The latest from the club via Chris Coles

[LeedsCityRam]

3 minutes ago, Rammy03 said:

I think that's slightly unfair on Lampard. He bought Bogle through and played him all season. It's all about having the right mix so that you can blood youth while being successful at the same time. In my opinion Lampard did that very well. People criticse him over the signings he made despite the fact that it had been happening years before he even got here. Its quite clear that the recruitment team and Mel Morris are to blame for that.

Bogle was a great spot by Lampard but there was no-one else who really featured other than Bennett, who had obviously been around the squad for a few years by that point.

My quarrel isn't with Lampard (or even Rowett) - their ambition was clear to see & the club could always have said no to their transfers. Bottom line is if you appoint managers like that, you have to accept their make up & can't simultaneously have a totally different strategy. Always believed with Lampard that Mel was totally seduced by the celebrity (a mistake he repeated with Rooney). After all, he told Rowett in the spring of 2018 that the plan was to restrict big name signings & to rely on the Academy more - which is the reason Rowett jumped ship to Stoke. That was the point at which we needed a Cocu-type manager - instead we had one last season of bingeing on high wages/big transfer fees & have been in decline ever since.

 

[Ramslad1992]

9 minutes ago, David said:

This is the first post I have seen since opening the thread, and the perfect one to say I'm sorry if you have messaged/mentioned me and I have ignored you, this morning has been chaos in all honesty, I'm not being lazy, haven't stopped since 8am.

I am now just finalising things by getting a couple of points fact checked to ensure that what I put out is completely accurate and not spend the day/evening correcting myself. 

Feel like I'm apologising a lot lately, it's just I want to you to know I'm not trying my best here, not looking to tease this out, get more views, likes, attention, nothing of the sort.

I'm being sent screenshots of abuse, tweets and posts asking to verify all morning across different platforms, I'm asking you to please stop, in fact please don't even react to this thread as it will only add further to my notifications I have to work through. Never had to deal with anything on this scale before and in all honesty, I'm struggling as I don't want to ignore any of you.

Thanks again to the many for understanding on the forum, love you all and the positive support from last night makes me proud of what we have all created, I just need a bit more time. ??

 

I was only messing mate ?

[cheron85]

3 minutes ago, brady1993 said:

Should we go back to the Clough days where we just had to give them chances because of no other choice ? Ideally no but they'd likely develop faster. Ideally we have a core small squad of around 22 players comprised of signings and the more mature academy talent (think Knight and Buchanan) with academy talent as emergency cover in and around the first team.  

I mostly agree - I've always thought 2 'senior' players per position was adequate - With any player who's started 15+ games in a single season counting towards that (so Knight, Buchanan, Bird, probably Sibley)

However I think the thing we haven't accounted for is leadership on the pitch - Wisdom and Clarke, whilst having experience, were not defensive leaders - Shinnie is an absolute asset and a terrier but is not a leader - And it was noticeable that without Davies and Bielik last season we didn't have that influence on the pitch 

[LeedsCityRam]

2 minutes ago, angieram said:

I agree with much of what you have said here, which is why loans at a lower level aren't always the best indication of what a player is capable of. 

In defence of Lampard though, he was quite good at bringing through the youth, unfortunately not ours! ?

 

Indeed. Harry Kane was very ordinary when on loan at various clubs throughout the League pyramid for example.

We've also had players here on loan who struggled but went on to have some success at Prem level  (Michael Keane, Lingard, Livermore, Danny Graham)

[Ramarena]

Who on earth is doing to PR at the club these days?

The decision to inform the fans of the situation during a very tense period, through a group of representatives is utterly ridiculous!

David and co should not be in this position, fair play on them for trying, but it’s not fair and shows how out of touch and clueless the club is.

[Scott129]

5 minutes ago, RoyMac5 said:

It means we need action. Why is that so difficult to understand? ?

There are two natural cut-offs for this tomorrow at midday to sign for Saturday and 31st August to sign at all. We need action as the first cut-off is fast approaching.

Yeah, but he's not answered the question has he?

It's hardly an insightful contribution - I could have given that answer and I have precisely zero contacts in the footballing world.

[NottsRam77]

9 minutes ago, Scott129 said:

Here's a good example of the sort of thing he likes to put out there...

What does this actually mean? It's just so vague!

It's like the people who share Dalai Lama quotes on LinkedIn - completely and utterly meaningless insight.

I think it is literally what it is 

Mel doesn’t know what the efl are going to say .. when they’re going to say yes or no 

so Nixon sure as hell won’t have a clue either 

[Reggie Greenwood]

1 minute ago, NottsRam77 said:

I think it is literally what it is 

Mel doesn’t know what the efl are going to say .. when they’re going to say yes or no 

so Nixon sure as hell won’t have a clue either 

Loves a feeding frenzy does Nixon must be paid on clicks 

[CollyerDCFC]

28 minutes ago, Mostyn6 said:

He’s a cryptic FUD who’s not worth the clickbait attention. He talks riddles and leaves things open ended so he doesn’t look stupid when nothing happens. He then blocks people who question him. Does have reliable sources at Wigan tho. 

 

9 minutes ago, Scott129 said:

Here's a good example of the sort of thing he likes to put out there...

What does this actually mean? It's just so vague!

It's like the people who share Dalai Lama quotes on LinkedIn - completely and utterly meaningless insight.

The reason I asked in the first place is because I saw a lot of his tweets quoted in here as I've been lurking over the past week. They aren't really written in a way I'd expect a credible journo to do so. However, as you all say - reliable and useful are two different things, he seems a useful source at least.

[brady1993]

6 minutes ago, Kernow said:

I think this point is largely based on hindsight, though. Hopefully we’ll all learn our lesson should it happen again, but if we hadn’t bought the players we did and never got promoted, then people would argue that side too.

It’s a good idea in principal, but we have had some awful luck with injuries. I’ll use a youth striker currently as an example, mostly because I can’t remember who it would’ve been at the time.

But the season where we looked nailed on for promotion and Chris Martin got injured and we slipped to 8th. Darren Bent came in for Martin, quite an expensive understudy I’m sure we’ll all agree, particularly when we didn’t go up. Imagine if we had failed to go up but instead put Jack Stretton in Martin’s place. The criticism would still be there, but for a completely different reason.

The reason we are in this mess isn’t because we bought players instead of using academy players. It’s because of the players we actually bought. Our recruitment strategy has been nothing short of pathetic and it puzzles me how through all the chopping and changing of managers and playing staff, nobody has ever looked at clearing the recruitment team and getting someone in who looks a little further than pissing money up the wall at any big name player or someone who is coming off the back of their first good half-season in their career.

I disagree that it's hindsight and think some of the stuff could be seen as it was going on. And importantly if you were in charge you should have had the vision to see that especially given we weren't the first club to think of something like it (think Southampton).

The issue with your example is that was a season that predates a lot of the issues that we are talking about. Signing a striker  that January at least on the short term did make a tonne of sense as there really wasn't cover at all for Martin (whether it should have been Bent is a whole different disucssion).

I do agree at least in part about recruitment but I think it's really hard to tell where the true problem lies because more often than not I'd guess the Manager sets the recruitment "strategy" at least in broad strokes and it's the task of recruitment to fullfill. Whilst I think we could have been more creative in the market and had better scouting, I think largely the problem with recruitment lies further up stream than the actual people doing the grunt work. With the problem being a combination of a schizophrenic approach to picking managers and then letting completely dictate another completlely different market approach unquestioned. 

[RadioactiveWaste]

5 minutes ago, LeedsCityRam said:

Bogle was a great spot by Lampard but there was no-one else who really featured other than Bennett, who had obviously been around the squad for a few years by that point.

My quarrel isn't with Lampard (or even Rowett) - their ambition was clear to see & the club could always have said no to their transfers. Bottom line is if you appoint managers like that, you have to accept their make up & can't simultaneously have a totally different strategy. Always believed with Lampard that Mel was totally seduced by the celebrity (a mistake he repeated with Rooney). After all, he told Rowett in the spring of 2018 that the plan was to restrict big name signings & to rely on the Academy more - which is the reason Rowett jumped ship to Stoke. That was the point at which we needed a Cocu-type manager - instead we had one last season of bingeing on high wages/big transfer fees & have been in decline ever since.

 

This can't be said enough. That was the time to suck it up and rebuild for a season or two before we go again. The dream was slipping away at that point, but instead of hunkering down for a longer project, it was that last glittering glimer of the big prize.

The last big roll of the dice with Lampard might even have succeeded, but as soon as it didn't we were in the poo.

The bit that baffles me is the bringing Rooney in part. There's clearly no room for anymore big swings at promotion, so give Cocu the breif (build the team, bring the kids through) and suck up a couple of sucky seasons whist we trim, rebuild and hopefully get some productive prospects out of the academy to either sell on or contribute to the 1st team. Oh but we've also spent all the budget on aging Rooney and promised himyour job. And you have to play him because sponsors.

We are where we are. It sucks. I hope the ownership and EFL issues get sorted sooner than later, obviously.

Never mind. It could be worse.

[RoyMac5]

9 minutes ago, Scott129 said:

Yeah, but he's not answered the question has he?

It's hardly an insightful contribution - I could have given that answer and I have precisely zero contacts in the footballing world.

Yes, but I know out of the two of you which I'd more likely believe - hint, not you mate. ?

[brady1993]

6 minutes ago, cheron85 said:

I mostly agree - I've always thought 2 'senior' players per position was adequate - With any player who's started 15+ games in a single season counting towards that (so Knight, Buchanan, Bird, probably Sibley)

However I think the thing we haven't accounted for is leadership on the pitch - Wisdom and Clarke, whilst having experience, were not defensive leaders - Shinnie is an absolute asset and a terrier but is not a leader - And it was noticeable that without Davies and Bielik last season we didn't have that influence on the pitch 

Ideally though you'd have that factored into who makes up your squad though right and the flip side is they don't need to be necesarilly all that experienced ? To be honest though it's something I'm never really convinced is as big deal as it's made out to be and I feel that it's often labelled the problem when the problem is elsewhere. For example whilst I concede that without Davies and Bielik you are arguably down two "leaders" I think the bigger problem was Bielik was tasked with doing about 5 jobs all at once and without we tactically crumbled apart.

Of course you need leaders in the squad but it's just something that no matter how well we are doing on the pitch feels like it's been talked about as being THE problem for as long as I can remember following Derby.  

[tinman]

21 minutes ago, Scott129 said:

Here's a good example of the sort of thing he likes to put out there...

What does this actually mean? It's just so vague!

It's like the people who share Dalai Lama quotes on LinkedIn - completely and utterly meaningless insight.

You mean the Dalai Lama quotes that were never from the Dalai Lama, but instead from Dai in Llandudno.

[Ghost of Clough]

18 minutes ago, angieram said:

I agree with much of what you have said here, which is why loans at a lower level aren't always the best indication of what a player is capable of. 

In defence of Lampard though, he was quite good at bringing through the youth, unfortunately not ours! ?

 

To be fair, he was the only manager since Clough to give Bennett a chance - it only took 5 years.
Bogle was down to luck more than anything, else we couldn't find a suitable loan for him (as he hadn't had any prior first team experience)
He was a big fan of Bird and was slowly introducing him into the team. It would have been interesting to see what would have happened if he was here for another season.

[Jram]

I’d like to echo all the sentiments suggesting the academy could have been better used in the last decade. The likes of Vernam, Rawson and Elsnik would have been able deputies instead of binning money on, at its peak under Rowett, 25-30 first team players

 

[cheron85]

2 minutes ago, brady1993 said:

To be honest though it's something I'm never really convinced is as big deal as it's made out to be and I feel that it's often labelled the problem when the problem is elsewhere. For example whilst I concede that without Davies and Bielik you are arguably down two "leaders" I think the bigger problem was Bielik was tasked with doing about 5 jobs all at once and without we tactically crumbled apart.

Each to their own

I think (especially in a relegation battle) matches can come down to the smallest increments and that's where having leadership figures makes a difference - The ability to pull a defence together to see out the win/draw in the last few minutes - Organising the defence in such a away that you're able to spot the gaps and direct people to fill them - Pushing the team on when they're flagging - Taking responsibility for the ball further up the pitch and holding on to it when options aren't available - Giving the more talented players the support and encouragement to try a pass or a run despite any grief they might get from the fans/manager for failure 

I think we have a lot of talented youngsters coming through - But they need those kind of leadership figures (or experienced old heads maybe) who can help give them confidence - Shinnie is essentially a relative newbie as a midfielder as is Wisdom as a CB - These guys are still learning their own position so can't impart that confidence in other people

[Ramos]

1 hour ago, The_Sheriff said:

So what the F is Mel winging about not bringing enough through :S

I think again this is why the club should of released minutes. The way Punjab rams on Twitter reported the academy comment and the way the rams trust talked about it this morning on radio Derby came across completely different. Punjab rams made it sound like mel was unhappy with the amount that have come through - whereas on radio Derby he talked about it like Mel was just talking still about the importance of bringing through youth and how that’s been a plan over the last few years. Rather than him stating the amount through hasn’t been good enough.  

[simmoram1995]

Hi I’m new to the forum. Nice to meet everyone.

I’ve got to admit that although well intentioned (like a lot of Morris’s reign) the fan meeting has caused more drama, confusion and division. 
 

I really hope we can sign those 8 players we are trying to frantically sign as it gives us at least a level playing field.

 

just a question if anyone is more informed then me, I remember reading Stoke recorded a loss of over £90 million last season alone how have they escaped any punishment and happy has Larry paid £5 million for a striker?

[CollyerDCFC]

1 minute ago, Ramos said:

I think again this is why the club should of released minutes. The way Punjab rams on Twitter reported the academy comment and the way the rams trust talked about it this morning on radio Derby came across completely different. Punjab rams made it sound like mel was unhappy with the amount that have come through - whereas on radio Derby he talked about it like Mel was just talking still about the importance of bringing through youth and how that’s been a plan over the last few years. Rather than him stating the amount through hasn’t been good enough.  

Unfortunately, I think a lot of things said behind these closed doors will become Chinese whispers with all of the original intent lost.