Stockport (A) - FA Cup - 8pm 11/01

Lukerz

So we will now have to experiment with another forward as Antonio is clearly not going to play 90 mins & we have no other striker. Benrahma, Bowen or Yarmolenko; one of those is going to have a spell up front in this game.

ASLEFshrugged

Benrahma has played as a centre forward 7 times, scored two against Stade Brest in the French 2nd tier

Bowen has played as a centre forward 8 times, scored two vs Derby, one vs Swansea and one vs Fulham in the Championship

Yarmolenko has played as a centre forward 7 times and only ever scored once

For Borussia Dortmund in the Bundesliga vs Bayern Munich.

I think Yarmo trumps the others and might be okay as a CF against Stockport

alderz

When we have space in our squad like this I always want to see youth team players fill some gaps rather than putting square pegs in round holes. I must confess I’ve not paid as much attention to our academy teams in the last year or so, but those who have gotten games (Rice, Diangana, Johnson, Ngakia, Coventry, Ashby) have all done really well for us when they’ve played.

ASLEFshrugged

alderz - if we were playing a Premier League or Championship side I'd agree about square pegs but against a Conference side I think a winger who has played CF before should be good enough

Gosh, I just remembered when Ian Pearce played as a makeshift CF because all our strikers were injured (or in Di Canio's case sulking).

yoyo

Sir Geoff Hurst started his youth career as a defender. What did he ever do?..... Oh, 'Ang on a mo

everhopeful

Gosh, I just remembered when Ian Pearce played as a makeshift CF because all our strikers were injured (or in Di Canio's case sulking).

Away at Blackburn if I recall, the year after we had taken a tonking from them which they insisted on playing on repeat for the full hour before the game!

IronHerb

ASLEFshrugged said:

alderz - if we were playing a Premier League or Championship side I'd agree about square pegs but against a Conference side I think a winger who has played CF before should be good enough

Gosh, I just remembered when Ian Pearce played as a makeshift CF because all our strikers were injured (or in Di Canio's case sulking).

au contraire, this is the opportunity to blood a youngster surely.

(And I won't call you Shirley again).

alderz

ASLEFshrugged said:

alderz - if we were playing a Premier League or Championship side I'd agree about square pegs but against a Conference side I think a winger who has played CF before should be good enough

To be clear, I’m not saying that a winger up front against Stockport wouldn’t be enough, because I 100% think it would be. I’m making more of a general point. Also, I guess if we don’t have another striker it could mean a youth striker will need to cover at some point, so why not give then some minutes in the cup

Lukerz

After the sale of Haller, I think we’ll see:

Randolph
Fredericks - Balbuena - Diop - Johnson
Bowen - Noble - Rice - Fornals
Yarmolenko - Benrahma

ASLEFshrugged

I r

IronHerb said:

au contraire, this is the opportunity to blood a youngster surely.

(And I won't call you Shirley again).

When it comes to strikers we don't seem to have many youngsters to blood. There's 22yo Dapo Afolayan who missed the last U23 match against Everton for some reason or 20yo Sean Adarkwa who hasn't scored this season.

I'd rather give Nathan Holland another run out, him on the left, Benrahma on the right and start Yarmo up front.

alderz

Sean Adarkwa became a club legend for me when I loaned him for Afturerlding in Iceland on football manager last year. Three seasons on loan then joined on a free transfer and was club record scorer. Became a Ghana international too.

I’m assuming Mipo Odubeko is not going to be fit?

ASLEFshrugged

Odubeko was reported as being back in training 11 December but obviously he's not played since he got injured in September.

OldCastleSwift

Yeah, big risk to play Odubeko from the start. I expect him to be on the bench and may get 20 minutes at the end if all is going well.

I think Yarmolenko will start up front, with Bowen and Benrahma either side of him.

yoyo

OCS, I agree. It would appear the best option

ASLEFshrugged

As I was chuntering up and down the Central Line this evening I had a thought. When we play of Monday we will have had 10 days since we beat Everton and it will be another 5 days before we play Burnley.

Do we really need to rest anyone?

WHU_Champo_league_in_7_years

ASLEFshrugged said:

As I was chuntering up and down the Central Line this evening I had a thought. When we play of Monday we will have had 10 days since we beat Everton and it will be another 5 days before we play Burnley.

Do we really need to rest anyone?

Probably not, but we may need to build up some players fitness who haven't featured much, ensuring they are sharp if they are eventually called upon

Randolph
Fredericks Diop Ogbonna Johnson
Noble Rice
Yarmo Lanzini Benrahma
Antonio

Barney

We need to win. Put out a strong team, get in a comfortable position then make substitutions to get key players off

ASLEFshrugged

Moyes on Stockport

"We have a good squad of players at the moment, who will be the squad of players that go to Stockport. We certainly won’t have a team full of young players"

steve

Wont be easy ,never is with us ,So hope it is a strong team we put out

yoyo

Anyone just a teensy weensy bit concerned?

IronHerb

Nope

Lukerz

Really hope Moyes goes for this. Top 10, 15 points clear of the bottom 3. I really hope we attack the cup this year. Happy to rotate tonight a bit but if we get League One or above sides in future, full strength we need to be (providing we get through tonight).

Slacker

yoyo said:

Anyone just a teensy weensy bit concerned?

Of course, it’s West Ham away to a non - league side, what could possibly go wrong.........

IronHerb

When did we last lose to a non-league side?

Yeoldhammer

Lukerz said:

Really hope Moyes goes for this. Top 10, 15 points clear of the bottom 3. I really hope we attack the cup this year. Happy to rotate tonight a bit but if we get League One or above sides in future, full strength we need to be (providing we get through tonight).

he has to, he literally has a squad of 18 players...i don't think he cannot go full strength (not including Martin and Reid)

IronHerb

Squad of 20 without Reid and Martin.

IronHerb

Ex has said that Holland is with the squad in Stockport and is likely to go out on loan this week.

Whitehorsehammer

From the BBC. Moyes said: "All our first team players will be there. I always go for the cup - nothing would give me more pleasure than winning it."

Cuz1

Winning is what he does

alderz

We should start Reid, even if it's just for a farewell