Edit: a completely unproven, average player out there from a minor league who no one else is after and has a long term injury.
I know but some people on here seem convinced that we must have a very low reserve price for our players. When it would seem like for some we clearly don’t. There will be a point where it is not worth getting money in for alcaraz and we’d be better off playing him. People saying “Alcaraz isn’t worth 30m”. Fine - he isn’t. Neither are many players. But I don’t see him being sold for 15m just because he isn’t worth 30. That’s too big a gap. Isn’t that what we bid first for Carvalho that our fans are insulting our board about for being too cheap and unrealistic? That’s what Flamengo are doing as well
This bit on the end is a bit over the top. I don’t even know who you are pointing the finger at with that. Who are the completely unproven average players we have signed for what is implied to be over the odds (implied because of the “no one else is after” comment - when no one else is after someone you only pay over the odds if desperate). What signings meet ALL of those criteria you list out? I’m not sure there will be many recently at all We are the tightest team in the league because we seem like we don’t have any money. Our sponsorship income has always been pathetic as has our match day income. And you can’t just inject money in anymore it seems. And I guess the owners don’t want to either When we make good fees on players which is our only way of making real money we have wasted it in a panic - but not on players meeting all of the criteria you mention. For example - other clubs wanted Sulemana and he wasn’t in a minor league. That drove the price up. Onuachu had a proven goal record. Everyone moans and whinges when are linked with strikers who don’t have a goal record. You get all sorts of pathetic comments like “3 goals in 20 games for an attacker - how very Saintsy”. But we sign a player with a track record of lots of goals in smaller leagues and he is initially not played in an appropriate system and then judged by future managers to be useless. And then you have the people online who just want us to spend spend spend and risk the points deduction - ignoring that it probably isn’t just PSR rules but actually finances that stop us. Our club nearly went out of business in living memory. Relatively recent living memory. I would suggest it’s not just spending rules that are influencing our decisions
Our track record at buying players above the £15m mark is atrocious & I don’t have any confidence it’ll change in the near future. We’re in a bit of a catch22 situ of desperately needing players, no £ & hampered by FFP. No £ might change if we can get rid of a few but I just can’t see it happening until really late in the window & that will force a panic buy again.
If we have to sell ABK on the cheap, due to his injury record and attitude, then OK. If we have to sell Onuachu on the cheap, because of his seemingly limited technical ability, then OK. If we have to sell KWP on the cheap, due to his contract situation, then OK. But I would be livid if we sold Alcarez on the cheap, just because he doesn't yet fit into Martin's style. I said on here the other day that I don't like managers dictating a club's transfer strategy. Maybe Martin gets sacked in November and his replacement plays a system which is perfect for Charly? Maybe Martin decides to change strategy in October, after our fifth straight loss, and decides to to play a system which is a better fit for Charly? Maybe we fail to sign a no.9 this month, and so we turn to the alternative option of a false no.9 (which Charly did reasonably well in for the brief period we used it last season)? If we need to sell Charly to raise funds, it has to be for a decent fee. Look at what is being paid for Solanke and Carvalho - you need sizeable funds just to buy OK players. If we only get peanuts for Charly, we'll barely be able to do anything with that anyway. So to make any sale worthwhile, the fee needs to be decent. He is one of our best players.
Imho we won’t get o’riley just like we were never really in with a chance of getting Carvalho. Once other clubs come in, they all offer bigger fees and wages. We have to strike early, and unfortunately with those type of players that rarely happens as the selling club realises higher bids will come in. Think the loan players will be crucial to us this season and hopefully pick up a gem or 2 like we did with Livramento and Lavia with what ever money we have.
We may have had a chance if we bid higher than we actually did. Both Celtic and Liverpool seemed to leak the fact they we had bid. Perhaps felt insulted by how low?
Or maybe we leak the bids so that fans think we’re being ambitious, when the club in fact know that we are never really going to get these players unless by some miracle the selling clubs agree to our lowball offer?
Agree about the importance of the loan slots. It's why I didn't like the rumour that we tried to get Rak-Sakyi on loan (thankfully it sounds like he's off to Sheff Utd on loan). My view has largely remained the same all summer. Buy top-end Championship players, in the hope that they're good enough to make the step up. And then use the two loan slots to bring in as high quality as possible. Yes there is a danger that Championship players (eg Clarke) won't be able to make that step-up, but the same applies to many overseas players too (or at the least the ones who we could attract!). Especially given SR's horrendous record in that department. At least with top-end Championship, there's the security of knowing that they could fire us to promotion back up from the Championship next season.
I think bringing in the best championship players is the way to go too, Especially in our position.. We are likely to get relegated back down so surely it makes sense to have the best team to go back up again.
I just started counting how many times we got the ball into an attacking position wide of the opposition box last year only to turn around and pass it back, across, across again to the other side of the box and ultimately create nothing. Obviously I lost count at 1753 or so. Now, bear with me on this but what if, and this might be silly, but what if we had a really tall centre forward that was great in the air and we crossed it to him? You know, like an actual attempt to create a chance? I know it seems like a crazy idea but I reckon that if we did that 1753 times, we may score some goals from it. That was my long-winded way of suggesting that I don't really understand why I constantly hear that Onuachu doesn't fit our style. From what very limited viewing we had of him, he appeared to hold the ball up well which is what we'd need him to do initially. If he can then get himself in the box, surely he'd compliment us rather than hold us back. Maybe this is tactical naivety on my part but I recall seeing the grand total of one cross aimed at him - he hit the bar.
Added bonus being that Championship clubs are usually broke, so we get to dictate to them how much the player is worth.
Problem is I don’t think we can afford the best championship players. Clarke will be £15 - £20 million, Hamer’s release clause is £17 million apparently met by Forest and Ipswich, even Rowe from Norwich around £10 million. Szmodics around £7-£8 million. Asprilla from Watford £15 million. O’Hare for free went to Sheff Utd so we were really in for him?? Any of these players would improve our team, but no go.
If Toney is off to Saudi and Brentford are actually in for Clarke then Clarke will go to Brentford Not sure who we will end up with, the Doak rumours seem pretty strong so that could be one of our loan slots.
