Almost every single supporter agrees the squad needs to improve yet a large number of people question the decision whenever a player is moved on. For example, McNulty - even though his goalscoring record was admittedly ok at Utd considering the amount of game time he had, proved himself to be not good enough (at the moment) for L1 and would be behind Sharp, Done and Adams in the pecking order. Fewer people, but still a fair few, disagreed with letting Alcock go - another who is simply not good enough and would not get a game. Now people are saying we should keep hold of Freeman, who again has others ahead of him in the pecking order and after a decent start to the season, regularly shows his defensive frailties.
Ultimately, Utd will not get out of this league until a large proportion of the following are off the books (preferably permanently) and replaced by a smaller number of higher quality players:
- Long
- Howard
- Freeman
- Harris
- Collins
- McGahey
- Scougall
- JCR
- Woolford
- McEveley
- Flynn
- Wallace J
- Higdon
- DdG
- McNulty
- Cuvelier
We are woefully short in a number of areas (GK, CB (although personally I think Basham should play there with Edgar), AMC, pace on both wings, target man) and none of the above players can ably fill these gaps.
To address the issue of cover should Brayford be absent - options are Flynn (until moved on), Basham, Coutts, new signing during JTW that could cover (i.e. not specialist RB), loan or a free agent so there's absolutely no need to consider not getting shut of Freeman.