The Squad for 2019-20

[Ian]

They may have offered him a really good deal.

 

[Rockford's Love Child]

I’m in shock. Not that I expected him to join us, or stay at Walsall - but to drop down to league 2 after a decent season in a struggling team? Must be financial surely

Mansfield have spent a fortune in the last couple of years and must have outbid some decent League One clubs to sign him.

 

[bigmart]

Mansfield have spent a fortune in the last couple of years and must have outbid some decent League One clubs to sign him.

Last season their playing budget was supposed to be £3.5 million so he has clearly gone their for the money

 

[Sparky]

And Tollit gets a 2 year deal at Blackpool. Hope he doesn’t come back to haunt us.

 

[Rockford's Love Child]

And Tollit gets a 2 year deal at Blackpool. Hope he doesn’t come back to haunt us.

That is an incredible deal for him given his recent record. It will be interesting to see how it pans out.

 

[Boz]

Cook is a very good signing at that level. I thought Mansfield were cutting back, but with signings of his calibre, maybe not.

Tollitt is a big surprise. Hope it works out for him.

 

[Rockford's Love Child]

We are apparently interested in James Vaughan, possibly between us and Bradford. I don't know how much football he has played recently, but potentially a good signing.

 

[Boz]

Vaughan seems to have had rather a patchy career and a bit injury prone. While I wouldn't mind him as part of the squad, his recent record doesn't suggest that he'll be a prolific scorer.

 

[Rockford's Love Child]

Vaughan has played fifty games for strong Wigan and Portsmouth sides in the last year and a half and I would be happy if we signed him. He has never been prolific but we won't be signing a proven twenty goal per season striker; we need two or three strikers to weigh in with five to ten goals. Unfortunately, he seems set for Bradford.

 

[drwhoman]

It sounds as if we are not able (or willing?) to compete with other clubs financially. The team clearly needs to be strengthened. It will be a test of MM's persuasive powers it seems. Should I be surprised that one or two of the loanees from last season have either not been approached to sign or have not been willing to sign if this was the case? The likes of Nelson and Morris are both looking for new clubs. I would take some sort of punt on McCullough as well although that would have to be a carefully constructed financial deal, given his injury position.

 

[Sparky]

Tollit has made some interesting comments about not getting a fair chance last season - before and after his spell at Wrexham. I remember thinking this when the likes of Pringle and Morris weren’t doing much but we got promoted so Ben can’t complain too much!

Not sure about Vaughan. He’s a handful and aggressive but not sure if he can be relied on for a full season

 

[Rockford's Love Child]

In fairness, when Tollitt was given opportunities last season he did not do anything to suggest he deserved a starting place. Aside from a twenty minute cameo at Stevenage he was awful, whatever he says now. Smith, Morris and Pringle were all deservedly ahead of him in the pecking order.

 

[aldoes mustache]

god this pre season is one of the most frustrating ive ever known . no new players yet not much rumours . and not much coming out of the club we have sold 4150 season tickets . oh we have 3800 tickets left for the liverpool game so going to be a sell out . but they need to get the fingers out of there butts its gonna be a long season with one forward on the books who has only had two seasons scoring just 10 in each .

 

[Ian]

Amazed Tollitt has got himself a move to Blackpool. Apart from a productive loan spell at Wrexham, he done very little albeit injured a lot. I hope it works out for him though as he could do with some luck. The position we are stuck in is a difficult one because we aren't going to be able to compete with a lot of other teams financially and yet we find ourselves a 30-goal a season striker down. I think we might have to take a punt on a lower league player who can bang them in and hope he can make the step up.

 

[Boz]

In fairness, when Tollitt was given opportunities last season he did not do anything to suggest he deserved a starting place. Aside from a twenty minute cameo at Stevenage he was awful, whatever he says now. Smith, Morris and Pringle were all deservedly ahead of him in the pecking order.

I saw very little of Ben in action last season, but remember him coming on in the first home game v Cheltenham. Was hoping that he’d do the same as the Stevenage cameo, but he seemed very nervous and cautious. By the time Morris and Pringle arrived, he was on the way out, but there seemed to be a disconnect in the relationship with MM before then.

Like AM, I’m starting to get a bit twitchy about the lack of signings or even rumours of signings. While it’s likely that things are happening behind the scenes, it would be good to have some new recruits soon.

 

[Sparky]

New recruits would be nice but also what about the likes of bucko and daggers - have they been offered deals given they were squad players? Arguably we should also be offering a new deal to Jennings as out of contract next season

 

[Rockford's Love Child]

I think we will see more activity once the majority of contracts run out on 30th June. I am not sure what people expect the club to do. If we can't compete financially with a number of clubs at this level, we have no choice but to stay patient until players lower their demands and / or players within our price range are out of contract. Do we really believe the club are making less effort this summer than in the previous four ?

 

[Rockford's Love Child]

New recruits would be nice but also what about the likes of bucko and daggers - have they been offered deals given they were squad players? Arguably we should also be offering a new deal to Jennings as out of contract next season

There seems to have been a deliberate policy of not announcing deals until they are completed, possibly because the contract offers to existing players might change depending on who else is available.

 

[drwhoman]

As RLC says we have to be patient but new players will not have much time to bed in with the first friendly against Liverpool on 11th July. Mind you we should probably just close our eyes on that one which is a money raising exercise!

 

[Boz]

The first couple of seasons the Palioi were in charge, we did a lot of business early. Think at present we’ve 10 players contracted for next season, may be more if some/all the youngsters accepted their first pro contract offers. Two of those ten are long term injuries. While I wouldn’t be bothered if we fielded a team of reserves and triallists v Red Scouse, would hope that we’d have significantly added to the squad by the time of the friendlies which follow.