Davefevs

Yes, I do, because he doesn’t like criticism.

Loved listening to @headhunter’s one to one with Dicks….so enjoyable to hear him reminisce about Collins and all the rest of the stuff.

Leve Jotterill? ???

Agree. Then again, even his son said “he’s just a lower league manager who’s a good man-manager” or words to that effect. What were the exact words @Sheltons Army?

Scouts might stop a bluffer CEO though! ???

With allowances, I don’t think FFP was an issue at all (the losses were ok)…but trying to follow the sustainable strategy was. It was however the season we started to spend heavily, albeit followed by big sales, that then funded “excess”.

Yep, agree, a nice little retirement beckons in Devon, I reckon….nor would I blame him.

Yep, hoping that someone takes an interest in certain players and they are happy to take them off our hands without us committed financially (e.g. still pay a portion of their wages).

Me too….think you can get more value on the pitch for less. @Marina's Rolls Royceto pick up on your recent comment re saying get rid of players, but never suggesting who might replace, here’s a couple I’d be scouting heavily to see if they are good enough. - Rudoni - Scully - Cadden Over a 3 year deal (fee and wages) I very much suspect they’d be cheaper than O’Dowda, plus would have upside off they did well here in terms of onward fees. I was really hoping Hull would go down because I liked Longman too. There are quite a few on my overall list that might come into scope depending on champ teams fate or Lg1 trans failing to get promoted.

I think yesterday’s interview wasn’t his best by a long chalk…it definitely had contradictions. It was as inconsistent with our on-pitch performances! ?

Absolutely, Pearson not without blame, but some would have you believe that posters like myself are happy-clappers re Nige….because it undermines their need to create a wedge in reasonable debate…which is what OTIB is great for. Create divide is their MO when there isn’t really divide there. My opinion will be scrutinised and challenged by a certain poster, with or without a spreadsheet, but as you asked and he doesn’t decide what I post or who I reply to or dictate my opinion….I don’t think the likes of Wallace and Lawrence will come here over other clubs, regardless of how much we are willing to pay them. We are in for a tough summer, even if we generate funds, because we are not attractive currently to other Champ players. I think we might be attractive to those good up and coming Lg1/2 players, where smaller fee and wages might well be less financially burdening than a free transfer on big wages. I sense Pearson thinks that type of player is already here / covered with the Academy boys and the signings of Tanner / Atkinson, and he’d like a few established Champ players…but that’s only my guess.

I agree, but we can’t ignore it either, whoever you want to blame or stop blaming, a complete “clusterduck” of a situation has been created for someone to come in and remedy. Those “somebody’s” tasked with remedying it are Gould and Pearson. Some posters in here seem to think there any show of support is sycophantic, but they look at the posts with one eye and their own agendas. There are very few, if any, decreeing messiah like performances on the pitch, most of us showing support are merely caveating on-pitch stuff with the state the club are in. Put it simply, you don’t lose £38m if all is rosy, do you? It’s fine if posters want to judge purely on what results we get on the pitch, but the context is wider than that. If you don’t want to see that, fine, but expect others to argue the bigger picture too. I do love the snide posts from one or two. Amazing how triggered some can be. To post on a forum that everything I post has to be scrutinised and challenged, is obsessive to say the least. Why would a professional care so much about a nobody on a fan’s forum. If they are genuinely involved somehow at the club, what a back-stabbing employee we have. No wonder they haven’t taken up @billywedlock’s offer to meet Pearson. And yet other posters often with the opposite opinion to me can have reasoned discussion, e.g. @Marina's Rolls Royce, @And Its Smith, etc. That’s why I post on OTIB and I will carry on doing so. Thanks to those posters and the ones who share similar opinions to me for making OTIB what it is.

Was that given out as fact on the pod?

Of those that have played first team football here are the list of players OOC this summer: King - 1 year option - we don’t know if club option, player trigger or both (if it’s like Martin’s it’s not likely he’ll have triggered on appearances) Cundy - no option (already exercised that last summer) Britton - no option (already exercised that last summer) O’Dowda - 1 year option - likely to be club-option based on age when signed Klose - no option

Deflect the focus of failure to the PA system and big screen! There is no way they expected to miss out on playoffs…you can never assume automatic promo. They may have got rid of lots of players, but not as many high earners went (Skuse) as came in. He will have a degree of sympathy from fans that it’s Cook’s fault, and had he had McKenna they’d be in and amongst it. Maybe, but his scattergun recruitment (again) will not be easily remedied. I look forward to him shifting Joe Pigott on £8-10k, without contributing to his wages, especially after the season he’s had. Their accounts for this season are probably 10 months away, so we won’t know the affect he’s had financially for some time yet.

I doubt Pearson is on £1m p.a (£20k p.w).

I guess the question you have to ask is are you evaluating them based on their “a-game” or the middling levels we’ve seen them perform at. Very few, if any (?) have performed at top 6 level consistently, odd flashes, yes.

How many times have we seen a player step up in this division for us, then dip 5 or 6 games in? Sometimes you get through those early games on adrenaline, but you can’t keep it up…need a little reset, then go again. The demands of playing plus training at this level, especially for Robbie, is a new encounter. Cundy yesterday looked like his body was letting him down. He hasn’t as slow on the turn in previous games. Body might’ve been pushed a bit too far over recent weeks. It happens. I also think we are seeing this a bit with Scott, lost his spark after a great first season. I said if he got 1k minutes this season it would be some achievement. He’s played almost 2.5k!! That’s massive. Again, I think Semenyo has lost a tad too….playing centrally and being duffed up my CBs is different to playing wide. Both players will “come again”. Same with Pring. I hope Cundy does too. But dips in form for players playing their first time regularly at this level happen. Normally a manager has a squad that can pull them out at the right times.

Yes. Was more referring to coming back from ACL with no impact. That’s some doing, at 30 too, for a player who has built his game on speed and buzzing around (amongst other things). Credit to Andi too.

Ashton’s return in Dec 2015 was to do the hatchet job…SL wouldn’t do it himself.

Yep, and those manacles get loosened 23/24, as long as we perform financially next season. You either accept that and show patience, or you don’t. Simple as that. A life buoy might get thrown in Webster or Kelly (I don’t Brownhill has enough value uplift to clear FFP), otherwise how much of £10m Semenyo is left over to rebuild…not enough is my view.

Thank you. …and he’d have recruited a new one to replace it!! How many times did we hear LJ say similar to Pearson, but using different words. Luckily he had about 3 squads worth of “trusted ones” he could flip between when one set had met him down. In fairness to Nige he has accepted some blame too. Short memories indeed. I did like some of the things LJ did, and if Ashton was really pulling the strings recruitment-wise, more fool LJ.

And we might not have kept as much powder dry for the summer if we’d been in a dogfight. At it stood, we’ve not been in a battle at all since we beat Cardiff (a) when there were some worries had we lost. We’ve kept our heads above water, with the lowest budget since 16/17 (by my estimates), that’s some doing. 17/18 was the start of the big budget spending.

Guess we have to quantify how expensive those “mistakes” were. It appears that Simpson was very cheap (according to Kid). King was a 1+1 contract, so we aren’t committed to him, and likely low wage. James has been below par since his return, looks like he could do with a good pre-season, but is here for another 2 years. I do agree we need to try to focus on recruiting players with strong non-injury records though. We have seen improvements under Rennie….Weimann and Martin in particular. O’Dowda hasn’t suffered a recurrence of his h/s, both his injuries have been contact or joint in matches. Williams really needs a full pre-season too. Needs to build that robustness. But he’s played significantly more than last season…appeared in 21 / 41 match day squads. Not as many as we’d like, but an improvement.

You do realise only 3 get relegated don’t you?