nonstripdzebra
Player Valuation: £1m
I agree with a lot of this sentiment. Listen the majority of damage proceeds his tenure. We allowed manager after manager to hastily do short-sided business, avoided selling our best players at peak value and generally bought at too high of prices in the market. I do think the board has learned a bit of the mistake of IMO not allowing Brands to really execute a competent DoF strategy. That's still grading on a massive curve.
Regardless be it the books restraints or intelligent frugality, the fact we are paying less for recruitment is a welcomed change. this extends prior to Thelwell but the Patterson, Myko Garner deals should have been the transfer approach for years. Stretching on Onana I thought was a worthy gamble considering the upside. We are buying younger and cheaper that should warrant reinvestment opportunities down the line. And then on the other side adding veterans relatively cheaply you can accept. All that in total may be enough to afford some room for mistakes like Maupay and McNeil.
The fact though is I still don't know his strengths are as a DoF. His knowledge of global markets seems slim and thats where real value is and the business the club would be wise to target. He was wise to finally sell Richy (something that likely should have been done prior to his time) and leverage an Alli loan. That said comparing him to others in the division he seems to be nothing more than a DoF. It's nice we have one now empowered but that isnt enough in its own.
The more concerning thing personally is the business he didn't do. I think he would have been wise to be more hardlined and turnover more. For starters the lack of Dom cover had precedent of being very dangerous and I think he judged poorly in more goals coming from the wings. He would have been wise to entertain Pickford offers for reinvestment. And most of all if the Gordon deal was 50 million thats grounds enough to void him the position personally. That's repeating prior madness and literally would have changed the entire conversation of signings. Instead weve replaced 1 to 1 positionally but with mostly rawer players and with an absence of goals. It's not hard see that that isnt enough. If it was a funds issue he should have garnered more funds.
But the failures of this club extend way past him. McNeil is not the reason we are in this mess, its really poor transfer policy and asset management window after window that are baring fruit now.
