also last summer wasn’t a complete disaster, I’d suggest Oscar/Ozan/Seri/Traore/Christie are all major upgrades on who they replaced.
We finished 15th. For all our splashing of the cash we were significantly out-performed by Sunderland who we have no reasons to be faltering to, let alone someone with a budget the size of Luton or Coventry. My point is there are many ways to skin a cat, and a second successive summer of throwing money at the problem and hoping more of it sticks only to find ourselves in a financial hole in a couple of years isn't necessarily the smartest way to do it. I don't think we will anyway.
I don’t think we need to spend outrageously either but spending a few million quid on a proven #6 at this level would be a wise investment. We can sign a couple of wingers, a forward and a left back on loan or free transfers but a holding midfielder is where I think we should stump up some cash for.
A businessplan to increase the playing budget from bottom 4 to top 10 in order to grow towards playoff contention is hardly 'throwing silly money at it'. But you're right, we won't be signing 21 players like last year because we don't need to. The core of last summers signings and we'll chosen additions will suffice, which in itself belies your contention that the owner spaffed up last year's recruitment.
lets not confuse spending money and investing smartly with throwing money at things for the sake of it. I’d be much more confident now with the lessons learned and Rosie’s input that we’d sign the right players. Just because we got a few wrong doesn’t mean we should stop. Also we finished 18th/19th (can’t remember) the year prior and all the players that we sold were deemed to be our best players, so we saw a rise up the table which was facilitated by the new signings. The constants between the two are half the league one brigade who simply need upgrading in the starting 11 if we want to climb higher.
Exactly, I’m not saying we need to go mental but solid investment in the right areas and not leaving us starting players like Longman in crunch ties for the top half is exactly what we need to be doing.
Even Fergie, Klopp and Pep don't have a 100% success rate in any given window. It's unrealistic to expect that to be the case. And out of the long term deals how many were actually failures? At worst some are unproven due to injury - but we signed them as longer term assets and can't be judged wholly on just a first season. Sinik should still be worth similar to what we paid, Woods will have takers, Figs definitely a flop but he was to all intents proven in the champ and not a silly money 'Acun' signing. Pelkas, Vale, Salah, Baxter, Malcolm were loans so we had security there which we opted to exercise by returning them. But then Syd obviously knows better.
Since Rosie took over, we're only 3 pts behind Millwall and 7 pts behind Sunderland, we were only really significantly outperformed by them when you include Shota's chaotic reign. If you only look at our season under Rosie, we're only one place outside the top ten already.
11th still isn't very good for the amount of investment and size of our wage bill. Which is fine, we made a lot of mistakes and we've learned from them, all I'm saying is we need to be better this summer, and we will be.
So what is our wage bill and where does it put us in the wage hierarchy? Suspect about 10th and roseniorball puts us 11th. What was our net transfer spend?
Half-decent wingers who can perform at this level are a dime a dozen imo. Even most teams in the bottom half have at least one good winger who could play in a top 6 team. However, a good #6 in midfield who puts in solid 7 or 8 out of 10 performances every week is much harder to find and harder to replace. If one of your wingers is having a bad game, you can switch him to the other side, sub him off and tinker around but if your midfield is getting bullied, not winning duels in the middle and getting played through, you’re ****ed. We could get decent wingers on loan like Khadra or a free transfer like Ogbene but if we don’t get a midfielder like Bielik or Whiteman or whoever else of that calibre, I think we’ll have a disappointing and anti-climatic season again.
I would imagine so but I wonder if we try to sign an average one to plug the gap or go out of our way to get a quality one like Whiteman. Steven Toast said we were interested in Kenny Dougall from Blackpool but I honestly don’t see how he’d be much of an improvement on Smallwood.
It's known as 'say cheese'...Even I do it on occasion(and I'm a dour faced ****,according to her outdoors in the Garden). I fail to see what that picture proves in terms of what he thinks about last season's finishing position but please tell me he's not grinning like a Cheshire Cat because we finished 15th?
Hull City can confirm its retained list following the conclusion of the 2022/23 Sky Bet Championship season. The club has exercised one-year options on captain Lewie Coyle, midfielder Greg Docherty and forward Vaughn Covil. Young goalkeeper David Robson, whose current contract expires this summer, has been offered a new deal. Forwards Tyler Smith and Billy Chadwick will not be retained when their contracts expire on 30th June. Smith scored five goals in 39 matches for the Tigers, while Hull-born Chadwick made nine senior appearances after progressing through the club’s academy. Left-back Callum Elder, as communicated earlier this month, will also be leaving after four years in East Yorkshire. Loan players Nathan Baxter, Aaron Connolly, Karl Darlow, Malcolm Ebiowei and Dimitrios Pelkas have returned to their parent clubs. Under-21s Defender Jevon Mills, who was out of contract this summer, has agreed a new one-year deal, with a club option of a further year. The following players are under contract for the 2023/24 season: Jack Leckie and Jim Simms. The club has taken up options and offered new contracts to the following players: Harry Fisk, Sincere Hall, Alfie Taylor, Jake Leake, Tom Nixon, Oliver Green and Will Jarvis The following players will be released following the expiration of their contracts: Tom Macauley, Louie Chorlton, Harry Lovick, Harry Wallis, Josh Hinds and McCauley Snelgrove. Under-18s The following second-year scholars will be moving up to the Under-21s after receiving professional contracts: Jake Brown and Kyle Fanning. The following second-year scholars will be leaving the club at the end of their scholarships: Ben Voase, James Carr, Keegan Green, Aman Panesar and Glen Sani. The following first-year scholars will be moving into their second year: George Wilson, Archie Cooper, Paul Iggulden, Sam Jackson, Anthony Onoh, Rocco Coyle, Cameron Gray, Mason Johnson, Sam Opoku, Jaedyn Chibanga, Ronnie Kelly, Ralph Nkomba and Harry Spence. The following nine players from the Under-16s have been given two-year scholarships and will move up to the Under-18s as first-year scholars for the 2023/24 season: Archie Howard, Joe Batty, Stan Ashbee, Ed Devine, Harry Revill, Lucas Dawson, Alfie Perry, Aidan Durkan and Stan Hewitt. We would like to thank all departing players for their efforts during their time with the club and wish them well for the future.
