Is it a good idea? Should it close before the start of the season? Plenty of calls for it to be closed by now, which certainly makes sense with some playing squads likely to alter considerably over the coming week. Not sure if there is any great benefit to having it open the first 2 weeks of the season. Personally not a big fan of the transfer window in general, however with the amount of money some clubs have to spend at any given moment it may be required to prevent huge numbers of transfers each season.
The transfer window is a real joke. Say someone was to put in a big offer for Pilkington on the last day of the window. We would not be able to buy a replacement for months. The skill of management is in knowing when to buy or sell players for maximum effect and maximum profit. I never saw much wrong with the old system that had transfers all the way through the year with a deadline in March
Also, Moussa Dembele ripped us to shreds for fulham, yet 2 weeks into the season he will do it again for another club. Window should close a week before the season, or dont have one at all. Also the window should stand for managers aswell, once it closes a manager can not be sacked until January
Only problem with having a window for managers is if they have committed a sack-able offence, but I guess that would be a breech of contract so could be worked around. But certainly for players I'm not a huge fan. One of the other major issues is that it can often lead to inflated fees as teams are desperate to get players on board in time. There have been plenty of big money panic buys in recent seasons which otherwise may not of occurred
Agreed lads , window should shut before season starts IMO Quite frankly the shorter time available to mark Hughes the better, we could sign another 4 keepers before Friday at this rate At the risk of sounding my age, can you recall when a team only had about 14 players in the squad and any transfer was big news? It's all gone bonkers with too much money flying about
Hi wubba, I'm so old I remember the Wembly curse! Year after year, a Cup Final team would have a player stretchered off, usually with a broken leg, and would have to complete the match with ten men! No substitutes then!
Very often players stayed on the pitch with serious injuries rather than go down to 10 men. Ken Nethercott, our GK, once played on in a Cup game with a broken collar bone. Going back to the point how about having no transfer window at all but reduce the squad size to 20 allowing the squad to be changed monthly.
It is a bit mental, the game is almost unrecognisable. I suppose evolution of the game is inevitable but it was almost totally different.
It was very different, you were allowed to tackle back then, one of the most wonderful sights was to see a defender put ball and attacker into touch with a sliding tackle, then to see the attacker jump to his feet and take up position for the throw-in! No rolling around on the floor in pretend agony!
I think I missed out, I do love a good hard tackle (oo er) But an atmosphere free of egos and 40K odd fans at Carra Rud must have been breathtaking.
In some ways it would be amazing if football could switch back to an amateur sport, similar to Gaelic football in Ireland but maintaining a mass following.
I'm almost 60, but I think a lot of you guys are looking at the past through rose (yellow-and-green?) coloured spectacles. In my opinion modern football is much better on the whole. There is a far greater emphasis on skill rather than clogging, and I don't see how you can romanticise a hard sliding tackle one moment and then criticise Stoke the next. Yes, lots of things about modern football piss me off, like players rolling around the floor in 'agony' and trying to get each other sent off. And I hate the way that only a tiny number of clubs can now ever dream about winning things short of getting an Arab sugar daddy. But I still think the modern game is more skillful, fluid and tactically interesting.
You are correct in pointing out a greater level of skill, directly related, I'm sure, to a much higher level of fitness, the thing I don't like about the modern game is that most referees now treat it as a non-contact sport! Who'd be a defender in the modern game? As soon as an attacker is approaching the penalty area, defenders can only stand and watch, for fear of giving away a penalty!
Just as an example of how potty it all is I've just seen on BBC look north news that Jordan Rhodes is off to Blackburn in an £8m move.....ridiculous
To an extent I agree with you, it's a large fee for a player not even proven at Championship level yet, but would put two scenarios to you.... If QPR had signed him, as reported for £4m now and the remainder later, would you have been unhappy about it? (I think I would be happy enough if he came to Norwich on those terms) and Would it still be ridiculous if he went to a PL team and scored 15+ goals in the first season? I am guessing both answers are no, or leaning heavily towards no. ok, it's all if's and buts but JR is a highly promising player and if no-one takes a gamble on him he is not going to make the top league unless Huddersfield find a way to get promoted (which seems very unlikely) and his true potential will never be discovered.
No I think JR is a great talent. One of the lads who works for me is a 'town fan and raves about him. No my point is that a championship team has signed him for £8m. £8m in the championship. What's the record championship signing I wonder? All it does is raise the bar yet again. I suppose if he fires.blackburn back into the prem you could make a case to say he's worth it but when Swansea are signing la liga's top scorer last season in michu for a reported £2m it just reinforces how out of control the game is here in England
You are spot on with that and don't get me wrong, I am not defending the actions of Blackburn spending that sort of money but alas it is how the game has been going for some years. A new rich owner seems to a appear every season with the intent of making that team the next big thing (I am not talking about QPR here, more in general terms, before anyone wants to start a bun fight) and to do that they seem to believe the need to spend big to achieve their ambition. Leicester City are a perfect example, how much have they spent in the last 2-3 years? and where has it got them? I have no idea if Blackburn have done the right thing or not in this case but gut feeling is they have got a bargain in the long run. You are of course also so right about Michu and the "low cost" to Swansea, would love a player like that at CR
