firstdivision

9 hours ago, Davefevs said:

Firstly didn’t delete the rest of your post by way of ignoring it, just thought this bit was the pertinent bit for me.

I certainly don’t want us throwing money at it, nor am I one that works on a basis of - we’ve raised £20-25m, Nige can expect to spend x% of it on transfer fees.

You’ll know from my posts that I know it doesn’t work like that, in fact Nige says exactly that earlier today.

What has come as a surprise is that it appears from what Nige has said is that the wage budget is constrained around the current cost of the squad wage bill, ie we are at / near the max.

Based on the kind of slashes we’ve seen over the last 2.5 years and again this summer (Kalas, Moore, Massengo, Dasilva, etc), it seems like the imposed (and I assumed accepted by Nige) budget, and Nige talks wage budget specifically, has been set pretty low for where we are aiming.

Thats the bit I’m struggling to square off.  However…

…if you’re saying that this is Nige “boxing clever” to avoid Alex-tax, and budget has been increased (by however much, it doesn’t matter the amount) then it doesn’t feel that way.  Maybe Nige has a tremendous Poker Face.  I get that he’s smart.

If so, great.  Fingers crossed.

Re Luton, a correction / addition - SL actually said our players were far more talented bunch than theirs.  That is one helluva statement to make.  1) I disagree, 2) it shows poor recognition of the talent in their team and 3) seems incredibly outcome orientated and ignorant of the process / journey Luton went on to get there.

At least in your final anecdote the owner / chairman gave you some credit for what you do!

 

 

I listened to the whole press conference, Dave, because a lot of people said he was tetchy etc and there’s something up with him and Uncle Steve. I didn’t necessarily think so. I’ve heard him do much tetchier ones.

He must have agreed the wage restraint - after all, he criticised our mad spending during previous regimes.
 

He must have been frustrated by the sale of AS because, like all of us, he knows we have a better chance with him than without him. But he also must have known he wouldn’t get stacks of the AS cash - that’s why made the comment about AS’ wages before he was sold. 

What I do know is that the biggest metric for success is spending on wages. And we’re doing it much cheaper now it would seem. Not sure how it compares with other Championship clubs. More than some but less than others? 

4 hours ago, Davefevs said:

I totally believe we aren’t lightweight up front.

I do believe we are poorly structured to make use of the types of players we have and benefit the midfield behind them.

I’ve written plenty of times about this.  I also recognise that there might be reasons why Nige plays the three the way he does, and moving to a pair might create other weaknesses.

I think you should pick the team, Dave.

We are lightweight with the current structure - and without Tommy C.
 

I would like to have seen Mehmeti, Conway, Bell. I wonder if he’ll get there eventually (quite a while now with TC’s injury), just like he got to Cam Pring eventually, and a back four eventually. I don’t mind your idea of Mehmeti in the 10 role either. 

God, I miss Antoine. And AS. And TC.

2 hours ago, Sir Geoff said:

I'm sure they do, but that's not giving any credit to the opposition management / players who do the same. We can't win every game.

We weren't shite against Preston. I can't comment on Birmingham as I wasn't there.

Why would you blame the manager, if players don't carry out their roles as instructed. (not saying that is the case but its not always the mangers fault).

You're right about the Millwall game, Sir Geoff (I did bother to watch it and watch nearly every game). We played well enough, but there was still something troubling about it, I thought. Afterwards I was ecstatic with the win but couldn't help feeling a little disquiet as well. Our uncontrolled forward play left me wondering about our ability to unseat teams (especially at home) who've done their prep and stick to the game plan. We are simply too lightweight up front. We had one of those (rare) days when something fell nicely for us at the end. Serendipitous. But the Championship is generally more brutal than romantic.

I would characterise the Preston game as worrying (the lack of creativity and the ease with which Preston started to open us up when they were 1-0 down). The way the Birmingham game panned out didn't surprise me in the slightest. We're hard working, but I fear some hard work for our watching fans this season.

And God help us if we get any more long-term injuries. 

11 hours ago, headhunter said:

You should know all of us on FBC never sugar coat any discussion topic

I listened to the whole podcast this morning. I agreed with nearly everything that everyone said. The contributors were gloomy but reasonable in their analysis: critical but largely fair.

I always desperately hope we win every game but I also try to be objective about how we play etc. People think using your critical faculties makes you a bed wetter (or if you over-support, you are a happy clapper.) I ignore that nonsense. It’s childish. Just say what you see without insulting.

This is what I see: we have problems and those that run the club/team need to find solutions: injuries, illness, some average signings and the sale of AS have left us looking leaden and unconvincing. We will get injuries so we need a bigger squad if we want to compete - the last few seasons have shown that. I agree with Ian that we need five new players - not that we’ll get them, of course. 

I can’t believe some posters are using the phrase: ‘if we want to compete for a top six place…’ I thought 10-14 at the start of the season and for the first time since we were promoted I didn’t try to work out three teams obviously worse than us. I did it after Saturday though. Fortunately, I think there are more than three but there aren’t stacks of them. 

2 minutes ago, Davefevs said:

So, he just lets him break on us with our players caught in the area from a corner.  Good yellow for us, he ain't catching speedster Whatmore.

Knight working his socks off, splitting their central midfield up, so they can't get into a compact shape.  Gotta watch what players do off the ball too.  Spread the play, nibbled away, nice interplay.  A decent first half performance from him.

If not a pen then a definite foul on the edge and potential denying of a goal scoring opportunity.  How Stroud ignores it just does my head in.

 

Decent / v.solid first half.

They exposed us once from a square throw-in, from LWB through Mitchell to RWB, but Vyner blocked the end-shot.

They tried it again, we'd learned...Belly nipping it away from Hutchinson, didn't get run of the ball.

 

Pitch is dry / sticky (surprise, surprise) to suit Millwall.  Not helping us at all.

Happy so far.

Stroud’s refereeing of that incident was like someone seeing the sun rise and saying ‘no, it’s still midnight.’

16 minutes ago, Son of Fred said:

This-

We are only bringing in players that improve us/are better than what we have- ?

That, I'm sorry to say is not the case.

Indeed.

I’d like to see us try Bell on the right and Mehmeti on the left.

I’m not a huge fan of Sykes because his delivery is so often disappointing but he looks more natural on the right than HC who looks like he struggles to control his own body let alone the ball. 

11 hours ago, IAmNick said:

Lackadaisical, careless in possession, slow to second balls when out of possession, afraid to take risks or chances, and more... not much of it good. Disappointing overall. Really disappointing in fact, as we were almost the opposite to what I thought we were.

However, it's also only one game and Preston are always a tough team to play against and my guess is quite a few teams will come away after playing them feeling like we did today over the course of the season. I'm not getting despondent or even that down yet, there's a long way to go and if we're still looking like this half a dozen games in then I'll start to worry.

That said - we must do better.

Agree with all of that apart from the not getting despondent bit. I found it quite depressing. And slightly worrying. 

I was hoping to watch a team that had a coherent plan of attack. We were so boring and lacking in creativity. I want a bit of excitement. It looked like a team picked to work hard…and, my god, it was hard work. 

3 minutes ago, old_eastender said:

I agree, Sykes all day long for me. Trouble with Cornick he, as you say, is not a wide man, he is not a CF, not sure what he is or adds, other than a really good long throw.

I’m absolutely baffled why we bought him. A Luton fan told me he is decent alongside a big target man - and we don’t play with one of those. In fact, we don’t have one in our first-team squad. 

16 hours ago, BCFC Rich said:

Assuming I'm missing a joke here. But just to be clear Climate change causes erratic weather changes, including storms. It affects the intensity and frequency of precipitation. Warmer oceans increase the amount of water that evaporates into the air. When more moisture-laden air moves over land or converges into a storm system, it can produce more intense precipitation—for example, heavier rain.

That response is far too well-informed and sensible. Don’t be bringing your science on here.

14 minutes ago, pl00peh91 said:

Biggest talking point I reckon is that he said even if we sell Scott we won’t be able to sign many more players as we are at the top end of our wage budget already.

He also referred to us looking to sign one more player which I inferred was a goalkeeper (although he didn’t specify that).

The rest of it was the usual stuff but he seemed happy with how things are shaping up.

Can anyone explain how this works? And when any potential AS-transfer funds could be reinvested in the squad?

30 minutes ago, Andy082005 said:

There are two huge differences 

HNM wanted to leave. He didn’t want to stay. We could have offered him more money and he still would not have signed 

Kalas wanted (wants) to stay - but we offered him a contract which was considerably less to what he is on now.
 

This will possibly be his last  chance at a decent contract - I don’t think there is any one of us on this forum that would accept a wage that is considerably lower than what they are earning now 

Two completely different situations 

Yes, I see the difference as I pointed out in my original post (‘I might sign’; ‘I won’t sign’)

But my point is about our attitude to the two players. Why didn’t TK turn down the contract when it was offered and say ‘thanks but no thanks’? Because he’s hoping he might get better somewhere else and wants to keep his options open with us if he doesn’t.
He’s still not committed, which NP said he wanted players to be. TK wants the best option for him (same as HNM), not us. Fair enough. I have no quibble with either. But TK was offered his contract before the end of the season, didn’t sign, and yet we still played him. That’s the double standard: NP always emphasises commitment. Well, TK is/was hedging his commitment. 
Anyway, let’s move on. 

45 minutes ago, BritAbroad said:

I think there were a lot of differences with the two cases - I believe Massengo would've been offered at least equal terms to stay, otherwise we wouldn't get compensation (at least that's how it used to be), and made it clear pretty early on that he wasn't going to re-sign. Kalas had those injury issues, so I don't know when he would have been offered a new contract, but it's clearly on lesser terms... plus we had minimal injury cover at CB, so we needed him. Also there's attitude. We don't know how Massengo was acting behind the scenes, nor Kalas. NP has hinted that it may be a situation like with Baker.

To be honest, BA, I can't quite work out the point you are trying to make. Also, there are a few unknowns and 'I don't knows' in there.

This is what I know: NP said he wants players who are committed. HNM didn't want to sign (so loaned out); Tomas Kalas hasn't signed (yet?) and has missed pre-season. Neither committed. One treated differently to the other.

Also, I would say there were definitely times last season when we had injuries in midfield and could have used HNM. We had to use OTC who was reasonably promising, but not a patch on HNM. We didn't have to play TK in the final game of the season, but we did (when he clearly hadn't agreed a new contract).

One other point re: HNM. We (and clubs) are perfectly happy to play players who will be leaving at the end of their contracts (eg Jay Dasilva) when it suits.

There are (possibly) some differences in the HNM and TK situations but it does look like double standards to me. 

So we hang on for TK (leave the contract on the table and play him in the final game despite the fact that he hadn’t committed to the club) but bin off HNM halfway through a season because he wouldn’t re-sign. This smacks of double standards to me. 
People will doubtless say the situation is different (‘I might re-sign’; ‘I won’t re-sign’), but I can’t see how in principle. (‘I can’t commit to you, Mr NP.’)

2 minutes ago, BCFCGav said:

As soon as Leeson started earlier I was concerned about McCrorie and Tanner! Seems the former is playing no part today. Concerning. 

‘Minor calf strain’ according to the local paper, fingers crossed they’re right! We’ve heard that before and not seen a player for two months. 

Indeed. It was a calf strain last season as well. 

I’ve missed Naismith’s injury. Anyone? 

8 hours ago, Davefevs said:

What will happen in your scenario (assuming £25m meets the amount / terms required) is either:

- we say thanks, yes, let’s wrap it up (unlikely, Alex Scott is key to this decision)

- we say thanks, but we have other interested clubs, and we need Alex’s view on this (most likely)

- we reject it and try to get more (unlikely, they’ve met the asking amount / terms

- other variants on the above.

Depends who the club is too.

Alex played yesterday with a bid in.  We are playing this well.

Or, Dave, we say (in my specific scenario where a club really wants him and wants to get it done): ‘Alex/Alex’s agent, xx FC want you. We think it’s a fair price. They want to get it done and want to move quickly to beat their competitors. But might withdraw if a bidding war starts. What do you think? They need a quick decision.’

I’m looking at this purely from the position of a club that really wants him but doesn’t want a daft bidding war. 

I think we are playing this perfectly well. But surely we can’t and won’t say no to a straight up £25m. Imagine that club withdrawing if we said ‘hold on for a bit’, and then no one else was prepared to pay our price. And then Alex Scott does an ACL in September. That’s a worst case scenario but it’s also part of the subtle negotiating leverage for a buying club. 
 

Anyway, it’s just one strand of a potentially tangled negotiating web. All I did was put forward the pretty uncontroversial view that if you really want him, then offer the cash, make it clear the offer is there for a (relatively) quick deal to avoid a bidding war. 

If I’m a PL club, that’s  my strategy to get what I want. Everyone else can have their own. 

8 hours ago, And Its Smith said:

You make it sound like it takes an hour to get a deal done. Remember the agent is working everyone here to get the best deal for Scott.  If someone bids £25m then we would accept anyway but that club wouldn’t have an advantage in getting Scott unless nobody else bid £25m.  

Silly me. I thought you just turned up with a lorry containing £25m in used notes, plonked it on the table and walked off with the player. 

16 minutes ago, And Its Smith said:

I don’t really get what you mean. Say Wolves want to ‘get the deal done’ and bid £25m and offer Scott £40k per week.  City then tell the other clubs they have accepted £25m and Scott’s agent tells the other clubs they have offered him £40k a week which is acceptable. The other clubs then have a chance to offer the same.  So ‘getting the deal done’ doesn’t really exist.  

It does if you say ‘here’s £25m. Take it or leave it. We get the deal done now or we’re out. We’ll move elsewhere.’ 

We’d have to accept. Think about it:  AS is almost becoming too valuable for us to play in our team now. Imagine if he gets an ACL or another serious injury. His highest value, without gambling, is probably now.  

30 minutes ago, W-S-M Seagull said:

 

For the final time, it was never said that we would accept 25 million. It was 25 million at least. Lansdown said with lots of interest then that would drive the price up, and that's where we are now. 

25 million gets a club a seat at the table. 

So here’s a question then: a PL club offers £25m last month. They say ‘take it or leave it. We get the deal done now.’ We say ‘sorry, that only gets you a seat at the table.’ Have I got that right? 

2 hours ago, And Its Smith said:

As soon as one club has a bid accepted then another club will bid that amount. At the moment wolves and Bournemouth are seeing what they can get away with paying. Would be weird if they didn’t do that 

Oh, I hadn’t thought of that.

My point is that you risk losing him to the other club if you dont just get the deal done.
 

We are also part of this and we’ve made it clear we want £25m. Whack down £25m if you really want him. Take out the others. Get the deal done. £5m here or there for a player of his ability is nothing to a PL club. If you really think he’s the real deal, do the deal. 
 

I’m actually surprised no one has just said ‘yep, we’ll have him. Here’s the cash.’ I think he’s that good. 

2 hours ago, And Its Smith said:

As soon as one club has a bid accepted then another club will bid that amount. At the moment wolves and Bournemouth are seeing what they can get away with paying. Would be weird if they didn’t do that 

Oh, I hadn’t thought of that.

My point is that you risk losing him to the other club if you dont just get the deal done.
 

We are also part of this and we’ve made it clear we want £25m. Whack down £25m if you really want him. Take out the others. Get the deal done. £5m here or there for a player of his ability is nothing to a PL club. If you really think he’s the real deal, do the deal. 
 

I’m actually surprised no one has just said ‘yep, we’ll have him. Here’s the cash.’ I think he’s that good. 

1 minute ago, Mr Popodopolous said:

While I agree from an ability let alone potential perspective and think our value is fair, clubs will always try to maximise every penny in and out.

It's arrogant on one level but just business too.

Of course, Mr P. But why lose him to another club if you really want him? 

I find it amazing that one of these clubs doesn’t say, ‘here’s £25m. Thanks.’ And get it done - especially if you think he’s that good you are bidding £18-20m for him in the first place. 
To me, it’s a no brainer. Class player: great attitude, works hard, versatile, skilful, good passer, holds the ball, 19yo. Every signing is a gamble, but some signings are less of a gamble than others. 

Looking forward to another EFL beauty following Norwich away on a Wednesday night and Burnley on the Saturday last season. 
Oh, look: Rotherham away on Wednesday 4 October; Leeds away on Saturday 7 October. Leeds, meanwhile, home on the Wednesday night before the play us. Ridiculous schedule. 
SL might have to splash out on a few nights’ accommodation in Yorkshire. 

How is it possible to judge this? What metric do we use? 
I assumed WBA, Norwich and Watford would do much better, which perhaps left an opening for lean, well-organised clubs to do well. 
 

We must do better next season. And my hunch is we will. Glad we’ve got away from being a soft touch defensively. The plaudits we received for losing 3-2 at Norwich nearly gave me a stroke. 
Sad to see Antoine go. Will be sad to see Scott go. Hope Mehmeti kicks on. I want to be entertained, excited by our football. Hope we don’t just become a team of hard-working dogs.