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For me the signing of Oleginik is a perfectly adequate replacement for Bevan and Saah perhaps may be so for Branston, but Branston did bring about a certain air of leadership and nous that may be difficult for Saah to replicate.

I'm afraid I cannot go along with McPhee being adequate to replace Zebroski...McPhee is a totally different player but not in the same league as Zeb. If the argument is that Leadbitter is to go to full-back so Mansell can sort of replace what would have been Stanley in midfield, then again, I feel we are much the poorer.

And if indeed Robertson does go, then we will need yet another centre-back and this is where I think we rue one of Buckle's worst decisions for us in selling Charnock. Furthermore, when you see the likes of Bevan, Branston, Zebroski, Stanley, Robinson, Tomlin and possibly Robertson, what does that leave you thinking if you are someone like Eunan O'Kane? Who will know he is coveted by other clubs and managers. Would staying at what could be a downward spiral at Torquay be good for your career or would you be starting to feel a little unsettled? Would blue and white quarters suddenly seem so much more exciting?

People have had a go at Robinson and suggested we will not miss him or that he is another Danny Stevens and that view is nonsense. Robinson scored about 15 goals last season and was quick and got past players, a fact no doubt recognised by that very shrewd judge of player in Gary Johnson.

I really am very concerned about next season. Too often - during the Bateson years - people would say 'don't worry, there's loads of time' when players had not been signed and we resorted to trialists. Yet the season kicks off in just over 4 weeks and it seems we are in disarray.

I think Charnock would have been out of contract this summer, and given who things were going he would have been first on the released list.

If Robbo does go, I don't feel that we'll need another Centre half. I'd imagine that Saah and Ellis would then start as first choices, but in terms of back-up we'd then have Oastler, Leadbitter, LRT, McPhee and Palmer in reserves who could all do a capable job. We'd have to hope that we didn't lose both first choice centre halves in one swoop, but if we did (and didn't sign a permanent back up) then Ling would hopefully have the space in the budget to dip into the loan market.

Given the current state of the squad, I think that even without Robbo we'd have adequate cover at the back. I'd like to see any money re-invested in the attacking areas as that is so obvious where we are lacking at the moment.

And for what its worth, I think we'll be pleasantly surprised by the type of player McPhee has become. You don't score 17 BSP goals if you're as bad as he was when he left. He's obviously improved and I hope this time he can show us.

Jeff wrote:I think Charnock would have been out of contract this summer, and given who things were going he would have been first on the released list.

If Robbo does go, I don't feel that we'll need another Centre half. I'd imagine that Saah and Ellis would then start as first choices, but in terms of back-up we'd then have Oastler, Leadbitter, LRT, McPhee and Palmer in reserves who could all do a capable job. We'd have to hope that we didn't lose both first choice centre halves in one swoop, but if we did (and didn't sign a permanent back up) then Ling would hopefully have the space in the budget to dip into the loan market.

Given the current state of the squad, I think that even without Robbo we'd have adequate cover at the back. I'd like to see any money re-invested in the attacking areas as that is so obvious where we are lacking at the moment.

And for what its worth, I think we'll be pleasantly surprised by the type of player McPhee has become. You don't score 17 BSP goals if you're as bad as he was when he left. He's obviously improved and I hope this time he can show us.

You also don't score 17 goals by playing CB!

If i was picking the team tomorrow (without Robbo) i'd probably start with Saah and Oastler with Ellis and LRT (who looks to me like a more capable CB than LB) in reserve. It probably is enough as you say.

you would play Oastler in front of Ellis. Interesting.

That's definitely what i said.

Just checking. Glad you weren't on the shortlist Fonda!

In fairness, our previous manager made much more bizarre selections, and you supported all of them...

I don't think we can judge Oastler as a centre back as we have never seen him play there. From what I have seen he is capable of doing so though - whether it is a better choice than Ellis - I suspect the pre-season friendlies will show.

People seem to forget that Ellis was being linked with a host of league 1 clubs as close as last January. Personally, i think he is a potential class act and even right now is perfectly capable of playing league 2 standard, even if his game does still have some rough edges. Ellis and Saah would be my CB pairing. No one even knows what kind of CB Oastler would be and once again, only in my opinion, i saw him as quite a good tough-tackling midfielder.

stevegull wrote:People seem to forget that Ellis was being linked with a host of league 1 clubs as close as last January. Personally, i think he is a potential class act and even right now is perfectly capable of playing league 2 standard, even if his game does still have some rough edges. Ellis and Saah would be my CB pairing. No one even knows what kind of CB Oastler would be and once again, only in my opinion, i saw him as quite a good tough-tackling midfielder.

Linked by our own supporters perhaps.

Fonda wrote:In fairness, our previous manager made much more bizarre selections, and you supported all of them...

Not all of them. I could understand why he might have done some of them at the time doesn't mean I agreed with all of them.

Just found it interesting you'd pick Oastler to play centre back instead of Ellis, everyone's entitled to an opinion and who knows maybe Ling might agree with you.

We rejected some bids too didn't we?

Actually, no, that doesn't sound like us...

royalgull wrote: Not all of them. I could understand why he might have done some of them at the time doesn't mean I agreed with all of them.

Just found it interesting you'd pick Oastler to play centre back instead of Ellis, everyone's entitled to an opinion and who knows maybe Ling might agree with you.

We shall see. As Rich suggests above, we'll see his thinking in the friendlies. A lot depends on Leadbitters readiness for first team action. If he's ready for the RB role from the off, Oastler might be used elsewhere.

A quick search of the Herald Website has a few results.

Bid rejected in January 2011, unnamed L1 club:

http://www.thisissouthdevon.co.uk/GULLS ... story.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Last August too:

http://www.thisissouthdevon.co.uk/UNITE ... story.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Interesting that it's not really been mentioned that maybe Ling wasn't overly bothered about Zebroski going, who knows. Different managers have different ideas and maybe he *might* have thought he wasn't worth the money and wasn't bothered to let him go. Again it now gives him the chance to build more of his own team.

I know they did offer Zebroski a deal to stay and I'm sure Ling would have been ok with him staying but he probably knew walking in the door that Zebroski was going to go, was probably a token offer.

Speculating.