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What Mark Ashton actually said about January


Olé

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With apologies to @CodeRed's phenomenal "Mark Ashton Transfer Update" this week, I was searching for what our CEO actually said about this transfer window, because the clamour on here and on social media combined with the volume of rumours each day in the media, has got completely out of hand in the absence of any official word from the club. I started to wonder what was driving all this excitement.

Personally I need some factual context from City to temper the massive daily expectation, so I searched for what MA actually said about this window. Perhaps this won't be news to everyone, but I certainly missed this interview and I searched OTIB high and low and can find no thread even mentioning these comments - which he gave in December (albeit buried after long ramblings about his "data dashboards"):

 

"When we write a plan for the summer, I look to do probably 95 plus per cent of my business in that summer window, not the January window. Hence why, when we recruited this summer, I tried to recruit one of the learning points from last season, we needed a bit more depth in key areas. So, I made sure I felt that, with Lee, we got that depth and that’s been tested."

"You then move to a January transfer window, which are notoriously difficult for everyone because players are overpriced. Clubs don’t want to sell the recruiting in gets smaller and smaller. And if you are at the top end of the division is even smaller because people who are competitors don’t want to sell to you. It is difficult, so I would always want to do minimal business in January, in that January window."

"Yes, I think it would be remiss of me to say no [to City entering the transfer market in January] but it has to be right. It has to be right. The worst thing we can do is take the wrong one - because I think in the summer you’ve got pre-season. Lee’s got pre-season to get them up to speed and work with them. He hasn’t got that time in January because he’s in the middle of games."

"That’s the challenge because that pond we recruit from has shrunk and its shrunk even more because clubs see us as a competitor, and we’ve got to get someone who’s up to speed or fairly up to speed and will fit the way we play. It’s not easy. In saying that, we have options. But I’m too long in the tooth, you can be 99.9% sure you’ve got that option nailed, and at the death it’s gone. Because the club get an injury and they keep him in. All of a sudden, it’s a spider web, once one movement happens three clubs away, the effect comes down to you."

"I can understand the emotion that runs around [January strengthening]. But what I would say is when I’m working in the summer or I’m planning a summer transfer window, I’m thinking about January. So, I’m thinking right what depth have we got here? Let’s be really clear we’ve had an injury to Benik that no one could have foreseen."

"It’s just my opinion but you look at the squad, I think we’ve got depth, we’ve got players coming back. You know, what do we need in January? Well, we lost Benik, Afobe. So, the logic is, if the right player is available in that position, then absolutely we look to recruit it. But I make no apologies for saying this, it has got to be the right one. Someone who can make an impact and have an effect."

"What you’ve also got is some good youngsters in the building who are who are coming through. What you don’t want is someone to come into that group who upsets that because that would undermine everything we’ve got. We'll go into January with options and requirements. But then with the grace of God, they can change because someone could get injured and then we have to move. But what we do is we carry options in all positions, not just the positions we’re looking at. So, if something happens, we’re always in the game for what’s available."

 

Now, he gave this interview at the start of December before we hit our bad run, but anyone reading that would surely recognise the message: we are not going to be making many signings in January and certainly not making signings for the sake of making signings. In fact you'd read that and would not be surprised if we signed no one in January if the "right deal" wasn't there. We all need to calm down.

With that said I blame Arsenal.

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Agree, as I said in the thread in the transfer forum, I am not actually going to be too bothered if we don't get anyone in, I think we need a striker, but pick a stable system that suits our players and stick with a team and I think we can make the top 6 I don't think our squad is far off being where it needs to be. 

For me that means throwing any 2 striker systems in the bin as unless you are going to go balls out and play Semenyo and Fam for the rest of the season and hope it works then we do not have the players for that, but any variation of 4-5-1 will work fine with the squad we have and probably suit them much better, and re evaluate when Afobe is back. 

But it's not going to be the end of the world if we don't get anyone in, we have been gash for most of the season and are sat 1 point off the playoffs, if we can improve performances, which for me can be done without making changes and just picking the same team and style week in and week out we will continue to be there or there abouts. Leeds and WBA are being dragged back to the chasing pack and if we pick up points in the next few games we are likely to be close to either of them than we have any right to be. 

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27 minutes ago, Olé said:

With apologies to @CodeRed's phenomenal "Mark Ashton Transfer Update" this week, I was searching for what our CEO actually said about this transfer window, because the clamour on here and on social media combined with the volume of rumours each day in the media, has got completely out of hand in the absence of any official word from the club. I started to wonder what was driving all this excitement.

Personally I need some factual context from City to temper the massive daily expectation, so I searched for what MA actually said about this window. Perhaps this won't be news to everyone, but I certainly missed this interview and I searched OTIB high and low and can find no thread even mentioning these comments - which he gave in December (albeit buried after long ramblings about his "data dashboards"):

 

"When we write a plan for the summer, I look to do probably 95 plus per cent of my business in that summer window, not the January window. Hence why, when we recruited this summer, I tried to recruit one of the learning points from last season, we needed a bit more depth in key areas. So, I made sure I felt that, with Lee, we got that depth and that’s been tested."

"You then move to a January transfer window, which are notoriously difficult for everyone because players are overpriced. Clubs don’t want to sell the recruiting in gets smaller and smaller. And if you are at the top end of the division is even smaller because people who are competitors don’t want to sell to you. It is difficult, so I would always want to do minimal business in January, in that January window."

"Yes, I think it would be remiss of me to say no [to City entering the transfer market in January] but it has to be right. It has to be right. The worst thing we can do is take the wrong one - because I think in the summer you’ve got pre-season. Lee’s got pre-season to get them up to speed and work with them. He hasn’t got that time in January because he’s in the middle of games."

"That’s the challenge because that pond we recruit from has shrunk and its shrunk even more because clubs see us as a competitor, and we’ve got to get someone who’s up to speed or fairly up to speed and will fit the way we play. It’s not easy. In saying that, we have options. But I’m too long in the tooth, you can be 99.9% sure you’ve got that option nailed, and at the death it’s gone. Because the club get an injury and they keep him in. All of a sudden, it’s a spider web, once one movement happens three clubs away, the effect comes down to you."

"I can understand the emotion that runs around [January strengthening]. But what I would say is when I’m working in the summer or I’m planning a summer transfer window, I’m thinking about January. So, I’m thinking right what depth have we got here? Let’s be really clear we’ve had an injury to Benik that no one could have foreseen."

"It’s just my opinion but you look at the squad, I think we’ve got depth, we’ve got players coming back. You know, what do we need in January? Well, we lost Benik, Afobe. So, the logic is, if the right player is available in that position, then absolutely we look to recruit it. But I make no apologies for saying this, it has got to be the right one. Someone who can make an impact and have an effect."

"What you’ve also got is some good youngsters in the building who are who are coming through. What you don’t want is someone to come into that group who upsets that because that would undermine everything we’ve got. We'll go into January with options and requirements. But then with the grace of God, they can change because someone could get injured and then we have to move. But what we do is we carry options in all positions, not just the positions we’re looking at. So, if something happens, we’re always in the game for what’s available."

 

Now, he gave this interview at the start of December before we hit our bad run, but anyone reading that would surely recognise the message: we are not going to be making many signings in January and certainly not making signings for the sake of making signings. In fact you'd read that and would not be surprised if we signed no one in January if the "right deal" wasn't there. We all need to calm down.

With that said I blame Arsenal.

The man can certainly bullshit can't he?

Short version: We planned to only sign Nketiah but Arsenal f'ucked us - again.

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32 minutes ago, Spud55 said:

But it's not going to be the end of the world if we don't get anyone in

That's the we will just plod along and see if we get lucky over the remainder of the season kind of attitude though? 

We don't have an attacking Plan B as it is at the moment 

Does the club want to push on a go for promotion or be like the past few January's and drift away slowly. 

The other bigger issue is that if Diedhiou gets injured we've nothing in reserve.

This is also what LJ said in the past https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/av/football/48140826

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38 minutes ago, CodeRed said:

The man can certainly bullshit can't he?

Short version: We planned to only sign Nketiah but Arsenal f'ucked us - again.

He can yes. However, what has he said there that you consider bullshit? I think there are lots of perfectly valid points made. And to think that we pick one player, sit back and do nothing else and leave all our eggs in one basket, I'm pretty certain isn't accurate. It's only us fans that do that!

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@Olé I do remember that interview, I recall the 95% bit, the depth bit and the players coming back bit.

I wonder if Lee’s little messages in the last week or so is him realising that the boat will only be pushed out for a Benik replacement, the squad is big enough / deep enough already.

Nketiah was plan A.  It’s as if MA predicted getting that over the line had some hurdles.  He’s looking elsewhere, but that too isn’t easy for a variety of reasons.

Looks like the other avenue of recruitment is preparing for someone leaving, so if nobody goes, nobody comes in.

So pressure on MA to deliver Plan A, as Lee eluded to.

But pressure on LJ to work with the squad he has.  It doesn’t feel quite as deep with Wright and Szmodics gone out on loan, but perhaps unbalanced is a better word.  Can still recall Taylor and / or Morrell.  Shame Vyner is injured.

51 minutes ago, CodeRed said:

The man can certainly bullshit can't he?

Short version: We planned to only sign Nketiah but Arsenal f'ucked us - again.

you wrote it for him ???

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54 minutes ago, CodeRed said:

The man can certainly bullshit can't he?

Short version: We planned to only sign Nketiah but Arsenal f'ucked us - again.

It’s not bullshit, it’s him being honest about how he has to go about recruitment particularly in a January window. 

Do you want him to lie and raise all our expectations to a frenzy i.e. like it has all by itself anyway?

We could ask SL to find a few more coppers from down the back of the sofa but that’ll be just short term gain and we’ll be in the dock for FFP - as per the teams we’re all debating on here and enjoying being hopefully brought to account by the ever toothless EFL. 

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51 minutes ago, phantom said:

That's the we will just plod along and see if we get lucky over the remainder of the season kind of attitude though? 

We don't have an attacking Plan B as it is at the moment 

Does the club want to push on a go for promotion or be like the past few January's and drift away slowly. 

The other bigger issue is that if Diedhiou gets injured we've nothing in reserve.

This is also what LJ said in the past https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/av/football/48140826

What's our plan A? 

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11 minutes ago, Simon bristol said:

Nice thread,,, im pretty sure there was reference to needing a “nine” according to ashton too...

this 4.5 million budget for transfer highlights now the amount wasted over the last year or 2 on fees paid for players which have not been used,,, with palmers looking the most expensive.

“Nine” was the summer window interview.

The £4.5m budget that I suggested has had a few tweaks, firstly down, because I’d miscalculated Webster, but then back up again, because I’d dealt with Transfer Profit too simplistically.

Heres an update.  Coppello reckons it looks about right without seeing my underlying calculations.  Blue Nix is the key one in terms of £39m allowed.

54E60077-0B83-48BC-98A4-2A796F4A7055.thumb.jpeg.a5d40559bc48c553b5ef6a6132b1b424.jpeg
 

caveat:  doesn’t include agent fees, bonuses to clubs, e.g. owe Preston £x because Brownhill has made y appearances.  Likely that wage bill might be higher.

But not as bad a picture as I initially painted.

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Summer or winter matters not, he procures voluminous amounts of has-beens, never-weres and never-will-bes. He's like the proverbial housewife who returns from the supermarket proudly proclaiming she's bought 100 tins of half price cat food only to be reminded by her kids that they don't own a cat.

5 Pillars. 5 Pillocks more like.

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Putting my issues with LJ aside... 

Im not sure even with his loyalty to Johnson, SL would want to spank a load more cash on a transfer policy that’s seen more miss than hit. And really, who can blame him. 
 

With it currently looking 50/50 as to whether we’ll have a new man in charge in June, he might want to keep a little ammo in the ‘war chest’ (god I love that phrase!) for the potential new man. 

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This window is notorious for how quiet it has been. Just have a look up and down the country and around Europe and see how few transfers there has actually been. This problem is not specific to us! With that in mind people need to be patient until the window closes and reserve judgement until then. I suspect the market will get moving over the next couple of days. 

We are after a striker, so are Spurs, so are United, Chelsea etc, it seems everyone is after a striker, as MA said it's like a spider web, a Bristol City fan in the Championship may not understand how Man Utd signing a striker enables us to then secure our target but we have to remember we are in a chain, it's just like buying a house, if everyone in the chain completes then alls good, if one falls away then they all fall away but the chain only gets moving once the bigger clubs secure their targets. 

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As the January Window comes towards a close with us having released our misfits, didn’t happens and so forth, the only thing now I want The Club to do is get a Director of Football in. A football man, somebody who cuts through the crap whether it be weasel words, analytics and the like. Someone who can spot a decent player, one that defines a system and buys players to fit that system. 

Interesting debate about MUFCs woes last night on BT. Said that their CEO very good at raising finance but useless at identifying players. Young, inexperienced manager with them too. Owner interested in cash side more than the football. The solution? A Director of Football. Parallels? 

Last Summer’s window and the re-signing of CoD just demonstrates to me, we haven’t a ****** clue. 

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2 hours ago, Olé said:

Now, he gave this interview at the start of December before we hit our bad run, but anyone reading that would surely recognise the message: we are not going to be making many signings in January and certainly not making signings for the sake of making signings. In fact you'd read that and would not be surprised if we signed no one in January if the "right deal" wasn't there. We all need to calm down.

 

Thanks for posting that transcription @Olé, it is useful to actually read what was said rather than seeing conjecture built on conjecture.

I guess I'm left with three observations. Firstly as much as I rate Mark Ashton because I think he has improved our selling of players beyond my best expectation, I still don't believe him. That's not to be dismissive or disprespectful but I'm certain he has a completely different private transfer agenda compared to the one he talks about in interviews. That's the nature of the game as you cannot afford to be too public about these things.

Secondly, "Let’s be really clear we’ve had an injury to Benik that no one could have foreseen". Let's actually be honest, it wasn't the most unlikely injury given that he suffered a ligament injury in 2013.

Finally, why do we not have a functioning pathway for young strikers? Most of us were excited when Semenyo was recalled from Newport County but for one reason or another he hasn't even got a regular place on the bench. Blame whoever you like but the reality is that he hasn't done enough to warrant more than being a distant backup option. When was the last time we 'produced' our own top level striker? In 40 years of watching Bristol City I can't actually recall a striker who has come through the reserves/academy, become a first team player and been sold for a decent price.

I appreciate that good strikers are hard to find and many are signed up by Premier League academies as young kids but they are also the most valuable players. Where's the pathway and the development? Are we just unlucky?

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9 minutes ago, RedRock said:

As the January Window comes towards a close with us having released our misfits, didn’t happens and so forth, the only thing now I want The Club to do is get a Director of Football in. A football man, somebody who cuts through the crap whether it be weasel words, analytics and the like. Someone who can spot a decent player, one that defines a system and buys players to fit that system. 

Interesting debate about MUFCs woes last night on BT. Said that their CEO very good at raising finance but useless at identifying players. Young, inexperienced manager with them too. Owner interested in cash side more than the football. The solution suggested a Director of Football. Parallels? 

Last Summer’s window and the re-signing of CoD just demonstrates to me, we haven’t a ****** clue. 

I’m fairness I’m not sure our owner is more interested in the cash side of things.  But there are some similarities. They need a new manager, we need a new a manager. 

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28 minutes ago, Up The City! said:

Except you're missing the point this was said in December. Before Arsenal ****** us again.

Exactly.

But it will fall on deaf ears.

FWIW I think Ashton is spot on with what he said - all of it.

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26 minutes ago, Xiled said:

Thanks for posting that transcription @Olé, it is useful to actually read what was said rather than seeing conjecture built on conjecture.

I guess I'm left with three observations. Firstly as much as I rate Mark Ashton because I think he has improved our selling of players beyond my best expectation, I still don't believe him. That's not to be dismissive or disprespectful but I'm certain he has a completely different private transfer agenda compared to the one he talks about in interviews. That's the nature of the game as you cannot afford to be too public about these things.

Secondly, "Let’s be really clear we’ve had an injury to Benik that no one could have foreseen". Let's actually be honest, it wasn't the most unlikely injury given that he suffered a ligament injury in 2013.

Finally, why do we not have a functioning pathway for young strikers? Most of us were excited when Semenyo was recalled from Newport County but for one reason or another he hasn't even got a regular place on the bench. Blame whoever you like but the reality is that he hasn't done enough to warrant more than being a distant backup option. When was the last time we 'produced' our own top level striker? In 40 years of watching Bristol City I can't actually recall a striker who has come through the reserves/academy, become a first team player and been sold for a decent price.

I appreciate that good strikers are hard to find and many are signed up by Premier League academies as young kids but they are also the most valuable players. Where's the pathway and the development? Are we just unlucky?

I think it's you with the agenda rather than MA. 

Firstly Afobes injury was a freak injury on the other leg. Using your own logic no club would ever sign any players. I heard something recently where players said they only actually feel fully fit once every ten games.

Secondly, the Pathway for pur strikers is very clear, Semenyo is on the bench most games because of the club developed player rule, so not sure why you think he doesn't even get on the bench when hes been on the bench most weeks. That's the clear pathway, but you may not like to hear this, currently he is simply not good enough to get himself into the team despite our lack of striking options. The fact the fans are not calling for him to start also suggests the majority do not think he is ready for Championship football.

Finally, Lita and Reid.

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Nothing like getting your excuses in early, and they are mostly nonsense.

I'm afraid that whilst it's true January is difficult, our need was great and by not being ready to sign someone on 1st (and wasting two weeks sniffing round the arsenal kid again like a mug) we have seriously damaged our chances of a top 6 finish.

The reason our need was great was because we had very little depth in goalscoring, and that was exposed once Afobe was injured.  Semenyo is miles away from ready, Taylor wasn't good enough, Diedhiou is ok for one type of approach and Wieman is ok for a completely different approach, but the manager seems to want to play two up top and it doesn't work.  We needed another forward in the summer and the reason we haven't got one is that we planned poorly and put all of our eggs in one basket.

Ashton should have owned that and got on with persuading SL to part with some more not-very-hard-earned and pay the January premium.

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43 minutes ago, Xiled said:

When was the last time we 'produced' our own top level striker? In 40 years of watching Bristol City I can't actually recall a striker who has come through the reserves/academy, become a first team player and been sold for a decent price.

I appreciate that good strikers are hard to find and many are signed up by Premier League academies as young kids but they are also the most valuable players. Where's the pathway and the development? Are we just unlucky?

Mabbutt I suppose, left in '81 so within your 40 year timespan.

For all the hype he scored less than 30 goals for us and left in exchange for Terry Boyle.

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22 minutes ago, Nibor said:

Nothing like getting your excuses in early, and they are mostly nonsense.

I'm afraid that whilst it's true January is difficult, our need was great and by not being ready to sign someone on 1st (and wasting two weeks sniffing round the arsenal kid again like a mug) we have seriously damaged our chances of a top 6 finish.

The reason our need was great was because we had very little depth in goalscoring, and that was exposed once Afobe was injured.  Semenyo is miles away from ready, Taylor wasn't good enough, Diedhiou is ok for one type of approach and Wieman is ok for a completely different approach, but the manager seems to want to play two up top and it doesn't work.  We needed another forward in the summer and the reason we haven't got one is that we planned poorly and put all of our eggs in one basket.

Ashton should have owned that and got on with persuading SL to part with some more not-very-hard-earned and pay the January premium.

And two fingers to FFP ?

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4 minutes ago, Up The City! said:

I think it's you with the agenda rather than MA. 

Firstly Afobes injury was a freak injury on the other leg. Using your own logic no club would ever sign any players. I heard something recently where players said they only actually feel fully fit once every ten games.

Secondly, the Pathway for pur strikers is very clear, Semenyo is on the bench most games because of the club developed player rule, so not sure why you think he doesn't even get on the bench when hes been on the bench most weeks. That's the clear pathway, but you may not like to hear this, currently he is simply not good enough to get himself into the team despite our lack of striking options. The fact the fans are not calling for him to start also suggests the majority do not think he is ready for Championship football.

Finally, Lita and Reid.

I have an agenda? You're welcome to elaborate.

With regard to knee injuries, have a look at this:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2492018/
 

Quote

Conclusion

The risk of new knee injury, especially overuse injury, was significantly increased on return to elite football after ACL injury regardless of whether the player or the knee was used as the unit of analysis.

We spend all that time analysing a player's DNA but we don't make a judgment on their injury risk?

Regardless of whether it was a freak injury or not, after a summer of inactivity (when Mark Ashton is at his busiest "I look to do probably 95 plus per cent of my business in that summer window") we signed one proven striker (on loan) as a desperate measure when our only other loan target chose to play for Leeds. Hardly a robust contingency plan. The fact that Afobe played from the first league game of the season shows that Lee Johnson wanted a new striker option.

Semenyo has started 3 games and he's been sub for 6. We've played 28 league games this season. I've no idea if these stats are accurate but has he really been on the bench most weeks?

Bobby Reid was a midfielder who LJ identified would make a good number 10. Leroy Lita came to us at the age of 18 and scored 29 goals during the following season - hardly a product of our development. Brilliant players both of them but neither a product of a Bristol City striker pathway.

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10 minutes ago, Xiled said:

I have an agenda? You're welcome to elaborate.

With regard to knee injuries, have a look at this:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2492018/
 

We spend all that time analysing a player's DNA but we don't make a judgment on their injury risk?

Regardless of whether it was a freak injury or not, after a summer of inactivity (when Mark Ashton is at his busiest "I look to do probably 95 plus per cent of my business in that summer window") we signed one proven striker (on loan) as a desperate measure when our only other loan target chose to play for Leeds. Hardly a robust contingency plan. The fact that Afobe played from the first league game of the season shows that Lee Johnson wanted a new striker option.

Semenyo has started 3 games and he's been sub for 6. We've played 28 league games this season. I've no idea if these stats are accurate but has he really been on the bench most weeks?

2EDB65E5-1EBD-48A2-AE2B-A460BC19B1D0.thumb.jpeg.882ecfdcc834731195463fe043612fc7.jpeg

10 minutes ago, Xiled said:

Bobby Reid was a midfielder who LJ identified would make a good number 10. Leroy Lita came to us at the age of 18 and scored 29 goals during the following season - hardly a product of our development. Brilliant players both of them but neither a product of a Bristol City striker pathway.

 

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1 minute ago, Nibor said:

It's pretty clear that there's sufficient room in the rolling three year finances for at least one large signing.

I wouldn't say its clear - people on here have made a best efforts attempt at estimating the accounts and FFP margin and its a good guide but I wouldn't take it as definitive. It seems to me that players need to be off the books in order for incomings and that is happening to a degree.

Everything MA said at the beginning of December seems perfectly logical to me and puts the January window into perspective.

I'm hopeful that we can get a couple in but if we don't I won't be blaming the club at all.

But each to their own and whilst I don't believe you have any axe to grind and its your opinion, there are others that will have an agenda and not getting any players in will fit perfectly into those agendas.

 

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