Has to be £120m+ to even stand a chance. Ipswich have spent around £150m and have got nowhere near staying up, although I think exclusively buying players from the Championship or players that were on loan in the Championship last season is not good recruitment.
I don't think there is an amount of money that says whoever will or won't stay up*. You could spend £120 million very poorly or £60 million brilliantly. All depends on the quality of the player and how canny/shrewd the club is. Add to that the need for a healthy dose of luck. Player X can look a fantastic buy for £20 or 30 million and just not work. * Apart from Mick McCarthy getting pennies that time we got promoted
That's the conundrum isn't it? When I see people say 'He'd be a good signing, decent player at this level' I immediately think 'what about next season'. As I've said before we couldn't afford to sign the team we currently have, it's the way forward imo.
I had this argument with friends Is there a gap between the leagues? Yes. Do you need to spend a fair bit? Yes however, have I seen a team recruit in a good way (imo)? No these teams don’t utilise foreign markets when they go up, they sign the championships best players or grab a loan or two and hope they can make a team there’s very talented players in Portugal, Belgium, Sweden, netherlands, Denmark, Norway aswell as all the major countries. Look at Brentford for example I feel we’d look abroad which would cost us less money and find some gems
Isidors header was a very poor attempt by any standards. Also his diving about costs us imo. as we should have had more than one penalty in that game , but his acrobatics only sway the refs decisions in one direction , and he actually escaped a red card before he was finally withdrawn. Very harsh on Mayenda being left out seen as he has more to his game than Isidor does,
Its an element of luck I feel, staying up in the Prem. Think many thought Bmouth, Fulham, Forest and Wolves should be goners at many times in the last few years.
The problem most teams face is that now upon promotion you pretty much have to buy an entire new starting 11 to have a chance. I honestly think our best chance of getting into the Premier League and staying there is to keep all of our players and then go up NEXT season automatically. The likes of Rigg, Jobe, Neil, Cirkin etc could all do with another season of development and then go up and be ready made Premier League players. That would mean we could spend c£100m on the rest of the team and have a shot of staying up. We'd be able to buy better quality players because we'd need fewer. Now that for me would be the ideal scenario. But I would obviously absolutely not say no to promotion this season. The financial benefits are far too high and I'd love to see this young team have a go. Also my ideal scenario above relies on us keeping all our players this summer, which I feel is unlikely to happen.
Agree, unfortunately... but, as Smug says we probably couldn't afford to buy our current team, therefore we continue to build the team next season. The players who don't move on will be better again next season.
Too many variables at play to say it’s as simplistic as spending a minimum of £120 million or whatever the figure. There may well be a correlation between spend and success there but I don’t subscribe to the idea that it’s not possible on our current model. A lot of teams go up with relatively inexperienced managers these days. Russell Martin, Vincent Kompany and the Ipswich fella good examples as well as Rob Edward’s at Luton last season. Could well be that it’s as big a jump in the standard of coaching and tactics as it is for the players.
We are an attractive club for loans, Man Utd, Man City, Liverpool have all trusted us with their young lads, we wouldnt have to buy a whole new team we could loan 2 or 3 decent young lads. I dont think KLD would pump 100 million into the team and I would be glad if he didnt, it would undo all the hardwork of the last 4 years. I dont want anymore Ndongs, Rodwells etc, youth and enthusiasm is our focus and I dont see it changing if we get promoted. As already touched on, Ipswich and even Southampton have blew a load of cash and never even threatened to stay up, next season they will have bloated expensive squads full of players nobody wants !
Solid job done by Browne when we needed him. Hume wasn't amazing out of position but more than did his bit - especially the beautifully taken goal.
Wouldn't be against Browne playing there until Cirkin is fully fit, was absolutely fine and complimented Roberts well
I’ve said, for a while, that I think Browne will play a bigger part than he has so far … … as for Hume, I don’t think Cirkin would’ve played any better there on current form.
I hate the prem and all its become but ultimately if you don’t move forward in football you can very quickly fall behind, I’m Comforted by being able to attract Le Fee in the champ no reason we can’t attract some very good players if we do go up, we’re a great club, that being said I’m just happy to enjoy the ride and what will be will be really
Working out how to stay in the Premier League is the problems we want to have. The way the club is run now and the talent of players we have I'm quite sure it will happen. Exciting times...HTL!!!
I understand that point of view but I don’t agree it was ridiculous. If he came on, made a couple of errors or heaven forbid Millwall scored after the change, he’d be slaughtered by some of our fans and have his confidence destroyed.
I was in the East Stand just above where the 'medical emergency' took place. I've just noticed, watching the full 90 minutes, that as the Sunderland physio comes off he says to the referee, 'Nowt to worry about, she's had a few and fell over coming down the steps' I'm not a professional lip reader but I'd swear that's what he says
Editing this as I didn’t have all the facts. Whatever the reason (and it appears this young lass had a seizure) the response time should have had more urgency.
