I think our best midfield would consist of Gogic, Irvine and Allan.
Irvine is one half a strong centre midfield pairing - but none of the options would complement him and give us a midfield strength I think.
All decent players, with good qualities but the balance isn't there.
Gogic and Hallberg have the defensive qualities, but not the creative ones. Mallan, Newell and Allan have the creative ones, but not the defensive ones. I suspect this is why we persist with Boyle/Murphy/Wright/Cadden in wide positions to try and give us some creativity.
I suppose I feel if you play Hallberg, it feels like you are playing a man short going forward. If you play Mallan, you're playing with ten men defensively if that makes sense.
This could be the upshot of transfer selection by numbers - trying to squeeze the best players out of the available budget by looking at their positive numbers and making allowances for their negative ones. I think most people are of the view that you couldn't build a team around Mallan AND Allan it is one or other. That's quite a hindrance to your game plan when you can't play two of your big earners together. And this season, JR has had to/chosen to make do with neither.
On a tangent, I thought bringing Cadden in was the end of Wright. I think it was probably the end of Gullan, with Boyle being shifted up top and Cadden replacing Boyle.
I hope we overhaul how we bring players through - Like Lewis Allan before him, Jamie Gullan has probably been here for two years too long. If we aren't going to play them, let them move on to somewhere where they will play. I'll put it out here now that Ryan Shanley will be the next one to leave at the age of 21/22 never having been given a chance/and/or not making the breakthrough.