Grigor Pasha writes: While Chairman Avdzhiev is busy trying to shift the players I’ve designated for exit, I’ve moved to the next stage of my assessment of the squad.
This has focused on leadership and set pieces.
Under set pieces I include not only penalties, corners, free kicks, and long throws, but also long shots.
My reason for thinking that way is that long shots can function like free kicks: they can get you a goal out of nothing.
At this stage I’m not just looking at who should be our designated leaders (i.e., captain, vice-captain, and deputies) and set-piece takers, but also who might have potential to go from good to great — or, more realistically, from not bad to actually quite good.
I then put these people straight onto specific training regimes. If you visited at our training sessions just now you’d find quite a bit of penalty, corner, free-kick, and shooting practice going on.
Not long throws, though: there’s nobody even half decent in that area, so I’ve decided to forget about it. Keep the throws short.
One lad I have some hopes for is Tasholov, who Avdzhiev has agreed to send on a leadership course. Tash should be getting plenty of game time because he’s a Bulgarian-tarined U21. Avdzhiev has agreed to send on a leadership course.
Avdzhiev is proving so helpful at the moment, BTW, that I’ve opted to take in my stride his failure to identify a potential senior affiliate.
