Baines

[Bally]

He was fucked on Sunday and I swear he was carrying an injury to his right leg, the run he made near the end of the game ended with him prone, arms spread above his head and him taking very very deep breaths, he was jogging back into position all game and he's lost a good 5 yards of pace, which is to be expected really, he needs someone in front of him to do most of the donkey work, for him to overlap and whip a cross in, why do you think everything we are doing is going down the fucking right.

[themilkycoffees]

I said it in the summer and I'll say it again. Great player in his day, absolutely finished now. 100% needs to be replaced.

[Hawkandro]

Amazing that we failed to sign a back-up. Another dereliction of duty by Walsh/Koeman/Moshiri/Glenda the cleaner/who fucking knows.

[Evertonian in NC]

Amazing that we failed to sign a back-up. Another dereliction of duty by Walsh/Koeman/Moshiri/Glenda the cleaner/who fucking knows.

The notion that he'd be able to play every single match with Europa on the slate was madness.

He'd need some rest even without it.

[Lxxx]

It's easy to say we should have signed another left back in the summer. We also needed a goalkeeper, two centre halves, a right back, a few midfielders, a few strikers, a few wingers.... I think Walsh needs some slack cutting really, it's unrealistic to expect him to sign a brand new first 11 as well as send half a dozen of the U-23's out on loan and replace them too.

[KoemansNumberTens]

It's easy to say we should have signed another left back in the summer. We also needed a goalkeeper, two centre halves, a right back, a few midfielders, a few strikers, a few wingers.... I think Walsh needs some slack cutting really, it's unrealistic to expect him to sign a brand new first 11 as well as send half a dozen of the U-23's out on loan and replace them too.

I agree but I think it then comes back to Rooney, Klassen and Sigurdsson. You kind of lose a little sympathy when you see they did manage to sign 3 players for that 1 position.
Though rightly or wrongly I blame koeman much more than Walsh

[Evertonian in NC]

I agree but I think it then comes back to Rooney, Klassen and Sigurdsson. You kind of lose a little sympathy when you see they did manage to sign 3 players for that 1 position.
Though rightly or wrongly I blame koeman much more than Walsh

It was Koeman's hard-on for Rooney without a real, structured plan for how to use him other than "he will just make everyone better by his awesome presence."

[Lxxx]

I agree but I think it then comes back to Rooney, Klassen and Sigurdsson. You kind of lose a little sympathy when you see they did manage to sign 3 players for that 1 position.
Though rightly or wrongly I blame koeman much more than Walsh

Completely agree. I reckon Klaassan and Rooney were at the insistence of Koeman and Sig was a mutual decision. I can see the merits of Rooney and Sig but the Klaassan signing took up time, money and effort that would have better spent on another centre half/forward, leaving a much more balanced squad.

I'm willing to cut Walsh a lot more slack than Koeman on the summer window although getting back to the thread topic, a body able to fill in at left back should have been a priority from the day after we sold Oviedo. 

[Waltzer]

It's easy to say we should have signed another left back in the summer. We also needed a goalkeeper, two centre halves, a right back, a few midfielders, a few strikers, a few wingers.... I think Walsh needs some slack cutting really, it's unrealistic to expect him to sign a brand new first 11 as well as send half a dozen of the U-23's out on loan and replace them too.

It is unrealistic to sign 11 new players but you'd have thought he might be able to prioritise a bit better. Struggle how or why you'd want to cut him some slack when it's almost footballing suicide what he did in not getting a striker in. Let's not forget a majority of our business was done early so he had ample time you do something, anything, even a loan, but he completely screwed up.  In my mind he shouldn't even be in a job at a multi million pound organisation with that level of failure.

[KoemansNumberTens]

It is unrealistic to sign 11 new players but you'd have thought he might be able to prioritise a bit better. Struggle how or why you'd want to cut him some slack when it's almost footballing suicide what he did in not getting a striker in. Let's not forget a majority of our business was done early so he had ample time you do something, anything, even a loan, but he completely screwed up.  In my mind he shouldn't even be in a job at a multi million pound organisation with that level of failure.

Walsh? are you assuming he had free reign to sign any striker he rated with the attributes koeman required? My assumption is that he had a very short list of approved strikers from koeman rather than a free reign. Surely if that's the case then koeman is more responsible than Walsh is

[Cereal Killer]

I was looking forward to reading some more opinions on Baines but seems this has turned into another Walsh/Koeman - who's fault thread.... 

[74Blue]

It's where Barry was great. He would read the game and move into the space vacated by the wing back so we're not left exposed. Gueye or Schneiderling should do the same

That is absolutely spot-on.
It's also the reason why the Bainaar partnership was so good. Baines could give it to Pienaar, safe in the knowledge he could bomb on and receive the ball back whilst Pienaar would instictively drop in to cover the space that he'd left.
With a player on a similar wavelength to him, Baines is still a very good player.
What I don't really understand is why he's been completely dropped from dead ball duties. In theory, we should be fucking lethal from free kicks. We've got Baines with a sweet left wand & Siggurdsson with a sweet right peg. Then there's also Rooney, who can take them too. We should be utilising all three of them to make sure that ANY dead ball situation around the opposition box is at least resulting in a shot on target. The onus on the attacking players then changes slightly, as they gain another option when they get the ball - win a cheap free-kick.

[Lxxx]

I keep getting these strange feelings like I've been here before whenever I read a Baines thread. 

[Coyb12]

His defending for their goal was fucking embarrassing.

[Duncs_a_legend]

It's so weird how the left back and striker positions were not addressed in the summer.