25/26 Recruitment

[wassy04]

There will be the mother of all clear outs this summer of some of the dross we have bought along with those who don’t want to be here or simply don’t want it enough.
Unfortunately some of our star players will go to fund it.

The only people who need clearing out are Dyche and his assistants.

A modern progressive coach will get our squad performing.

For goodness sake our squad is valued at half a billion plus.

Like I said the other day you would think we were in league 1 with a fiver in the bank reading some of these posts.

Get a good progressive coach in and watch us go.

Dyche out.

Easy to say but you're not getting one of those coaches in January. Man Utd chose to appoint a failed championship manager in the same situation.

[wassy04]

Going back to the chat we were having before on the Europa thread, after seeing the success last night of a few of the more maligned signings. I think you can see how this Europa campaign could've worked (And perhaps had we had consistency in managers it would've done). 

You sign a bunch of young, talented players to fill out the squad. Mcatee, Jesus, N'Doye, Bakwa, Hutchinson, Savona. Even if they aren't able to get ahead of established players like MGW and Wood initially, you'd see them get loads of minutes in these games and develop their games with a view to then replacing those established players in the future. 

Ultimately we saw last year, the squad was weak, we got lucky with injuries and only suffered at the end with the cup run. We had a starting 11, then sold Elanga so a starting 10. So we had 10-12 players or so capable of being in a Europa squad. We need to sign at least 10 players to fill out the squad properly and we signed players that would likely increase in value or at worst could get our investment back. These guys were always going to take time to settle in and were being signed to eventually replace Wood, MGW etc.

Obviously losing Aina and Wood so early was a bit of a disaster but it's allowed Savona and Jesus to develop quicker. Maybe if you wanted to be hyper critical we needed a more ready made replacement for Elanga but I really struggle to see why it is an issue bringing this many guys in. Sure it would take time for them to settle but we had no-one else there. Surely we needed to fill out the squad? Look at what's happened to Palace and we knew we were more likely to get injuries this year with the extra game (and Ange!)

Side point, one less talked about reason for this required influx of players, maybe this is due to such a quick jump. However Abbott is the only player to break into the squad from the academy since Brennan maybe? That pipeline seems to have dried up for a bit, if we had 4-5 decent academy players then we wouldn't need to sign the likes of Mcatee and Bakwa to essentially do the same thing.

[JollyLollyAussie]

See your point Wassy, however the caveat being that we had been playing in a lower standard of football, hence less pathway into the 1st team as now in the PL.

[DeesideRed]

Couple of things stand out from the Summer, obviously the issue regards the apparent lack of input from the manager we'll just hop over for now.

The fact a full back wasnt the number one (or two, or three) priority bugs me and i think its Salv's biggest peave.

At no point did we find or even look for that explosive winger to replace Elanga. Ndoye, Hutch, Bakwa all very technical.

Signing Bakwa made little sense when McAtee can also play there.

Signing the french Jermaine Defoe also made no sense for a league where no-one plays a front 2.

[Salvatore Matrecano]

Couple of things stand out from the Summer, obviously the issue regards the apparent lack of input from the manager we'll just hop over for now.

The fact a full back wasnt the number one (or two, or three) priority bugs me and i think its Salv's biggest peave.

At no point did we find or even look for that explosive winger to replace Elanga. Ndoye, Hutch, Bakwa all very technical.

Signing Bakwa made little sense when McAtee can also play there.

Signing the french Jermaine Defoe also made no sense for a league where no-one plays a front 2.

Im going to leave my whinges for the summer DR. I still have my doubts about what was done but at the same time if for example McAtee can prove me wrong I will be delighted. I was really pleased with his attitude last night, I actually cheered when he grabbed the ball for the pen, knew he would score, thats what I want to see from him.

Recruitment wise its clear we are being active this window, where mistakes have been made Zinchenko, Kali etc we are being ruthless and moving them on. We are clearly looking for another LB and CF, if we land them great, if not would prefer us not to give someone unsuitable a long contract. Accept we have to balance the risk of overpaying with the risk of relegation.

We are where we are at, January is difficult to change everything and Im going to try to be more supportive because theres not much else we can do. Hopefully it can still be a good (or even brilliant) season, if not we can do the blood letting in May.

[wassy04]

Couple of things stand out from the Summer, obviously the issue regards the apparent lack of input from the manager we'll just hop over for now.

The fact a full back wasnt the number one (or two, or three) priority bugs me and i think its Salv's biggest peave.

At no point did we find or even look for that explosive winger to replace Elanga. Ndoye, Hutch, Bakwa all very technical.

Signing Bakwa made little sense when McAtee can also play there.

Signing the french Jermaine Defoe also made no sense for a league where no-one plays a front 2.

The full back I think is a bit unlucky too, if Aina either gets injured before the deadline or doesn't get a long injury, I doubt it's a massive discussion point. Savona and Zinchenko would've only played occasionally and Savona would've played most Europa games. 

All good and reasonable points though, can't disagree with any of them.

I think the Bakwa one in particular because it ended up blocking Mcatee for more minutes. Under both Nuno and Dyche Dominguez has played there too so was another one really necessary. That said Bakwa hasn't blocked Mcatee as they've either both played or neither! We could've definitely used that money on a full back or centre back though instead of a winger or saved it for this window to overpay for a striker, I would say.

Plus don't forget the bizarre decision to not pick Hutch in the Euro squad (and include Bakwa).

In conclusion:

Hutchinson (made sense, bit pricey)
N'Doye (made sense, attempting to replace Elanga)
Mcatee (made sense, highly rated and cover for MGW and out wide)
Jesus (made sense, cheap and needed forward depth)
Savona (made sense, needed a backup RB although questionable whether he's really a RB)
Victor (made sense, needed a backup keeper)
Cunha (made sense, young and needed CB depth)
Luiz (made sense, needed another body in midfield as was expected to be a starter)
Kalimuendo (Made sense in that we proved with Wood's injury we needed another striker, just he didn't fit the system and didn't seem to like being in England)
Zinchenko (needed a backup LB)
Gunn (needed a 3rd choice keeper)

Bakwa (not required as Dominguez and Mcatee provided adequate cover)
Cuibano (no comment)

For me this shows the amount of bodies signed was broadly correct barring a few exceptions and the issue was just a few odd choices and a lack of investment in certain areas. Plus bad luck on Luiz injury. Not going to hit on every one, particularly with the amount of investment required to have a full 25 man squad. Still time for some of these guys to really step up and then everybody will go back to saying how well we did too!

[Salvatore Matrecano]

Wassy, my problem is never “we needed a winger so we signed x” its how much background we did on the player vs how much was driven by convenient deals with agents/Textor. The caveat is any signing can be hit or miss, just ask Liverpool, but it’s about maximising the chance of success and getting in someone who can improve the team (never back up!)

As Ive said I want to park the specifics now, we have to give the club credit for acting quickly on those who weren’t working and we will bring in who we can. For those that are here now they have this season to make an impact and from last night it looks like the majority will make a positive contribution, it looked like a team spirit was starting to build too. Give them all a good chance and we can reassess in the summer.

[Fumanchew]

The reason we didn’t just replace elanga with someone else just as quick was the belief we wanted to evolve how we played, who knows how that would have progressed if the managerial changes hadn’t happened maybe this was an ethos not being pushed by nuno but everyone else and that’s where the cracks started?

[DeesideRed]

The reason we didn’t just replace elanga with someone else just as quick was the belief we wanted to evolve how we played, who knows how that would have progressed if the managerial changes hadn’t happened maybe this was an ethos not being pushed by nuno but everyone else and that’s where the cracks started?

That's fine if that's your aim but then it makes sense to spend big on someone who can do that new thing and maybe a couple of nominal quid on an explosive winger so you retained that option to continue how you did last season at times. 

Hence the greased up Spaniard for £3m

[wassy04]

Wassy, my problem is never “we needed a winger so we signed x” its how much background we did on the player vs how much was driven by convenient deals with agents/Textor. The caveat is any signing can be hit or miss, just ask Liverpool, but it’s about maximising the chance of success and getting in someone who can improve the team (never back up!)

As Ive said I want to park the specifics now, we have to give the club credit for acting quickly on those who weren’t working and we will bring in who we can. For those that are here now they have this season to make an impact and from last night it looks like the majority will make a positive contribution, it looked like a team spirit was starting to build too. Give them all a good chance and we can reassess in the summer.

Thats fair, my post is more aimed at people that thought we bought too many as opposed to specifically the quality.

Although I do disagree that you shouldn't buy young players to be backups. I thought we were aiming for the Brighton model where you sign young players to backup and eventually replace your stars?

[wassy04]

The reason we didn’t just replace elanga with someone else just as quick was the belief we wanted to evolve how we played, who knows how that would have progressed if the managerial changes hadn’t happened maybe this was an ethos not being pushed by nuno but everyone else and that’s where the cracks started?

That's fine if that's your aim but then it makes sense to spend big on someone who can do that new thing and maybe a couple of nominal quid on an explosive winger so you retained that option to continue how you did last season at times. 

Hence the greased up Spaniard for £3m

I wonder how differently our season would've gone if they'd just signed Traore instead of Bakwa. (And made peace with Nuno)

[Salvatore Matrecano]

We signed some absolute dog S**t last summer and nobody will convince me otherwise.