[Archived] Benni Signs !

[rover6]

I'm not sure if I'd have preferred Mido. Whilst the Egyptian's a more skilful player imo, he is a loose cannon and would surely not have lasted long (altho similar things were said about Bellamy).

However, I'm pretty confident that the McCarthy - Roberts frontline will be very good. Pace and power and no Jon Stead in sight.

[pick32]

good signing wont get more than 15 goals but him and roberts upfront just nips bellamy and kuqi.

[Cocker]

Dont know if this has already been added

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[Hughesy]

Love these comments from the West ham board

1 Jesus they'll thump us if we're not at our best when we meet.

They do lack a little bit of flair. Must say though to be fair wouldn't class them as boring - remember when they played spurs at white hart lane - they were awsome.

2 Great signing for them. We were after him for a lot more than that.

Need to be careful though guys or we could end up with our faces covere in egg, being realistic they won't go down. Go through their team and you'll find like i did they've got one hell of side. Freidel, Nelson, Neil, Reid, Pedersen, McCarthy - not a bad backbone their.

Hope i'm wrong, but just have a feeling they'll be up there again this season.

[OscarRaven]

anyone who thinks we have a stronger front line must be taking some serious drugs.

We will miss bellamy in so many ways. Rather similar to when we lost duff. Oposition players used to try and double up on bellamy because he was so good, so it left areas open for other players.

same thing used to happen with duff.

everyone then convinced themselves pre season that we were better off without duff, as we had reid, emerton and fergusson.

how wrong was everyone then!

i hope benny and roberts do well and will get behind them, but If I had the choice, i would have had bellamy no questions!

So the fact we scored a significant haul if not more (will have to check) points when Bellamy was injured last season is explained how?

Rovers are stronger up front IMO and the balance is better which is important.

[Jan]

anyone who thinks we have a stronger front line must be taking some serious drugs.

We will miss bellamy in so many ways. Rather similar to when we lost duff. Oposition players used to try and double up on bellamy because he was so good, so it left areas open for other players.

same thing used to happen with duff.

everyone then convinced themselves pre season that we were better off without duff, as we had reid, emerton and fergusson.

how wrong was everyone then!

i hope benny and roberts do well and will get behind them, but If I had the choice, i would have had bellamy no questions!

Well, as one of only a handful who thought we were infinitely weaker without Duff seeing what was brought in to replace him, I'd like to say that this time I think we will be better off. OK, Bellamy is, on his day, world class, and I don't think any of the three brought in are that, but that's the point. Between the THREE of them I think we've improved the front line immensely (I don't think that the loss of dick-off was of any import whatsoever - he was pretty useless last season to us-so don't think any of them really were replacing that).

At least this time we've replaced properly. Replacing a world-class left winger with two central midlfielders who were average at best and a right back/winger when at that point we had a surfeit of each was always pretty dumb. But then............... (For the record I think Reid has improved hugely and is actually quite good now)

[daren]

Dont know if this has already been added

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Ha! Saw that myself. I love the images myself, especially the Blackburn postcard (see below)

[Finch]

Dont know if this has already been added

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That's just brilliant!

[RoyRover]

I'm delighted that we have signed Benni as he is a quality player. We'll have to wait and see if he can replace Bellamy and score regularly for us. You'd think that he would be able to do such. In a perfect world we would have been able to pair Bellamy and McCarthy together. There were doubts last year about Bellamy and he showed us how what he could do. A partnership of McCarthy and Roberts looks very potent, great speed, size, strength and the ability to finish. I presume that we are no longer persuing Mido or other potential strikers?

[arealbrfcfan]

Over the moon about this transfer. Benni is totally reliable and will stick a fair few in for us. I remember when Porto beat Chelski in the Champions League group stage back in 1994 in the first game against Mourinho. So we have the extra bonus of knowing he likes to play well against his former boss

Edited July 28, 2006 by starscascade

[thenodrog]

Must be the heat wave that cemented it! Somebody must have told him it's like this all the time.

[Presty On Tour]

Dont know if this has already been added

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thats top drawer quality fairplay mate

[Shevchenko]

I'm not sure if I'd have preferred Mido. Whilst the Egyptian's a more skilful player imo, he is a loose cannon and would surely not have lasted long (altho similar things were said about Bellamy).

Seeing as how he kept stalling it was pretty evident that he didn't want to come to Rovers.

So I'm glad the club pulled out of that particular deal.

As for Benni, I'm pleased with the signing. He should be good for 12 - 15 goals a season and with Roberts hopefully bagging 10 or so and MGP keeps getting his 10 or 12 we're looking good. I'm not expeting anything from Jeffers and will take anything from him as a huge bonus.

[Hughesy]

Benni McCarthy & Roberts or Bellamy & Dickov.

Id take McCarthy & Roberts any day.

Bellamy was injury prone and I often felt that we could have done better had he not be part of some of the attacks we had. Quite often players would get into good positions and then instead of receiving the pass it would get knocked onto Bellamy instead. I felt we played to him too much.

Now we have a partnership upfront which is full of pace, strength and power. McCarthy has excellent runs and he scores some classy goals. I honestly believe they are both capable of at least 15 goals each.

[Ozz]

At which match do you all think Benni will break his leg in? (Rovers injury curse part 23)

[AndyC]

I don't think anyone underestimates the effects of the loss of Bellamy, AndyC.

But what would you have us (including Hughes) do? We have to deal with what has happened and who we can afford to bring in. Under the circumstances Hughes has done exceptionally well.

I'm not disagreeing with that roversmum - I actually think hughes has done a great job of securing a decent front line for next season & i hope it all works out well.

My point is that I disagree that we have a better team now that bellamy has gone.

[speeeeeeedie]

Top site Cocker. I've never heard of it. This one had me laughing: Newcastle Hospital FC

[mode_m]

Well it was worth the wait for all this....so happy about signing benni, I cannot wait to see him in a rovers shirt and scoring goals!

[AndyC]

Yes, but Reid wasn't the player he is now, Emerton didn't (big error there!) deliver the goods often enough and Ferguson was a big baby. If these two can form a good partnership than that is better than just having Bellamy up there. Don't underestimate the skills of Benni, while Roberts showed last year that he can cause anyone trouble. If we can also add another striker as well as some other things I would be very pleased. We can also now play balls into the box and someone just might be able to head it!

Bellamy could create goals and chances from out of nothing. To be perfectly honest, I don't know enough about roberts or mccarthy to totaly judge yet. Is roberts another dickov type player? one that will run all day and try and out-muscle opposition, os is he something a little classier? Same goes for McCarthy - I hope he's lightening quick, with a great first touch, an eye for goal and a good header of the ball, but time will tell!

I will, as always fully get behind whoever is wearing the blue and white, but lets just wait and see how good these 2 are together.

Who do we play pre season at ewood?

[daren]

Bellamy could create goals and chances from out of nothing. To be perfectly honest, I don't know enough about roberts or mccarthy to totaly judge yet. Is roberts another dickov type player? one that will run all day and try and out-muscle opposition, os is he something a little classier? Same goes for McCarthy - I hope he's lightening quick, with a great first touch, an eye for goal and a good header of the ball, but time will tell!

I will, as always fully get behind whoever is wearing the blue and white, but lets just wait and see how good these 2 are together.

Who do we play pre season at ewood?

The New Zealand national side on Saturday the 12th, 15:00. Which is nice! Has the admiral's team been sorted out yet (both sides want him, but apparently no swapping at half time).

[BigDom]

Benni....Welcome to Ewood Park.....may you bring pace, skill, flair and 25 goals !!!

Benni McCarthy & Roberts or Bellamy & Dickov.

Id take McCarthy & Roberts any day.

Bellamy was injury prone and I often felt that we could have done better had he not be part of some of the attacks we had. Quite often players would get into good positions and then instead of receiving the pass it would get knocked onto Bellamy instead. I felt we played to him too much.

Now we have a partnership upfront which is full of pace, strength and power. McCarthy has excellent runs and he scores some classy goals. I honestly believe they are both capable of at least 15 goals each.

I totally agree. We will no doubt miss Bellamy but Dickov was starting to get right on my t*ts last season....his constant diving and subsequent moaning while play was going on around him

Benni + Roberts is a good start and with the addition of Jeffers and another forward and/or attacking midfielder we will be in good shape

[AndyC]

why so optamistic ?

people should have more faith in MH. his record as rovers manager demands that.

MH bought kuqi and there is no way you will ever convince me he is worthy of a place in a side challenging for Europe.

Granted - we had no cash and so MH had to take a punt on him, but his record signing forwards isn't proven yet!

Bellamy - great buy

Kuki - terrible

mccarthy - time will tell

jeffers - ditto

roberts - ditto

i'd rather we kept gallagher, loaned out derbyshire and sold kuqi to go along with the 3 new boys.

but Dickov was starting to get right on my t*ts last season....his constant diving and subsequent moaning while play was going on around him

totally agree with that.

Great thing about dickov leaving, is that hopefully our relationship with the referee's will be better now.

One thing Big Sam did a couple of years ago, which i thought was genius, was to invite some of the refs to train with the team, so that they could help the team to interpret the new laws being introduced.

What it most probably did, was allow some of the players to get to know the refs and vice versa. I bet some 50-50 decisions would surely then have gone in their favour in the future!

Edited July 28, 2006 by AndyC

[Drakefyre]

How can you say that McCarthy and Roberts are terrible? That just blows my mind!

And Kuqi was not terrible! He got some very important goals last year after signing on a free - absolutely a good "buy."

[AndyC]

does anyone have any videos of him scoring goals?

How can you say that McCarthy and Roberts are terrible? That just blows my mind!

And Kuqi was not terrible! He got some very important goals last year after signing on a free - absolutely a good "buy."

sorry - mistake with the keyboard!! I'm saying we need to wait and see how they turn out. I'm lookign forwrad to seeing them play as much as everyone else!

I could have scored the goals that Kuqi did last year!

[chris]

youtube obviously, get with the times