Realistically IF (and thats a big IF) we went up to the premiership at the end of this season how many signings do you think that we would need to make and in what positions? The championship teams that went up last year seem to have done well. They have made a few signings but not had any massive outlays like 5m+. What do you think that we would need to do transfer wise in the summer if we went into the premiership?
Well,as Cortese said,he wants us to compete in the premier league and in order to compete I think we would need 3-5 quality premier league players. To survive 2-3 good premier league players.
I'd like to think we're well-equipped for the PL, like has happened in the championship, and has happened for the likes of Swansea and Norwich, teams don't expect a newly promoted side to be much of a threat or play possession football. We'd still need 2/3 quality signings though, and a few more the next season if we expect to stay up once other teams have worked us out. Realistically to be competing for top 6 it would need some of our current players to step up in a big way and a complete overhaul of the squad, probably over the course of several seasons. Here's hoping a few of the youngsters can break into the team and reach the necessary level as well.
The starting 11 does it for me, although I do think we should get a loan in now and go back for Hooper in the summer. Some good players to push the first 11 and eventually succeed tem would be good.
For me, I would be comfortable with... New keeper (maybe) New RB New winger (the age old problem for us) New striker Maybe one more quality player too, probably CB
Personally we need to strengthen for the first few windows strongly, norwich and swansea may be doing well but the second season is even harder and getting relagated from that division can take years to overcome as we have shown. I think realistically it would take 5 years of investment and good management before we could count ourselves trully secure in the division and then look to push on.
But they need to be bought now so they can gel before we get there. Derby bought a whole new team when they got promoted and look what happened there...
An experienced (30 year old ish) premier league CM -someone LIKE Barton, Duff etc.. RW Striker (dont know how good Lee is so not considering him) GK RB Experienced premier league CB - Someone LIKE O'Shea, Riise etc.. I think one of these would need to be a free kick specialist (Riise..) Id say these are needed at a bare minimum
No sign that we are interested in older PL players..that's the sort of thing that will do you a turn in an emergency. Don't think we are having an emergency..we are building a side.
I totally agree we are a building side. But to survive in the premier league we will need atleast a couple of experienced players with premier league experience, at the moment we dont have any players of that description. Although I admit Duff and Riise may have been a bit too experienced as examples... I just meant someone along those lines