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Centre Half / Defensive Midfielder


Rscot

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People talk about right back, centre back, striker being problem positions, but this is our biggest deficiency IMO. The only way round it I can see is to play 5 at the back with jack in front. A back 4 just leaves us too open down the middle.

I'm desperate for Clarke to be successful and believe he should be given more time than previous managers were afforded, but I'm worried his stubbornness on this issue ultimately may be his undoing.

 

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What I can say is that last season Livingston played a back 3 with Halkett in the centre of the 3 organising the back line. Livingston had 14 clean sheets, a goal difference of -2, averaging a loss of 1.15 goals per game over the season. The back line consisted of 

                        Kelly(gk)

Gallagher.    Halkett.   Lithgow

 

Kelly gone to QPR

Gallagher gone to Motherwell, just won 1st cap for Scotland

Halkett gone to Hearts and believe it or not may well still be their top goalscorer. Injured out to January. He scored 7 goals in 40 games last season, all 7 goals in the league. He was the captain of Livingston and organiser of the defence. 

Edited by Rscot
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8 minutes ago, ghtresa said:

People talk about right back, centre back, striker being problem positions, but this is our biggest deficiency IMO. The only way round it I can see is to play 5 at the back with jack in front. A back 4 just leaves us too open down the middle.

I'm desperate for Clarke to be successful and believe he should be given more time than previous managers were afforded, but I'm worried his stubbornness on this issue ultimately may be his undoing.

 

5 at the back and a defensive midfielder 😬

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We have Mulgrew who has played the role for both Celtic and for Scotland and played it very effectively.  It's true, at 33 he's getting on a bit but pace was never part of his game and we can maybe get a year or two out of him before McTominay's ready to drop into that role.  I've always prefererred him as a midfield anchor rather than a centre half.  It's  a sensible option.

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18 minutes ago, henry george said:

We have Mulgrew who has played the role for both Celtic and for Scotland and played it very effectively.  It's true, at 33 he's getting on a bit but pace was never part of his game and we can maybe get a year or two out of him before McTominay's ready to drop into that role.  I've always prefererred him as a midfield anchor rather than a centre half.  It's  a sensible option.

Perhaps not the most popular choice, but I think if I was Clarke I’d be tempted to call him up again for the role. Especially for the Nations League games next year. I’d totally forgot that Mulgrew played as a Defensive Midfield Centre.

Edited by Rscot
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McTom at centre back with McKenna. Robertson and Tierney as full backs. Man U thought McTom would be a CB and Jose played him there. He’s big, strong, aggressive, right footed and good in the air. He’s also a leader. A lot better than what we have and we have a few for CM.

Edited by sandyb
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10 hours ago, Rscot said:

As a defensive midfielder, I don’t know he’s never played there, but I think he maybe able to. He’s mobile enough, probably decent enough on the ball to do the basics ok, which is all I’d expect. But he is very aggressive, good in the tackle, strong, threat at set pieces.  As a centre half he is decent, in a back 4 we probably have better, but in a back 3 he’s good in the middle, he is a leader / organiser.

That’s your suggestion for playing in our midfield? At international level?

You’re suggesting a defender, who has played one season in the SPL, and by your own admission, never played in midfield before?! 

I mean, by all means, if we want to rack up another 20 years of not qualifying for major finals, that would be the kind of selection that would go a long way to achieving that!

Where did you pull that suggestion from?

A. You’re a Hearts fan.

B. You’re Craig Halkett’s father.

C. You’re Craig Halkett.

(And just in case the suggestion didn’t make us laugh enough, you even called him Craig ‘Hacklett’ for added comedy value.)

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7 hours ago, sandyb said:

McTom at centre back with McKenna. Robertson and Tierney as full backs. Man U thought McTom would be a CB and Jose played him there. He’s big, strong, aggressive, right footed and good in the air. He’s also a leader. A lot better than what we have and we have a few for CM.

Pretty sure mctominay wasn't very good at CB and man utd gave up on that idea.

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50 minutes ago, mccaughey85 said:

Pretty sure mctominay wasn't very good at CB and man utd gave up on that idea.

Yep. Against West Ham.

In fairness, he was any worse than his two defensive partners in that match.

McTominay is not a centre back. He's not an anchorman, either. If you look at the stats they tell you that he's the most fouled player in the EPL and he's completed the most dribbles.

His natural game is getting the ball and striving forward with it. He's an old fashioned box to box midfielder. 

Edited by The_Dark_Knight
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3 hours ago, dohadeer said:

That’s your suggestion for playing in our midfield? At international level?

You’re suggesting a defender, who has played one season in the SPL, and by your own admission, never played in midfield before?! 

I mean, by all means, if we want to rack up another 20 years of not qualifying for major finals, that would be the kind of selection that would go a long way to achieving that!

Where did you pull that suggestion from?

A. You’re a Hearts fan.

B. You’re Craig Halkett’s father.

C. You’re Craig Halkett.

(And just in case the suggestion didn’t make us laugh enough, you even called him Craig ‘Hacklett’ for added comedy value.)

If you read all my posts I suggested that Mulgrew would be a possibility once another poster stated he has played there. 
But we can’t expect to get anywhere while we are needing to score at least 2 goals a game against anyone other than the very lowest seeded teams.

I imagine it wouldn’t take much for you to find something funny. You probably still think that singing a stupid song from “Sound of Music” is hilarious. It was maybe funny one time, 30 years ago mate.

Edited by Rscot
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The Cyprus game again highlighted that defensive mid the key weak area of our team.

We have a lot of 'reputation' players we've put in there..
Jack, McGregor, McGinn, McLean.. none of them can do that job tho. None of them are defensive enough, tho fortunately we've found a better spot for McGinn and he's doing well as a number 10.

McGregor was absent for long period against Cyprus, no real energy from him, and managed to lose his marker for the ball thru that the guy mis-controlled when in 1v1, and got robbed on the ball facing his own goal because he just lingered on it too long, which resulted in a shot on goal for them. Just not good enough, especially given the level of the opposition.

As for Jack. He just seems wildly unaware of anything that's going on around him and refuses to actually mark. Drifting off while ball watching as his man came around the back for the header at the back post that looked like it was in. Half jogging back when he could easily have closed the space to the man he should be picking up as it was swung across to a man left free at the back post (because the centerbacks had to cover for Jack). Not holding him responsible for their goal, but he was one of the 5 marking 4 that left Efrem in acres of space to score. Not guilty, but certainly not innocent.

Both of them were way below the standard required, not even doing the basics. That we keep going to the same dry well over and over is just depressing, be it McGregor, Jack or McLean. They simply aren't defensively good enough to play a defensive role.

Unfortunately there's no shining candidates to take the places. McTominay is one, I think we all agree he should be one of the two. But the other is really just picking the least bad option.

For me Armstrong is Mr Consistent. Always puts effort in, seems to be a started for his club now, can break from deep and also brings quality dead balls.

Shinnie should be able to do the job. Broken into the Derby side and doing well by all accounts. Yes, he was bad in Kazakhstan at left back. So let's not play him at left back.

McCrorie.. might be an option if he wasn't playing right back in League One.

One other slightly left field option is Liam Palmer.. He played center mid before be became a right back. For me it's a last resort situation, as he's doing ok at right back at the moment and should probably just be left to get on with it there.

 

We need a change, and for me it's pretty depressing that Clarke can't see it.

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3 hours ago, The_Dark_Knight said:

Yep. Against West Ham.

In fairness, he was any worse than his two defensive partners in that match.

McTominay is not a centre back. He's not an anchorman, either. If you look at the stats they tell you that he's the most fouled player in the EPL and he's completed the most dribbles.

His natural game is getting the ball and striving forward with it. He's an old fashioned box to box midfielder. 

Mctominay is our best centre back, our best anchorman and our best box to box midfielder. It's a matter of how much importance you place on each position and who the alternatives are.

Could be our best right back too but that is not a very important position

Conceding goals has become more important than scoring them so we can leave him out of playing striker

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16 hours ago, bazmidd said:

No way should we be sacrificing McGregor or McTominay if both are fit against any sides seeded or ranked below us. These two compliment each other well and long term could be a very good Midfield partnership. 

Remind me again which game it was that those two ran show in midfield? Cause for the life of me, I can't remember the last time a Scotland midfield dominated a game against any reasonable opposition, even though it's our strongest department.

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47 minutes ago, ceudmilefailte said:

Mctominay is our best centre back, our best anchorman and our best box to box midfielder. It's a matter of how much importance you place on each position and who the alternatives are.

Could be our best right back too but that is not a very important position

Conceding goals has become more important than scoring them so we can leave him out of playing striker

Nice. So we clone McTominay?

People know my thoughts about how I think we should set up defensively, so I'm not going to go there. If we can manage to do that, with McTominay in central midfield, given license to stretch his legs, I think there's something there.

One thing is for sure, though, McGinn is better playing as a second striker than an anchorman.

 

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56 minutes ago, ceudmilefailte said:

Mctominay is our best centre back, our best anchorman and our best box to box midfielder. It's a matter of how much importance you place on each position and who the alternatives are.

Could be our best right back too but that is not a very important position

Conceding goals has become more important than scoring them so we can leave him out of playing striker

Is he any good between the sticks?

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1 hour ago, The_Dark_Knight said:

Nice. So we clone McTominay?

People know my thoughts about how I think we should set up defensively, so I'm not going to go there. If we can manage to do that, with McTominay in central midfield, given license to stretch his legs, I think there's something there.

One thing is for sure, though, McGinn is better playing as a second striker than an anchorman.

 

So you don't agree that McTominay would be our best defensive midfielder if that was where we played him.

 

 

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