The Building Process

[spudski]

2 minutes ago, Major Isewater said:

Just  look at Mourinho with Pogba . How can an 89 million pound World Cup winning player not be playing every week ?

 

So many variables Major...it happens at every Club.

[Guest]

23 minutes ago, BCFC Grim said:

Johnson's building process is just like Jenga. Starts of well but it ineveitablely falls down and you have to start again. 

 

Building is a waste of time if we let it be knocked down every year, our best players are always head hunted and we show little to no resistance when they are merely...........go again next season, without actually going anywhere.

Kelly our current fav is too often "robbed" at the back and goes missing too far forward...more a wing forward than wing back.

[Davefevs]

38 minutes ago, spudski said:

So many variables Major...it happens at every Club.

I think what many of us are saying is that we can’t afford to get it wrong. We need to be more clinical in our recruitment and critique each signing regularly.  

Of course every signing is a gamble. Nobody is disputing that or if they are, ignore them!!!

You have to group them too. 

Jack Hunt at 27 on a 3 year deal at £1.7m is not likely to get you any money back. If he does well you extend him and that in fact lessens the chance of recouping. If he does badly you move him on at less than you paid or he sees his 3 years out and goes for free. 

Taylor Moore is different. It was a large outlay initially and you expect it to take a while to make your money back. As it stands (still time though and I still think he can make it here) the deal hasn’t worked out.  You would not get back the £1.5m. I’d argue we overpaid for him and assuming he doesn’t make it here, you can’t afford to make errors like this one. 

I hear varying amounts banded around re Bakinson but say it’s £350-500k. That’s the sort of money you can play the numbers game with. Not £1.5m!

I think sometimes you just have to say no too!  Go with what you’ve got. If any manager has the backing of the board, it’s LJ. Surely he can look SL between the eyes and say “I would rather play youngster X than spend £1.5m on someone I don’t think is worth it”.

But if course he does like a club in the bag!!!

Just to add, if it were me I would have a model of projected values across each season. For someone like Hunt it would probably align to his amortisation. For someone like Bakinson it would be increasing ultimately. 

[cidered abroad]

9 minutes ago, Bri Stool City said:

Building is a waste of time if we let it be knocked down every year, our best players are always head hunted and we show little to no resistance when they are merely...........go again next season, without actually going anywhere.

Kelly our current fav is too often "robbed" at the back and goes missing too far forward...more a wing forward than wing back.

His first season as a regular!

As long as he learns from his games, then he will improve considerably more. The best City youngster since Gerry Gow?

[Alex_BCFC]

25 minutes ago, Bri Stool City said:

Building is a waste of time if we let it be knocked down every year, our best players are always head hunted and we show little to no resistance when they are merely...........go again next season, without actually going anywhere.

Kelly our current fav is too often "robbed" at the back and goes missing too far forward...more a wing forward than wing back.

How else would you go about it? Spend loads more money and go for it? Spend nothing and hope to do a Blackpool or something? Realistically you have to build and hope you can replace well when you inevitably lose your better players - same for any club really (apart from maybe Real or Barcelona). You hope you can build enough one season to make the PO’s etc. 

Very harsh on Kelly who is clearly going to be a class act. 

[spudski]

16 minutes ago, Davefevs said:

I think what many of us are saying is that we can’t afford to get it wrong. We need to be more clinical in our recruitment and critique each signing regularly.  

Of course every signing is a gamble. Nobody is disputing that or if they are, ignore them!!!

You have to group them too. 

Jack Hunt at 27 on a 3 year deal at £1.7m is not likely to get you any money back. If he does well you extend him and that in fact lessens the chance of recouping. If he does badly you move him on at less than you paid or he sees his 3 years out and goes for free. 

Taylor Moore is different. It was a large outlay initially and you expect it to take a while to make your money back. As it stands (still time though and I still think he can make it here) the deal hasn’t worked out.  You would not get back the £1.5m. I’d argue we overpaid for him and assuming he doesn’t make it here, you can’t afford to make errors like this one. 

I hear varying amounts banded around re Bakinson but say it’s £350-500k. That’s the sort of money you can play the numbers game with. Not £1.5m!

I think sometimes you just have to say no too!  Go with what you’ve got. If any manager has the backing of the board, it’s LJ. Surely he can look SL between the eyes and say “I would rather play youngster X than spend £1.5m on someone I don’t think is worth it”.

But if course he does like a club in the bag!!!

It's forever changing Dave as you know.

Changes from one week to the next. That's why it infuriates fans when comments are made by the Club, that don't seem to get adhered to. Comments become written in stone so to speak. However...What happens one week, get changed the following week. Fans get sucked in. It's a game of comments made by managers and owners, from week to week. It's all a bit pantomime tbh.

I think we have brought in players like Jack Hunt...'to do a job'...not to fit in with our philosophy so to speak. It was a needs must to compete. Pisano was injured...so was Wright. Kalas came here to play CB.

Play a kid and it goes wrong...who gets the blame, or asked why we didn't spend on cover?

It's a no win situation.

No Club can afford to get it wrong. There are no guarantees that a player will work out. You do your best...but there are no guarantees.

I think it's way too easy for us fans to critique and right lists about players, without knowing all the facts, all the variables, the budgets, the contracts, who was available, who wanted to come here, and also the human elements that play a big part.

Like I said...even if you get everything right...no injuries, every player you want...there are still all the rest of the league doing the same thing and trying to stop you.

No Club is perfect...

Our biggest problem imo...is we are a big fish in the South west. But a very average fish in the Championship and above.

We get bigged up because of our owner...our new stadium and investment. Journalists say we are a Prem team in waiting. All that does is create expectation and more pressure.

We've only been back up in the Championship a relative short time. Still building...still putting infrastructure in place...and all against a whole bunch of teams with far more resources and experience than us.

We sit mid table...not doing too badly.

We very much are what I expect us to be.

 

[Davefevs]

Totally agree @spudski  

But I wonder how Bristol City critically analyse recruitment?

How does MA earn his bonus?

Is it purely on the financial accounts or league position or something else?

Look at Ed Woodward....doing a “great” job financially, but most fans would say he doing an awful job. 

[spudski]

48 minutes ago, Davefevs said:

Totally agree @spudski  

But I wonder how Bristol City critically analyse recruitment?

How does MA earn his bonus?

Is it purely on the financial accounts or league position or something else?

Look at Ed Woodward....doing a “great” job financially, but most fans would say he doing an awful job. 

Who knows Dave.

What we do know from history is that SL likes to work with people he trusts...to do the job his way.

It can be debated whether they are the best people for the job in hand, and whether they could do better...or whether there are others that could do a better job.

However... it's obvious SL trusts the people at the top, and he wants stability. He wants to build. He may want Premiership...but imo, he's more interested in building gradually and doing it with the people he trusts...rather than dismantling what we've built over the past few seasons.

Unless we get into a relegation battle, recruit massively wrong, make no money or people start going away from the 'philosophy'...then I can't see things changing.

I should imagine every aspect of the club is being looked at to improve on.

[Mr Popodopolous]

2 hours ago, Bri Stool City said:

Building is a waste of time if we let it be knocked down every year, our best players are always head hunted and we show little to no resistance when they are merely...........go again next season, without actually going anywhere.

Kelly our current fav is too often "robbed" at the back and goes missing too far forward...more a wing forward than wing back.

I can't agree about Kelly, think he's still developing and an excellent player in the making- strong performer already in fact.

The first bit- I think the model is alright- to a point. A time in a rolling 3 year period (factoring in financial regs here) where we can- and therefore must- stand firm and keep all assets, all must not sells and if cash allows, a bit of strengthening too.

I reckon we will get one year in every 3 where it is the case- perhaps if we are lucky/clever on occasion 2.

However, when things align a bit, when the chance arises (and it can be year 1, year 2 or year 3 in the FFP cycle) we must take it. A year where we say 'no sales' or a year we say 'trade yes, but most can be ploughed back in'- or a combination of the 2.

If it's just sell sell sell, it's fatally flawed IMO. I understand that is the Brentford model roughly, but given we have more resources I'd class our ideal one as a Brentford Plus. In this instance Brentford Plus Flexibility.

[Major Isewater]

3 hours ago, spudski said:

So many variables Major...it happens at every Club.

Does it really ? 

Thank you for informing me Spud.

 

[Lrrr]

4 hours ago, Shtanley said:

O'Leary, Kelly, Vyner, Bakinson and Semenyo the five I think could be in our 18 regularly fairly soon.

I think Morrell should be in and around it too but we've got a fair few CMs so not easy for him to get in.

Then the likes of Lemonheigh-Evans, J Smith, Janneh and Pring are the other ones I think could end up having some kind of impact here in a couple years.

To be a championship team with 4 or 5 local players in the team would be a dream. 

I wonder whether we may experiment with Pring as the back up LB next season, will probably depend on if Kelly leaves as bringing in a new LB to hit the floor running would be hopeful enough with then having Pring as the other option, but if Lloyd is still here we may try it I reckon.

[Lrrr]

5 hours ago, Red_Wizard said:

Not that I recall. Everyone is going to have a different opinion of course. But not many made noise regarding the list. Not sure how I can find the post again to the related topic. 

Might have been someone else's but there was one I remember