Very different situations though, surely? Charlie was running his contract down so we took whatever we could get...
So why do we let the players do this? Why does it always seem to be us? I remember after the Wembley game Charlie saying he was happy and wanted to stay. Just gone up so you sort out a new contract surely? Why is it we always make excuses? Sorry chaps but it was bad management on our behalf.
Not much in the way of transfer news which is starting to be a concern. Don't really want to be panic buying a bunch of muppets on the last day.
Agree but that would be back in Redknapp's time right? So not down to Les and Co. And then also there were and are his continual injury problems. With hindsight the time to have sold him for more would have been when he was fit and scoring, but that wouldn't have been popular at that time.
Yes agree it's not the current managements fault. It just saddens me when we let players go for peanuts when everyone else seems to rake in the money. That really is bad form on our behalf.
QPR manager Ian Holloway told BBC Radio London: "Losing so many games in a row forced my hand to be as brutal as I have been [with transfers]. "It is sometimes about clearing out things to get a freshness. The atmosphere here is one of optimism and the young players have helped with that." Question is are we clearing out deadwood/expensive players to 1) push on up and be contenders for promotion 2) becoming a tough team to beat in the relegation battle or 3) a cheap team to manage after we are relegated? Option 1 looks highly unlikely, 2 is possible and 3 not out of the question.
Miss Piggy and Kermit in: Caulker and Perch out. I can't see why we shouldn't all be pleased with such a deal?
If I remember rightly and I've had a couple of glasses of wine so maybe not as clued in as usual, but I seem to recall that the club did offer Austin an improved contract during our last season in the prem but he chose not to sign it.....when push came to shove last January and saints made an offer it was accepted. By that time he had 6 months left, been out injured for what 6 weeks......I don't blame the club for taking the cash as they'd got nothing 6 months later....
I agree, the club couldn't really win with most fans. If he was sold at the start of last season - no ambition. When he was sold in Jan, he was worth more than the £4m and the club was stupid. If he'd run his contract down and gone for nothing, then no doubt we should have got some money for him and sold before. It also grates on me when I read, 'Charlie was sold for £4m, therefore striker X is worth £1.70' regardless of the fact that he only had 6 months left to run.
....and that's stupid money.......but with the sky cash cow expanding season by season these sort of amounts are becoming the norm...... Football will implode one day.....
Also David Sullivan had made those comments about Charlie having 'no knees' . That knocked a few million off the price.
The fact is we were holding out for a big fee in the summer & apparently turned down bids of around £12m & then less than 6 months later when it was clear we didn't have a chance of being promoted so a loss of £8m or so which is clearly bad business. Matt Philips & Leroy Fer were similar examples where we were holding out for big fees following relegation & eventually happy to except knock down fees to get off books & so lose money. The problem was really the decision following relegation whether to try for instant promotion back, in which case keeping the players made sense but we'd appointed the wrong manager (again) to be able to deliver that or instead to sell & generate funds for re-investment and a longer term view to getting promotion. QPR didn't do either & so when re-promotion didn't happen we're forced to grab any fees to cut losses but then don't have the funds to re-invest which is why we're now shopping at the bottom end whilst other teams seem to have money to throw around.