Liam Roberts - Good enough?

I think he needs taking out the firing line.

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Got a ā– ā– ā– ā–  defence in front of him thatā€™s constantly changing, they only competition for place plays pat-a-cake with the ball, and also a useless goalkeeping coach compared to Neil Cutler, also young and confidence at an all time lowā€¦ heā€™ll come good with the right coaching.

Agree with other comments. Needs taking out the firing line and we need to sign an old head that can organise the back 4 and do more talking etc. He isnt saving shots he would have done and this may sound harsh on liam but I think if we do nothing and dont sign a replacement he will just continue to ship loads of goals and we will be in a deep relegation scrap

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As some have already said here Roberts is young and has been given his number 1 chance. His first season stepping up. Unfortunately the 10! Yes 10 in front of him arenā€™t doing him any favours and errors are starting to come in as heā€™s dealing with more and more errors from people in front of him.
Our wingers and full backs never bust a gut to get out and stop the cross coming in and Roberts at this moment isnā€™t commanding and probably even confident enough to come out and win those 50/50 or even 70/30 balls at the moment.
The team as a whole donā€™t defend as a unit very well, Iā€™d even go as far to say we donā€™t defend from the front.
Chambers is an unsung player for me and mopped up so many loose balls in front of the back four.

Ideally at this point our second keeper would normally come in and relieve some of the pressure thatā€™s on Roberts. Dunn isnā€™t going to do that unfortunately.
Hoping that it doesnā€™t destroy Roberts as he certainly has the attributes to become a really good keeper for us!

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Not a keeper but seasoned pro , and a defender shouldnā€™t he be assisting along these lines ā€¦ Martin ?

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But feel his replacement would be even worse , and probably push us closer to the drop ā€¦

I said 2 weeks ago he needs to be dropped and taken out of the firing line, but DK signed a rubbish no 2 so we screwed

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back up keeper for me get a decent experienced keeper in who commands a defence thats what is needed.

The budget only allows a rubbish number two or a kid. Literally always been the case.

Look at how Roberts broke in in the first place.

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But Roberts is still a number 2 really heā€™s a young kid with little or no experience

With a new contract. I mean, surely he deserves to be called number one considering his performances at the end of last season and the beginning of this?

This is exactly where the catch 22 of a good back up keeper comes in. Having someone who is able to do a job in the first team gives the manager an opportunity to take the first choice out of the firing line following a dip in form without too much risk. This though has got to be weighed up against the amount of the budget that is taken up for someone that usually wonā€™t play any more than 10% of games in a season.

In my opinion, Keates got it right by picking up someone on the cheap, although we could do with someone to fill in for Roberts for a few games and Dunn clearly isnā€™t that man. God forbid Roberts gets an injury!

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These stats show Roberts hasnā€™t been THAT bad, just the defence in front of him doesnā€™t give him much help at all.

It also shows that Guthrie is easily our best defender and that Leahy and Deviln provide many attacking chances. None of these figures surprise me but I think it does show that 3 at the back may be the way to go. After all both the the full backs were supposed to be wing backs!!

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Someone should tell Deano :rofl:

Said that a long time ago 3-5-2 is the way to go more cover in defence so devlin and leahy can push forward more.and extra man in central midfield .

Yep Iā€™ve been a fan of switching to three at the back. It failed twice and Deano threw it away.

Failed a lot more time than twice with 4 at the back this season.

Last season, I thought that he was going to be Bonserā€™s next big pay cheque but he has regressed this season.

Not sure I agree with blaming it all on those in front of him though. I would agree if he was putting in man of the match performances week after week, but he is not. On the contrary he is culpable for quite a few of the goals conceded.

The argument can be turned around in that a defence takes confidence from the 'keeper.

He clearly has talent, and as others have said, the backup ainā€™t great, therefore he may have to just ride it out.

6 of one and half a dozen of the other.

Heā€™s seeing more shots than most keepers in the league. Heā€™s probably making 4 or 5 regulation to good saves a game but itā€™s not enough to keep a clean sheet because heā€™s seeing 10 - 15 shots a game. That is the fault of the player in front of him.

But he should have done better with a couple and his confidence is clearly down.

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Off topic, but Cookie winning more headers than our first choice centre back this season is a massive effort.

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