Been thinking about this while bored at work and across three managers under the fernandes regime with the exception of perhaps Cesar i cannot think of one signing we have made that can be qualified as a success. Why is this? We have bought in so many players and all of them to a man have underperformed. Warnock, hughes and 'arry all seem to have bought duds (although 'arrys signings should be allowed a little more time). Can anyone else name someone they would consider as a success or would you agree this is ultimately what will take us down?
As you say, Redknapp's signing will need time to bed it. I think we all hope and pray that Remy will be the real deal and that Samba justifies his fee. I guess as you've qualified the thought as being under the Fernandes regime we must exclude Warnock's earlier signings. Nelsen?
Look at the team when we were promoted Kenny Hill Gorkss Orr Ramage Derry Taarabt Mackie Faurlin Routledge Smith Buzsaky Hall Helguson etc etc etc. Many of us probably thought this team would struggle in the Premiership but with little funds available to him Warnock had to shuffle what we had and out went Gorky to make room for DJ. Many of the older servants went (Big Dan, Rowly, Cookie etc) then in came Tony Fernandes and we had a few days of the transfer window to bring in some much needed quality. I came SWP, Barton, Young, Traore et al under Warnock's charge but the writing was on the wall and when Mark Hughes took over we saw the likes of Zamora, Cisse, Onuoha, Park, Granero etc and many of the fringe players from our Championship winning days drifted off to the bench, the reserves or out on loan. Fast forward to Harry taking over and even more cash has been thrown at the squad but we are in a worse position now than we were when Warnock was struggling to make it work in the early stages of our Premiership return. On paper our squad looks awesome and to be fair at the start of this season it didn't look too shaby either. The debate rages on regarding who is to blame for our current position with equal venom being spouted against the players, management and owners. If you were to interview all the players I'm sure they would say they hate to lose and that they give 100% every game and that they are the ones who need to do better to start winning but I wonder if you would get an honest answer if you asked "and what about everyone else then?" I am not so sure individual players are certain that their team mates are behind the cause. None of our signings since we were promoted can hold their heads up and claim to be a success.
I did think of nelsen as but then thought can a man at the heart of such a leaky defence be considered a success?? Now i only saw him play twice (stoke and wigan away) so am quite prepared to be shot down by more regular match goers but at best since he has now departed his success can only be considered as short term. And yes uber as you noted the fernandes regime discounts the likes of hill, derry , mackie who warnock got on the cheap. How ironic that the cheap buys should be the best ones.......
Grove can't disagree with what you say except the highlighted bit because I think our squad looks under average and far from awesome we simply, until recently, have had nothing to blend with. We have some good players that could do a good job in better teams, if you look at Norwich, for example, they have no stand out players but have a good blend of hardworkers and they kind of remind me of Jack Charltons "overachievers" Ireland squad on paper they should not be a mid table side. However back to the point Congleton our purchases have been dramatically underwhelming which takes me back to the point above that in better teams most of these players would do well but at the moment out of the teams in the top 7/8 I could not see one in the starting line up!
nelsen or cesar cant decide but if I had to then nelsen if only for the fact that now most kiwis know who QPR are