Newcastle need defensive reinforcements.
Posted on July 26th, 2010 | 167 Comments |
The treatment at St James’ Park is already beginning to fill up, even before a ball has been kicked in the Premier League.
It is worrying that we seem to be losing players left, right and centre due to injury, but an additional concern is the amount of time that players will be out because of these injuries.
Take Danny Simpson as an example, he will miss the first month of the season through injury, and it looks like Steven Taylor will be joining him although that is yet to be confirmed. Tamas Kadar is another player who is fighting to be fit for the start of the season. Add all that together and it is becoming apparent that we are desperately short of players in certain positions for the new season.
It’s sods law that we haven’t suffered any injuries in central midfield as we have between 300-400 players who can cover there. Ok, maybe an exaggeration, but you get my point. We need more players, especially in defence, especially now. Could that force us to reignite our interest for Bolton defender JLloyd Samuel?
Hughton said some time ago that he was interested in bringing the 28-year old defender to Newcastle, but then it all kind of died down and wasn’t mentioned again. Now the signing of Samuel is rearing it’s head again although whether or not this is new interest or regurgitated bollocks is unknown.
For the record, I actually think that Samuel would be a decent bet for cover. He has played all of his career in the Premier League and would be happy to play second fiddle to Jose Enrique at left-back. He can also play at centre-back aswell, although I wouldn’t want to see him there.
As it stands we currently only have Fabricio Coloccini and Mike Williamson as fit, recognised senior centre-backs, which isn’t good. Our other two central defenders certainly look likely to miss the start of the season so something has to be done. Hughton does at least know that.
“If I look at what we’ve got at this moment, defence is probably the area where we’re a little bit light,” Hughton told the Northern Echo.
We have four spaces left in our squad of 25, unless there is a mojor shock and some of our current senior players miss out, in which case there will be more. That does at least give us some room for manouvre. Thing is, it’s fine having the space, but it will need filling, and I can’t see how we are going to fill it, or who we are going to fill it with.
Injury crisis? It wouldn’t be Newcastle without one!
I think Samuel would be good cover for left back. We couldn’t really get anyone to compete Jose anyway and J’Lloyd would be a bargain probably in the region of 500k.
I know Van Aanholt’s name has come up a lot with fans but would Chelsea loan him knowing he will only be cover. Last season he came as a stop gap where his football was guarenteed. Bertrand is one who is further down the pecking order at Chelsea and might be available permanently.
The other left back options off the top of my head would include Danny Fox, Bouma, Shorey, Garrido.
With our budget Samuel is a decent signing in a position where cover only is required.