50 Transfers

[Davefevs]

34 minutes ago, Mr Popodopolous said:

I think some of those RBs were reasonable tbh- some were not of course and 11 in 5 or 6 years is terrible churn! Fredericks has gone on to have a reasonable career, thought Pisano had his good points and bad points, Pereira and Hunt had their uses- again good and bad, Bennett- was he under Cotts or am I thinking of someone else? If under Cotts, more of an RWB as the back 3 thing. Matthews first loan was impressive, second was awful- Fulham at home in February 2017 sticks in the mind.

Yes, my point was the churn / short termism, rather than a critique of ability.  I was including Cotts era, hence Fredericks and Bennett upon promotion.

[bpexile]

1 hour ago, Davefevs said:

he needs someone to run the database and build the dashboards!

 

Anyone in mind Dave ?

[Fuber]

6 hours ago, Pezo said:

I wonder what the average is across the league. I like to think most of the time if you're the big fish (us in league 1) then you should really be getting about 1 in every 2 correct, if your the small/medium fish (us in the championship) you should probably be looking at 1 in every 4 (we can't attract the best players at this level so there is a lot more risk and likelihood of getting it wrong).

1 in 12 is frankly embarrassing and shine's a 1000 watt bulb on our problems, I wonder what the warning signs were because a lot of those players could be doing better for us.

I do wonder if the club hierarchy know this level, we do like players that seem to be average league 1 players (we never buy the best league 1 players), old championship level players that are past it and prem castoffs that think they are too good for league 1 but that would also be there natural level.

The start of the 'collapse' was LJ himself.

He thought he was Guardiola and tried tinkering counter each and every opposition he faced.

Even when he stumbled onto the idea of Reid as a pressng forward or as he put it the 'double false nine' with Pato, the second Diedhiou was back, Pato was shipped to LM, Reid to CAM, collapse occurred as he did what LJ alway did when we started losing. The tombola came out again.

Huge initial investment kept momentum in his first two seasons, the issue was once we started selling. LJ went for options, plural, instead of faith in a  like-for-like replacmemt. I.e. Weimann, Palmer,  and Watkins were signed when Reid was sold. Moore was recalled after we sold Flint, we also signed Kalas and Webster.

It's not the fees that screwed us, it was wages. Kalas and Webster may have worked, but Flint was on his extended contract at the point so, circa £10kpw, wages of the former two we were likely around £30kpw. Weimann, Palmer, Watkins probably around £35kpw to replace Reid's 6kpw (L1?) deal. 

Add that to poor punts on decent wages such as Djuric, Engvall, Tomlin.

Put another way, aside from loans out, we bought in 17 players between 2018-20. In the same period, we sold 7.

[Rob k]

6 hours ago, Lrrr said:

I was told Ipswich saw someone who had all the physical attributes to be a top player who they could teach the game and skills to and help them develop to the required standard 

Fair enough 

[Oh Louie louie]

Funny enough that djuric was on tv the other day.

Thats 2 ex city players leading the line in serie a!

[RedRock]

Our recruitment has been an absolute joke for years - ever since Cotts left. 

Can remember saying on here if the Club can’t be arsed to change their recruitment model then they should just track Brentford and put in last minute higher bids than they were making on players they had identified. Look where they are as compared to us! 
 

Should have, ages ago, appointed a wise old head Director of Football and a network of scouts, under a Head Scout, who knew their stuff and used analytics to aid, rather than drive, the process.

Instead, it appears we had a wannabe wheeler/dealer and some work experience chaps overseeing multi million pound investments and the future of our football club.

For a fraction of the money wasted on the likes of Palmer etc we could have set up the scouting framework we need.

We all know why it’s never happened don’t we. What surprises me is why nothing seems in place to change things now. 

Things don’t look good do they? Seriously, I think we’d struggle to put out winning performances in the National League at present. While a huge amount of this mess can be laid at Ashton’s door there do seem to be recurring themes developing under Big Nige.

Massive opportunities wasted to progress this Club in the last decade. Opportunities unlikely to be available again for a generation or more. Beyond depressing. 

[spudski]

I agree with Harry, that the recruitment could be far better.

The majority of the players recruited aren't bad players. They go on and play well for other teams, or turn up here, look good, then digress.

So it's not the players recruited perse

The problem we have imo, is we buy players that don't suit the way the manager/ coach wishes to play.

We've bought decent players, often with a sell on value in mind.

Players with talent in their own right, that are then manipulated to play in a way that doesn't suit their best attributes.

Never a team...always a bunch of individuals.

We had a way of playing early doors when LJ took over. It went downhill when we stopped playing the high press with energy and introduced the likes of Famara. It then resulted in a mix bag of Bassett's all sorts. We lost our identity. Just a bunch of players with no particular direction. It's got worse season by season since.

[Rob k]

1 hour ago, spudski said:

I agree with Harry, that the recruitment could be far better.

The majority of the players recruited aren't bad players. They go on and play well for other teams, or turn up here, look good, then digress.

So it's not the players recruited perse

The problem we have imo, is we buy players that don't suit the way the manager/ coach wishes to play.

We've bought decent players, often with a sell on value in mind.

Players with talent in their own right, that are then manipulated to play in a way that doesn't suit their best attributes.

Never a team...always a bunch of individuals.

We had a way of playing early doors when LJ took over. It went downhill when we stopped playing the high press with energy and introduced the likes of Famara. It then resulted in a mix bag of Bassett's all sorts. We lost our identity. Just a bunch of players with no particular direction. It's got worse season by season since.

Agree totally - hence why in my opinion we have to stick with this manager and give him the time to sort this mess out, i don’t believe many managers could get this bunch of players playing well together consistently. 
look at the forward signings we have made in recent times  that have not made a good contribution, Engvell, Duric, smozics, Adelkun, Eisa, Wells, Palmer…… it’s disgraceful recruiting 

[Harry]

1 hour ago, Rob k said:

Agree totally - hence why in my opinion we have to stick with this manager and give him the time to sort this mess out, i don’t believe many managers could get this bunch of players playing well together consistently. 
look at the forward signings we have made in recent times  that have not made a good contribution, Engvell, Duric, smozics, Adelkun, Eisa, Wells, Palmer…… it’s disgraceful recruiting 

Yep. And just to clarify - I am not calling for Pearson’s head. My point is that Pearson needs a better recruitment team behind him in order to help him to succeed. 
It’s an area we need to take action on asap. 

[Rob k]

23 minutes ago, Harry said:

Yep. And just to clarify - I am not calling for Pearson’s head. My point is that Pearson needs a better recruitment team behind him in order to help him to succeed. 
It’s an area we need to take action on asap. 

Yeah i don’t think you were calling for the managers head but I’ve seen plenty who have, I’m at a point where time has to be given purely to sort things out and just looking at your opening post it’s clear to see it’s a huge job 

[Davefevs]

4 hours ago, JonDolman said:

I think we made many okay signings under LJ and Holden and also some very good ones. Too many very bad ones though. Especially in 16/17 when we had that chief scout who seemed to be the person who was blamed for that as we soon got rid of him. Lansdown himself criticised the recruitment in this period.

Des Taylor?

What bugs me for all the self-proclaimed world class recruitment, why were there so many “okay” signings.  Proclaim world class, deliver average.

Pearson is impressed with the recruitment department though. And the signings that maybe Pearson was more dependent on them rather than his own knowledge were the ones that impressed me in the summer - Tanner and Atkinson.

That’s what he said, although I don’t take everything he says at face value!

Still would like to know a bit more about Atkinson and the process that took place, not forgetting Atkinson partnered Elliott Moore, ex-Leicester and Leuven CB (well known to Nige) at Oxford.  I’m a bit sceptical that’s all.  Tanner too.  When did he come to light?

The ones that Pearson knows and probably was entirely down to him I'd say only Matty James has impressed me. Very good signing imo.

Simpson - seems like Nige realised that was a mistake by then having to bring in Tanner earlier than it seems they had initially planned.

possibly.

King - I think had completed 90 minutes once in the three previous seasons. For him to basically be first choice going into the season expected to play game after game as Joe Williams was injured and surely no confidence in Williams remaining fit once back, King may have been the wrong one to bring in. He's had 3 injuries already. Also his performances became worse the more games he played. None of this should be surprising.

I’ve been impressed by King (when he’s played).  I don’t think he was expected to play game after game.  Do you really think that?  Low wage I suspect, does the basics really, really well, will help change the culture, etc.  and definitely a strong case to say we played better stuff earlier in the season - and he was part of that team.  Injuries are a bummer.  Leuven was a bad career choice and issues with the coach not wanting “King Power” players.

If we look at contract renewals in Baker and Weimann I think so far Baker has been a mistake, I guess Simpson actually falls into this category as he was here last season too.

All about opinions, and I think Baker was a bigger picture, better the devil you know signing, especially when you’re also going to have to integrate a CB who’s never played at this level.  So far (imho) he’s done the job he was signed to do, in fact he’s played very well.  Concerns re injuries have surfaced again though.

Pearson knew Baker comes off a lot injured. He's done so 5 times already this season. Started and completed only 8 games.

by all means evaluate on an ongoing basis, but let’s just rush to give a final verdict at this point.

Weimann not played very well so far imo. Mainly because of our style of play and playing him alongside Martin. That's down to Pearson though and it might turn out to be a good decision to keep him on if Pearson knows how to get the best out of him.

He’s had good games and bad games.  He has 7 goals and 3 assists in a struggling side..

3 year contract seemed crazy to me for a runner now in his 30s. I would be interested to know what championship clubs were interested in him and what their plan would have been for Weimann in their side. Not been impressed with the long ball tactics up to him and Martin so far.

Sometimes you have to concede terms on contracts.  Ideally Club wanted to give him 2 years, but it was a compromise on him taking a wage reduction.  

So still big problems but I'm not so sure how much blame the recruitment department has when the only 2 signings that had not previously played under Pearson are good ones imo.

very subjective.  I could argue all signings bar Simpson have been decent.  Depends what you’re measuring against.  As per above, if you’re judging King on playing 40+ games, you’re setting your objectives wrong.

They could not afford whatever striker Pearson wanted. As Pearson said it would cost millions to improve on what we have up front. I was concerned by this as I don't believe a good team is all about having the best players on paper.

I suggested on here Danny Ward in the past. On paper it would have been a Cardiff reject joining us. Look at him play and he's a good all round striker at this level. He's been starting regularly up top in the lone role for Huddersfield who are 8th. He was a free transfer signing. That's just an example as he was under contract at Huddersfield last summer.

Danny Ward is a decent player, I like him too.  Is that Pearson’s fault?

Was there any other of this type I wonder, free or very cheap. This comes down to recruitment but also comes down to Pearson correctly seeing what the team needs.

obviously not, or I’m sure we’d have signed them!  

Comments above.

on a serious point I think you are trying too hard to make these recruits a binary “good signing” / “bad signing” evaluation, when it is anything but that.  When you do that, if you set your “scoring method” wrong, you’ll end up putting them into “bad” because you’ve set the rules.  There is far more grey than black and white in these signings.

For the previous recruitment collective (first sentence) you’ve shown inconsistency because you’ve introduced an “okay” score to your good and bad.  That gives you a massive “get out” to allow you make Pearson’s recruitment score worse.

If you applied the same consistent scoring method to this summer’s 7 “signings”, you’d get a very different answer.

 

FWIW I don’t think it will be until next summer that we really will know how good our recruitment is / has been.  We might even see personnel changes in that set-up.

[Unan]

Slightly unfair as Tanner/Atkinson/James are out with short term injuries. King/Simpson were always squad players at best. That’s 6/12, I can’t think of the next 6 most recently in but it might not be as clean cut as you’ve said.

[Red-Robbo]

19 hours ago, Harry said:

I was having a little bit of a wonder about our starting line up yesterday and how it was put together. 
I found it quite interesting that to get to the 8 non-academy players we started, you have to go back 50 transfers. 
So that’s 50 signings we’ve made, that resulted in the 8 players being fielded yesterday. 
 

That’s over 10 transfer windows - the earliest being O’Dowda in July 16. 
 

We can shorten this period down by stating that only 1 of our last 12 signings started. Read that again. ONE OF OUR LAST TWELVE SIGNINGS!! 
 

So, whilst we all knew there was a stockpiling of players under MA & LJ, since LJ left, things haven’t got any better. 
 

I keep banging on about it, I know some will be bored of me saying it, but our recruitment over the last 4 years has been absolutely shocking. And it hasn’t improved over the last 18 months either. 
 

We need to sort out the recruitment ASAP. We still don’t have a Head of Recruitment. We still don’t have a Chief Scout. We still rely upon an in house database that doesn’t send a scout to watch Cheltenham v Exeter under 18’s last Saturday morning, a database that won’t have a damn clue about Felix Miles or Will Armitage or Alex Hartridge, just like it didn’t have a clue in the past about the likes of Grimes, Watkins, Jay, Key or the likes of Twine, hell let’s even go back further and say Bowen when at Hereford. 
We seem to have once again abandoned the idea that there are potentially good youngsters on our doorstep, and we aren’t thinking about these for the future. 
 

Unless we’ve got 15 absolute diamonds in our youth set up, I sincerely worry about the next few years with the lack of knowledge of local/south west youngsters. 
 

 

Our approach was certainly "throw a lot of mud at the wall and see what sticks".

Unfortunately, all it has left us with is a wall covered in crap and a hefty clean-up bill. 

[Offside]

My thoughts on the players brought in/ brought back under NP:

Atkinson & Tanner - I like both of them, both are young with potential. The type of players we should be going for. 

James - good signing, decent player. Needs players around him with energy because he lacks mobility.

King - in the games I’ve seen he’s been largely anonymous. I’m happy to be proved wrong. 

Simpson - seems past it. But like King his infuence off the pitch might be the most important thing  

Baker & Weimann - no problem with retaining these two. Experienced players to compensate for the young players NP has selected for the squad. Baker has played well, Weimann has been mixed and looks like he has lost some pace. We definitely need more options up front.

 

 

[rednotblue]

I can never get my head around why after getting the academy set up the scouting and recruitment was not as well. It must be a concious decision by SL not to do it. Is it because he is still desperate to be involved? It makes zero business sense especially with his mantra about the club being self sustainable. 

Player after player has been signed. How much research was done on Nagy, Palmer etc etc. I think too often decent players have been signed with no thought on how they fit in the team or intergrate with the club. You would not recruit like this for any business unless you were desperate, or had another agenda. As a result we are back to having champagne lifestyle on a lemomade budget again. Under SOD and DM part of their remit was to cut the playing budget iirc? Pearson seems to have the same.

We have lots of players who are on good wages that aren't good enough and no one else wants. Piss poor recruitment and we have been here before many times. How can someone like SL (who is an astute businessman) fail to see it? In the grand scheme if things how much would it cost to set up a decent scouting network, DoF and associated systems, analysts etc?

 

 

 

[spudski]

8 minutes ago, rednotblue said:

I can never get my head around why after getting the academy set up the scouting and recruitment was not as well. It must be a concious decision by SL not to do it. Is it because he is still desperate to be involved? It makes zero business sense especially with his mantra about the club being self sustainable. 

Player after player has been signed. How much research was done on Nagy, Palmer etc etc. I think too often decent players have been signed with no thought on how they fit in the team or intergrate with the club. You would not recruit like this for any business unless you were desperate, or had another agenda. As a result we are back to having champagne lifestyle on a lemomade budget again. Under SOD and DM part of their remit was to cut the playing budget iirc? Pearson seems to have the same.

We have lots of players who are on good wages that aren't good enough and no one else wants. Piss poor recruitment and we have been here before many times. How can someone like SL (who is an astute businessman) fail to see it? In the grand scheme if things how much would it cost to set up a decent scouting network, DoF and associated systems, analysts etc?

 

 

 

You could have a whole bunch of scouts watching games every day, for the cost ( nothing ) of someone in admin emailing the home club saying someone is in attendance...just need a club accredited badge or whatever it is these days and email to show on entering.

Many knowledgeable people attend games regularly out of choice, that could easily report back to the club for nothing...just the time to email, nothing more...why would they not use copious amounts of people watching, then send head scouts and check deeper.

Scouting is the cheapest form of finding gems at ground level, yet a dieing art it seems.

It now relies on number crunchers who watch games and put on data bases.  Football is like every other business...easily manipulated by other businesses looking to take a chunk out of them.

Example...

Top Club takes on a new direction in recruitment and technology. Finance (money) has a major influence on this. Others take notice and follow...then everyone follows. Follow my leader...whether proven or not.

MA used to bang on about being ahead of the curve...it was utter bollox...head of the curve means looking to be doing what the top teams are doing...who have technology but also soldiers on the ground so to speak. We didn't do both well. Neglected scouting properly at ground level.

The one thing I've noticed with this Club,is that it's become more and more closed shop. Less likely to look outside the norm. It has a fear. A fear of looking stupid.  

SoD was close to showing up the ownership. MA came in and closed shop so to speak.

Scouting and recruitment is a joke. Has been for as long as I can remember.

[22A]

On 29/11/2021 at 19:29, Harry said:

We seem to have once again abandoned the idea that there are potentially good youngsters on our doorstep, and we aren’t thinking about these for the future. 

 

Nothing new. Paul Cheesley from Gordano had been spotted by Norwich and we had to sign him from them.

[Davefevs]

3 hours ago, JonDolman said:

That's the problem with the King signing imo. How could he not be expected to play many games when we go into the season starting him in the first 3 games before picking up an injury in the Reading game. Then going on to have another 2 injuries.

Ask yourself why he started the first game?  Williams not quite ready, Massengo injured.  Williams then injured v FGR.  You are ignoring several things.

After a 2nd injury he came back into the side for two full games and then he's injured for a third time for probably about 2 months before he returns some time in December.

If you want to put him in the “bad signing” pile overall because of 7 starts, 2 subs, 2 unused out of 20, then fair enough.  But no way was the expectation for him to start most games just because he made the starting eleven first few games.  Without looking back at your posts I bet you had different expectations of game time at the point of signing?

I think there's only been one game where he has been dropped or rested. The other times he has started on the bench has been when coming back from an injury. Pearson generally looks to start him. Obviously Williams has been injured, but that should not be a surprise.

Look at who was available Jon in the period King was starting (2nd column is FGR in cup)

Its down to circumstances.

I think any signing should be expected to start a lot of games because there is always a chance they will be required to do that with players unavailable, especially now with a smaller squad of players and in midfield we have the ridiculously injury prone Joe Williams.

If those are your rules, then you need to revisit your evaluation of MA / LJ’s time….because there are are a lot you must’ve put into “okay” that got nowhere near your expectations.  I’m asking for some consistency. 

I think Baker has had some good games, but he certainly has a bad error in him for such an experienced centre back. Biggest thing though is we know there's a good chance he will come off injured which keeps happening.

Do you think overall (so far) he’s been bad?  13 starts, 2 subs, 1 unused, 4 missed.  Out of 20 league games.  There haven’t been many mistakes in that amount of gametime.  With Kalas likely to start every game, between him and Atkinson they’ve played a decent chunk of minutes each.  At this point, we don’t know how long he’s out for.  We don’t even know if it was concussion (unless I’ve missed something).  It’s a squad game.  If we are gonna 3 at the back then we need to raise expectations, but probably need another CB (Cundy? Moore?) as cover.

I am evaluating on an ongoing basis. I can't see what will happen with the rest of the season but things we have seen with Baker and King aren't at all surprising to me.

Fair enough.

On Weimann, I just don't really get the Martin - Weimann partnership. Yep, they've both scored goals.

Weimann had 2 great games where he scored twice in each vs Reading and Cardiff. He scored twice and I think had a decent first half against Barnsley in a different role. And he scored in the Coventry game but actually had quite a bad game in that one imo. So he's scored in four games this season and there is 16 games he hasn't scored in.

I just look at each game and think whether someone is playing well, and I don't think Weimann has played well in many games this season. He did play well in all the games at the start of last season before the injury imo. It's about finding a role for him to get the best out of him.

might not have played well (I agree), but in your reckoning does that mean he must’ve played badly then?  Can he not have played “okay”?  You must have a small list of players playing well each week this season based on your view that most weeks as a team we haven’t been very good.

I was very frustrated with LJ so often going with the Diedhiou - Weimann partnership, and it's similar now with the Martin - Weimann partnership. Not that I think Fam and Martin are really similar but the current partnership I find frustrating to watch.

As a whole team it’s frustrating.  We are at the start of a major change cycle.  It’s a tough watch.  There are struggling partnerships all over the pitch.

My Danny Ward example was that there can be good signings that don't cost much, or in his case a free but of course going back the previous season so never an option for Pearson. I explained it's just an example in the previous post. It should not cost millions to bring in a good striker to do a decent job up front at this level imo.

I agreed, I still agree!  Why aren’t we getting them.  @Harrymight be onto something

Where you say 'obviously not, or I'm sure we'd have signed them.' Just because we didnt bring in a good inexpensive striker doesn't mean there wasn't one out there. That would come down to Pearson knowing what he wants and the recruitment team finding that type of player.

Absolutely.  This is where we are in the dark aren’t we?  When you looked around the free transfer strikers this summer there was a dearth of quality.  I thought Ashley Fletcher might’ve been realistic.  But we’d be up against several other champ clubs for his signature.  He went to PL Watford.  There were other freebies, but I don’t expect either of us thought they were better than what we had (in our amateur scouting view).  If Danny Ward was available this Summer, then I would’ve been advocating him as an option for sure.  Last summer, I suspect going back to his former club had major appeal.

On the scoring thing I am not scoring anything. I am not comparing this seasons recruitment with any previous seasons.

Ok, but you started by talking about the previous regime.  If you aren’t comparing to / scoring against previous then fine.  But then I think you’re setting your tipping point between good and bad particularly high.  But that is your prerogative.  I’ll stand down

1 hour ago, rednotblue said:

I can never get my head around why after getting the academy set up the scouting and recruitment was not as well. It must be a concious decision by SL not to do it. Is it because he is still desperate to be involved? It makes zero business sense especially with his mantra about the club being self sustainable.

Because Mr Ego wanted to control it all.  Having people around that could challenge his view of the best recruit was not what he wanted.  Imagine two similar ability players.  One with a favourable agent, and guess which one gets recommended?  Imagine that the other player might actually be a better fit.  You can imagine what came out if the filter can’t you.  Someone like Keith Burt would’ve seen straight through it.  He didn’t last long. 

Player after player has been signed. How much research was done on Nagy, Palmer etc etc. I think too often decent players have been signed with no thought on how they fit in the team or intergrate with the club. You would not recruit like this for any business unless you were desperate, or had another agenda. As a result we are back to having champagne lifestyle on a lemomade budget again. Under SOD and DM part of their remit was to cut the playing budget iirc? Pearson seems to have the same.

There are stories that some players signed were never watched.  It’s bizarre because I think one of the Italian signings (Magnússon, Djuric or Pisano, I don’t know which) was watched 7 or 8 times by various members of the team, inc several times by LJ himself.

We have lots of players who are on good wages that aren't good enough and no one else wants. Piss poor recruitment and we have been here before many times. How can someone like SL (who is an astute businessman) fail to see it? In the grand scheme if things how much would it cost to set up a decent scouting network, DoF and associated systems, analysts etc?

We received good fees.  We also spent a lot on fees…and a lot in wages.

 

 

35 minutes ago, spudski said:

You could have a whole bunch of scouts watching games every day, for the cost ( nothing ) of someone in admin emailing the home club saying someone is in attendance...just need a club accredited badge or whatever it is these days and email to show on entering.

Many knowledgeable people attend games regularly out of choice, that could easily report back to the club for nothing...just the time to email, nothing more...why would they not use copious amounts of people watching, then send head scouts and check deeper.

Scouting is the cheapest form of finding gems at ground level, yet a dieing art it seems.

It now relies on number crunchers who watch games and put on data bases.  Football is like every other business...easily manipulated by other businesses looking to take a chunk out of them.

Example...

Top Club takes on a new direction in recruitment and technology. Finance (money) has a major influence on this. Others take notice and follow...then everyone follows. Follow my leader...whether proven or not.

MA used to bang on about being ahead of the curve...it was utter bollox...head of the curve means looking to be doing what the top teams are doing...who have technology but also soldiers on the ground so to speak. We didn't do both well. Neglected scouting properly at ground level.

The one thing I've noticed with this Club,is that it's become more and more closed shop. Less likely to look outside the norm. It has a fear. A fear of looking stupid.  

SoD was close to showing up the ownership. MA came in and closed shop so to speak.

Scouting and recruitment is a joke. Has been for as long as I can remember.

Yep, Brentford have a massive scouting network, fluid to deal with changes like Brexit.  As you say they don’t have to be permanent employees.  The fact that Ashton got rid of a lot of it, proves my point in reply above. Would’ve undermined his little clique(s).

[lenred]

1 hour ago, 22A said:

Nothing new. Paul Cheesley from Gordano had been spotted by Norwich and we had to sign him from them.

It’s interesting.  I played at a decent youth level against teams in Somerset/Avon (as was)/Devon growing up in the early 90s. City never ever scouted our leagues players afaik. I played with and against lads who ended up at Argyle, Rovers, Swindon, Southampton and even Palace youth set ups but never ever City. None of them went on to actually  ‘make it’ as a pro but whose to say they didn’t missed out on gems that would’ve at the various age groups.
I always wondered at the time why City never even seemed interested in these lads, but seems it’s an ongoing theme that they just didn’t look that far out. 

Edited November 30, 2021 by lenred

[Lorenzos Only Goal]

On 29/11/2021 at 19:41, Davefevs said:

Keep the posts coming, always an interesting read.

You need to pitch your services to Mr Pearson directly, or get in via Tinnion.  I’m sure you could list a number of players that might pique his interest!

I’m not expecting much in January.

Having thought about it, some of the signings you’d want to do in the summer, can’t really be brought forward, because they only becoming viable when they are OOC.

Think we will be relying on keeping players fit.

I quite fancy Tony Scully

[Davefevs]

18 minutes ago, JonDolman said:

I thought there was a chance King would play quite a bit this season. Williams having injury problems, and with us having a lack of wingers so always a chance Pearson might want to go 3 centre mids, 1 being a narrow wide man which I still think is something he might want to do in the future. King was also ahead of Bakinson, and probably still preferred to Bakinson by Pearson.

I don't know what these rules are you say I have. There have been okay signings under LJ that did quite well for us overall I think. Hard to really put them all in categories. I'm not really trying to do that. What I am saying with Andy King is that we may have been better off looking elsewhere.

On Baker I said he's had some good games. But I don't rate him as highly as some do on here. I didnt think he was reliable enough for us to go back in to sign him.

On Weimann I think generally him and Martin has been a poor combination imo. I just think Weimann has been quite ineffective in his role under Pearson so far this season. That's not really a criticism of Weimann.

Ta for reply.

As for Weimann / Martin I tend to agree.  I didn’t see both starting every game, I’d hoped Wells would’ve forced his way in, and also Semenyo wouldn’t have had his set-back when he initially came back…and from those options we might have seen some better partnerships evolve.

Really could do with Antoine getting a game through the middle, scoring and therefore making him a really good option up top.

I hate bloody talking formations but with current injuries I do wonder whether Nige might start with a 343 like he ended Sunday.  It’s not what I’d do, but hey-ho!  Semenyo, Martin and Wells across the front-line?  I hope Antoine gets a start.

 

[Davefevs]

52 minutes ago, Lorenzos Only Goal said:

I quite fancy Tony Scully

Is the wink emoji pertinent?

[Olé]

8 hours ago, spudski said:

MA came in and closed shop so to speak.

7 hours ago, Davefevs said:

The fact that Ashton got rid of a lot of it, proves my point in reply above. Would’ve undermined his little clique(s).

The question for me will always be WHY would Mark Ashton reduce the network or close in on a far smaller counsel of individuals (and spreadsheet) for our recruitment. It doesn't appear to have saved any money nor been successful. 

So why do it? There must have been a reason - as bad as MA was, no one sets out to do the wrong thing and fail.

• Was it simply because it played to his sense of self importance? I don't believe even MA is that vain or spiteful 
• Did it transfer power/control and eventually unprecedented remuneration in his direction? It seems to have helped build his remit/salary, but again I don't believe MA is stupid enough not to recognise success in the transfer market could do that even more effectively - why gamble on all the control and none of the impact for personal success 
• Was there some other material benefit to restricting the scope and network of recruitment and giving him greater say? I've heard innuendo about a limited number of preferred scouts. Scouts as we know monetise transfers. MA loves the corporate game - in business many enjoy a high life of favour / reward from suppliers who stand to make money. I keep coming back to this and wondering if our transfers had some benefit to MA? All the other pieces fit.

I wish someone could join the dots on that last one. I hesitate to make accusations of bungs which are a serious matter and I'm not here to slander the guy, but there seems to be little to explain the basis for his approach to transfers in other terms (not success, experience, or cost saving). So why did he close ranks and limit our approach so specifically? And let's not forget that MA first came to the club explicitly working as a third party making money from brokering transfers.

I don't much like the conclusion I keep landing on, and hope for his sake he was just crap at recruitment and knew no better.

[Tin Soldier]

12 hours ago, spudski said:

You could have a whole bunch of scouts watching games every day, for the cost ( nothing ) of someone in admin emailing the home club saying someone is in attendance...just need a club accredited badge or whatever it is these days and email to show on entering.

Many knowledgeable people attend games regularly out of choice, that could easily report back to the club for nothing...just the time to email, nothing more...why would they not use copious amounts of people watching, then send head scouts and check deeper.

Scouting is the cheapest form of finding gems at ground level, yet a dieing art it seems.

It now relies on number crunchers who watch games and put on data bases.  Football is like every other business...easily manipulated by other businesses looking to take a chunk out of them.

Example...

Top Club takes on a new direction in recruitment and technology. Finance (money) has a major influence on this. Others take notice and follow...then everyone follows. Follow my leader...whether proven or not.

MA used to bang on about being ahead of the curve...it was utter bollox...head of the curve means looking to be doing what the top teams are doing...who have technology but also soldiers on the ground so to speak. We didn't do both well. Neglected scouting properly at ground level.

The one thing I've noticed with this Club,is that it's become more and more closed shop. Less likely to look outside the norm. It has a fear. A fear of looking stupid.  

SoD was close to showing up the ownership. MA came in and closed shop so to speak.

Scouting and recruitment is a joke. Has been for as long as I can remember.

A well know OTIBer poster who used to post a lot (I think @spudskimay know him) used to be a part time scout for City. Some of the stories he told me about the running of the club made me realise that Bristol City has been badly run for many years, and still is. This is where IMO SL has been found out - he just does not know how to run a football club, relied on Ashton and the mistakes came one after another. And where are we now .......

[Davefevs]

3 hours ago, Olé said:

The question for me will always be WHY would Mark Ashton reduce the network or close in on a far smaller counsel of individuals (and spreadsheet) for our recruitment. It doesn't appear to have saved any money nor been successful. 

So why do it? There must have been a reason - as bad as MA was, no one sets out to do the wrong thing and fail.

• Was it simply because it played to his sense of self importance? I don't believe even MA is that vain or spiteful 
• Did it transfer power/control and eventually unprecedented remuneration in his direction? It seems to have helped build his remit/salary, but again I don't believe MA is stupid enough not to recognise success in the transfer market could do that even more effectively - why gamble on all the control and none of the impact for personal success 
• Was there some other material benefit to restricting the scope and network of recruitment and giving him greater say? I've heard innuendo about a limited number of preferred scouts. Scouts as we know monetise transfers. MA loves the corporate game - in business many enjoy a high life of favour / reward from suppliers who stand to make money. I keep coming back to this and wondering if our transfers had some benefit to MA? All the other pieces fit.

I wish someone could join the dots on that last one. I hesitate to make accusations of bungs which are a serious matter and I'm not here to slander the guy, but there seems to be little to explain the basis for his approach to transfers in other terms (not success, experience, or cost saving). So why did he close ranks and limit our approach so specifically? And let's not forget that MA first came to the club explicitly working as a third party making money from brokering transfers.

I don't much like the conclusion I keep landing on, and hope for his sake he was just crap at recruitment and knew no better.

Rob.  I would like to close the loop on this one too.  Would love to know the transaction flow beyond City to Selling Club and Agents, how many players used the services of his / his wife’s (ex-wife?) business.  A lot of transfers (in and out) means a lot transactions.

The other aspect is that people in football (like all professions) can spot a BSer a mile off.  20Man for example saw through him.  The less football people to question him the better in his mind.

[spudski]

2 minutes ago, Davefevs said:

Rob.  I would like to close the loop on this one too.  Would love to know the transaction flow beyond City to Selling Club and Agents, how many players used the services of his / his wife’s (ex-wife?) business.  A lot of transfers (in and out) means a lot transactions.

The other aspect is that people in football (like all professions) can spot a BSer a mile off.  20Man for example saw through him.  The less football people to question him the better in his mind.

Problem is...anyone given the boot by him, was paid off and had to sign a gagging order. I remember talking to someone who had this happen to them, and they would only allude to certain things. I didn't press as it would have been unfair on them. There were no positives though. Impression was wanted to control of everything and take credit for things...even though on occasion he hadn't done it.

[Red Skin]

I keep returning to the feeling that something catastrophic like relegation will have to happen before SL presses the reset button and rethinks the whole recruitment model (and the way the football structure is organised for that matter).  If we keep stumbling on like we are, just surviving, then we'll keep kidding ourselves everything is gonna be alright given a bit more time.  

Plenty of coaches, like LJ, visit other clubs to see how the coaching is done, so why don't the corporate suits go and visit a well run club to see how they organise themselves?  Maybe English clubs may not be keen to share the secret if their success but I'm sure a trip to a well run German club may be useful.   They may operate to different rules and regulations, but I'm sure we could learn something from how they are structured.    

[Davefevs]

19 minutes ago, Red Skin said:

Plenty of coaches, like LJ, visit other clubs to see how the coaching is done, so why don't the corporate suits go and visit a well run club to see how they organise themselves?  Maybe English clubs may not be keen to share the secret if their success but I'm sure a trip to a well run German club may be useful.   They may operate to different rules and regulations, but I'm sure we could learn something from how they are structured.    

According to MA, clubs were flocking to come to see how Bristol City did stuff….but what bits did they take away???

[Lorenzos Only Goal]

13 hours ago, Davefevs said:

Is the wink emoji pertinent?

Add ambiguity spices things up, but in all seriousness he is like a little Scotty Murray.

[Henry]

58 minutes ago, Davefevs said:

According to MA, clubs were flocking to come to see how Bristol City did stuff….but what bits did they take away???

Some laundry tips?