funk_hits_the_fan wrote:Phil does make me laugh, I aint gonna knock someone that goes so often to games, but my God what planet is he on.
Romaine Sawyers is a human being, not just a footballer. If I stand and shout dogs abuse at you when all of your opponents are lavishing praise on you, plus the team is above and beyond where it should really be, are you really going to turn around at the end and say, oh yeah thanks so much for that?!
For a very short time I was on the books at Halesowen Town and a kid called Julian Alsop was getting abuse every game from behind the goal - they were calling him donkey, lazy, awkward etc etc and what people forget is players can actually often hear what they are shouting even if its just 50 behind the goal. He could never get his head around it when all opposition teams found him a handful. He left Halesowen that year for free - went on to have a long, successful career in the football league with Bristol Rovers, Cheltenham, Oxford, Swansea plus many more.....lets just say slightly above Halesowen's level! Can picture some of their fans faces now calling him donkey, belly's hanging over their jeans.
My god there's some idiots on here.
I dont see anyone, certainly not myself, saying Sawyers is useless, not worth his place in the team, a donkey etc.etc.... So why draw that comparison?
What I do see, is some sensible people appraising the pros and cons of his game, and his value to the team, countering arguments from others who think he is infallible.
Answer me this - is Romaine Sawyers infallible? Has he reached perfection as a footballer?
For those morons out there, thats a rhetorical question.
I didn't give him "dogs abuse", I told him, pretty straight, in a quiet stadium that he shouldn't be ducking out of headers when there's a chance to score - which is pretty much what I'd expect anyone without sh!t in their eyes would say to any player doing that, it's also what any captain would say to a player ducking out of a header. But because this is Romaine Sawyers, and he's quite a talented player who does lots of fancy flicks, you can't say a bad word against him, and if you do dare to criticise any aspect of his game, you are totally deriding him. This is the problem with moron football fans, there's no middle ground, you either totally love a player and he can't do anything wrong or you hate his guts. I'm neither, I just see where the failings in his game are.
Just look at his twitter account - he believes his own hype, jokes along with the "blame sawyers" hash tag etc. The joke doing the rounds of twitter is that Walsall fans call him lazy - I've not seen anyone say he's lazy.
Can't he take criticism of his game? Is he so precious that he cries every time someone says there's a part of his game that could be improved?
Presumably, he too thinks he's reached perfection, so when he does move on in the summer, he'll walk straight in to the team and certainly wont get his ability tested, or his quality questioned.
As far as I'm concerned, he's a very silky player, great passing, great vision, bags of ability, BUT, he doesn't score enough goals (last goal was in October), he's not physical enough (he still shirks challenges) and he believes his own hype to an extent whereby he visibly gets moody/stroppy when he gets criticised in any way. Do you think Ian Roper or Pedro Matias or David Kelly or Jimmy Walker (to pick a few names out of thin air) went in to a strop when criticised? No, they got down to it and worked hard.
Someone said to me he's our greatest strength and our greatest weakness. When we're 1-0 up away from home, and confidence is flowing, and the game has opened up meaning the opposition midfield are pushed further forward, then his fancy flicks look great, and probably come out. But...when we're 1-0 down at home and we need our most talented player to grab the game by the scruff of it's neck, perhaps score a belter, he's not that player. That's not to say he doesn't graft - of course he does, but his style of play is based of flowing, possession football which isn't always the case. Instead, at times like that, the flicks and tricks dont come off, and he looks daft.
It will be interesting to see how we fair we out him next season. He's played a big part in instilling the footballing ethos that the club has developed over the past 5 years, will his replacement be better? Will they be worse? I don't know, but whilst he may not have Romaine's strengths - he may also not have his weaknesses.
