The unofficial AFC Rushden & Diamonds messageboard

ParcelFace wrote:I think Leslie is just a panic buy because we've lost Quigley, same reason we brought in Lawless and Kilbride in the summer.

Bit hard to tell at the minute as we've not seen him in his preferred position. Maybe he wouldn't mind actually fighting for his place having stepped up, as many others haven't wanted too.

Bit harsh to describe Leslie as a 'panic buy' after 2 and a half appearances and one goal! He's looked OK to me. Lawless on the face of it was a decent signing but in reality he didn't look anything like a player capable of scoring 40+ goals in a UCL Premier season.

But yeah Kilbride was woeful.

Some players need time to fit in and get some games under their belt before a real decision can be made upon them. Who would have thought Brad Harris would have still been at the club three years later, after his first few matches and a similar estimation can be made of Tom Lorraine. I thought they would have done well to make the bench last season, but both turned out to be key members of the team.

Don't get me wrong, I'm hoping that he does really well - I'm just being super-critical here.

ParcelFace wrote:I think Leslie is just a panic buy because we've lost Quigley, same reason we brought in Lawless and Kilbride in the summer.

Leslie is decent, from what I've seen though he's not a winger.

Also, in my opinion, the biggest obstacle to making the step (no pun intended) from Step 5 to Step 4 is attitude. We saw players leave in the summer who seemed to be able to more than do a job at S4.

Others have come in and struggled to adapt, that could be because the training is twice a week in Northampton, so the time commitment is much more than they would be used to the better standard of players shows up individuals weaknesses which some won't be prepared to work on or they don't fit the style of play.

Quigley's social life was/is well documented so he was always going to be a gamble, the same could be said for Kilbride, futsal is obviously his number one priority and that is a very different game from Southern League football.

Highlights and Interviews
I can't work out how to embed it in a post!

Couldn't make the game but after watching the highlights all I can say about our defending is Wow! That was shocking. They didn't have to work hard to score their goals did they.

Their number 11 targeted Wilkinson's defensive weaknesses and was very effective. I think we need someone else to come in at right-back, Wilkinson is a liability against the bigger teams.