Notes from the Habbin: the end of the beginning

With League One safety secured, Garry swings the axe.

So farewell to 2023/24, a Cambridge United season that seemed to go on forever despite very little of note happening. Other than the merry-go-round in the dug-out, it’s hard to imagine any single match or moment will live long in the memory, despite Lyle Taylor’s best efforts to blow up The Gram.

The main thing is the U’s have secured a place in League One next season, having spent the last few months trapped in Schrödinger's relegation battle, simultaneously safe (we have a decent cushion! The teams below us are, objectively, very bad!) and unsafe (it would only need a two-game swing! What if Burton and Cheltenham both go on a run!) from the drop.

I have Thoughts On The Season as a whole, which I may elaborate on at a later date, but Wednesday’s big news was the announcement of the retained list, Garry Monk’s first opportunity to reshape the U’s squad ahead of the new campaign.

Monk was clear in his post-match interview game after the Port Vale game that his ambitions for next season extend beyond simply avoiding relegation, and indeed since he was appointed you could tell he was itching to get through the first bit of his job and move on to planning for the new campaign. So now the beginning of his time in charge is over, what comes next?

See you soon?

Of the players offered new contracts, it is perhaps no surprise to see Mamadou Jobe, Will Mannion and Glenn McConnell offered new deals. All three have shown varying degrees of promise throughout the season and will hopefully continue their development if they choose to stay on.

With the senior players the picture is less clear cut. I did not expect all three of James Brophy, Elias Kachunga and Sullay Kaikai offered new deals, but can see the logic behind it. The trio have been trusted by Monk to play the link role in the 3-4-3-ish formation we adopted towards the end of the season, initially with Brophy and Kaikai supporting a lone striker, then Kachunga playing behind a front two when Monk realised our midfield was so bad we might as well simply not bother having one.

If we assume Monk will be aiming to build a team more comfortable on the ball than either of his immediate predecessors, I think Kachunga and Kaikai can thrive. Both of them, but particularly Kachunga, are good at retaining possession, and having more technically adept players in the team may help them make an impact on games more regularly. If they sign new deals, both need to deliver more performances consummate with their status as senior players in the squad.

I am broadly pro-Brophy (Prophy?) and hope he sticks around too, because for me the qualities and versatility he brings to the squad outweigh his obvious and frustrating deficiencies. While his many detractors will reasonably point to a lack of goals and assists, it’s worth noting he was way out on his own last season when it came to making the most key passes, ie passes that result in a shot on goal that doesn’t go in. Perhaps if we were generally better at finishing his headline numbers wouldn’t look quite so bad.

I don’t think it’s guaranteed that he will stay - I heard he was looking to leave last summer but couldn’t make it happen - but hope he does.

It would seem like we are trying to bin off Jordan Cousins, because if we weren’t we would surely have just announced he had triggered a contract extension, in the same way that Michael Morrison and Danny Andrew seem to have. I’m pretty ambivalent on this one, I think he’s a useful player to have around, but at the same time if we could trade him in for a version that doesn’t give the ball away quite so much that would also work.

Missing you already

There are no big surprises on the released list. I’m unsure I’ll ever truly get over the departure of Harrison Dunk, but it had to happen at some point, and it was always going to be the end of the road for treatment room regulars Haunstrup, Janneh (farewell Saikou, we’ll always have August) and Okenabirhie. Taylor has also been freed up to continue his important work establishing grudges against everyone in the world of football, and perfecting his overhead kicks.

I may have kept Ryan Bennett on for another year, but it is clear from the promotion of Jobe and Rossi to the first team, and the moving of Andrew into a central role, that Monk values mobility in his centre backs, so it probably makes sense to go in a different direction.

For the contracted players placed on the transfer list, a move could be just what is needed. Both Lewis Simper and post-injury Adam May look a bit short of the quality required at League One level - May’s mobility was never the best, and since his return he barely seems to move at all - but both should be able to find takers in League Two or the Conference.

Lankester and Okedina both appear to be at a crossroads in their careers; you would not be surprised if either were able to kick on and show the consistency needed to play regularly at this level or above, but both run the risk of fading into obscurity if their next move isn’t a good one. I’m really surprised how Okedina’s progress has stalled in the last couple of seasons, and it may do him good to get a run of games in a team at a lower level that isn’t constantly on the back foot, and where he has a consistent and more experienced partner alongside him.

For Lankester, he’s either going to need to acquire Brophy-style work-rate or improve his finishing. He had the second highest xG of any player in our squad last season, but only managed one actual G.

If he’d got a bit nearer the six or seven he should’ve scored, we would probably have been safe a week or two earlier, and it’s likely we wouldn’t be having a conversation about his future now. As it is, a number 10 who fades in and out of games without really impacting them is always going to struggle to hold down a place in any team.

Whether we can move on the transfer-listed players, and indeed whether those offered new contracts sign them, will obviously have a big bearing on our transfer business, but either way there’s a lot of work to do strengthening the team down the middle of the pitch. We probably need at least one centre back, two or three central midfielders and three strikers, plus cover at full back. It’s likely to be a busy summer in CB5.