Bzz... "The crowds at West Ham have never been rewarded by results but they keep turning up because of the good football they see. Other clubs will suffer from the old bugbear that results count more than anything. This has been the ruination of English soccer." - Ron Greenwood Shame it is no longer true...
Not atall. Not many sides go down and come straight back. Considering the utter shambles that Allardyce took over, team morale was on its arse. Trying to integrate 7-8 new first team players from day one. Na. We didn't under achieve. But for a dicky spell in March where our home form suffered, we were pretty close to winning the division. We did what was needed and got promoted and Allardyce deserves credit for that. Your side was settled from the start and you had a **** hot striker in great form. Your promotion was impressive without question, but the quality of our 2 squads wasn't that different. But in the summer, while we were out signing jaskelainen, Collins, Jarvis, Diame, Benayoun, Jarvis etc, you were spunking a fortune on an untested (in England) luxury. Any team that wins promotion needs to make quality signings to have a chance of staying up. With the amount of players that departed West Ham in the summer (8 plus) we probably needed strengthening more than you did. Allardyce identified the players he knew we needed. A lot of you took the piss out of him last season and in fact many of you still do, but for his knowledge of the transfer market alone and what is needed to compete at this level he is proving to be invaluable . And we are a biggish medium sized club. I dunno about Eastenders actor fans. Haven't watched it for years. Brand and Winston provide good PR for the club though. Not our fault. But I doubt that has much bearing on players choosing us though I assume that was a joke?
Interesting point here which is that although we spent a huge amount on transfer fees which put us on some interesting tables alongside the European big boys, our wages are still on the floor compared to the rest of the league. Difficult to get hard info but I think the only sides with wages lower than ours will Wigan and Norwich, Swansea and Reading probably about the same as us. Also all of our transfers have undoubted resell value, so if we went down and had to sell them all, we'd get it all back. If you asked me who spent more on transfers this summer out of Southampton and QPR, I would say them.
I wonder if Gaston is on the massive wage (for us) that was reported. I know when a Saints player was asked on Soccer AM about player fines for transgressions, he said it was £20, then added jokingly that Gaston would have to pay more.
This is half the point that most fans and definately trixter doesn't see. West Ham can go hammer and tongues at the transfer market because their chairmen will offer high wages. Ours won't so we can bandy about transfer spend as much as we like the truth is our wage bill is much lower. I seem to remember this cropped up last year in the NPC. Fans have got to start looking past the transfer fee, saying we should be going for X or Y player and realise we have a wage structure. A key comparison would be how many players has Sam bought since leaving the Prem? How many has Adkins bought since promotion from L1. Massive difference I would guess and I would also suggest that Nolan, Cole and Noble plus some others were probably on more a week in the NPC than our top earners are in the Prem. That s why many will say we over achieved and the Hammers underachieved. The difference in outlay over that transfer window to the end of the NPC season in transfers and wages was vastly different. Either way I like the way we are building. No wholesale changes in terms of new team for Prem. Adding just where needed and I agree we probs only bought Ramirez to send out a statement either to the fans that we mean to compete or to others that we are serious. The long term philosophy is the same though. We are building a side that will comply with fair play, that is mainly homegrown and that will benefit us for the real long term even if it doesn't seem very positive at the moment.
Working within a tight pay structure only gets you so far. Something I would imagine even your chairman has realised considering he signed Ramirez, who, I doubt joined you over Tottenham because of his love of your club (£££). Bear in mind that in the summer you spent around 8m more than us on transfer fees and your record signing is around 3m more than ours. Several of your posters have also mentioned that you would have spent even more if defender deals hadn't fallen through. I would therefore question the point you make that you are living within your means more so than we are.
The biggest concern is that we are goinig to have to go in big again in jan spending at least 10-20 mill so thats 40-50 mill spend in a season. Obviously we will have to get rid of the dead wood but don't see much income there.
Well I have to say I'm disappointed we didn't bring in more experience, particularly in defence, where experience is vital. I know Alan Hansen still jokes about "You'll never win anything with kids" but that Man Utd side he was talking about had Bruce, Pallister, Schmeichel, Irwin and Cantona in it. Obviously Saints aren't aiming to win the league but we have a very young side and (with the probable exception of Lambert) our oldest, most experienced players aren't good enough for this level. I never thought I'd say this but I'd love to see us sign someone like Phil Neville. A proper, solid, experienced Premier League pro (preferably a defender) could do our squad the world of good.
See...told you so. You spent £3m less in the transfer market. How much more in wages are you paying. Transfer fees are the 'in your face' cost. People forget about the ongoing wages.
Sorry mate but told me what? I don't know if you are some kind of professor of football finance but you are coming across a touch condescending. It is generally understood that you spent 30m plus this window no? That's your own fans saying that on here not me. I assume they have it right? We spent 10m on Jarvis (actually 7m with addons), 5m on Maiga, 2m on Collins, 2m on Diarra, minimal fees on McCartney and Henderson, 1.5m loan fee on Carrol and a 1m loan fee for Benayoun. Now I'm no genius like you seem to be, but that comes out at around 22m does it not? We will be spending very little in January whereas you will be needing to spunk another 10m on your defence. So yes your wage bill may be smaller, but that's pretty meaningless when your spending 20m more than us in transfer fees in one season wouldn't you say Pal? Our wage bill was large for a championship side last season. Gold and Sullivan threw money at the team to achieve promotion which was an absolute must given our financial problems left behind from the Icelandic banking crisis. Right now I would suggest our wage bill is around that of a top ten premier league club which is where we are aiming to be. I can see no problem with that myself. I wouldn't be surprised to see your chairman break your precious wage structure in January as he did with Ramirez in order to ensure survival.
I would describe it as a bit of fun in response to your fans HOOOOOOOOOF! Jibes. So no not hypocritical atall.
everybody wants their team to do well, so it must be nice to see west ham up near the top. Despite southampton only having 5 points this season i have been fully entertained after nearly every match and i cant wait for the rest of the season i guess it's risky to say it only get's better from now on but i actually believe that to be true based on a select few matches . So despite you being near the top with your HOOOOFFF ball i am enjoying our entertaining football at the bottom!
Southampton may have spent more on transfers, and West Ham may have a higher wage bill, but I'm sure that over a complete year, it works out about the same. Also didn't Ramirez say when he signed that Southampton made an offer that he "couldn't refuse?"
Of course I don't know that but if it were about to made public I would bet money on transfer fees + wages coming out in our favour by some margin. He was on championship/L1 money at Bologna. And the statement is subjective. A job on £10 an hour is 'an offere that can't be refused' for many whilst will be sniffed at by others. Just how much the 'actual' weekly pay for Ramirez is. There have been all sorts of arguments about net and gross. Some Liverpool fans trying to equate it to £80k a week (when adding back full tax) but I am pretty sure that Cortese would not go anywhere that high. It's probs in the region of £45k a week with some accountancy wizradry enabling him to take home £30k of it. Then of course I would suggest there is going to be a very generous assist, goal and win bonus to fill up the coffers. We're not suggesting we are Blackpool with a wage ceiling of £10k but we are not paying the 50k that Nolan was reported to be getting last year. How much is he getting this year? And how much the rest of them? You have quite a big squad compared to ours, and even then many of ours are juniors on small pay. Like I said earlier. I'm glad you lot are happy. After all it's your team so if you are happy then that's all that matters. Like I also said....................HOOOOOOOOOOFFFFF, erm no thanks.
I'm not a hypocrite...prefer to watch good football, but a hoof down field and a winning goal into the net via Lambert will do fine on Saturday.
Aslong as WHU aint cheating anyone then fairplay to them, Yes SFC would love to swap places but the season aint over yet. Im not saying we will end the top half of the table but Im 100% sure we will survive even if it ends up on goals scored we should be fine.
We may of payed Nolan a high salary but he was key in getting us back into the premier league, with all the sky money and parachute payments I think it was worth it.
As you say, we are unlikely to know for sure, but I would be willing to take that bet given the fact that you are probably going to spend another 10-15m in January on top of the 8m you have already spent more than us this season. Regarding Ramirez' wages, I would be surprised if they are as low as you suggest considering Spurs and Liverpool both baulked at his demands in the summer. As Bzzz rightly said, West Ham had to win promotion no matter what last season, given our financial problems. Nolan was money very well spent and proved a very shrewd signing which Gold and Sullivan deserve credit for. The arguments over our wage bills are a bit silly. If we were sitting on level points with you then I would agree there is an issue. The fact is, the wage bill of Whufc and Southampton probably reflect the teams respective league positions. And we are very happy with our team thanks. We can have no complaints. We are playing some good stuff in amongst the long balls and our performances have been professional and efficient. We are Happy Hammers for once.
I think they balked more at the transfer fee, £12-14m for a squad player is a lot of money. He was only on £20k/week at Bologna so it's reasonable to imagine we'd have doubled that. No-one else on our payroll is on more than £30k-ish, and most are on much less than that. I wouldn't be surprised if, along with Reading, we had the lowest wage-bill in the division. Frankly we were the only game in town for him â we were the only club that could afford the transfer fee but who would also see him as a key player. No-one else who could afford the fee would see it as good value, because he simply wouldn't be an important enough player for them.
