ExiledAjax

Is this another reason why a sale, and therefore a settlement with the EFL, are so "critical" to the Club's future? They need a new owner asap so that they can get back to that £39m threshold. Do I have that correct? Is that how that would work?

Certainly there will be a QC out there who will take Wycombe's case. Who exactly they should sue I couldn't be sure. Is it Derby for initially cheating, or is it the EFL for delaying things. With Derby in the financial situation they are in I would suggest that the sensible option is to go at the EFL. IIRC Wyconbe want about £6m. I can't see the EFL paying that but maybe they would give Wycombe something. Thinking a little outside the box but could there be scope for giving Wycombe a promotion, or if they get promoted this season then granting them immunity from relegation next season? I've not read the regs in detail, but presumably if enough clubs agreed to it then that could happen.

@LondonBristolian. Probably worth quoting the OP here. Havanatopia, as the rest of us, would presumably love to see that the EFL have not bungled this one (at least not entirely, my thoughts go to Wycombe as well). Derby have, realistically, been handed the relegation that they deserve. The EFL have made a mockery of the thread title...and it's fantastic that they've done so.

It's a shame that @havanatopia is no longer here to see his thread title made mockery.

Loved that line as well

I have no idea. My experience has taught me that every buyer is "prospective" or "potential". Only when the docs are signed and the money moved is anyone actually "buyer". I suspect there are a couple in discussions. Maybe someone has negotiated an exclusivity period, maybe not. Insolvency sales tend to see less due diligence done as the attitude is "you know this companiy's crap, you're getting it for cheap, so don't ask questions". Absolutely. And the trick now is that it is certain that it's a league 1 club. Before this there was a slim chance, that the administrators could talk up, of survival. Now, needing 50+ points from 29 games...its realistically impossible. So that gives them the certainty that investors crave.

I saw this quote from the Admins. Carl Jackson, a joint administrator for Derby, said: “This has been a difficult matter to navigate bearing in mind the various issues concerned. Whilst point deductions are never ideal for any club, it was critical to the club’s future that all matters were concluded between the EFL and the club in relation to historical issues. This conclusion allows us to proceed with our restructuring strategy for the club with prospective interested parties.” The bit in bold suggests to me that this has been settled in large part because potential buyers have been insisting on the issue being concluded. They want to buy with certainty, and don't want to take on the appeal and surrounding legislation. They also presumably don't want to pay for it either. Get it finished, pay the lawyers and accountants, stick an indemnity for future issues in the SPA, and get the deal done.

Imagine coming on here. On a saturday night. You see no new threads about Nigel Pearson's health, or likely return, or anything else related to that. You remember that less than a week ago a simple rumour that he might be leaving spawned a 40 page thread. Your conclusion is to create a new thread asking if anyone has any news.

Line ups being omitted is pretty bad. They are useful as a historical record, and that should include the basic line ups, cards, goalscorers etc.

27 managers in my lifetime (ok, some are interim). Blimey. Wins a double. Could do better mate.

I was just trying to make the point that Bentley is a good, but not exceptional keeper, and that I think we could very feasibly replace him should we need to cash in on him.

It's testing one single quality, and it doesn't tell the the story. Goalkeeper is, in my opinion, the toughest position to apply stats to. How do you measure communication? Or control of the box? Or other things that are crucial for a good goalie. Even weighting save % for shots on target is poor. Ideally we at least want to be weighting for xG faced rather than simple shots on target. There was a very good article a few years back that talked about how goalies were hugely undervalued in the market when you considered how many points they earned you over a season.

To my mind ultimately it comes from attempting to rank a player in a category that requires n=1 when his value for n is 0. It's absurd as no player with 0 goals can possibly have any value for goals/90. You wouldn't include strikers in the ranking for saves/90 would you? In short you are correct Dave. So yeh I'd suggest that the numbers are run again, excluding all who have <1 goal. Ultimately it is more useful in this case to state that he's scored 0, as 0 per 90 tells you the same thing anyway. Perhaps compare him with other players in his position if you really want to test him on that quality.

I don't think he is either. He's conceding goals at an alarming rate, and has only 1 clean sheet to his name this season, but if we look at the stats he's still maintaining a 70% save rate, which gets him in to the top 10 goalies in the division on that metric (9th out of those who have played at least 10 games), having faced the second highest number of shots on target (81). Of those who have played every minute of the league campaign, only Collins at Barnsley has a better save rate, and it's better than Bentley's by only 0.5%. Compared to his own past performances 70% is far from his best season (that being 77% in 2013/14 with Southend), but it equals his best Bristol City season average - that he set last season. He's a very solid Championship keeper. Does that mean we should keep him at all costs? In my opinion no. He's not only solid, but he's also replaceable. Again, just focussing on save % - Southwood, Roos, Collins and Ingram are at relegation threatened Reading, Derby, Barnsley and Hull respectively. All have a higher save % than Bentley this season, and if their teams are relegated then all could be available in the summer if we need a replacement.

Good stuff. Have you broken down his running and passing stats by game period? My hypothesis is that HNM's issues and weaknesses are that he tries to play the entire game at the same pace. He hasn't yet learned to adjust his own tempo and pacing to that of the game, or how to use an adjustment in pace and tempo to help his team control the game. As a result he is sometimes very useful and a great attribute to the team, but at other times his fast, direct style can in fact be detrimental. To test that theory I'd be interested in seeing if a) it's true - does he vary how/where he runs, or how long or short his passing is, or the directions he chooses, and b) if he does vary it then do those variations match with how the rest of the team plays. Just a suggestion on how you may be able to develop your good work and use the numbers to come to a deeper conclusion.

Given the prevailing narrative regarding the competency of the players, one would think that most would see this as a good opportunity to prune yet more of the squad. I don't think that will apply to the 3 players that you name here, all of whom should have considerable value in the market. However, perhaps some others can be allowed to drift onwards?

If so then I'd humbly suggest to Luton that they wear their white third kit, and we use our black away kit. They wore the third kit when they played us at AG becaude their away kit is the below mess. It seems to involve red, black, and either purple or blue...so isn't really great against any of our kits.

These are the Premier League fixtures. Looking at the kits available I think there would potentially be issues in the Man City v Leicester, Newcastle v Man Utd, Norwich v Arsenal, and Spurs v Palace games. A lot would depend on whether each home team went with its away kit or third kit, likewise it's hard to know whether we'd see the away teams go for their away kit as normal, or maybe use the opportunity to wear their home kit (which might be slightly off message) or third kits.

This is one occasion where their forum is pretty good as well. A couple essentially arguing that the administrators (the guys who are basically the go to football club admins) are incompetent, corrupt, or just didn't try very hard. Exceptional.

Cheers. So just for this season, and is tied to wage payment. Seems a tad redundant to have it apply to this season, but presumably this is dictated by the sentencing guidelines (or whatever the equivalent document is).

Jolly good. Glad to see the spurious Force Majeure claim seems to have been given the short shrift it deserves. Hopefully we will see some reasoning for that at some point. Has anyone said what the 3 suspended points could be enacted for? How long are they suspended for etc? Gives certainty for prospective buyers as well - they're buying a league 1 club. That's good in terms of avoiding liquidation. For all Morris and Derby's sins I wouldn't want one of the old ladies of English football to liquidate.

He's been there a while. But as editor was effectively Gregor's boss. So it's reasonable to assume that when they find a replacement for Gregor, that person will take over. I think Piercy is just filling in for a bit to keep the City articles flowing.

A great summary of our issues in midfield in that article though.

It's a useful and largely well written summary of the events of Monday. Useful to have someone pick out and compare the relevant sections of the Post article, the RB interview, and the YouTube piece. Useful also to have that same person put them into context and to show some of the internal club reaction. Probably the best all around summary, and quicker to read than the 40 odd pages in the thread on here. No it doesn't add much in the way of facts, but it does add useful context, and I like Piercy's style (although there's a couple of typos tucked away in there).

Would that tip be "try asking to play against the women's teams".