Summer Rumour Mill

[Ramarena]

50 minutes ago, Kokosnuss said:

I think the ability to spend fees is probably there, but we'll only spend if we feel it's absolutely necessary.

There are more expensive signings who would be 'nice to have' but if we believe that we can bring in a less flashy player to successfully accomplish our aims without spending a transfer fee, we'll choose that route.

Say we spend £1.25m of a £1.5m budget on a striker &/or a No. 10 in this window, but then Bird (having his most influential season to date) does his ACL in November and is out for the season, does the remaining £250k cut it in terms of finding a suitable replacement? If not that's our season buggered - we could have the best striker in the league but if our midfield balance gets mucked up it would be for naught.

Good points. I think a few of our fans forget where we are and where we’ve come from.

Things are going to be very different moving forwards.

[i-Ram]

25 minutes ago, Mihangel said:

Quite - It shows you many people's approach to budgeting - I have £500, I must go and spend £500 as soon as possible. Worry about the rainy day when it rains.....

Unless you want to build on your story, I can’t imagine that future weather conditions are of any significant importance.

[Animal is a Ram]

Spending huge chunks is what got us into this league - and now people are moaning we aren't spending all the budget? I despair.

Our budget is bigger, looking at the back-line signings alone I would be very surprised if Elder, Ward, Nelson and Bradley aren't being paid more than Chester, Roberts, Davies, and Stearman.

There needs to be a mental reset when it comes to transfer fees. Look across the board in League 1, hardly anyone is spending any money, let alone anything above £1m. The Covid effect is still in full swing.

*Edit - this should perhaps have been in the other thread but the two seem to have headed in the same direction

Edited July 20, 2023 by Animal is a Ram

[duncanjwitham]

33 minutes ago, Jimbo Ram said:

Said they will be rotating in the midfield 2 or 3, didn’t he?

I think the implication was more that they would be rotation options for the midfield 2/3 as a whole (so cover etc for Bird, Hourihane etc), not that we would be rotating between those 2 for one of the spots.

[Jimbo Ram]

Just now, duncanjwitham said:

I think the implication was more that they would be rotation options for the midfield 2/3 as a whole (so cover etc for Bird, Hourihane etc), not that we would be rotating between those 2 for one of the spots.

Oh, I see 😊

[whiteroseram]

33 minutes ago, Mihangel said:

Quite - It shows you many people's approach to budgeting - I have £500, I must go and spend £500 as soon as possible. Worry about the rainy day when it rains.....

You've met my Mrs then

[Eoghan1884]

59 minutes ago, Ghost of Clough said:

I think you're the only person other than me to mention him this summer.

Back in December, @Macintosh told us Rosenior had lined him up as a January loan signing and described him as "Brighton's best ever prospect"

He's a versatile player, having played CM, both wings, and CF. Scored 10 and assisted 6 for Brighton in 19 U21 games, mostly at CF, but a few games on the wing.

Here's a Youtube video from a couple of years ago.

Great player and highly rated by everyone in the Irish set up, be very surprised if he doesn’t get a top half championship loan move though

[angieram]

8 minutes ago, Animal is a Ram said:

Spending huge chunks is what got us into this league - and now people are moaning we aren't spending all the budget? I despair.

Our budget is bigger, looking at the back-line signings alone I would be very surprised if Elder, Ward, Nelson and Bradley aren't being paid more than Chester, Roberts, Davies, and Stearman.

There needs to be a mental reset when it comes to transfer fees. Look across the board in League 1, hardly anyone is spending any money, let alone anything above £1m. The Covid effect is still in full swing.

Well said. 

I think when asked about the transfer budget he said, "I have a budget." 

Sometimes a better wage negates the need for big transfer fees. Or spending on a transfer fee means there isn't enough in the budget to pay that player's wages. 

[BathRam72]

13 minutes ago, Animal is a Ram said:

Spending huge chunks is what got us into this league - and now people are moaning we aren't spending all the budget? I despair.

Our budget is bigger, looking at the back-line signings alone I would be very surprised if Elder, Ward, Nelson and Bradley aren't being paid more than Chester, Roberts, Davies, and Stearman.

There needs to be a mental reset when it comes to transfer fees. Look across the board in League 1, hardly anyone is spending any money, let alone anything above £1m. The Covid effect is still in full swing.

Agreed, most of the spend was also down to the constant change in management who then wanted to bring in their type of players. So you can add to those who want Warne out before he has built his own team, who need theirs heads checking. Stability and a sensible leadership is the way forward.

[Ghost of Clough]

41 minutes ago, Mihangel said:

Quite - It shows you many people's approach to budgeting - I have £500, I must go and spend £500 as soon as possible. Worry about the rainy day when it rains.....

A seasonal football club budget is completely different to a personal budget.

Your personal budget has to cater for a potential rainy day at any point in the future. However, a football club budget will be the assigned amount available to spend in that season. You could hold some back in case you need to add to the squad in January, but as Warne has stated, he sees the January window as a period to fix the mistakes from the summer. But, you could use the full budget in the summer and make sure you have adequate quality and depth for the whole season.

[Ghost of Clough]

5 minutes ago, Eoghan1884 said:

Great player and highly rated by everyone in the Irish set up, be very surprised if he doesn’t get a top half championship loan move though

Still only an Ireland U21 player due to bottom half Championship players being chosen for the men's side instead. CMs/AMs selected in the last squad being:

Cullen - Burnley, 1st
Molumby - West Brom, 9th
Browne - Preston, 12th
Smallbone - Stoke, 16th (now Southampton)
Knight - Derby, 7th Championship (now Bristol 14th)
McGrath - Dundee Utd, 12th (now Wigan)

[TomTom92]

Warne also noted the burnout affect of having a small squad and thats exactly what we're going for again this season.

We've lost an international midfielder in Knight and a 20 goal a season striker in McGoldrick. We lost Dobbin and Springett who arguably weren't that great however, so far we've brought in Washington as a workhorse. I really can't see why we're recruiting in this manner.

As i've previously stated defensively the recruitment team have knocked it out the park, but in offence they've been found wanting so far. 

Maybe we're unlucky that the financial money pit has fallen on its bum just as we need to spend a bit. But this is where a manager with good connections could sign a couple of smart signings out of nowhere. 

[Eoghan1884]

3 minutes ago, Ghost of Clough said:

Still only an Ireland U21 player due to bottom half Championship players being chosen for the men's side instead. CMs/AMs selected in the last squad being:

Cullen - Burnley, 1st
Molumby - West Brom, 9th
Browne - Preston, 12th
Smallbone - Stoke, 16th (now Southampton)
Knight - Derby, 7th Championship (now Bristol 14th)
McGrath - Dundee Utd, 12th (now Wigan)

Being Irish, I know this but we usually player 2 in midfield (Cullen and Molumby) rarely play with a 10 until recently where smallbone has played in a few games. Jim Crawford the u21 manager has talked about how special he is and how we don’t want to put to much pressure on him.

[MACKWORTHRAM]

34 minutes ago, Ramarena said:

Good points. I think a few of our fans forget where we are and where we’ve come from.

Things are going to be very different moving forwards.

Agreed. Someone on the forum wanted us to spend £2-3 million on Jonson Clarke-Harris.

Whilst I would love him here. Spending that money on a 29 year old striker on a 3 year deal is an absolute no go.

At the end of that 3 years he'll go for nothing. Doing that is what got us in this mess.

Waghorn, Johnson, Butterfield, Blackman. Circa £18 million there that went for nothing.

[May Contain Nuts]

20 minutes ago, Ghost of Clough said:

But, you could use the full budget in the summer and make sure you have adequate quality and depth for the whole season.

You could try, but it relies on you not making any mistakes...

20 minutes ago, Ghost of Clough said:

You could hold some back in case you need to add to the squad in January, but as Warne has stated, he sees the January window as a period to fix the mistakes from the summer.

...but rarely does a club make no mistakes, as Warne is clearly aware, and if you've used up all of your budget you then have no room to correct them.

Tough balance to achieve.

Edited July 20, 2023 by Kokosnuss

[valakari]

Its like buying a second hand car..you know it will lose its value every year..thats why you have someting called depreciation..and in football terms, ( not the MM way of doing it), if you sign a player for £3m on a 3 year contract..his value depreciates by £1m each season...

[TomTom92]

1 minute ago, MACKWORTHRAM said:

Agreed. Someone on the forum wanted us to spend £2-3 million on Jonson Clarke-Harris.

Whilst I would love him here. Spending that money on a 29 year old striker on a 3 year deal is an absolute no go.

At the end of that 3 years he'll go for nothing. Doing that is what got us in this mess.

Waghorn, Johnson, Butterfield, Blackman. Circa £18 million there that went for nothing.

Agree them fans banging on about JCH are in cloud cuckoo land. But i don't think its beyond the wildest expectations for us to spend a bit of money to bring in an attacker or two?

I would love to see who our targets have been for the forward positions just to see who we've lost out on. 

Look at the 3 promoted teams last season, they all had quality options going forward. Yes Ipswich rolled out the war chest so we can discount them, but no reason why we shouldn't have the same standard of options as Plymouth and Wednesday. 

[EnigmaRam]

3 minutes ago, TomTom92 said:

Agree them fans banging on about JCH are in cloud cuckoo land. But i don't think its beyond the wildest expectations for us to spend a bit of money to bring in an attacker or two?

I would love to see who our targets have been for the forward positions just to see who we've lost out on. 

Look at the 3 promoted teams last season, they all had quality options going forward. Yes Ipswich rolled out the war chest so we can discount them, but no reason why we shouldn't have the same standard of options as Plymouth and Wednesday. 

To be fair, Wednesdays top scorer has 16, 6 of which were penalties. Plymouths top scorer had 13, 4 which were penalties. Increasing our goals across the team is just as good as a 25 goal striker. 
 

Peterborough, Derby, Portsmouth and Cheltenham had strikers scoring more goals than both Wednesday and Plymouth yet none went up. 
 

I 100% agree we need more firepower, but the sum of the parts just needs to be better than last year

[duncanjwitham]

5 minutes ago, TomTom92 said:

I really can't see why we're recruiting in this manner.

As i've previously stated defensively the recruitment team have knocked it out the park, but in offence they've been found wanting so far. 

The way I see it, you're never going to get a player that's very good at everything.  You get some players that are bang average at everything (jack of all trades, master of none types), you get players that have some strengths and some glaring weaknesses, plus all the variations between those.  And the further you go down the leagues you go, the more extreme those things get. At prem level, your bang average players are still pretty good at everything (Jordan Henderson is a good example, I think - he's a decent all-rounder, but not really spectacular at anything).  And likewise, players at the other extreme are going to have a lot of strengths and only a few weaknesses.  

However at League One level, if you want a player that's really good at one or 2 things, you are going to have to accept that he's bad a lot of other stuff.  If you want a quick winger that can cross, you have to accept that he'll probably be injury-prone, or inconsistent, or lazy, or old, or can't finish, or can't pass or whatever.  A player that's good at all that stuff simply won't be available to League One clubs, he'll be playing at a higher level.

How that relates to us is if you make "works extremely hard" an absolute requirement for all signings, you are reducing the pool of potential players significantly.  You are instantly disregarding the likes of Chris Martin (I know, I know, he's just an easy example to use). If you want a striker that works extremely hard, you are going to have to accept that maybe he doesn't score goals or maybe he can't hold the ball up or whatever.  And that's why we're ending up with players like Conor Washington - he meets the one, fundamental requirement, and the rest will have to do.  And it's possibly why we're finding it harder to sign other players - there just aren't that many players available who are good at crossing/finishing/passing/whatever and also run themselves into the ground every week, and they're in high demand.

[Big Bad Bob]

Jeez, I can't believe the comments of some on here (well I can knowing how fickle some fans are) about the lack of transfer fees being spent. Lets take a look at Sonny Bradley - captain of Luton Town when they got promoted to the Premier League. Has a lot of experience and is a great build for a centre half. We signed him on a free. Would folk be happier if we spent £1m on him?

The same applies for the other players we haven't spent a fee on. If Warne is building the team he wants without compromising or spending money, then what is the issue?