Spud55 Posted December 19, 2009 Report Share Posted December 19, 2009 Now I'm not going to sit here and moan about the team, players or management, as I think we are mostly in agreement that our football at the moment is a sack of crap regardless of our position and that is worrying. However have we got a bit ahead of ourselfs, we have a decent squad of players assembled on a relatively small budget but in the grand scheme of things is our squad really that good? And do we have any reason the be expecting to be competing with teams with a bigger resource pot than we currently have? We came into this division 2 and a half seasons ago, and for the first season we did fantastically well, but in the cold light of day we overachieved on a monumental scale, last season we were solid and finished in a respectable position, and we will probably do so again in this league. We have put a decent mount of money into the playing squad over the close season, but still very little in comparison to other sides in this league, Newcastle have massive resources and can pay wages that we as a club can currently only dream of, same goes for WBA and many others in this league that have more than we do. I suppose thaty point is, should we really be that dissapointed with how it's going? In many ways the answer is yes because I think all that most of us want more than anything is steady improvement, and I can't say we have ticked the boxes for this one, in some ways we have improved the playing squad, we have Hartley, saborio, Sno and from the look of him Clarkson who have in personnel terms improved on the players we had, but we have lost McCindoe and left our squad worryingly unbalanced so despite the improvements in some areas we haven't really moved forward on the squad front. Neither have we solved any of our frailties from last season, we are still generally about as threatening as a sausage going forward, we still have no width, and despite Johnson and Millens rambling to the contrary it is a hugely useful weapon to deploy. We still surrender leads to the opposition and we still give away late goals, and we are still playing god awful football, so we haven't really made any progress in that area either. But we are still 9th and not doing too bad, and can we really expect to be doing better than sides that have massive, compared to us resources. I suppose my main point (if I have one) is that are we expecting too much of a side that has only been in this league for a couple of years when it took the likes of Burnley, Reading, Hull et al, many years of building to get out of this league without throwing silly sums of money around? Not really sure if that makes any sense but I think mabye at times we are far too hard on the players and gj, when we say he's had an unprecedented amount of resources for us but in terms of this league it's sod all really. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted December 19, 2009 Report Share Posted December 19, 2009 We maybe 9th but that is a very dodgey position, we have international players and the likes of Maynard who any team in this div would jump at. Our players, are not playing as a team and our wingless tactics are costing us and we could yet pay a higher price. Its down to poor management ignore it at our peril. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spud55 Posted December 19, 2009 Author Report Share Posted December 19, 2009 We maybe 9th but that is a very dodgey position, we have international players and the likes of Maynard who any team in this div would jump at. Our players, are not playing as a team and our wingless tactics are costing us and we could yet pay a higher price. Its down to poor management ignore it at our peril. I agree with you to an extent, but I would say baring skuse, hartley and mabye maynard how many of our players would get into any other top 6 side in this league, I'd only probably put skuse and maynard in the Reading side we played today, Hartley would play every now and then but I'd expect majtaiovski (sp?) to keep him out more often than not. The management are making too many mistakes I agree, but I really don't think that most our players are really top championship players, and I think it's vastly overstating their ability to say otherwise. I just think too many of us are vastly overestimating our players. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nibor Posted December 19, 2009 Report Share Posted December 19, 2009 £6.5m loss Spud, that's good hard cash spent that puts us comfortably in the top half of the spending league. We can't afford to invest on that level and go backwards and right now we are definitely going in the wrong direction. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
garlicbread Posted December 19, 2009 Report Share Posted December 19, 2009 I'd agree and say a top half finish is acceptable, and yes, some people do get carried away (esp after 2 seasons ago). Mind you, can you blame the hordes when the gaffer boldly states at the start of the season that he is targetting a top 2 finish? ...only got himself to blame! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
philgas1 Posted December 20, 2009 Report Share Posted December 20, 2009 Now I'm not going to sit here and moan about the team, players or management, as I think we are mostly in agreement that our football at the moment is a sack of crap regardless of our position and that is worrying. However have we got a bit ahead of ourselfs, we have a decent squad of players assembled on a relatively small budget but in the grand scheme of things is our squad really that good? And do we have any reason the be expecting to be competing with teams with a bigger resource pot than we currently have? We came into this division 2 and a half seasons ago, and for the first season we did fantastically well, but in the cold light of day we overachieved on a monumental scale, last season we were solid and finished in a respectable position, and we will probably do so again in this league. We have put a decent mount of money into the playing squad over the close season, but still very little in comparison to other sides in this league, Newcastle have massive resources and can pay wages that we as a club can currently only dream of, same goes for WBA and many others in this league that have more than we do. I suppose thaty point is, should we really be that dissapointed with how it's going? In many ways the answer is yes because I think all that most of us want more than anything is steady improvement, and I can't say we have ticked the boxes for this one, in some ways we have improved the playing squad, we have Hartley, saborio, Sno and from the look of him Clarkson who have in personnel terms improved on the players we had, but we have lost McCindoe and left our squad worryingly unbalanced so despite the improvements in some areas we haven't really moved forward on the squad front. Neither have we solved any of our frailties from last season, we are still generally about as threatening as a sausage going forward, we still have no width, and despite Johnson and Millens rambling to the contrary it is a hugely useful weapon to deploy. We still surrender leads to the opposition and we still give away late goals, and we are still playing god awful football, so we haven't really made any progress in that area either. But we are still 9th and not doing too bad, and can we really expect to be doing better than sides that have massive, compared to us resources. I suppose my main point (if I have one) is that are we expecting too much of a side that has only been in this league for a couple of years when it took the likes of Burnley, Reading, Hull et al, many years of building to get out of this league without throwing silly sums of money around? Not really sure if that makes any sense but I think mabye at times we are far too hard on the players and gj, when we say he's had an unprecedented amount of resources for us but in terms of this league it's sod all really. As a gas head i agree..we always expect too much..youre doin fine were doin fine...the realists will agree but the others what ever theyre called wont.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spud55 Posted December 20, 2009 Author Report Share Posted December 20, 2009 £6.5m loss Spud, that's good hard cash spent that puts us comfortably in the top half of the spending league. We can't afford to invest on that level and go backwards and right now we are definitely going in the wrong direction. And we are comfortably (well sort of) in the top half of the league, we are a small club in this league, and can't possibly hope to compete with the spending power of Newcastle, WBA, Sheffield United, Cardiff, Reading, Boro etc etc. We also have to compete with them just to get players, Lee Martin had a straight choice between us and Ipswich, and he picked Ipswich because they are a bigger club and on the face of it are far more prestigious, and look at where Ipswich are, until we are really seen as a club pushing for the prem we will struggle to get proven players in and will have to continue to take risks on unproven players which may or may not work out. In terms of Player choice i'd say there are at least 10-12 clubs that they would pick over us every time in this league, and thats the problem we face, until we can entice the caliber of player needed to compete we will always have to overachieve to get anywhere. A 6.5 million pound loss doesn't tell us anything, especially not that we are one of the bigger spenders in this league, what it does show is that in all likleyhood we have a much lower turnover than a good portion of clubs in this league, i'd guess we are well below, Newcastle, West Brom, Sheffield United, Sheffield Wed, Middlesborough, Cardiff, Forest, Leicester, Reading, Ipswich, Derby and probably Coventry and Swansea too. In terms of Transfer spending we haven't spent much at all either, Barnsley - 500k Peterborough - 200k Plymouth - 250k Preston - 850k QPR - 3.5 Million Reading - 4.9 Million S****horpe - 375k Sheff U - 4.5 million Sheff Wed - 0 Swansea - 1.8 million Watford - 0 Forest - 6.2 Million Newcastle - 0 Blackpool - 0 CITY - 1.6 Million Cardiff - 6.7 Million Coventry - 1.5 million Palace - 0 Derby - 1.5 Million Donny - 0 Ipswich - 8.8 million Leicester - 350k Middlesborough - 600k West Brom - 3.6 Million That puts us 8th in money spent this season, but looking back at what other clubs have spent last year as well puts us a good way behind most of our peers, Forest have ploughed the best part of 12 million quid into their side this season and last, Ipswich have put more like 13 million in, cardiff are up at about 8.5-9 million quid, Sheff U are up at around the 12-13 million mark as well, Newcastle, WBA and Borough are up in the 20-30 million mark for the last 2 seasons, we have spent about 6 million in 2 years, that is what Forest spent this summer alone, as it stands we can't compete with that, especially when you consider most of the clubs spending big this summer did so also last summer so we are even further behind, how are we supposed to compete with that ? When teams can easily spend in 1 summer what we have spent since we've been in this division what do you expect ? If we are going to get out of this league then we have to do it over a long period as we need to build a solid squad of decent player and mould them into a bloody good side, how long has it taken Burnley to build this side that got them out of this league ? the larger part of a decade, and i'm damn sure they didn't get better every year, i'm sure they had some crap seasons in there along the way, but they persevered and over time they had ammassed a bloody good squad that with a tiny bit of tinkering looks as if it has every chance of staying in the best league on the planet. Thats the way we need to be looking at this, we can't compete in the short term with the spending power and the pull of the bigger clubs in this league, in terms of attractiveness we are a little above Coventry with Swansea, we don't have the history of Forest to help, nor the more recent success of Leicester, Derby et all. We have the basis of a decent sqaud here, i'd do some trimming but largely we have a solid backbone, but we need some tinkering. This season despite the god awful performances is the first one we've had where the team doesn't look like it needs wholesale changes in order to compete, we have to core of a good squad, but add in two good wingers a proven striker and some competition at left back and we have a squad that is more than capable of the top 6. There are some serious issues with Johnson at the moment, his tactics seem all at sea, he can't seem to pick a settled side, and he's generally having a shocker, and i'm as frustrated as anyone with life at AG at the moment, it's terrible to watch, but in the cold and harsh light of day we are not a big club or a big spender, we are pretty much milling around the middle with a host of other clubs who are on a similar level as us, but we have no right to be honestly saying we should be competing with sides paying out a huge amount more than us in transfer fees and wages, our total spending over 2 years is what, about 15% of Newcastles wage bill in a year, and mabye 20-25% of Wba's and probably about 40-60& of what a host of other clubs are laying out in a single year on wages, before they go out and buy anyone. I think it's more than hasty to remove Johnson now, i can understand why people say this and my faith in the man is Waifer thin at the moment, but i say give Him January, let him bring in a couple of players (wingers please) and if he still can't sort out our shortcomings then i think it will be time for him to move on, but we are not privy to what happens behind the scenes, it could be he had a couple of wide men lined up in the summer but got gazzumped and couldn't et anyone in time so is having to make do with a squad with no wingers bar one who is generally awful. We don't know if we just got buggered in the summer by things beyond our control, but if he doesn't rectify the problem in January then i will be standing there calling for him to go. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nibor Posted December 20, 2009 Report Share Posted December 20, 2009 Spud, I think your numbers are very much on the low side for transfer fees. Undisclosed can mean anything. Loans have big fees too. You're talking gross spend and not accounting for players out as well. I suspect our spending on transfer fees this season alone was nearer £3m than £1.6m. We paid fees for Clarkson, Nyatanga, Haynes, Gerken, Saborio, Sno and Velicka. We also spent over £3m on fees the two seasons previous. And it's the wage bills that are what really counts. Lee Martin went to Ipswich because of Keane by the way. Not money, we didn't get to talk money. A £6.5m loss and more specifically the accounts showing the wage bill and transfer spend tell us exactly what we the fans and SL the chairman are putting into the club in term of money. We don't need to remove Johnson now but we do have a right to expect more than the dire long ball shite that is currently taking us backward after the level of investment made. This isn't anything to do with unrealistic expectations, nobody here expects promotion we just want to be in with a shout of the playoffs, it is to do with a woefully underperforming side that is going to slide down the table unless something changes. 9th means nowt because we are going backwards and not going to finish there. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest DanC Posted December 20, 2009 Report Share Posted December 20, 2009 As a gas head i agree..we always expect too much..youre doin fine were doin fine...the realists will agree but the others what ever theyre called wont..I don't expect too much, And I am a realist, When I go to a football game I expect to see a game of football. I don't know what you would call what we are constantly serving up week after week but for sure it's not football. We struggle to even do the basics which with the players we have should be a very simple task. I can honestly say I can go up and watch a downs league game and will see the basics performed like pass and move, Don't try to cling on to a 1 nil league win with 60 minutes remaining and able to see out a game by running the ball into corners and wasting time and slowing the game down. From the outside it may look like we are doing fine but seriously when you can predict how teh game is going to turn out week after week then there is serious problems. You really need to watch a home game of ours to see how bad it is, I think you would actually be the only person in the ground who would be happy with our current performances. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WellRedPhil Posted December 20, 2009 Report Share Posted December 20, 2009 And it's the wage bills that are what really counts. Thats the issue for me, even though are transfer fees have not been massive our wages are significantly higher than we as a club are used to, and are we benefiting for it? We signed 6 players in the summer, and a further 3 on loan, admittedly the injury to Vellika was very unfortunate, but baring in mind we let go only 6 players, 6 players whose average wages would also be significantly lower than the 9 players we've signed, I think our wage bill is being seriously underestimated. I heard a rumour in the summer than SL had made this money available, supporting GJ on big loan signings, on the basis that we played attractive football that not only brought big crowds and therefore revenue to the Gate, but that also brought success on the pitch. As the rumour went should GJ have not achieved either on-pitch success, or an increases in gates, which atm we are clearly severely down on, then he would be fired after this season. Yes this is speculation, and I have no hard evidence to back it up, but it is something that sounds plausible IMO. One final thing I will add though, is that SL and GJ's relationship does seem to be very friendly, and although a good relationship is clearly required I always think there can become a point when a manager and chairman grow too friendly, affecting the professionalism of both men. SL seems to consider GJ integral to our World Cup and new stadium bid, and I do believe there is a danger that they will become too close, or possibly have already. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
22A Posted December 20, 2009 Report Share Posted December 20, 2009 Spud posted "We came into this division 2 and a half seasons ago, and for the first season we did fantastically well, but in the cold light of day we overachieved on a monumental scale, last season we were solid and finished in a respectable position, and we will probably do so again in this league". That's it. If this season's result's and perfomance had occurred in 07-08, and the 07-08 results this season all would be peace & light. On the other hand there are those who argue we could have gone up auto in that first season back. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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