But that's always the case at this stage of pre-season. The promoted teams always have lots of work to do so none of those teams have their squads sorted by this stage. I'd say we're the closest of the 3 teams to having our squad ready. But the positions we still need are vital - more attackers and a keeper. Plus another midfielder (2 if Charles goes on loan). Yoshida was signed the day before the window ended and Ramirez on deadline day. And Boruc signed as a free agent in September. If we go back to the last time we got promoted we had 4 transfers done at this stage - Rodriguez, Davis, Clyne and Gazzaniga. Of course we didn't have as many holes to fill and players like Morgan and Lallana were clearly good enough to make the step up to PL. And we also had Lambert who also made the step up with relative ease. There's still lots of time left in the transfer window so there isn't much point in trying to judge how the 3 promoted sides will get on just yet. Although I accept the PSR regulations make things a lot harder than it was in 2012.
I think they will revamp FFP soon, but probably won’t consider/care about the promoted sides and it will be more in favour of the teams mid table who want to spend to try and challenge Europe. They should just scrap it but too many teams are worried about relegation for it ever to go through. As you say the teams who finish 10th-17th every year won’t vote it in in case a team comes up who spends massively and threatens their bottom half status. If it was all about every team wanting to compete for the title it wouldn’t have even come in in the first place
The gap is as big as it’s ever been as well. Who would you say is the worst team in the league not including the promoted teams? Compare their team to ours and see how many of our players would get in. Still lots of time to go of course, but I don’t think the gap can be closed in one window unless you do a Forest. And even then they were relatively lucky to survive after a bad first half of the season. You need a bit of a perfect storm where we over achieve with the squad and another couple of teams underachieve
But IMO we just need one team to underperform and that nearly always happens. Leicester are likely getting a hefty points deduction and I think Ipswich will struggle badly. I'd say the worst team from last season is either Forest or Everton.
I think Ipswich have the best chance to survive of the promoted teams. They have a lot of players where we don’t know if they can make the step up, and will be motivated to do so with a manager who seems like he knows what he’s doing. We know how we are going to play, we know how good a large number of our players are at PL level as we only went down a year ago. And how many of our side would get into Forest or Evertons team? 1 maybe 2? And the guaranteed one looks like he’s off! I’d have Brentford and possibly Fulham below those 2 but same story really. Anyway as you say pretty pointless discussing it now, let’s see how the next month plays out.
I think Sugawara would get into both of their teams. I think he's a terrific signing. I think Downes may not get into other teams yet as he's unproven at PL level but I think he will prove himself. BBD is another possibility.
Ok so maybe 3 would get into the team who you think are the team we need to finish above to avoid going down. Not exactly convincing! As I said a bit pointless doing comparisons now with the business end of the window still to come
The big question is where are we actually strong? Not in goal. At centre back we have huge potential. Not really a good defence for right now. Fullbacks are probably good enough. DM we have a fantastic link man but we have no enforcer. Some Prem teams are just going to flatten us. CM is probably good enough for 17th. Wide men - I think BBD and AA will be a decent starting wide combo and I like the youth we have here. Up front we are a dead duck. Squad depth? Minimal.
A lot of discussion about our team/squad and we have bought in a good number of decent players but looking at the potential starting line up it hasn’t improved that much from last season which is worrying Macca (God help us) Suga - THB- Bedders- Taylor Downes Smallbone - Aribo SAA - BBD - Arma My starting line up with what I have seen
Unless we're prepared to ignore FFP and smash half a billion on the team we're pretty ****ed to be honest. Can't take much from a pre season friendly, but the gaps that have been there for years are still very much gaps. Only highlight from last night was SAA looked good, that's it. A really really long season ahead. ****e players with mad tactics could well see us pull off a Derby
Ipswich seem to be spending and their revenue will be tiny over the past few years due to L1. I don't think it is FFP that is holding us back.
It’s good to set your expectations low and you’ve certainly done that, with bells on On the bright side that means we’ll be back in the best league in the world again next season
it’s the relegation season I think, spending £140m or whatever it was to then have a drop in revenue. I’m not entirely sure how it is all calculated but I did see somewhere that if you sell a player during their first contract (which FFP is calculated against) for a loss then it goes down as a loss rather than income. So for example if we sell Onuachu for £7m instead of it showing as +7m in the books it would be -13m as we spent £20m on him. Doesn’t really make sense as surely it should be a -20m at time of purchase then +7m if he is sold, but none of the way it’s calculated seems logical to me
If you scrap it then Man City won’t have to waste all that money on an army of Lawyers and can spend more of their oil money on players. Sounds great It is currently broken though
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The project that SR have, is based on us staying in the premier league and having a gem or 2 to sell every summer. That has been knocked back for a year or 2 after relegation. We were lucky to have the gems in Lavia, Livremento and then a JWP and Tella to throw in. Problem is that after a season in the championship and having to sell all our saleable assets in one summer, we then have no gems to sell for big money this summer to help rebuild quicker. It is crucial to stay in the premier league this season as revenue increases 10 fold and the building blocks can be put in place where you can add 2 or 3 better players per season. The Covid loan can then be paid of easier etc. Job this year is to finish no lower than 17th. This season was always going to be about clever signings in the transfer window with a minimal outlay. Let’s see where we are at the end of August.
You are spot on about competition being stagnant, but football has become a major pillar of the worldwide (armchair) entertainment industry, so the vast majority of "football fans" don't support one particular club, although they will happily wear a particular club's shirt, just to 'belong'. Watching the same team doing well every week does not diminish their desire to watch more of the same, so the money keeps rolling in. Anyone who believes that individual club's fans' voices make a dingo's kidneys worth of difference to the money men is sadly mistaken.
