Roy complains every week we have a small squad! so if there fit we have to choose who to play,in there best positions,
if he moans johnsons not great and i do agree with that at times and he doesnt like him in defence its worth trying him further forward! one things for sure if as roy says johnsons form is bad then he should try to encourage good play not crusify are players in public
Hit the nail on the head here. We have 21 (is it?) players over 21 in the squad. That means that if 4 players are injured we can't field a match 18 without using the youth (and Aurelio is automatically injured). Since we also have a large number of central midfielders, it stands to reason we are either going to be playing players out of position or blooding youngsters in position; and there really isn't all that much difference between these two options so a mix of these should be used (eg starting Maxi on the wing and substituting him for Pachecho, but then moving Stevie G to the right and putting Pacheco in the hole or as a second striker OR SOMETHING that keeps 11 players on the park in positions where they are comfortable). It should always be remembered that giving a youngster experience will generally help his game in the long term, and if our squad really is SO bad then putting youth players on to gain experience for the long term cannot possibly be worse than the status quo (and it might even prove to be a boon in the short term as well).
All this clearly explains why Shelvey plays on the wing, for example.
No, it bloody doesn't.
Roy is making up a lot of excuses, some of which are at least marginally valid (we DO have a small squad - but so do clubs like Aston Villa and I don't recall Martin O'Niell having this many issues with it last season despite the same number of games), but we have several options available to us none of which he is using, and he had a chance in the transfer window to address at least some of them instead of signing old and average players (who were obviously going to be a cut above the bad players we already had, right?).
Johnson may not be a great fullback, but he does offer something going forward. Now you can adjust your tactics to fit his attacking tendencies so that his forays actually pay off every now and again, or you can make him appear to be absolute crap by forcing him to play to his weaknesses. Which of these is going to suit an attacking team (never mind the player himself)? I'm not defending Johnson here, because he's not the best player, but for the manager to single him out in the press (and then apologize while standing by his opinion, which means it's not an honest apology) instead of someone like Poulsen (who doesn't deserve to touch the 'This is Anfield' sign) is rank, especially when coupled with tactics that will never suit Johnson; tactics picked by the man who is saying he's rubbish, a man who then complains about squad depth while not picking Kelly for the last game either.
Mismanagement, pure and simple. Complain about the squad all you like, these are the guys we have and the vast majority of them are international players [either full or at age-level], but the manager simply isn't prepared to adjust his system for a squad that quite obviously doesn't fit it. Not enough common sense is going around inside that 63-year-old head. He's not prepared to think his system is at fault. He is not adaptable, and that is why he is failing. The sooner he gets [oops] off with the fans for singing Kenny's name the sooner we can justify getting rid of him for non-footballing reasons (because those are all he and his die-hard supporters are clinging to right now).
