I'm not much of a fan of Mansell in CM to be honest - his distribution isn't good enough for me.
However, I think Terry has it right here - with (probably) 3 huge and obviously tough games coming up, we are very short of experience and presence in the centre of midfield and desperately need a striking option on the bench.
Ellis does give us another threat from set pieces and a potent one, we seem almost too reliant on trying to hit Branston every time, he's getting marked by 2 or 3 defenders now and this may give Ellis some space to attack.
Defensively Ellis has come back well from a break before.........it's risky but his inclusion and Mansell to CM with Lathrope does give the side a bit more balance.
O'Kane to RM and Billy to come on fresh for the last 20.
There have been a couple of calls for Ellis to come back into the side recently and whilst there is every chance he would come in and do a good job for us, lets not forget the reason why he was dropped in the first place. He was becoming a bit of a liability. He was responsible for several of the goals conceded during his last 3 games, mistakes aplenty and sent off for a challenge he didn't need to make because he was caught out of position (I wasn't that far from the incident and he did catch him). On top of all that his confidence was, possibly still is, shot to pieces. If he gets an opportunity now chances are his confidence would still be low or he would be worried about making a good impression and not as committed as we would need him to be. I'm not so sure it's such a good idea to bring him in right now, after all 'if it ain't broke, don't fix it'. Robertson has been playing well and combines well with Branston and whilst Mansell hasn't been as effective over the last few games, I'd take him at right back over Robertson any day.
We are unbeaten in 11 and 3 clean sheets out of 4, just because we haven't won the last 3/4 games I'm not convinced of the need for such a knee jerk reaction.
If it is to release Mansell into midfield then I believe the options we have already are good enough to ensure that we keep Manse at right back. I think Lathrope and Oastler in the middle with Okane and Robinson wide, with Tomlin and Zebs up front,allowing Zebs to drop if he wants/needs to. That leaves Kee and Stevens on the bench as the obvious replacements. The added advantage of this is that, with the exception of Oastler, they have been playing with each other for a few games now so they should be used to it/each other, changing it around now smells ever so slightly of desperation to me.
Now I'm not saying Ellis is a bad player, its just that it would frighten me more to see the team disrupted so much to accommodate him, or the move of Mansell to midfield. Not something I would advocate with so much at stake so late in the season.
As always it's just my opinion.
I pretty much agree with you there Richard and think the lack of confidence in Oastler is misplaced. Looking at Oastler's stats, he has started 18 matches with only two losses, both narrowly 1-0 away to Accrington (10 men, crap pitch), and Chesterfield (probable champions) and these two do have the best home records in the league.
OK, he may be very defensive and quietly gets on with the job but that is probably what we need for the next 1 - 4 matches.
I think fans generally agree that Kee shouldn't start on the right wing and technically Zebs is the best player we have in this position but we are short up front and where would you then put the talent of O'Kane who has played right across midfield and in the hole this season? As always, it is about the balance of the team and sometimes there is no right or wrong answer but it just comes down to opinion.
Some very excellent points in the last two posts, who`d want to be a manager `eh?
Some excellent points and what it all boils down to is if we go with Lathrope and Oastler in central midfield then we had better hope that Gillingham and Stevenage don't manage a point each or it will be goodnight vienna.
Suggesting that Ellis had become a liability is utter tripe. So he got sent off - so what. How many defenders get dismissed.
I don't think its a lack of confidence in Oastler - he may well be a better option than Lathrope - but both of them in central midfield? do me a favour. We are not going to win the play offs with that combo, thats a dead cert.
Lathrope and O'Kane with Oastler in front of back 4. Fairly sure that's been done already. Wings of Tomlin and Zebs, interchanging with Robinson the other forward.
Oastler/Lathrope last played together when Bradford got drubbed (possibly their only pairing?).
Ellis was very poor in January and justified being dropped, a whole 2 defeats since he was withdrawn against Hereford (1 of which he started in and got sent off) says enough.
How long does a player have to be out for before he is considered again to play?
Ditmar - Looking at dot com this morning I think Bucks agrees with you!
Aussie - surely it depends on how the defence is perfoming presently - 5 clean sheets in the last 6 games shows that they are doing OK although to be fair Robertson did make a few mistakes against Chesterfield!
Maybe you weren't able to get to see him much before he was dropped, wasn't that around the time when you were disillusioned with the club.
He most certainly was becoming a liability. It wasn't just the sending off at Accrington, he was already making plenty of mistakes in the 3/4 games before that. His confidence was obviously shot to pieces and it was right at that time for him to be dropped.
I'm not saying he is a bad player, in fact I would go as far as to say that he is the best centre half we have at the club when he is on top of his game, unfortunately we haven't seen him play like that for a while now, probably at the time when higher league clubs were coming in for him. The point I was making is that now isn't the time to put him back in and hope that somehow he has regained that sort of form. However, having not played much that is unlikely to have happened and also don't think he is fully match fit. Hopefully he will get a good pre season behind him and come back next season as our starting centre half, but right now I don't think he should start, but as I said in that post its just my opinion and as Aussie rightly pointed out who would want to be a manager.
Don`t get me wrong here because I like Chris as a player and as a person but he really needs to stop pushing his opponents so obviously and the shirt pulling, someone needs to teach him how to do it so it doesn`t look so blatant or just cut out doing it all together! Mark doesn`t need to push and shove like Chris does because he is a better player and will get to the ball instead of the player, some of the recent games at home I have cringed at times waiting for the ref to give the opposition a pen because of Chris pushing and pulling players about, fortunately the refs haven`t been good enough to spot the fouls or have just bottled it!