James Collins

would be delighted to be proven wrong by Collins but didn’t see it any time he played for us. Always felt he looked out of his depth.

He is in form though.

AKA pedantic kunt

How many Irishmen have scored a hat-trick for their clubs?

Keane, Walters, Leon Best and Stokes.

It was far across the sea,
When the devil got a hold of me,
He wouldn't set me free,
So he kept me soul for ransom.
na na na na na na na na na
na na na na na na na na.
I'm a sailor man from Glasgow to

hornet just text me to say that Frank Stapleton scored a hat trick against watford in 1983 😀😀😀

Edited by Baldrick - 13 Dec 2020 at 11:22am

AKA pedantic kunt

If parrott scored a hat-trick yesterday the view would be very different.

For me Collins is our only player scoring goals at a high level. We can't expect ireland to score when you look at the players who are not scoring

Connolly, idah, Robinson, parrott, mcclean, odowda are all in contention for the front three of ireland. All play under different managers that cant seem to get them to score, yet, when they play for ireland we expect Kenny to turn them into goalscorers.

To me, its a PR issue with the fans, as far as Collins is concerned. Basically, he is a lad in his early thirties, who spent the guts of his career in the lower leagues, before moving to a club that has moved through the divisions to become a Championship team (but in recent memory, they were a non-league club). He was potentially the victim of the system employed in the last days of the MM era, where he was cut adrift up top, and was in the team in Switzerland, which was the poorest night under the MM era. In combination, this makes it difficult for fans to take him on as a potential front man in an international sense. This would be different if he was three years younger and doing the same for Boro, Blackburn or Brentford.

The difficulty is, our greatest concern is up top. We have just lost our front man to retirement, the natural alternative (Long) is chronically out of form. After that you are either shoehorning a wide player like Connolly or Robinson in up top, relying on the likes of Parrott, or Idah to come good, or else looking at players like Sean Maguire who is neither as prolific or as involved in a Championship team as Collins is. I suspect the desire for Ronan Curtis would even be more dubious.

Collins ticks a number of key boxes.

he is a striker with some good traits playing well in division two, if you are looking for a pretty footballer he will get you nowhere, but he has effectiveness when played to his strengths

aviva8 wrote:

Not near god enough but unfortunately we have no other strikers scoring at the moment

Well i think this is pretty much where we are at the moment, Collins deserves little criticism unless you can put forward a better option... of which there is none.

A player like obafemi is pretty much nowhere with respect to the ireland squad, however if he plays three games and scores a couple of goals there would be reasonable calls to have him in the starting 11.

Were very much in transition.

avfc wrote:

Poor first touch, one footed, slightly overweight journey man and he is currently our best available centre forward.

He's not Pele but he is currently our best bet at 9.

I'd rather persevere with a 19 year old who's performing sh*te now than give more caps to a 30 year old performing at a similar capability. Collins will never get better. Our chances of qualifying for the WC are infinitesimal so we might as well persevere with the kids. With that in mind, we owe it to ourselves after investing approx. half-a-dozen caps to give Idah more support up top with a second striker or someone playing directly off him.

avfc wrote:

Hotlips_Hoolahan wrote:

avfc wrote:

Poor first touch, one footed, slightly overweight journey man and he is currently our best available centre forward.

He's not Pele but he is currently our best bet at 9.

I'd rather persevere with a 19 year old who's performing sh*te now than give more caps to a 30 year old performing at a similar capability. Collins will never get better. Our chances of qualifying for the WC are infinitesimal so we might as well persevere with the kids. With that in mind, we owe it to ourselves after investing approx. half-a-dozen caps to give Idah more support up top with a second striker or someone playing directly off him.

Senior managers job is to pick the best available 11 for the next game.

The only game that matters is the next game.

Collins is currently our most in form striker.

It's one game. Before the weekend, he had 1 in 11 league games (a penalty). His decision making was shocking after coming on in the Wales match and he was similarly abysmal in the Bulgaria match. He may have a different physique than the likes of Idah, Parrott, Connolly, Robinson, Maguire and Long but he's no Daryl Murphy or Jon Walters who will unsettle defenders and get the ball to stick to him. I just don't think he's any better as a short-term alternative than any of the others mentioned. Between the Wales and Bulgaria matches, he had at least three good chances and fluffed all of them, and did little else of note.

Edited by Hotlips_Hoolahan - 14 Dec 2020 at 2:53am