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Target man....Matt Smith

Much discussion on here about a target man to suit our style. One player I can think of beside Bayo, and that’s John Parkin, who obviously couldn’t do the job any more. Matt Smith from Millwall has been mentioned before, and his contract at Millwall runs out July 2021. Millwall paid around £675000 for him, and maybe they would be open to offers in January. I saw him totally dominate us when he was playing for QPR, and he would make the perfect target man. He’s early thirties and a three year contract with us might appeal as his stage of the game. How much would You pay for him??? I rate him so highly A fee in the region of 1m could tempt him away and securing him could well lead us into staying up and staying in the Championship. Now maybe the time to speculate to accumulate.

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Comments

  • You had something until talking about paying fees. Especially of 1m for a 32year old (by the summer)

  • Boring name though

  • How many goals does he score? Missed some very presentable chances against us recently

  • @chairboyscentral said:
    No chance

    Not for a mere million pounds?

  • Unless we crowdfund it? And the hefty wage...

  • Looking for a target man in the loan market might not be a bad move though

  • One million pounds sterling?

  • @floyd said:
    One million pounds sterling?

    Well a million for one of England's best players is a different matter

  • Let's get Uche fit and see what he can do first

    His injury has really scuppered our plans for this season

  • I'd also be interested to hear what people would prefer in the meantime - Bayo playing every game possible, and exhausted, or playing every second half. I am starting to lean towards the latter after today. I think he can manage 45 every time, and we just have to keep it tight till halftime?

  • I would say Matt Smith is a highly achievable signing judging by lack of faith Millwall have in him and contract situation. He would fit perfectly for Wycombe and is someone that can be unplayable at this level.

  • If he's out of contract in the summer, 100k would be a sensible offer....

  • Kashket can score. Kashket will score. We need to give him the ball in the right place. I suspect we were set up today to use Mehmeti to create those passes. After we lost Curtis that went out the window.
    Matt Smith or Bayo or Samuel or whoever need the right service. If we were missing hatfuls I would be saying get a new striker but let’s tweak the create side first.

  • Yep, for all this "we need a striker, we need a goalscorer" business, unless people have in mind some kind of amazing guy who can create their own chances, it's by far more important to create some chances.

    Kashket score with the right service.
    We've barely given Kashket a chance to miss this season. The goals he's scored have by and large been due to his own closing down.

  • Can't make any permanent signings without getting someone off the wage bill / sending a loanee back first anyway.

    A £1 million transfer is silly talk. Our biggest fee in the summer was £50,000 is for Horgan. We will not be parting with 20x that less than six months later, would be amazed if we bought anyone even if we had the space.

  • Think we need to call in a doctor who can check your noggin @MBS

  • I think the key question we have to ask about any new signing is Does he believe that Jesus died for our sins?

  • I’ve got an appointment on Monday morning Dr. Congo.

  • Look at the size of that thing!

  • In the past decade, I have experienced us getting only two prolific goalscorers on loan: Trotta and Paul Hayes (first time round). And both were in lower leagues than the championship. Matt Smith has played in the championship for a long time without ever really being a prolific scorer, and I dont want to sound defeatist but I doubt whether anybody that has the ability to be a prolific goalscorer in the championship is likely to be available on loan to Wycombe Wanderers. With that in mind, building on being hard to beat and hoping for little bits of magic like what we so nearly got from mccleary today seems like a very prudent strategy, even if it isn't always exciting. For what its worth I really enjoyed todays game and I thought we were largely excellent second half.

  • @OnOurWay said:
    I doubt whether anybody that has the ability to be a prolific goalscorer in the championship is likely to be available on loan to Wycombe Wanderers.

    And even if they were, your examples remind us that you can then have the problem of the player getting recalled if they do too well.

  • While I would be horrified if we spent £1m on a player, I do agree with the sentiment. We desperately need to find another absolute unit to take the pressure off Bayo this season and, in time, succeed him. Although I still think the Beast has plenty left in the tank and can see him playing for us at 40.

    Smith would be perfect but I can’t see that there would be much benefit to Millwall in letting him go for what we could afford. If nothing else it must be pretty handy to know you’ve got a player like that on the bench you can put on if it’s all going wrong.

    I slightly disagree with Gareth’s comment about needing to find another way of playing for when he’s not there. I think the focus needs instead to be on finding another big target man who can win headers and hold the ball up so that we don’t have to change our style, just our target man.

    Our squad remains a group of lower division players that have been inspired by a gifted manager that all buy into a relatively straightforward playing style. The likelihood of them developing another way of playing that enables us to hold our own in the Championship is pretty unlikely.

    So, for me, we should stick to what we know and wherever possible have a big man upfront who can be the fulcrum of the attack and provide chances and quality possession in the final third. We can then surround him with quicker, more skilful, hard working players.

    Uche may come good but I think we need to search high and low to find one of those centre-forwards like Bayo that strikes fear into centre halves just because of their sheer physical presence. I don’t think they even need to be particularly prolific in front of goal, those kind of players often aren’t, but he will need to know how to lead the line and bring others into play.

  • Does this 'Matt Smith' (assuming that's his real name) have a beard though?

  • Agree with @TheatreOfChairs - the strategy in buying Uche was clearly to double down on the big target man, who could learn from the master. The thing about Bayo is that he is absolutely brilliant in speed of thought - if he has time to make a decision, he will often play the perfect pass, or take the shot if it is the right thing to do. There is so much knowledge he could pass on to someone like Uche. Fans of other teams think Bayo is a big lump who can do nothing other than win headers. He has been proven he is so much more than that for year after year.

    It would be nice to play a style that could thrive without Bayo, but I think that the context of being in the second tier makes it a little more unrealistic, as we are then perhaps playing a poor man's style of whatever the opposition are doing. It was more possible in L1 - we had a spell near the start of 2018-19 (from the draw with Plymouth onwards, I think) where we played some neat stuff, and the Bayo debate heated up for a while. I just don't think it is anywhere near that realistic in the second tier. The Bayo setup makes us an absolute pain to play against for anyone, even if it is not quite clicking. The game today was night and day in terms of the pressure we were putting them under in either half, and the Derby fans were acknowledging Bayo's immense impact on their forum, saying GA schooled Rooney on how to change the momentum of a game in midstream. Not just Bayo either - Blooms really played well even without the goal, and nothing delights me more than to say that.

  • With the new Championship rule of only 25 players allowed to be registered, I would imagine the Jan window will see a hell of a lot of wheeler dealing, teams trying to get players out to bring others in. No doubt another chance for agents to line their pockets.

  • we don't necessarily need a prolific goalscorer but someone who has the mould of Bayo ....as that's the most effective way that we play....Matt Smith would be perfect as means that Bayo would get a rest !! but talk.of 1million is silly...GA is much more screwd than that ...

  • Long shot but I wonder if Rob and co can find us a target man in the US college ‘soccer’ system? Or maybe they don’t play that way- anyone over 180Lbs being sent to the gridiron? (I’ve often thought Bayo would make a great tight end).

    I know the mum of a lad from Wycombe who is on a full football (our kind) scholarship at a US university. More attacking midfielder though and I don’t think he’s missing South Bucks and mum enough to want to return post degree.

  • More than ikpeazu in a way i dont see the point of having Parker if we are not going to play him...even to give Bayo a rest. Surely he could do a job in that role?

  • I think the plan is just go to the next strongest striker on FIFA that we can afford.

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