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Transfer Window Thread

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Was McGeady even on the bench yesterday? What is with him? I know Bobby has uncovered some diamonds and pulled off some real coups in the transfer market, but man he's also bought in some duff, hasn't he?
 
LAToffee said:
Was McGeady even on the bench yesterday? What is with him? I know Bobby has uncovered some diamonds and pulled off some real coups in the transfer market, but man he's also bought in some duff, hasn't he?
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Better isn't it that his mistakes cost ~£1 million than £30 million?
 
riddick said:
We haven't signed any boss players on a free tho
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Those were the days. Those inspiring free transfers:
neill_1559519c.webp
 

Ollie d said:
People moaning about us spending so little, if we signed some boss players on free transfers,would it still count?
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I was wondering this as well. If we got that konoplaynka on a free and signed szczesny on loan would people still be bothered we only spent 4m? The window we bought mccarthy and loaned Del, Barry, and Rom was our best in ages and we spent 13m
 
Jayhow15 said:
How much resale value do you think they have? Obviously the longer term benefits would be seen from the saving in their wages, but you cant just ditch 5 (7 if you add Distin and Alcatraz into that mix) and not replace them; the quandry then is do you replace like for like in terms of positions, if so, the quality you are likely to get from the transfer money generated and the savings in wages is gone before you realise. Catch22 situation.
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I agree with you mate. Kone and McGeady are woeful and we never should have purchased them. It is more wishful thinking than a realistic expectation that someone would come in and offer money for them, because they are both truly pony. With Barry and Pienaar however, and indeed Gibson, there is genuine talent there. Pienaar could still do a job in a less physical, or slower-paced, league. I think the same is true of Barry.

However, the fact is that Barry aside, the five named players don't play much and therefore I feel we could risk losing a couple of them without immediately replacing them. Or we could replace them with youngsters who we send out on loan to develop, or loanees to warm the bench. The key word is risk, I suppose. On the one hand we risk wasting wages by keeping players around who, quite frankly, we hope will never have to actually play for us, but if we sell them and only receive minimal transfer fees then we risk not being able to keep the squad at a certain size.

This problem of deadwood is partially related to us not being very sensible with how we dispose of players. We tend to hold on to them for too long and by the time we are actively looking to shift a player, they are at a stage of their career where no-one else wants to pay money for them. We would do better to look at how the New England Patriots continually rejuvenate their roster by moving players on when they have reached their peak and probably have a good couple of years left in them - sure, you lose a year or two of great performances from that player, but you create space (in terms of the numerical size of the squad and available funds for wages) to bring in new, upcoming, younger players. We have obviously held on to Pienaar for too long, from this point of view.
 
LAToffee said:
True. His failures though a disaster for us in terms of the Europa and league position haven't cost us much.
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Every manager is going to have hits and misses. The key is to reduce risk, which Martinez has more or less done. Truthfully we need him to be above average to good in the market, but he's been average, and that's not always the easiest feat.
 

USABlue said:
I was wondering this as well. If we got that konoplaynka on a free and signed szczesny on loan would people still be bothered we only spent 4m? The window we bought mccarthy and loaned Del, Barry, and Rom was our best in ages and we spent 13m
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For me the sum of money spent is not as important as the quality brought in.

Some people get very het up about net spend, but forget that a team who buys no-one and sells no-one has the same net spend as a team that buys £100m worth of players and sells the same amount.

Equally, I would be attaching a hose to my exhaust if we went and spent £49m on Sterling, but even though McGeady is an utter failure I will never think him as bad a buy as Sterling simply because of the fee involved.
 
Tree13 said:
I agree with you mate. Kone and McGeady are woeful and we never should have purchased them. It is more wishful thinking than a realistic expectation that someone would come in and offer money for them, because they are both truly pony. With Barry and Pienaar however, and indeed Gibson, there is genuine talent there. Pienaar could still do a job in a less physical, or slower-paced, league. I think the same is true of Barry.

However, the fact is that Barry aside, the five named players don't play much and therefore I feel we could risk losing a couple of them without immediately replacing them. Or we could replace them with youngsters who we send out on loan to develop, or loanees to warm the bench. The key word is risk, I suppose. On the one hand we risk wasting wages by keeping players around who, quite frankly, we hope will never have to actually play for us, but if we sell them and only receive minimal transfer fees then we risk not being able to keep the squad at a certain size.

This problem of deadwood is partially related to us not being very sensible with how we dispose of players. We tend to hold on to them for too long and by the time we are actively looking to shift a player, they are at a stage of their career where no-one else wants to pay money for them. We would do better to look at how the New England Patriots continually rejuvenate their roster by moving players on when they have reached their peak and probably have a good couple of years left in them - sure, you lose a year or two of great performances from that player, but you create space (in terms of the numerical size of the squad and available funds for wages) to bring in new, upcoming, younger players. We have obviously held on to Pienaar for too long, from this point of view.
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Pienaar - much as I have liked him - probably shouldn't have come back from Spurs. Although the agitation was huge for his return, and we probably let him go a year too soon, the end was likely in sight..
 
JustOpp said:
Every manager is going to have hits and misses. The key is to reduce risk, which Martinez has more or less done. Truthfully we need him to be above average to good in the market, but he's been average, and that's not always the easiest feat.
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Ultimately, I think he has made enough astute purchases for me to trust him with a kitty: McCarthy, Barry (the loan), Del, Lukaku (loan and purchase), Cleverly, and Besic were all sound purchases for their price. Some of these could turn out to be real steals. He has also sold well. On the downside: Alcaraz was a disaster and McGeady was symptomatic of Bobby's attraction to players that "flatter to deceive." I'm of the camp that Kone suffered a terrible injury that has crocked him for good.
 

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