I’m less convinced than you are… I’m not entirely convinced that Carey is restricted to the extent you suggest either…
I’d be interested to see where he’s forced a decent save from the keeper, because from what I’ve seen he rarely hits the target.
Maybe he’s low on confidence, maybe his ability off the field just doesn’t translate into performances on it (he wouldn’t be the first) …. We need to see more from him though, because what we’ve seen so far isn’t good enough.
I know for a stone cold fact (cos I do) Sonny isn't being told 'go and create, don't worry about defending' and that's fine. It's perfectly within Critch's gift to use a player as he sees fit and overall Critch is doing more right than wrong.
What irks me though is then how people complain he's not 'doing the role of a 10' as he's 100% not being asked to play that role.
I'm not 'convinced' at all by Sonny's success. I'm convinced of his underlying ability and I'll back him as I want us to bring on players like this and I recognise how he's desperately trying to be a more all round player.
It's the way of it. I feel like now everyone is asking him for more risk and if he starts spraying it about and trying cute through balls and losing it, then everyone will be on his back for that.
Think there's a chance of a very good player still. As I said above, CJ is reborn at 28. Carey is 22 and lacks the same grounding of some other players his age. He may or may not do it. But I'll try and credit him for what he does instead of just trotting out the 'does nothing' line as others seem to do.
Off the top of my head...
Good low save away at Lincoln.
Ridiculous first time effort away at Wycombe that hit bar.
Hit bar with header in home game I forget where lost .. derby I think.
Near post effort whisker wide in same game (I think)
Thunder bastard that keeper stopped away at Charlton
Effort yesterday that he hit cleanly and looked to be going in and was deflected just over top (which was just about it for us, 2nd half but people seem to say he was the reason we stopped attacking even though he literally had that one effort
)
I'm not claiming he's on top form, just that he really, really needs something to go his way cos, like Marvin too, I think he's a bit scarred by last season and like Marvin, comes from non league and maybe has more questions in his own head about his right to be there than players who've never been let go/rejected/had to go and play outside academy/league football level.