Billy Bodin

[friendlygas]

Firstly my very best wishes for a good season for you this year with all the changes taking place.
I see that we have Billy Bodin on trial for 2 weeks. Would like to know your opinions on him.It has been suggested he is a wide man but i always thought he was a striker but if he was he does not appear to have that good a scoring record.

[IanGull01]

My opinion of course.

Didn't rate him. Too much of a primadona. More worried about what his hair looks like and what colour his boots were than the football. Won't win you a tackle or header.

But hey, good luck to him.

[DJ Gull]

Had his moments to shine but all in all he was a bit of a dissapointment.
We had him on loan initially and he was superb but once we bought him he never seemed to reach those levels.
Do hope he kicks on with you guys, he was a player I wanted to do well.

[PhilGull]

Full of potential but seeming to lack the necessary application to fulfil it.

Added in 3 minutes 18 seconds:
As for position, doesn't work hard enough to be a winger in a 4-4-2 nor does he use his strength well enough to play as a striker. Typical modern wingery-striker probably best as the inside/outside forward in a 4-3-3 or 4-5-1 - the Premier League version would definitely be a Spurs player!

Overall just a very frustrating player.




Edit: double post

[tomogull]

Firstly my very best wishes for a good season for you this year with all the changes taking place.
I see that we have Billy Bodin on trial for 2 weeks. Would like to know your opinions on him.It has been suggested he is a wide man but i always thought he was a striker but if he was he does not appear to have that good a scoring record.

Nah - his best position is as a bench-warmer

[taxilady]

he scored a lurvely goal at Pompey...well, he definitely scored it, but was too far away to see if it was lurvely or not ! Other than that, for most of his time with us he faffed too much & frustrated everybody ! Lots of tricks, no end product. Other opinions are probably available !

[Dave_Pougher]

Feel he could have developed into a decent player with the right coaching, maybe wrong.
Just didn't happen for him at TUFC.

All the best to him.

[Sunnysideup]

for most of his time with us he faffed too much & frustrated everybody ! Lots of tricks, no end product. Other opinions are probably available !

Other opinions may well be available, but probably dont sum him up so succinctly and accurately

[leetufc]

I think Bodin has talent, but for various reasons it didn't work out here.

His best spell with us was on loan when he was played in a favourable formation and in a team playing well. I think he looks good if the team are strong and playing with confidence. When he signed we were involved in two relegation fights and I don't think he was the type of player to knuckle down, and got lost quite often in games.

[Burnhamgull]

A very very very poor mans Ronaldo........

He was all about the hair gel. I'll never forget watching him pre-season at Weston Super Mare a couple of years ago, He had a great sun tan, enough hair product to make his hair solid and still produced nothing. Even their defenders didn't fall for the step overs.....

Doesn't work hard enough, doesn't tackle, doesn't track back but probably wants a decent wage.

Good luck with him.

[Gashtufc]

Plenty of talent but a shame that he failed to reproduce the same form from his loan spell previous

[Yorkieandy]

Disagree slightly with Burnham. I've seen Bodin work hard, I've seen him track back to be fair but what I haven't seen is tangible productivity. Neither have Crewe before us nor Northampton after (although he rarely got on the field of play. Reason?).

IMO his addition would be a complete disaster. League 2 last season was brutal. There is no space. Rovers aren't likely to be confidently steamrollering teams willy nilly and knocking it about like Barcelona, conditions Bodin will prefer if he's to achieve anything at all on the green stuff.

Also the added pressure on him to do well at a club with a much larger fanbase whilst at the same time trying to get back on track will also be an issue. I just don't think he's a strong enough character mentally to learn what isn't working for him and improve on it and ultimately to turn his career around.

For his sake I hope he does. It doesn't matter either way to me. This is my view anyway.

[Dave]

Wonder whether we've missed an obvious connection in the form of Lee Mansell, strikes me that perhaps Billy Bodin is on trial at Rovers on a recommendation from Mansell. Sometimes I feel us TUFC fans are little unforgiving and at times unfair.

I remember us being sat in 2nd place and many of us fans being devastated when Billy Bodin was recalled by Swindon, also remember Billy Bodin spending the second half of that season at Crewe, a club that was no where when he arrived and got promoted ahead of us, both us and Crewe fans wanted our respective club s to sign him, we were delighted when he choose us ahead of Crewe who also tried to sign him.

Not sure want this obsession is with every player having to run around the pitch flying into tackles every 5 seconds, Billy Bodin is not that type of player and never will be, if you want a player to get on the ball and make things happen, he can, could be that type of player. Billy Bodin has a flaw, confidence, he is a confidence player, when he's on it, Swindon, Torquay/Crewe loan he's as good as anything you'll find at this level, when he's not he does struggle, as we saw.

He's had a serious injury, one that could have cost him his career, not nice experience for any player, the lad deserves a break, hope he gets it and wish him well.

[friendlygas]

Thanks for all your replies. From what i have read here I would imagine it will be 2 weeks and that will be the last we hear of it because DC is pretty ruthless on handing out contracts which is good after years of paying well over the top for rank average players. I wish you all the best for this season and hope that you can force your way back into the league. I believe you now have a Manager who could well do that because I think he is a Manager who wont sign big names but will make good signings who will make a career in the lower leagues. Good luck.

[hector]

Wonder whether we've missed an obvious connection in the form of Lee Mansell, strikes me that perhaps Billy Bodin is on trial at Rovers on a recommendation from Mansell. Sometimes I feel us TUFC fans are little unforgiving and at times unfair.

I remember us being sat in 2nd place and many of us fans being devastated when Billy Bodin was recalled by Swindon, also remember Billy Bodin spending the second half of that season at Crewe, a club that was no where when he arrived and got promoted ahead of us, both us and Crewe fans wanted our respective club s to sign him, we were delighted when he choose us ahead of Crewe who also tried to sign him.

Not sure want this obsession is with every player having to run around the pitch flying into tackles every 5 seconds, Billy Bodin is not that type of player and never will be, if you want a player to get on the ball and make things happen, he can, could be that type of player. Billy Bodin has a flaw, confidence, he is a confidence player, when he's on it, Swindon, Torquay/Crewe loan he's as good as anything you'll find at this level, when he's not he does struggle, as we saw.

He's had a serious injury, one that could have cost him his career, not nice experience for any player, the lad deserves a break, hope he gets it and wish him well.

I would agree with the above - Bodin was all about confidence and I had also thought about the Mansell link.

At the moment, Bodin's confidence is probably shot. His two seasons with Torquay were very poor and then last season he barely featured anywhere. Add his quite serious injury into the mix and I think he will be a sort of poor man's Martin Phillips, one who will never quite hit the heights he was meant to. When Bodin was here on loan he looked electric.

Sadly, it was never the same again after he signed a contract for us.