I wouldn't loan players full stop. It's breeds short termism and a high turnover of players which I don't want and that doesn't bring success. I'd look to follow the paths of Brentford and Brighton who are both successful PL sides and they don't loan players. I think Brighton have loaned 2 players in the last 5 years We're going to go into the summer with 6 loanees and we're going to need to bring 5 players in realistically to replace them. Hopefully Pelkas & Salah will stay, so the number of new faces can reduce but we'll still be going into next summer having to sign 7/8 players.
Is that the Brentford who just loaned Schade in for the season, or the Brighton who got Colwill on loan from Chelsea? Brighton have had 3 loans in the last 3 years alone so not sure what you're trying to suggest. Brighton and Brentford have also earned huge figures from player sales so can afford to take punts on permanent signings more than we can as it stands. Look what happened when we took a punt on a young signing on a permanent in Sinik.. It's not as easy as you seem to think with regards to just spraying money at a bunch of young permanent signings and making profits on them as you suggested in the Summer window, with Sinik a clear example of why loaning players first is often better and more financially sensible. If they work like Longman and Slater, we can sign them permanently. If they don't, like Forss or Walsh, we don't.
But, both Brighton and Brentford have owners that own other clubs in Europe which allows them to sign both academy and first team players for very little (this is something we are trying to do). They also have category one youth systems, which allow them to develop youth players very quickly. They also have very wealthy owners; Brighton bought an 18 year old Argentinean for their youth team this season that cost over £5m. Loaning players might seem short term, but sometimes you have short term problems that can't be fixed by just buying players. If we need a backup striker and we can't find one that is willing to sign and not be a first team regular, then a loan from a bigger club makes perfect sense. In an ideal world we would buy all our players, but it also works both ways; our youngsters need game time in men's football and won't get that if they don't go out on loan. The same applies to Premier League youth academies. Signing players on loan is also a good way to see if they have a bigger role to play going forward, with Pelkas, had we bought him and he had been a flop, it would have been a pretty expensive flop given his wage at Fenerbahce so a loan with an option is always worth it, that way you're not obliged to keep the player if they turn out to be duff.
When we were in the PL we loaned in very few players (just Graham and Livermore essentially in Bruce's first PL season; Ramirez and Ben Arfa in the second). It demonstrates that when money is not as much of an issue, or attracting players on a permanent is easier, loans aren't needed. It also indicates why in the Championship Brentford loaned in 4-5 players in their promotion season but not as many since. There's a reason Brighton don't loan many in now but had 5 on loan the season they were promoted.
I think it really depends on expectations and I would be delighted with a top half finish this year. Despite loaning players we've still got major holes. We've been playing Doch, Slater and Tyler out wide so it isn't like the loanees have fixed our problems. I'm happy to wait for the right player instead of jumping at players who aren't quite right which has cost us a fortune. And if that means Jarvis, Snelgrove etc get a few minutes too then great. It comes down to recruitment and we have to stop the scattergun approach that was deployed last summer. It should be easier moving forwards as LR has a clear way of playing unlike Shota. It felt like not enough thought went into how the team would fit together, especially in midfield as we've got lots of technically players who aren't really great defensively. Loan wise, take Ebiowei. There's talk that he'll miss the next 4 games, so that's 20% of the season gone. If we only pick up 3-4 points out of the next 4, any hope of the play offs is gone. So what would be the point in signing him then? By that point, Salah should be back as should Traore, Allahyar won't be far away, neither will Pelkas too. What's the point in giving minutes to somebody who won't be here next season when we've realistically got nothing to play for
Weren't you advocating for this in the summer? Saying if it were up to you you'd have just overhauled the entire squad that summer rather than an incremental turnover which would have avoided such a 'scattergun' set of signings (hard to know who to buy without seeing others play etc.) The point of signing him would be to get us to finish as high as possible in the table. The higher we finish the easier to attract players in the summer and convince them of the project. The point of signing him would be to see how he fits in the system and whether we should be looking for a player of his nature in the summer who could fill that role going forward (since it's highly unlikely we could get him on a permanent). The point of signing him is to maximise the output for our other attacking players such as Oscar and get him used to playing with natural forwards not Slater and Docherty on the wings. If he has a good season it can encourage Palace to send us more players on loan and they have a large number of young exciting players who we could look to bring in. There's countless reasons why bringing in a loan is a good idea other than just 'oh well we won't go up or down so we should do nothing and tank the season'.
That's a piss weak argument, nobody cares whether you finish 14th or 12th. I'd use the season to get as many minutes as possible into players like Tufan. He's taking time to adapt to English football but if he does there's no reason he can't be the best midfielder in the Championship. I'd love to see him given a run of games, even out of position. And yes, I'd prioritise that over Palace maybe giving us more loans in the future. We've got Longman, Allahyar, and Connolly who'll probably play wide for us and there's Tetteh too. Plus there's Pelkas once he's back.
People care if you finish 8th or 20th though. It indicates if you're in the play off picture or a couple of bad results away from relegation. It's not a pissweak argument and it's laughable that you think table position has absolutely no bearing if you don't make the play offs or get relegated. Why are you prioritising minutes in a rusty and zero confidence loanee like Connolly over Ebiowei? I just don't really understand your logic at all. Pelkas is another who is a loanee and not our player, why are you advocating for him?
We won't finish 20th, we're improving at a good speed. I'd prioritise Connolly because we can have him back next season if we want him. He's surplus at Brighton and that's highly unlikely to change so we'll be able to get him on a loan or on a permanent.
We'll continue to improve if we bring good players in to play in the right positions. We've had two good results in a row against two quite poor sides (and might make it three against Hudd, but that's by the by). I don't think you can base a window's activity on a kneejerk reaction to a couple of results. If we had lost those two games would you or others be advocating for 5-6 players to come in to rescue us from potential relegation? I don't think you can be so shortsighted with your strategy. If the intention is to bring in round pegs for round holes, then that shouldn't change just because of a couple of wins.
I really don't believe in knee jerk reactions and I constantly post about how the performances are just as important as the result. Performances since the winter break have been very good and very consistent. Regardless of the result, the Wigan game was probably the worst one. We didn't create a lot, despite complete domination in the 1st half and let an extremely poor side back into the game. I'd be happy if our business is already complete for the window, a period of stability is important and there's still plenty of the summer additions we've not seen much, if anything of.
I think you're underestimating how important it is that the club is seen to be moving forward this season. We had years under the Allams when rot set in. Just look at the attendances this year compared to last. If we have an impressive second half of the season, it will look like the club is on the up and that will be noticed by agents, clubs and players as well as the fans. I'd argue that's more important than developing the right team this year. That can come. Improvement this season will help lay the path for the future. If Ebiowei is a better prospect for the next 6 months than Jarvis etc than I think we should take it.
