++Charlie Kelman signs on a 4 year deal++

There's some ridiculous defensiveness here about Kelman. 

At the moment he looks less effective than our other options for the front two, TC, Miles and Tanto, whether down to fitness, or how they suit our system. That's not me writing Kelman off, that's me wanting us to play our current best 11 on Saturday in a tough away game. With the way we play, the physicality of Miles or Tanto will cause defenders more problems, and hold the ball up better. Godden fitted the Nathan Jones way of playing better than Alfie May, as he's more physical and can hold the ball up.

Yes Kelman was a big money signing, but Tanto was around £1.5m so hardly signed to be a backup either. And how much are TC and Miles worth? A fit and firing Miles will be worth way more than Kelman in a year's time.

killerandflash said:

There's some ridiculous defensiveness here about Kelman. 

At the moment he looks less effective than our other options for the front two, TC, Miles and Tanto, whether down to fitness, or how they suit our system. That's not me writing Kelman off, that's me wanting us to play our current best 11 on Saturday in a tough away game. With the way we play, the physicality of Miles or Tanto will cause defenders more problems, and hold the ball up better. Godden fitted the Nathan Jones way of playing better than Alfie May, as he's more physical and can hold the ball up.

Yes Kelman was a big money signing, but Tanto was around £1.5m so hardly signed to be a backup either. And how much are TC and Miles worth? A fit and firing Miles will be worth way more than Kelman in a year's time.

Exactly. No one is saying he’s shit, writing him off or saying the signing will fail. Just saying exactly what was being said before we signed him, he is not Godden! If we play the way we did with Godden there and put Kelman there instead, it won’t work. Hopefully that isn’t the plan but based on the limited evidence so far, it might be 

Callumcafc said:

Was asked what I thought about Kelman in June before we even were linked and at the time I said I wasn’t sure where he would fit the system. Godden managed to fit the system after Nathan Jones realised how deceptively good he was with his head and with his back to goal. I don’t know if Kelman has developed those qualities yet.

The fact he’s not previously done it at this level (yes he’s young) and we paid a big fee for him does not help with my anxiety around this transfer.

I hope it’s misplaced.

If you’d asked any fan on here last season, who would you rather have up front Kelman or Godden. Then nearly everyone would say Godden, for exactly that reason in that his attributes fit the role 

We clearly wanted Kelman and have a plan for him. My assumption was that he would play the other striker role, so next to Godden/Leaburn but so far that hasn’t been the case 

Maybe our plan is far more long term, we want him to develop his aerial and back to goal ability so that he can play Godden’s role. I am fine with that because if successful then he will be worth more than £3.5m, but in the short term for this season he could struggle with that role 

thenewbie said:

NabySarr said:

Callumcafc said:

Was asked what I thought about Kelman in June before we even were linked and at the time I said I wasn’t sure where he would fit the system. Godden managed to fit the system after Nathan Jones realised how deceptively good he was with his head and with his back to goal. I don’t know if Kelman has developed those qualities yet.

The fact he’s not previously done it at this level (yes he’s young) and we paid a big fee for him does not help with my anxiety around this transfer.

I hope it’s misplaced.

If you’d asked any fan on here last season, who would you rather have up front Kelman or Godden. Then nearly everyone would say Godden, for exactly that reason in that his attributes fit the role 

We clearly wanted Kelman and have a plan for him. My assumption was that he would play the other striker role, so next to Godden/Leaburn but so far that hasn’t been the case 

Maybe our plan is far more long term, we want him to develop his aerial and back to goal ability so that he can play Godden’s role. I am fine with that because if successful then he will be worth more than £3.5m, but in the short term for this season he could struggle with that role 

This is my current belief, he's not been bought (just) for what he does but what we hope he WILL do. Kelman himself has professed admiration for Godden, he probably is open to learning and development to improve aspects of his game.

Yeah that makes the most sense. I just wouldn’t be starting him and expecting him to do all of that now though. If he starts it should be with Godden or Leaburn 

I don’t think Kelman is a better striker in that role than Godden or Leaburn are at the moment. But I do think he could definitely be a better option than TC and Olaofe for the second spot, so I’d rather he played there while we develop him to take over from Godden. Maybe when Godden returns we will see that change 

Kone is a better signing than Kelman. I don’t think Kone would have signed for us though, he will be worth at least £10m in the future so was always going to have interest from more established championship teams. QPR have done well there 

_uptheaddicks said:

Some of the comments in the past few days are nothing but an insult to Kelman. Oh well, at least it's easy to note which posters follow themselves rather than their club and players.

How is someone saying that they'd prefer Miles or Godden up front to him, an insult to Kelman? None of the comments in the last 2 pages have slagged off Kelman, called him useless or lazy. It's just been people preferring other members of our squad at the moment. 

Ditto preferring Kone to Kelman, which even if you disagree, if a perfectly reasonable position to take. The likes of Swansea and Leicester were after Kone, whereas our rival for Kelman was L1 Luton.