Come off it mate, it’s nowt like that. Woods hadn’t performed since leaving Brentford, Crooks was still performing last season for Boro.
The things said about Crooks now on this forum were the exact same things people said when we were linked to Woods and eventually signed him. Don’t pretend that wasn’t the case.
I questioned the Woods signing at the time based on Birmingham fan reaction, Boro fans seemingly would happily take him back and are giving nothing but glowing praise for the signing. Brum couldn’t believe we paid a fee for him
I get the comparison but I just think Crooks is a Tufan esque midfielder, physical enough to play 8 but has 10 qualities. Great technical ability, dominant in the air, goals and versatility WITH experience on top
I think this could be important. We've seen in the last few games that we don't have enough players who can be an effective out ball when we're pressed close to our goal. Pandur and the centre backs literally can't find anywhere to send it at times.
That won't stop someone from assuming his knowledge is greater than the collective wisdom of professionals trying to balance budget, availability and need though, will it?
Yeah I ment in the summer if we stay up, acun will back Ruben, I’m not sure crooks fits in going forward. A loan helps us short term which is what we need
Internal flights are like buses over there though, just rock up to the airport and catch the next one. Bonkers.
I get what you’re saying but it’s one of those signings I can see people saying on this very forum ‘we need to get him off the wage bill’ next January because he doesn’t have a future at the club. There’s been several signings of that ilk under Acun’s tenure. Speaking of which, how many players have we signed then sold for profit under Acun? I can only think of Philogene. Lewis-Potter and Greaves don’t count as they were academy products. We’ve signed a few players for big transfer fees and/or big wages and sold later for a significant loss. Tufan was sold at a loss, so was Allahyar, we won’t see a penny for Sinik, we paid a seven-figure sum for Woods and terminated his contract etc. One thing Bruce did really well was sign younger players and sell them on for huge profits like Clucas, Robertson, Maguire etc. We haven’t really done that for a while barring Philogene and even then we paid a lot for him and Villa benefited from a buy-back clause. It’s not emphasised enough how piss-poor recruitment has been under Acun.
That type of signing hasn't been enough of a priority until last summer when it was with the likes of Hughes, Puerta and Belloumi, but it'll take time before we're cashing in on any of them. They're the players everyone wants though, so obviously harder to sign than players with less potential. Your concern about Crooks comes down to the contract length. I'd hope it's an 18-month contract with an option for the exact reason you cite for your concern. If it's more than that then you might have a point.
I don't understand the criticism of the Crooks signing. We can't just keep punting on kids from abroad, we're going down. We need his experience, know-how and he's also a very decent player. It's a substantial upgrade on Mehlem and a really good start to the window.
