Oh yeah don’t get me wrong very happy with this signing, this looks like an excellent bit of business
I’d love to see Hernandez in the left, Buendia behind Pukki and Roberts on the right. Very dangerous front line that!
That will depend on how quickly Roberts adapts to Farkeball, including the emphasis on possession and pressing once the ball is lost. Buendia already had that in his locker but it took longer for Hernandez to adjust. Farke puts great emphasis on winning the ball back in the opposition's third and that led to many of our goals this season. If we can do that in the PL, it could make a big difference to our chances of survival. Edit: Any thoughts that this might lead to a permanent deal look unlikely now though: "Although he has struggled for first-team opportunities at the Etihad, the player signed a two-year contract extension keeping him at the club until 2022 before sealing the temporary switch to Carrow Road." https://www.skysports.com/football/...city8217s-patrick-roberts-on-season-long-loan
But, at a less rarified level, isn't that exactly what we do with our own academy? Having a Cat 1 academy enables us to "hoover up" youngsters from outside our region, who might otherwise have been picked up by their local clubs. Not all our academy products will make it to our first team; some will go on loan, acquire value and then be sold, albeit for more modest sums. It's a case of big fleas and lesser fleas etc.
Great post, I read your first post as being a criticism of the club's approach, rather than the situation in football that makes this a necessity. Completely agree that the finances around youth development are utterly wrong at the moment. Chelsea having 41 players out on loan last season is ludicrous. I guess the issue is how do you limit it. If you put a hard squad limit on the senior side, then suddenly Patrick Roberts is sold to us for £2m, with a clause in the contract that Man City can buy him back for £2m in 12 months time. The big clubs do it because it makes financial sense, buy fifty youngsters for £500k each and you've spent £25m, if two of them even become decent championship players then you've made your money back. To stop it you have to remove that incentive. I guess the easiest way is to adjust the tribunal fees for young players. Norwich got £250k up front for Angus Gunn (when they wanted £1m), and a 20% sell-on made them about £2.7m on a £13.5m transfer. Maybe the tribunal fee for U18s should be adjusted based on the size of the club the player is moving to? Move to a Champion's League club and it's a flat £5m, regardless of the player. £2m elsewhere in the Prem, £500k in the Championship, etc. Force the teams to really think about whether they want a player.
Yep, I am happy with the club’s approach - If you can’t beat’em, join’em... I just think the entire system adds to an ever greater discrepancy in the club hierarchy, as you rightly point out that helps us to a degree further down Didn’t know we had a sell-on fee for Gunn, thanks DH. That’s well done by the club. Hopefully I can get my wish and we get sell-on fees for year-long loans as well!
Allegedly that's why we could afford Rhodes this season, the windfall was completely unexpected, and gave us more breathing room in the transfer market last summer.
As I said above Duncan, I think our approach isn’t great either But what can we do? They need to change the rules to even the playing field a bit more. At the moment it’s just getting worse and worse, and of course we are part of that. Latest travesty is the champions league financial awards going partly to a team’s co-efficient ranking over ten years! Basically guaranteed that the likes of Barcelona get a massive pay-out, irrespective of how successful they are in a particular season. The whole system is broken. Norwich can’t do anything but take advantage of what little we get, at the expense of clubs even further down the pecking order. I don’t blame them.
There were no guarantees the players we hoovered up from Luton would turn out any good , we bought Raggat he has not come through nor did Abrahams and our entire youth cup winning side . Luton probably needed the money , Coventry definitely did when we turned a quick profit on Maddison. For every Darren Eadie there are a hundred Adrian Cootes.
I may be wrong but some of the comments about Roberts seem a bit strange. A simpler analogy would be , there is no point dating a 9 out of 10 girl as she will end up marrying a richer more successful guy in a years time . I think Patrick Roberts will do well for us next season and we will sign him permanently for at least half what Manchester city paid . It will be interesting to see what happens a year from now , just for the record I thought Marshall would do well and he ended up back at Millwall on loan and frozen out . Wildshit, Franke another pair of overpriced duds
Just for the record, I thought JM would do well after seeing him in pre-season against Coventry!!!! I also thought Godfrey would do well and he played quite a few games for the under 23s at CB.
