they need to earn there chance then when they get it, grab it with both hands and stake their claim.

[Dave]

If im right in saying, wasnt Ellis dropped because Branno said that he prefered to play along side Robbo as Mark still had slight issues with positioning (which you do find very often with young players) Theres no doubt Mark has the ability to play very well, but its like every other position in the side, they need to earn there chance then when they get it, grab it with both hands and stake their claim.

Thats a polite way of putting it Brett, i thought the words used by Branno were more like, "its like playing next a schoolboy who needs baby sitting"

[CP Gull]

Obviously we don't know all that goes on in the dressing room but what I do know is that I believe that Mark lost his place in the team last season after what I'm sure the player himself would probably agree was the worst performance he had ever given in one of our games - that game was the 1-3 home defeat to Hereford (the illegal player(s) game). That night he quite simply couldn't do a thing right, he was getting pulled all over the place by the Hereford strikers and kept giving the ball away, often by slicing it, in dangerous positions. Personally he was that bad that night that I felt relieved for the player that Buckle brought him off with around 25 minutes to go. It also didn't help that this performance came just days after the morale sapping defeat in the FA Cup to Crawley when Ellis and Branston appeared to blame each other for letting Matt Tubbs get in between them to score the decisive goal.

Unfortunately he then had to wait a few weeks for his next chance in the away game at Accy and was doing OK in the first half until he got caught out by Gornell's pace, they collided and the referee deemed it a (harsh) straight red card and an immediate ban. Consequently other than a few brief appearances from the bench in the latter stages, his season was pretty much over as Robbo and Branno became the established pairing once again.

I'm sure the change of Manager has probably gone down well with young Mark as it represents a real chance for him to prove to the new man that he is worth a starting place in the team which is clearly what he is desperate for. He has now got the shirt and by all accounts he did pretty well on Saturday and no reason to believe he won't keep it for next Saturday. He clearly needs to cut out the basis errors that he has been prone to in his career with us - often they appear no more than a momentary lapse in concentration but all too often as this level they can prove costly. I almost think that at times he tries too hard to impress (probably not helped by not feeling that his place in the team is ever secure) at times, he tries to do too much to win the ball ahead of the opposing striker and it doesn't always come off.

He does have some great attributes though - his courage and enthusiasm always shine out and if he can just iron out some of those mistakes and improve his positional play a little then he could well end up turning into a very good centre half. There is no doubt he needs to reestablish himself in the first team and if he can do that I believe his confidence will return and he will be back to his best. Having highlighted his worst performance in a United shirt (at least based on those games I have seen) I would also like to balance things out by saying that one of the best performances I have seen him make was against the champions of 2010 Notts County in the last game of the 2009-10 season, when he gave a masterclass in defending in a 0-0 draw when up against the likes of Lee Hughes et al. He put in a really class performance that day and when you see how good he can be it's just a little frustrating that he hasn't always been able to maintain that level of consistency - still plenty of time left in his career (hopefully with us) for him to find that though.

[tufcbrett]

Thats a polite way of putting it Brett, i thought the words used by Branno were more like, "its like playing next a schoolboy who needs baby sitting"

It was something like that, but im to polite