Davefevs

…at a cost of £10.

Haha, he’s looked really impressive from highlights, and i caught sone of his stuff pre-season. I follow Rochdale on Twitter because over the past couple of seasons they’ve produced some good players who I thought were capable of going higher. I’m not saying we should target him, but he’s certainly playing better at this point in time than his career previously has suggested.

Yep, different, and bloody good too…but if there was ever a need to improve other positions it’s now, improve the balance.

Yep…and relatively tiny amortisation cost to boot too…unlike the years of £12-14m each year.

You just have to play differently if so.

He can’t be recalled before January…and only if there is a recall clause inserted in the loan agreement.

Yep, just keep it. Antoine tried a few different ones last season.

I’m hoping they see that light when we put a contract in front of them. Andi Weimann has showed that it can be done. The big problem is us gambling that they will next summer, rather than bugger off elsewhere for a similar wage.

That is true. Brentford were happy to accept a slow start to the season rather than move away from a tried and trusted pre-season routine. Paddy Orme admitted on a podcast that “we” City / Rolls got it wrong.

If Antoine does go…the biggest problem for me is that the finances are such a mess, that we haven’t been able to succession plan for this scenario properly (at all?). That’s where other clubs get it right, Brentford for example. It’s all well and good having targets lined up, but getting them over the line inside 2 weeks (less if this drags on) is not easy either. But as big a miss as Antoine will be it’s not disastrous with options of Martin, Weimann, Wells and Conway. I would rather we recruit a CB and a CM first. Could get Michael Hector on a free…he’s probably as good as anyone who might come here for a fee. I’m sure others will have other names too.

I don’t think anyone inside or outside of football thinks Bents is world class. He is a decent keeper at this level, but has mini-spells of poor / good form.

You keep forgetting that fee is just one dimension of a transfer. What about the wages that we are obliged to pay under the current contract. Who is gonna pick up the tab on Kalas’s £25k p.w without us still having to pay some of it? This will be a big reason why bids haven’t been forthcoming for some of our players.

We did improve…but I also thought we improved further when Bents came back too. Unfortunately we’d hit a low point prior to Max coming in.

Joe, re bold bit…if none of those are here, the OOC ones will free up significant budget (no wages / no amortisation) which is currently disproportionate to the budget of the rest of the squad, e.g. Kalas costs us circa £3.5m p.a….ouch! If Semenyo or Scott go, then we can reap the fees they bring in. Obviously need good recruitment to match. We need to get through the cycle that ends this season…then things get better. As above, recruitment will be so important. It appears Cisse is bringing pro-knowledge into the office.

Here’s every single Mark Ashton negotiated transfer (perm and loan)…none of them anything to do with LJ (apart from the ones in 20/21 - Holden)….hmmmm! Loans come at a cost too, don’t forget. Fees need a recent update, but they are all in a very good ball-park (I’ve since updated from an impeccable source).

I think Sky Q changed red button recording a while back, ie you can no longer record it.

Simple answer: Yes, £12m added to the transfer profit (fee (£12m) minus current asset value (£0 - Academy)), and therefore reduces any losses this season / increases profits (hahahaha) this season..and therefore helps towards this FFP cycle. Whatever fee is agreed, whether that be all up-front or stage payment…goes into this year’s accounts….it’s a sale of an asset. Add-ons are different, but if / when they are received, go into the accounts the year they are received. No accounting is done on a prediction basis. Hope that explains it. I wrote a post earlier saying that it doesn’t really work like that. We aren’t £10m+ outside of the FFP limit…and when paying a fee the cost of that fee is spread over the contract length. If I ignore wages we could buy four £5m players on 4 year deals, and it only cost us £5m (4 x £1.25m) this year. They successfully replaced them before they left = succession planning!!!

In many industries these are public domain. I think your response to Ajax - all he was asking for was ideas, not for people to Poo-pooh ideas - was OTT. Even a crap idea can spark someone to come up with a great idea, that wouldn’t have come out otherwise. He responded politely with good reasoning. You were abusive. Nice one ??

Sounds like Stanley is in rehab for solvent abuse! ???

Great post, very balanced. ?????????? Ultimately, yes…SL and JL (Maggie might get away with this one!).

If you’re like me you’ve waited since the late 70s…what’s another 20 years! ??? The main point is we aren’t getting worse, we have improved a bit. I hope for more and quicker improvement, but it’s a tough job imho.

Pearson's reign....both win percentage and points per game trending up from start of last season. League games only. Progress isn't fast. Average win percentage over his tenure 23.98%, current win percentage 26.98% Average points per game over his tenure 0.95 ppg, current 1.03 ppg. This won't be enough for some, but it's factual. Like stocks and shares past performance isn't a guide to future performance, so its possible Pearson might regress this season. I could be divisive and remove season 20/21, but I left it in, warts and all.

Why the need to mute…just sit there quietly until it’s time to talk. ??

We don’t know that it is, but I’m sure the recent sponsorship deal has some benefits on both sides.

I hope that when we come out of a tough schedule of fixtures we can settle into seeing Wilson and Tanner rotate and Sykes play somewhere across the midfield / attacking midfielder roles. Wilson was good on Wednesday against a tough opponent and played well but Saturday came too quick.