Taylor Could Become Fans' Favourite
Saturday, 1st Sep 2012 06:00 New signing Paul Taylor will become a fans’ favourite at Portman Road, manager Paul Jewell has predicted. The 24-year-old signed a three-year deal on Thursday after the clubs agreed an initial fee of £1.5 million with top-up clauses understood to take the price to £2.5 million.
Jewell says the striker’s battling qualities will endear him to the Portman Road faithful: “He’s aggressive, he’s quick, he’s hungry and he looks like he’s ready for a fight.
When I say a fight, I’m not talking about going around trying to get sent off, fighting in the right way — he’s hungry.
“He’s had a tough upbringing in football. He’s played for Vauxhall Motors, he’s been over to Anderlecht, so he hasn’t had a silver spoon in his mouth and he won’t be talking to the media too often.
“He wants to do his talking on the pitch. He’s quite a shy boy but when he gets out on the pitch, once he’s settled in, he’ll be a fans’ favourite because he represents the supporter because he fights for every ball.
“I would imagine that fans would like him because of the way he goes about his job on the pitch," he continued. “I don’t think he suffers fools on the pitch, he doesn’t care who he is playing against. He’s not one for big reputations.
“When we showed him around here on Wednesday afternoon, he was mightily impressed with the facilities and the size of the club. We’re delighted to have him and I’m sure when he settles in he’ll be a good signing for us.”
The early stages of Taylor’s career weren’t without their problems — including a six-month ban for testing positive for cocaine — but Jewell says everyone makes misjudgements at some time in their lives and that his fellow Liverpudlian has done well to bounce back: “He’s obviously made of quite stern stuff mentally.
“I’ve said this a million times regarding other players here and myself, we’ve all made mistakes. Anyone who hasn’t made a mistake is a liar.
“We’ve all made mistakes, I’m not interested in mistakes and the past, I’m interested in the future and what he can bring us going forward and I think he’ll give us a different dimension going forward.”
Jewell says he first noticed him in the 7-1 thrashing by Posh a year ago, Taylor’s first Championship start, in which he scored twice: “He came to our attention when he played against us last season.
“He’ll bring an edge. He can play in a number of positions, he can play wide, he can play up front, he can play off the front. He’s an intelligent footballer that we’re looking forward to having here. He’s got a bit of pace in him as well and that’s a thing we’ve been lacking a little bit.”
Both Taylor and returning loanee Daryl Murphy have given Jewell options: “I think the beauty of the players is that they are versatile. Murph gives us that physical presence in either box that we’ve lacked a little bit this season. And up front, we’ve been a little bit lightweight.
“He can play wide, he can play down the middle. Same with Paul Taylor. He can play down the middle, he can play wide right, wide left, he’s an all-round good footballer.”
The lack of height has proved a problem in the early weeks of the season: “I’ve said before, we’re a small team and we’re trying to get bigger. We’re trying to improve. People say Barcelona aren’t the biggest team in the world, but they’re the best team in the world.
“In the Championship, freekicks and corners and set plays are vitally important, as we all know, and we’ve conceded goals from those because we haven’t been big enough.
“We’ve tried to get the right players in, but we haven’t been able to do that just yet. But as time goes on, we will do.”
Photo: Action Images
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whiskey added 06:04 - Sep 1
holy gush |  | |
ericgates added 06:29 - Sep 1
Slightly disturbed that Jewell knew nothing about Taylor until he was banging in a hat rick against us! I thought management analysed the opposition before matches, not during!
Welcome aboard to all our new players and good luck to the ones that have left. |  | |
bigolconnor added 06:31 - Sep 1
Yeah load of wind and gumpf there from jewlio. |  | |
Mr_Evans added 06:38 - Sep 1
Ericgates; To be fair to PJ, it was Taylor's first appearance for Posh when he scored those two goals.
As much as I despise Craig Bellemy, I'm hoping Taylor has his fighting pedigree.. Give your best for the team and run your socks off and the fans of this club will be right behind you! Hopefully maybe JET will see this guy giving his all and start playing rather than being a 3rd rate Ballotelli wannabe. |  | |
megamoth added 06:58 - Sep 1
It's not really fighting talk from PJ. Even without the new signings we were doing ok prior to Blackpool. Having cleared out the deadwood, I can't help feeling that PJ should be giving his Henry V speach to the lads rather than the "I know we're not good enough but more new faces will come in next week". COME ON! I'm there today cheering the boys on and I expect no less from the manager |  | |
raycrawfordswig added 07:16 - Sep 1
Jewell says the striker's battling qualities will endear him to the Portman Road faithful: “He's aggressive, he's quick, he's hungry and he looks like he's ready for a fight.
Only need another 10 or so like him then. |  | |
cressi added 07:32 - Sep 1
To be fair Peterboro fans say his the best striker they have had in 30 years i understand they have not had a Mariner or a Marcus Stewart but they rate him very highly also meant to give Reading a torrid time tues night here is hoping we have got a gem.Many thought and still think he is premiership bound hopefully with us in the future | | |
Tufty added 07:59 - Sep 1
Come on walberswick give the guy a chance another priskin or the new mariner wait and see. |  | |
itfc1981 added 08:04 - Sep 1
Adam Tanner springs to mind. |  | |
TooleyBlue added 08:13 - Sep 1
Can't wait to see Taylor today, especially as my son is the mascot! Got to be a win. |  | |
hello66 added 08:16 - Sep 1
Poof is in the pudding as they say.......Well if he scores over 20 this season , then we will all be very, very happy fans !
Im looking foward to seeing him at the game today....BLUE ARMY! | | |
TooleyBlue added 08:19 - Sep 1
My son is playing FIFA2012 Ipswich V Huddersfiled. We're winning 4:0. Good omen?????!! | | |
Keaneish added 08:22 - Sep 1
Sorry all for this but i'm gobsmacked by this transfer! How can you not be!?
All summer we've been after a big man, a man with muscle, with a head who can hold the ball up. Davies was our target and we refused to pay 1 million. The price came down to 750k but he opted for city, presumably for better wages and we waited too long!
Why the hell have we splashed a ridiculous amount of cash on 5'7 STRIKER!!!!!???
This transfer figure is unbelievable given the climate, given what we have to spend and given we need a fookin' DEFENCE!!!!!!
Is it me or is this all completely gone to pot? Look how weak our midfield is! Look how weak our defence is and we've done nothing about it but let players go and splash 2 million on a striker who doesn't fit the mould of what we've been after!
Loan players to become perms? What a JOKE!!!!! ITFC - you have failed miserably in this transfer window. You've got the next 6 games to save yours, Cleggs and Evans job for me Jewell because we are going to the dogs and i think every town fan feels the same... |  | |
Stato added 08:32 - Sep 1
On the basis that the positions he can play are currently occupied by Chopra, Martin, JET and Murphy ? it will be interesting to see who Jewell drops today. Considering Chopra was 4th choice for Cardiff when we took him and hasn't performed for us I'm hoping that he is here to put Chopra on the bench. But with Martin not yet signing a contract perhaps he'll end up playing behind a target man with Martin leaving. | | |
Stato added 08:46 - Sep 1
@Keanish
I agree with most of your posts and again I think you're right to make this point. I didn't want Davies but Jewell did and for the reasons you state it makes the Taylor signing look questionable. | | |
JewellintheTown added 08:51 - Sep 1
@Keanish - take the red pill fella and breath deeply. | | |
WorcesterBlue added 08:55 - Sep 1
Said at beginning of window we needed to let The management's plan for the club play our before making judgement. Now's the time and lo and behold there wasn't a plan for the 4th season on the trot. Even a 7 year old on Fifa 2012 would have focused on the defence first and I doubt they would have paid up player contracts before bringing in replacements either. Why are we again relying on loans when with decent scouting we should have targeted lower league and foreign players who fit our requirements without breaking the bank? Nuts!! |  | |
WorcesterBlue added 08:56 - Sep 1
That said welcome to Chambers, Taylor, N'Daw and Murph. | | |
lilcornishblue added 09:16 - Sep 1
This has made me feel very confident!im a trusting man do I will believe that all that Paul says is true and I can't wait to see Taylor and kourouma get going in the next couple of weeks lets hope we can banish the bad de ja vu that we are having from last season with a good solid win against hidisfeild now that their main man has gone (which for a couple of weeks I think they will have trouble coping with!) and that will give us about a mid table place for this weekend and a good base to build on for rest of the season hopefully in the jan transfer window we can finish what we started on bloyd and hopefully get a cb (st ledger being the main target) but until then let's try and win the games we need to win or draw and draw the ones we predict to lose!! COYB |  | |
budgieplucker added 09:21 - Sep 1
When the dust settles I think this will prove to be a decent signing. However It does strike me as a panic buy - I think he will give JET & Chopra a much needed kick up the rear which will only be good. I think Boyd would have been a reasonable signing as well.
Having said that some of the teams that were below us last year have strengthed considerably.
Davies and Baldock at Bristol and Sharp and Coppinger at Forest. It just makes me annoyed that a club of our stature couldn't put together a deal like one of these. I think both these pairings would have given our team a real threat and greater rate of conversion of chances.
PJ is though treading a tightrope by leaving us so exposed defensively. I just hope that his mate Tony Pullis doesn't let him down or that another Stoke player gets injured or even Matthew Upson changes his mind.
|  | |
NITFC added 10:13 - Sep 1
Posh forums constantly praise Taylor and many of their fans say how good he was for them. That sounds encouraging to me |  | |
NITFC added 10:17 - Sep 1
....and they reckon Boyd is better by the way | | |
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