When I’ve been thinking of next season I had him slotted into the 6(Neil’s role) In the case where we don’t go up (I think we do)
The other bitter taste with Watson (if he leaves) is that it feels clearly too soon. He’s going to be a PL2 player. If he’s lucky he might get a championship loan next season…
if watson gets the move, he aint going to their first time but id imagine his salary will still be sizable?
Tragic if Watson goes, seems like a motivated lad though and probably lacks the patience to sit on the bench, if he does go to Brighton he might end up not playing as much as he is expecting.
From what i gather (only watched him a handful of times this season) he seems more suited to Jobe's role a bit more advanced
I’d take £10m for Watson. Even more so if it includes a loan for the rest of the season. We do have that extra loan slot now.
Who said it mate? If true im a bit disappointed like. Local lad and away at the first opportunity when hes just broke into the team hopefully we pull their pants down and reinvest this window
At least with Watson it doesn’t hurt our strongest 11 even though I’d be reluctant to lose a top local talent. Annoyance of it is we’ll need a replacement we probably haven’t planned for. If it’s 8 figures and we pulled off Clarke on loan (don’t think it’s a possibility personally) then I’d be very happy with that. Tough call for the club mind.
Scout tickets, at hibs games it's right behind where the friends and families sit At hearts it's in amongst the fans
One thing to be fair to Watson is he did sign a pro deal when he had prem clubs sniffing round him. Could have easily done what many others have done and left us for minimal compensation. We are gonna get 10x what we probably would have done.
It’s never nice to see an academy product leave, but it’s a good move for him and they do promote youth. He’ll get minutes. As long as the club get what they value him at then it’s fine. Hopefully we have things in place to replace him.
Wages will be a factor sadly. He's on his first pro contract at the moment so probably on something like £1500, I'd imagine his next one will be £4-6k and Brighton can just put him on £15k and stick him in the reserves, we can't really afford to do that.
Yeah he spoke about being disappointed at the lack of opportunities last season. With hindsight, perhaps him getting some pitch time in the dead games towards the end of the season might have seen him sign a contract extension when he hit 18. Will be disappointed if he leaves - and even more so if we just bring a simple loan in to replace him.
The jobe role, I don't see him as a top end championship CDM He isn't as physically commanding as you'd think in CM, considering he is a CB by trade
It's fine someone mentioned Watson has two brothers in the academy, fingers crossed there as good haha
Just makes sense on absolutely every level. No settling in period needed. He even had a pre season and 3-4 games under Le Bris. It will be like he never left.
I will say that Watson going does put pressure on us to bring at least one in. They didn't play much but Watson, Connolly, Aouchiche and Rusyn have played around 1000 combined minutes this season and at least one of them has been in every squad this season (I think). Would be disappointing if we don't see an incoming.
