Our Away Form

[Alf]

I think it's been a mixed bag in terms of aquisitions, but agree that the overall vision has been dire.

On one hand Carva is a 3-4m player who cost 13m and we've well overpaid for someone who still needs significant development. Fine if we're gonna give a manager 2-3 years developing said players and not expecting top 6 by Jan, awful if we're not.

Mendes had our pants down on that one.

I like the kid but hideously wrong price & wrong player.

He's the sort of player you want to tempt at 16, 17, 18, for peanuts, pop him into the academy for a couple of years, then get a year or two out of him, before we sell for an inflated 13m to someone else.

We also made what, to me, is one of the stupidest buys ever (right up there with Silenzi) in Soudani at 3m. A player who's never experienced the physical challenge of this league, who's over 30, and yet who's game is based mostly on physicality. Absolutely asking for trouble expecting a 30 year old who's games based on physicality to come over here and hit the ground running in the Champ for a promotion push.

Again, nothing against the player but always bad business, always likely to break with very little chance of any profit.

But on the other hand I think Lolley's been an excellent signing

For £900k?

That's the sort of deals we want to aim for.

13 Lolley's, or 1 Carvalho?

It's not rocket science, is it?

Grabban the only real quality one which stated we meant business

& even that was flawed, buying him injured, & leaving Murphy as main cover?

The board & club need to run the admin & business side of things, and leave the recruitment to MON in the Summer. 

Very much, although I trust Martin significantly more than the last guy & doubt he could do worse with that sort of money.

It really is simple stuff aint it?

What concerns me with Carvalho is his mentality. I think he's pretty weak-minded, and goes missing when it counts.

I'm not sure that you can change that in certain players, and I wouldn't be against the club selling him if we can recoup a good amount of his fee.

He's been great to watch at times, but when the chips are down he's nowhere to be seen.