Starting XI’s

[Sydney Posse]

Expect us to go 442 this season.

GK Johnny Maxted

RB Jake Caprice
CB Rory McArdle
CB Tom Parkes
LB Lewis Page

RW Randell Williams
CM Archie Collins
CM Nicky Law
LW Jack Sparkes

CF Matt Jay
CF Ryan Bowman

Backup: Lewis Ward, Pierce Sweeney, Jordan Dyer, Nigel Atangana, Jake Taylor, Joel Randall, Josh Key, Harry Kite, Nicky Ajose, Alex Fisher, Ben Seymour.

Overall a good squad and plenty of options to play a few different formations. I’d like us to maybe be able to bring in another striker but that will only happen if anyone leaves. I think we should be aiming for the top places again.

I'd personally stick Ward in goal but they are both decent keepers for this level. I think Parkes may be recovering from a minor injury as well. Very interested to see if Ajose finally proves his worth this season as well and would not be totally surprised if he starts. The rumour mill suggests the managers is not keen, but I'm not so sure

 

[shoddycollins]

We have quite a few injuries right now, don't think any of them will be back for Saturday. This puts our line up at this

GK - Rory Watson (Terrible, one of the worst keepers in the league)

RB - Jai Rowe (Normally a back up, only played 1 league game)
CB - Tyler Cordner (Back up)
CB - Jacob Bedeau (Looked promising towards the end of last season)
LB - Frank Vincent (CM playing at LB)

RM - Ryan Colclough (Great player when he can be arsed which is hardly ever)
CM - Alex Gilliead (Normally a winger but may play CM)
CM - Lewis Spence (No clue if he's any good yet)
LM - Abo Eisa (One of our very few good players)

ST - Ryan Loft (Four FL goals)
ST - Kelsey Mooney (One FL goal)

Things aren't looking too great right now, looking at the other squads I think we may be in a bit of trouble.

Olomola still not in contention? I'd certainly be starting him over Loft.

 

[Bottega Don]

Olomola still not in contention? I'd certainly be starting him over Loft.

He's out injured for 2 months, he'd be starting next to Kevin Van Veen if they weren't both injured.

 

[Casey]

Every time I look at this I come up with a different variation. The only constants are Morris in goal , Craig at Centre back, Hessenthaler in midfield and Nadesan up front.

Gk; Morris
Rb: Adebowale (played 60 minutes in the last friendly but really a cb)
Cb: Craig
Cb: Tunnicliffe
Lb: Doherty (only left footed defender we have )

Cm: Hessenthaler
Cm: Francomb
Cm: Jack Powell

Lwf: Tyler Frost (signed from Reading Academy)
Cf: German
Rwf: Nadesan

Subs: Archie Davies (rb); Fergusson (cm), Sam Ashford (cf), Dannie Bulman (cm, 41 yrs old now); Dalison (cb); Sesay (lb, cm); Alfie Jones (gk)

If Nadesan gets injured we are weak up top. Frost has no great record of scoring in academy football, German has 1 league goal and Ashford was at Conference south last season.

We seem to have accumulated centre backs. 5 on the books. None of whom would worry me if they were named in the starting line up.

Lewis Young has been injured for a while. He tends to play most of the games at right back. Then we have some interesting youngsters who could feature in games. I personally like the look of one who I think is Salah-Edine but the numbers on the backs seem to be random. Brian Galach has looked good in the highlights of friendlies and we have just signed Sam Matthews from Bristol Rovers.

We're fine apart from up front and left back.

Casey

 

[masi51]

I think we have a good blend going at the moment, 2 deep at almost every position with 3 or 4 still likely to come in with a couple of the younger lads getting loans elsewhere. Bit thin upfront and the defence is a worry early on but I think we'll have no problems scoring goals if we keep the majority fit.

GK - Crellin

RCB - Santos
CB - Delaney
LCB - Taft

RWB - Jones
CM - Comley
CM - Sarcevic
LWB - Gordon

CAM - Crawford

ST - Delfouneso
ST - Doyle

Dont see Delaney starting if Babtiste is fit...Goalie a huge gamble but Evatt rates him. Happy with our wing backs but would play them in a more traditional flat back four drop one of the centre halfs bring in Darcy/white into the midfield and go 442 gives us more energy

 

[meanderson]

Dont see Delaney starting if Babtiste is fit...Goalie a huge gamble but Evatt rates him. Happy with our wing backs but would play them in a more traditional flat back four drop one of the centre halfs bring in Darcy/white into the midfield and go 442 gives us more energy

Yeah I can see Baptiste starting regularly if he stays fit, I think the lineup above is our strongest though once the season is in full flow. I don't see us ever playing a 4-4-2, we just don't have the wide players for it in the squad. 4-3-3 would have been an option until the Politic injury, now we'd need to add a replacement for that to be viable.

 

[Son of Cod]

I think we have a good blend going at the moment, 2 deep at almost every position with 3 or 4 still likely to come in with a couple of the younger lads getting loans elsewhere. Bit thin upfront and the defence is a worry early on but I think we'll have no problems scoring goals if we keep the majority fit.

GK - Crellin

RCB - Santos
CB - Delaney
LCB - Taft

RWB - Jones
CM - Comley
CM - Sarcevic
LWB - Gordon

CAM - Crawford

ST - Delfouneso
ST - Doyle

Has anyone flagged Comley up as a weak link for Bolton yet? Decent enough player at this level, but not for a side with title winning aspirations.

 

[masi51]

Yeah I can see Baptiste starting regularly if he stays fit, I think the lineup above is our strongest though once the season is in full flow. I don't see us ever playing a 4-4-2, we just don't have the wide players for it in the squad. 4-3-3 would have been an option until the Politic injury, now we'd need to add a replacement for that to be viable.

Unfortunatly i agree....just got to give Evatt time it may go tits up until christmas but he will get it right

 

[Worcestershire White]

Has anyone flagged Comley up as a weak link for Bolton yet? Decent enough player at this level, but not for a side with title winning aspirations.

They all could be weak links yet as it is almost a complete new squad; defence were bobbins for the three Crewe goals and National League defenders may not handle it. Time will tell and I dont think we will have the flying start that some are predicting but we should be challenging by Xmas

 

[meanderson]

Has anyone flagged Comley up as a weak link for Bolton yet? Decent enough player at this level, but not for a side with title winning aspirations.

All part of the system, looks a very tidy and active player, there to keep the ball moving and harass the opposition. Don't think he'll be a weak link but if he is CM isn't a position where we're lacking options so it's not too concerning.

 

[masi51]

Has anyone flagged Comley up as a weak link for Bolton yet? Decent enough player at this level, but not for a side with title winning aspirations.

Really.......He had the highest pass completion rate in this league last year.....what more do you want from a holding midfielder

 

[Jonny12]

GK: Liam Roberts (Can go from being top 3 GK in the league to dropping a clanger mid game)

RB: Cameron Norman (OK at best, we're actively looking for competition for him)
CB: Dan Scarr (Quality centre half)
CB: James Clarke (Managers love in, captain, steady, hasn't shown his best for us yet)
LB: Callum Cockerill-Mollett (Youth product - last chance saloon to make the starting LB his own, very promising though)

RM: Josh Gordon (POTS last season - naturally a ST but pushed out wide as he is too good not to play, should get 10+ this season)
CM: Stuart Sinclair (The bearded viking, quality when fit)
CM: Danny Guthrie (Our media team are trying to force a nickname of "The General", I prefer "Talented crock" cause he is Championship quality on the ball when fit - which was hardly ever last season)
LM: Wes McDonald (Our best player)

CAM: Rory Holden (Somehow got him on a permanent after his loan last season. Was shite in 2019 playing as a RM but when he was moved to CAM after the turn of the new year was first class and a cut above - we have high hopes for him)
ST: Caolan Lavery (Managed 10 goals in a injury hit first season for us, dependant on his fitness should get 15+, if not we have Josh Gordon and the frustrating talent Elijah Adebayo behind him.

All the noises from the club is we will be looking for play offs after retaining most of our squad from last year where we ended the last few weeks in top 3 form - looking to build from that. Can't say I disagree with them, just need one or two more (RB, RM, no2 GK) to really give us a good chance. A lot of our depth is very exciting youth prospects like Alfie Bates who managed 21 apps as a first year pro and was fantastic. Players like Sam Perry, Joe Willis, Tom Leak and 15 year old Jayden Campbell will be looking to follow in his footsteps.

 

[Chris FGR]

A couple of injuries? I wish!

Norman
Armer
Dixon
Kayode
Dickenson
Patrick

is our current injury list. And the rate it’s going there’ll probably be more added to that by Saturday, then more by the following Saturday.

​

Why would more and more of your players get injured and the other ones not recover?

 

[Moomin]

GK: Liam Roberts (Can go from being top 3 GK in the league to dropping a clanger mid game)

RB: Cameron Norman (OK at best, we're actively looking for competition for him)
CB: Dan Scarr (Quality centre half)
CB: James Clarke (Managers love in, captain, steady, hasn't shown his best for us yet)
LB: Callum Cockerill-Mollett (Youth product - last chance saloon to make the starting LB his own, very promising though)

RM: Josh Gordon (POTS last season - naturally a ST but pushed out wide as he is too good not to play, should get 10+ this season)
CM: Stuart Sinclair (The bearded viking, quality when fit)
CM: Danny Guthrie (Our media team are trying to force a nickname of "The General", I prefer "Talented crock" cause he is Championship quality on the ball when fit - which was hardly ever last season)
LM: Wes McDonald (Our best player)

CAM: Rory Holden (Somehow got him on a permanent after his loan last season. Was shite in 2019 playing as a RM but when he was moved to CAM after the turn of the new year was first class and a cut above - we have high hopes for him)
ST: Caolan Lavery (Managed 10 goals in a injury hit first season for us, dependant on his fitness should get 15+, if not we have Josh Gordon and the frustrating talent Elijah Adebayo behind him.

All the noises from the club is we will be looking for play offs after retaining most of our squad from last year where we ended the last few weeks in top 3 form - looking to build from that. Can't say I disagree with them, just need one or two more (RB, RM, no2 GK) to really give us a good chance. A lot of our depth is very exciting youth prospects like Alfie Bates who managed 21 apps as a first year pro and was fantastic. Players like Sam Perry, Joe Willis, Tom Leak and 15 year old Jayden Campbell will be looking to follow in his footsteps.

I fancy Walsall to be right up there. Clarke should get the best out of them now he’s settled in as boss. Some decent players there too.

 

[hellogregory]

Why would more and more of your players get injured and the other ones not recover?

Because that’s been the pattern of the past 2 weeks.

 

[The Terminator]

We’ve signed literally one player (who was here on loan last season). So it’s a really different-looking:

GK: Lawrence Vigouroux

RB: Sam Ling
CB: Jamie Turley
CB: Dan Happe
LB: James Brophy

DMC: Ouss Cissé
MC: Craig Clay
MC: Jobi McAnuff

FW: Conor Wilkinson
FW: Lee Angol
FW: Jordan Maguire-Drew

Reserves: Sam Sargeant, Myles Judd, Joe Widdowson, Josh Coulson, Josh Wright, James Dayton, Louis Dennis, Danny Johnson, Ruel Sotiriou.

Kids: Shadrach Ogie, Jayden Sweeney, Hector Kyprianou, Brendon Shabani.

Defence is shite. Midfield is workmanlike. Forward line flatters to deceive. The good news for us is that the squad players are almost all roughly as good as the first team, so there won’t be much of a drop-off when the inevitable rotation/injuries happens. The bad news is that there isn’t a very high standard to drop off from. Liking the look of 15th.

I'd agree with that, I think Wright will start ahead of either McAnuff or Clay in midfield though on Saturday.

We have a settled squad and good numbers, if lacking in quality in places - Particularly at full back in terms of defending.

Ouss Cisse is an excellent holding midfielder in this league.

If Jordan Maguire-Drew can keep his head screwed on, then there is no reason why he can't have a good season and play at a higher level - But he's got to get his mind more focused. His stats for us in terms of goals and assists in his 18 months with us are very good.

We need more from Lee Angol and Conor Wilkinson this season, both suffered with injuries last season and we didn't get the best out of them on a consistent basis, a shame because both on their day can deliver in this league. Both of them will be out of contract at the end of the season and I'd get rid of them both if they don't step up to the plate this season.

 

[E10rifle]

We need more from Lee Angol and Conor Wilkinson this season, both suffered with injuries last season and we didn't get the best out of them on a consistent basis, a shame because both on their day can deliver in this league. Both of them will be out of contract at the end of the season and I'd get rid of them both if they don't step up to the plate this season.

Angol can jog on, but I’m slightly in love with Conor Wilkinson. I think it’s the mysterious way in which he’s absolutely brilliant at football, but doesn’t actually score any goals or do anything else useful. The most quixotic player I’ve ever seen.

 

[meanderson]

Angol can jog on, but I’m slightly in love with Conor Wilkinson. I think it’s the mysterious way in which he’s absolutely brilliant at football, but doesn’t actually score any goals or do anything else useful. The most quixotic player I’ve ever seen.

This the same Conor Wilkinson we had as a young lad? We couldn't stand the bloke. Given a chance at that level you'd expect him to be all hands to the pump, 100% every minute, but he just never seemed arsed. Strolled about like he thought he was a Berbatov when he was more of a Rasiak.

 

[E10rifle]

This the same Conor Wilkinson we had as a young lad? We couldn't stand the bloke. Given a chance at that level you'd expect him to be all hands to the pump, 100% every minute, but he just never seemed arsed. Strolled about like he thought he was a Berbatov when he was more of a Rasiak.

Same guy, yeah. Dumb enough to still have a bit of a temper, but I think he was one of those players that needed to have the shock of dropping down to non league to get his arse in gear. Can’t really question his effort so far. Makes defenders down here look silly most of the time and shoots accurately and powerfully with both feet. Just... doesn’t score.

 

[Son of Cod]

Judging on the pre season we'll be going with a 4-3-3 in

GK- McKeown

RB- Hendrie
CB- Waterfall
CB- Pollock
LB- Preston (Apparently signed hasn't been announced)

CM- Hewitt
CM- Rose
CAM- Williams

LW- Scannell (Reportedly signed after impressing on trial)
ST- Green/Hanson (If he's fit)
RW- Jackson Jr

Yeah, there seems to be a lot of people thinking we'll start with wing backs but I'm with you in that I think 4-3-3 is more likely. I'd switch Wright or Tilley for Jackson Jr in your lineup and maybe even Clifton for Hewitt. If Preston doesn't sign we'll have to do the latter and play Hewitt at RB and Hendrie at LB.

For the opening game, it'll have to be Hewitt at RB and as things stand Hope at LB so Clifton almost certainly starts unless we sign a midfielder. A full back (preferably one who can play both sides but left sided if not) has to be a priority in terms of next signing surely.

Really.......He had the highest pass completion rate in this league last year.....what more do you want from a holding midfielder

Didn't know that, to be fair. Where can I see these stats for the division? Maybe he's kicked on from the two spells we had him, when he was distinctly average for this level. Failed to really impress when I've seen him for Colchester since too.

 

[Conker]

It would be a miracle if Lee Angol finally delivers, could work for Hermes.

 

[Greenacres]

Based on our pre-season it looks like we'll be playing 3-5-2. Would expect something like this on Saturday:

GK - Luke McGee

RCB - Udoka Godwin-Malife
CB - Jordan Moore-Taylor
LCB - Chris Stokes

RWB - Kane Wilson
CM - Dan Sweeney
CM - Carl Winchester
CM - Ebou Adams
LWB - Nicky Cadden

ST - Aaron Collins
ST - Jamille Matt

The likes of Liam Kitching (CB currently injured), Dom Bernard (RCB/RB), Elliott Whitehouse (CM banned for 6 games) and Scott Wagstaff (CM/W) could just as easily start when available, Hard to tell our strongest xi at the minute.

I pretty much agree with the team that Chris posted and think it looks a bit stronger than last season, in a couple of key areas. Midfield looks to have a bit more to it, like the look of the wide players, Cadden and Wilson based on a few highlights from games at their previous clubs (still surprised we managed to sign Cadden as he looks at least a level above Division Two). Up front we really were lacking last season, our now departed left back Mills being top scorer probably says it all, and think that Matt gives us a really genuine striker that most defences will fear...it just remains to be seen if one of our young forwards can seize an opportunity to become his natural strike partner, there are several candidates who are all of a muchness. I have a feeling that Collins might get the nod on Saturday but it could be someone like Josh March or Matty Stevens who can achieve that if given the opportunity...one of them needs to!

 

[Conker]

Bit of a stab in dark because I honestly not sure what GC is thinking but I’ll give it a go.

GK -Marek Stech

CB - Rollin Menayese/Aaron O'Driscoll, Ryan Sweeney, Farrend Rawson

LWB - Mal Benning, RWB - Corey O'Keefe

CM -Harry Charsley, Ollie Clarke, George Maris

ST - Rose, Maynard.

Ollie Clarke, Maynard, will be first choice but Clarke might not be fit enough, and Maynard might not quite be ready for the first game, plenty of options if not though, Cook, Reid, and Bowery.

Really like the look of Corey O’Keefe, Benning needs some competition because I feel like he might be a tad complacent. I’m worried about a lack of leadership at the back, still think not resigning Pearce (if a option) was a big mistake, we will miss him.

If Clarke isn’t fit, I imagine Perch would be in his place, we don’t really have any wingers so Benning and O’Keefe are vital, although at least down the right we have competition.

 

[Vanni]

Has anyone flagged Comley up as a weak link for Bolton yet? Decent enough player at this level, but not for a side with title winning aspirations.

And George Taft is another weak link. He may have been decent before he signed for the U's but he was only average for us. And when he's poor he's unbelievably poor. He's too slow and he really should win more headers for a lad his size.

 

[masi51]

And George Taft is another weak link. He may have been decent before he signed for the U's but he was only average for us. And when he's poor he's unbelievably poor. He's too slow and he really should win more headers for a lad his size.

Crap for you because your players brought him down to your level
Cream they say rises


You even admit he was good before he joined you

 

[Conker]

I’m surprised Bolton didn’t sign Pearce, I mean they still could, but he’s so much better than anything else they have.

 

[masi51]

I’m surprised Bolton didn’t sign Pearce, I mean they still could, but he’s so much better than anything else they have.

You released a player...he touted himself all round lge 2 nobody wanted him so you give him a payrise to come back. mugs

 

[Vanni]

Crap for you because you players brought him down to your level
Cream they say rises

All I'll say for now is that I fully expect your manager to replace him with someone else after say 10-12 games into the new season. He's seemingly a good lad so I do wish him luck but I just don't think he's good enough for an aspiring top 3 side like Bolton.

 

[masi51]

All I'll say for now is that I fully expect your manager to replace him with someone else after say 10-12 games into the new season. He's seemingly a good lad so I do wish him luck but I just don't think he's good enough for an aspiring top 3 side like Bolton.

We have 8 yes 8 centre halfs on our books

 

[Conker]

You released a player...he touted himself all round lge 2 nobody wanted him so you give him a payrise to come back. mugs

Pearce is deffo better than anything you have, why get so defensive about it?

Who have we given a pay rise?