Now that Priskin has gone ( thank god ), I still think we have a few players that we need to consider...... 1 - Bowyer - At 35, currently injured, he's probably quite high down the pecking order. Am I right in him having another year left on his current deal, and I wonder what wage he is on ? 2 - Scotland - Out of contract in the summer, he will gain another year if he starts 3 more games. Will he continue to be the BETTER Scotland of this season, or could he become lazy again. Keep or show the door ? 3 - Leadbitter - again out of contract, I think its fairly obvious this clown can go. Sooner the better, offers nothing in my opinion and others are ahead in the queue. 4- Edwards - awkward one. I feel he'd be an asset IF IF IF IF we had 2 QUALITY cb's. At the moment, we don't. I'd offer another deal personally, though what are his wages !? 5- Ellington ( to a lesser extent ! ) Surely less on wages, however, why on earth was he offered a 2 year deal !? Has found chances hard to come by in fairness to Nathan. I want to know peoples thoughts on wages etc. I think Bullard CAN have another good spell in the side. He was unused at Coventry, however we were playing well at the time and the CM didn't need altering. The penny seems to have dropped regarding the kind of players we're targetting.
Its a bloody disgrace that the club have only offered Luke Hyam a 1 year contract! He should be given 3 years and the Captain's armband at the beginning of next season. We pay Bullard £22K a week and we cant tie down one of our brightest young talents. Welcome to the new improved Ipswich Town where short term madness reigns!
I can see why they only offered him a 1 year deal, they probably saw how well Cresswell did with a relatively short contract and then rewarded him with a 3 or 4 year one. I don't agree with it as I believe we should tie down our best assets for as long as possible, like most fans. However, Scowcroft did make a good point on Saturday when he said that Luke seams the type of player who will give 100% no matter what.
Jewell has said that he likes to ensure younger players dont automatically assume they have made it by offering shorter contracts and renewing them on a regular basis. He said something along the lines of alot of youngster he has worked with in the past earned their first big contract as an 18-19 year old and then basically became cocky and big headed. I hope if he stays on form for the rest of the season, we will reward him with a new contract either in the summer or at the beginning of next season. I like the idea in some ways as its very incentive based but it has the downside of potentially losing a player for nothing if their heads are turned by other clubs. Hopefully as long as he is in the first team he will be happy to stay here regardless of 1 year or 4 year contracts.
Poor management in my eyes. Hyam should be tied down longer, will probably get a few bigger clubs in for him and will go for a pittance! Ellington, crazy signing him in the first place. let alone on a two yr contract! Leadboots will see out his contract and go for nothing. Edwards is not a right back and should not play there but due to the failings of the management team we have no choice. Once we get a right back, maybe in 2020, then he should be released, we have better right midfielders! Bullard, not up to it in my opinion, probably on a hefty wage and not worth it, lets hope someone tries to take him off our hands! Sick and tired of our management failing us with their transfer dealings. Fail to get in necessary defenders, rely on loan signings etc etc. Still can't get over the Pompey trio saga, surely we must have had an idea whether the players wanted to come or not and at what price, why else would we have chased them for 3 weeks?
I can understand the logic of not giving him a long-term deal now. Hyam came into the side at the beginning of last season under Keane, he had a few games and was dropped for no reason. He has come back into the side very recently. So basically he has had two spells in the first team, both lasting maybe 10 games each? In fact, according to wikipedia he has played only 14 games for us, so it would be mad to give him a 4 year deal on the basis of 14 games. Give him a 1 year deal, play him regularly in that year and then (and don't forget, he'll still only be 21 in a year's time) give him a long term deal - make him feel like he's earnt it and things will work out the better for it.
wouldnt that constitute tapping up? Find the situation a bit strange all round but I would rather us chase our first choice targets and then pull out if they become unrealistic over a scattergun approach by bidding for any one. Its annoying that it didnt come off but I would rather be in our current situation then pay 3x the rate to get them in.
You speak to the players agents, happens all the time!! Can't see how anyone can defend the whole situation, we should have known well in advance that these players didn't want to come to us or that they wanted way to much money. Then we could have moved on and looked at bringing in someone else!! The whole thing could have been easily avoided had we done our bloody homework but no, thats too damn easy for us. Nobody is saying we should have payed triple the rate for the players, just that we should have sorted things out well in advance. No ****ing planning, just organised chaos!!
No planning and no plan B, not good enough Pretty annoyed to hear no loans are imminent either, we are going to pay with another heavy loss if Smith remains in defence
Spanish, agree that it should have been sorted earlier. I didnt mean to defend the club (on this occasion) but am unconvinced by the whole situation. The agents can say one thing to get themselves a cut of the deal and I find it hard to believe that players would actually want to continue to put up with the situation. We may have our own organisational problems but at least we pay on time (afaik) Sven - each to there own but I think Smith is generally ok but he seems better with a guiding hand through matches. For me Sonko is either brilliant or bambi on ice like. Need to get new blood into the defence either way.
Tractorbhoy I guess we will never know what actually went on bud, just wish we had put the Pompey trio to bed a little earlier and moved on to other, maybe more realistic, targets! I must admit, Pearce would have been the ideal player to bring in, wasn't too worried about the other 2, its a pity we didn't push the boat out in the summer and bring him in. Deffo need 2 CB's and a RB, guess we will have to wait until the summer now but if we still fail to bring in the defenders then......
Spanish, Its a difficult one to call. Although the end result was bad. I like the way we kept on at trying to get what the club saw as the best possible option in and then still pulled out when the financial aspect made it look unsuitable. In an ideal world we would have had a bid accepted a week earlier and then had time to move onto the next target but given Pompeys plight I reckon they held off until the last possible moment to ensure they accepted the highest possible bid. It could have been worse. We could have endlessly pursued the deal and ended up with another Norris situation whereby our inability to pull out of the deal meant we paid Bentley prices for a naked old Austin Maxi. As you said, we will never know the finer details but it looks like the case of right player and wrong circumstances from the outside. We have shown enough over the last couple of weeks to suggest we have enough to survive at this level but if we want to challange next season then 2 CB and the RB are a must. Hopefully this gives us plenty of time to make the right decisions on who we want (and backups).
I hope that we don't bring anymore players in on loan i'd like to see the players dig in given the run in the team to prove themselves and use this time to bring a few of the youth team into the action. As for Smith i think he gets a hard time from alot of fans he is young and will make mistakes but he always seems to give 100% and i think he has done well to come back and i can only see him getting better.
Like Weighty, I would rather not see any more loans. We have shown enough in the last couple of games to make me think we will be safe. How can the players we own get better if they don't get a good run in the team? It also has to be better for morale to be playing than constantly seeing your position filled by a loanee. Let's just stick with what we've got and hope we score three goals every game to cancel out the two we will inevitably let in.
. I would welcome a loan with a view to a long term deal in the summer, especially if it was a younger player which hadnt played regularly (ie from a premierleague club) or someone that has done well in league 1or 2 but hadnt played at this level before. I could also understand a squad player loan but we cant keep leaving our own first team players out of the squad and bringing in new players ahead of them short term.
I'm not wasting my valuable support on people that aren't going to make it Seriously though, the guy craps himself everytime the ball is at his feet and when up against good movement he loses the plot. West Ham played to his strengths Good tackler though, not that that counts for anything nowadays
With more games he will become more comfortable on the ball and he is probably scared of making a mistake and getting slated by the fans again. you can not expect a young player to be the finished article they need time.
