I must admit, I knwo one or two fans like that. They seem to think money grows on trees. They say why can't we just spend a few million to get us up and then everything will be fine. First thing I ask is where is this money coming from, as we don't have a plethora of multi-millionaires knocking on our doorstep to give us this money... and then, if it doesn't work, we are up the creek without a paddle AGAIN!!! Some people do live in their little workd of Chelsea's and Man City's!! As for Bas... I am still in the wait and see camp. The next 2 months will decide it for me. What I want to see is no more player sales, Malky to stay and given a budget of between half and a £1million, with at least 3/4 permanent signings and a couple of loanees! I'd also like him to do a couple of the meet-the-fans forums just to be a bit more open with the fans and explain some of the things they are trying to do behind the scenes - even if they are struggling with progress, it would be nice to know they are at elast trying!!
Maybe its deep breath time ! I dont like the guy and he probably doesnt like me! However lets see what sort of team we send out on the opening day of the season! Before making up minds and coming to premature judgements! ( I am more guilty than most, however have taken my deep breath and have my wfc emotions back under control!). He said there would be players coming in early so If true something should be happening soon and with a Ash Young windfall coming in soon , there should be a couple of quid for MM to play with ,this may also(hopefully) persuade him to stay for a bit longer.
Sorry I misunderstood - I was amazed as it was so not like you - agree about the standard of the Wobby webbies
Oh No! Did you read the GT interview that harrow posted above? It says that Mr B is taking control of all major decision making. We are going to be (quote) "an owner -managed club". No wonder Winter left. Too soon to say "doomed" but how long before we say "I told you so"?
One thing that's caught my eye in the Wobby (I'm not sure if this is old news), is that Bassini said "he was unable to confirm for legal reasons whether the chief executive [Winter] was dismissed or had left the club voluntarily."
More on the Wobby; http://www.watfordobserver.co.uk/sp...40.Bassini_discusses_transfer_plans_and_more/ Bas says we don't need to sell any more players and that Malky will have funds. He also says the playing budget has actually increased by 30%
That makes him look even more of an idiot than I have portrayed him. Let's recap. He plastered a massive "please bid for our players" sign, in neon lights, when Brighton were already interested in Buckley and several clubs were most certainly after Graham. He accepted a bid for Graham when other clubs were clearly still in the hunt. He accepted a bid for Buckley which is the very least he is worth now, and even that is on the assumption that he has peaked. He then says that we don't need to sell anyone else. Incompetent fool. One other interesting piece of news in the Wobby though. Jimmy Russo has said "I can categorically deny I am acting as a consultant for Laurence Bassini or have anything to do with the takeover."
The only thing I actually disagree with him was when he said that we had to sell players - this was just welcoming low bids for our players - but we did infact reject 2 bids for each of these players!! I would say, if DG is worth so much more, then why didn't WBA or QPR up their bids? Surely they had time from when Swansea had the bid accepted to phoning up and matching it? This tells me maybe they thought £3.5m was too much! We can compare other players of course, but a player is only worth a much as someone is willing to pay for him... one club valued him at £3.5m, that's it! As for Buckley. I thought £1m was a fair price but felt we should have got more add-ons or a higher percentage sell on! He is right telling people we don't need to sell anyone else. If people want any more of our players, they are going to have to pay a lot of money for them! This is something Malky will want to hear! he's issued a hands-off warning to Malky as well! I eprsonally think this has repaired some of the damage he has done by either no or the wrong communication!
The proof will be in the pudding - he needs to back up his action with words. It also states that we are still after A Taylor and Conway - although this is just the Wobby's opinion, still good stuff if we get those two on frees.
It is fair to say that, if it wasn't for the fire-sale type announcement, the only criticism that could be made of transfer policy would be the fees themselves. EDIT: Because Swansea upped their bid, and we accepted within 36 hours. We do not know whether QPR or WBA matched the bid but were rejected by Graham. I can understand that point of view. Mine is that Buckley has shown that three or four times a season he can single-handedly rip the best teams in this division to shreds, yet still feels that he had a poor season. This is positive going forward. But it doesn't mitigate the incompetence with which he has handled the situation up until now. We'll have to agree to disagree. But if that was the plan all along, he should have came out and said that we have financial targets to meet (without saying what they were) and that once those were met, we would reject all further offers for players. This would have made interested parties desperate to get the deals done, for fear that other deals might cost them their number one targets (which both Buckley and Graham were for their respective bidders).
I do understand your point of view NNW... he really hasn't endeared himself to the fans, but if he makes good on what he says in this interview, ie no more sales unless a high bid, players coming in, an increase in the player budget and no intention of letting Malky go, then I think this is all positive. He really did start off on the wrong foot, but hopefully he has learnt his lesson and going forward he can 'win over' the fans. Only time will tell, but do think some fans he has lost already and won't get back, whereas I want to give him the benefit of the doubt! Watford does seem to be a learning experience for everyone... and unfortunately at board level, it is a dangerous place to be learning!
I do accept that if everything Bassini has said about not needing to sell and looking to get players in in time for pre-season is true, Malky stays for the entire season, and he competently manages the business side of things, there would be grounds for optimism. But I have zero confidence in his competence, for the reasons I have given.
Well his statement now reflects my own view as to how things should be so as I said elsewhere his only error so far has been in his communication and with coaching he'll get that right. I'm surprised that he's increasing the playing budget 30% as that means we must be looking at more players coming in than I thought with the wage cap of 5k and our outgoings of Ellington and Saddler we're probably looking at close to double figures in terms of new contracts. The model is obviously to get a big enough squad to have the depth to player trade at a profit yet keep a competitive core. Rightly he hasn't closed the trading out door just made it clear that any offer would need to be above market value to make it happen, we will sell our players when they are at their peak values in most cases in future. As to DG and WB values I think we got what we could, holding on probably would not have been a good tactic. Malky will enjoy having time to prep new players into our way before the closing week of the transfer window, hopefully some confirmed signings next week... See my glass is nearly full now.
I think that although Buckley could be a very good player in the future that Malky was not entirely happy with him so selling him was probably good business - now if MM had stated he wanted to keep Buckley that would be different
It would be nice if LB could produce any action rather than words...........Me thinks that this story has got a real twist in the tail!
Feeling a lot better about him after reading this; although I think it's still fair to have our doubts. It's good that he is willing to communicate and he does seem to be taking everything on board. Increasing the playing budget by 30% seems somewhat risky though... I think the old saying runs true here, he's either very clever, or very stupid!
Only just come back and have a quick read of it. If he had not been such a fool over the past months I think we would have accepted that as forward looking in general. The WO say that he refused to answer only two questions about the departure of JW, but was there a limit on the number they could ask? I would have liked to see what the situation is with the SW corner. Is work being carried out on it and to what degree? It was also noticeable that the Russos are denying any involvement. So can we gather that some questions about finances were off limits anyway?
