[Archived] 2011 Summer Transfer Window Roundup

[mike at picture]

We sold Jones and Kalinic for 22.5M. Our outgoings were less than half of that. Moreover, the surplus went into servicing debt without which we presumably could not have carried on.

How then do we differ from a selling club?

( I never said we were a buying club by the way so the condescension wasn't needed)

Clearly "yes". Now what about answering my questions?

I came on this thread offering an opinion on footballing matters, something that you are clearly incapable of.

Over recent months of lurking I have noted the somewhat brusque nature of your contributions. That and the fact that you are a complete turncoat.

[47er]

Why does the Phil Jones money keep getting mentioned as money that should have gone towards transfers? I was under the impression that two facts had been established -

1) We only got £8.5m of the Jones money up front.

2) The bank seized all of that.

Has it come out that these were not the case? I don't tend to follow these things too closely as they seem to just be one big cycle of contradictions.

Complete misunderstanding of the discussion which is/was about whether we are any longer a "selling' club. As you say you don't follow these things too closely.

[T4E]

I don't care about the selling club/buying club bit - anyone not entrenched in that conversation can see how pointless that is. Venky's could have spent more than they recouped without being considered a buying club.

I'm referring to yourself and den, amongst others over recent weeks, counting the Jones money in a number that Venky's should have paid out before they could be considered as having invested in the club.

We sold Jones and Kalinic for 22.5M. Our outgoings were less than half of that.

So, again, if it is accepted that all the Jones money has not come in, why are you including it in this figure?

Good decision, we really need to get to football again, I feel prety let down by Venkys and really dislike Kean but quite a few people are saying these signings look good, so I look forward to Kean winning games or he better go.

You should get a Lifetime Achievement award for that avatar.

[chris]

plus I believe Jones and Kalinic income can reach up to 26.5 million.

[Mattyblue]

What it comes down to is that Venky's don't have the funds/intentions to make us net spenders each window.

In June the noises were somewhat different, but we are where we are.

Venky's have got their hands on an invaluable publicity vehicle and this needs minimal capital investment on their part to maintain. They've played a blinder.

[T4E]

Didn't most people say when they took over that they hoped that Venky's would continue to spend in a cautious way, not over committ or burden the club, and not pay over the odds for average players?

The players we have signed in this transfer window remind me of the trust under Souness or early day Hughes - we sold one or two players for good cash and reinvested most of it in quite a few players. There's absolutely nothign wrong with that - infact its sensibility on a level that Venky's have yet to meet in any other aspect of their running of the club.

[den]

So, again, if it is accepted that all the Jones money has not come in, why are you including it in this figure?

The debate about how much money should be available is more of a general debate. Not one of us on here can say that any specific figure should be available. Too many unknowns.

My comments T4E, are really against the argument that we shouldn't count all of the Jones money as being available to the manager because only half of it has been paid up front. Well, if you accept that all of the Jone's money didn't come in, then you have to accept that Rovers have actually only spent half of what has been quoted - because rovers don't pay all their transfer fees up front either. If we accept that, then there is still a significant gap between the financial outgoings and incomings.

Bottom line is, to really judge whether we are reinvesting all incoming transfer fees, it can only be done after a period of two or three transfer windows. I think it's fairly certain that we wont put all sales monies into new players, because essentially outside Man City, no club does.

In my opinion, Venky's wont provide more cash input than the trustees did prior to the last few seasons when they withdrew their cash input. In fact, after their initial contractual obligations, they might even provide less funding. Who knows?

[47er]

I don't care about the selling club/buying club bit - anyone not entrenched in that conversation can see how pointless that is. Venky's could have spent more than they recouped without being considered a buying club.

I'm referring to yourself and den, amongst others over recent weeks, counting the Jones money in a number that Venky's should have paid out before they could be considered as having invested in the club.

So, again, if it is accepted that all the Jones money has not come in, why are you including it in this figure?

Den has answered it. We must have a like for like situation. If Rovers have only got half the money for Jones because clubs only pay in instalments then, by the same logic Venkys haven't spent 5M on Dann and so on.

[JAL]

If Paul Ince only managed to sign one good player during his tenure at Ewood in Paul Robinson, yet clown Steve Kean who's showing that hes a far worse manager than Ince ever was. Then what are the chances of Kean being capable of bringing in at least ONE solitary good player from his tenure?

Will there be one ?

[deryck guyler's spoon]

what are the chances of Kean being capable of bringing in at least ONE solitary good player from his tenure?

Will there be one ?

What are the chances of at least ONE of your posts not reading like you are on crack?

Will there be one?

[T4E]

Den has answered it. We must have a like for like situation. If Rovers have only got half the money for Jones because clubs only pay in instalments then, by the same logic Venkys haven't spent 5M on Dann and so on.

Exactly - but the difference is you know for a fact that we haven't got all the Jones money. Kalinic money in and Dann money out can be debated. Just because we don't know all the facts doesn't mean we should ignore the ones we do.

[philipl]

There is little point debating the merits of this summer's player signings until Kean's replacement has bedded them down (yes I know there is an assumption in that sentence and I know I was hasty in my comment about Petrovic).

However, two points are worth making. Whilst cogitating on my lunchtime sandwich, it struck me it as all but impossible until (if ever) Grella is fit to put out a Rovers team from the current squad without at least two glaring weaknesses (bite in midfield and full back vulnerability).

And irrespective of marquees etc., we had been repeatedly promised a NET investment of £5m per window in the transfer market. Accepting that includes wages, we were at least £15m shy of that number in this summer's window. It is actually almost certainly worse as it appears we received higher percentages of incoming transfer fees up front than we were willing to pay for incoming transfers.

[67splitscreen]

Diouf get a six figure pay off, my guess is around 50% of the remainder of his 10 month contract. 600k ish, Ouch! + no doubt extra for the impossible, keeping his trap shut.

[T4E]

However, two points are worth making. Whilst cogitating on my lunchtime sandwich, it struck me it as all but impossible until (if ever) Grella is fit to put out a Rovers team from the current squad without at least two glaring weaknesses (bite in midfield and full back vulnerability).

Agreed about the full backs, however how important is "bite in midfield"? In this day of 5 man midfields it has become less of a necessity - who provides the bite in Man United's midfield? Chelsea's? Arsenal's? Liverpool's? It's not something that is as necessary now as it was in the days of Keane and Vieira.

I think we can do without, ball playing centre midfielders are far more important nowadays than "ruffle the feathers" Savage types.

[den]

Agreed about the full backs, however how important is "bite in midfield"? In this day of 5 man midfields it has become less of a necessity - who provides the bite in Man United's midfield? Chelsea's? Arsenal's? Liverpool's? It's not something that is as necessary now as it was in the days of Keane and Vieira.

I think we can do without, ball playing centre midfielders are far more important nowadays than "ruffle the feathers" Savage types.

Can't agree with that T4E.

Away from home in particular, when you're up against it, or you're not getting the results, then you need a bunch of players who can stand firm and show the "thy shall not pass" attitude. Sometimes a team has to simply go out, defend for their lives and see what happens. We haven't had that since Savage last performed. Hughes had a bunch of players at Rovers who could stick up for themselves as well.

[Miker]

And irrespective of marquees etc., we had been repeatedly promised a NET investment of £5m per window in the transfer market. Accepting that includes wages, we were at least £15m shy of that number in this summer's window. It is actually almost certainly worse as it appears we received higher percentages of incoming transfer fees up front than we were willing to pay for incoming transfers.

Pointless making these sort of assumptions when you don't actually know the exact numbers and you're not taking into account all the expenses that the owners may have had to incur in less than a year. Especially where there's every possibility that more players will be bought in January, especially if we have a proper manager in place.

I'm not really sure what you're trying to prove anymore anyway, so I'm going to stay out of the discussion from here. I'll thank you and Paul for pointing me to the Company House documents, which after reading will let me sleep easy knowing that there's nothing sinister going on. Plenty of stupidity on show on the part of Venky's, but we're all human after all.

[philipl]

Pointless making these sort of assumptions when you don't actually know the exact numbers and you're not taking into account all the expenses that the owners may have had to incur in less than a year. Especially where there's every possibility that more players will be bought in January, especially if we have a proper manager in place.

I'm not really sure what you're trying to prove anymore anyway, so I'm going to stay out of the discussion from here. I'll thank you and Paul for pointing me to the Company House documents, which after reading will let me sleep easy knowing that there's nothing sinister going on. Plenty of stupidity on show on the part of Venky's, but we're all human after all.

To err is human but to really fowl it up needs the Venky's.

[Veevs]

Agreed about the full backs, however how important is "bite in midfield"? In this day of 5 man midfields it has become less of a necessity - who provides the bite in Man United's midfield? Chelsea's? Arsenal's? Liverpool's? It's not something that is as necessary now as it was in the days of Keane and Vieira.

I think we can do without, ball playing centre midfielders are far more important nowadays than "ruffle the feathers" Savage types.

It's not just about bite though is it, most big teams play with experienced players in the middle of the park that provide cover for the back 4.. imo allot of them are actually misread in how they play just because they are not seen throwing themselves around nor in the thick of the goalmouth action.. for me

ManU have the likes of Carrick playing that role (personally think he looked better as a deep lying playmaker when alongside a proper defensive midfielder but thats the position SAF wants him in)

Liverpool have Leiva for that role

Chelsea have Essien, Mikel and co

Spuds have Sandro and Parker

Arsenal have not looked the same since loosing Alonso and ask any of their fans and they will point to that being one of the main weaknesses in their side (Wenger believes they need someone there as they have even gone as far as playing Frimfrong in that role this season)

ManCity have Toure, Barry, De Jong and Hargreaves (greedy little...)

Some of these players are more box to box however when required they play that defensive midfield role (against tough teams or when the main defensive midfielder is out) take a scout around the EPL and you will find them in almost every team.

Take a look at how we played at the end of last season all of our decent games came from 2 def midfielders (2 from PJ, JJ and Nzonzi), Keans more attacking/passing style suits us having two defensive midfielders or 1 box to box and 1 defensive.. and at the moment we have no Box to Box players and two youngsters and a sick note. I would say Kean also favours that formation.

As it stands I reckon we will have to play Nzonzi AND Petrovic (and hope he hits the ground running) to get the best out of the other lads we have signed.. because frankly Simon, Dunn, Hoillett, Formica, Rochina, Olsson et al are all full on attacking players who are not going to help break up the play, win the ball, pressure the opposition or even effectivly track back.

[LeChuck]

Agreed about the full backs, however how important is "bite in midfield"? In this day of 5 man midfields it has become less of a necessity - who provides the bite in Man United's midfield? Chelsea's? Arsenal's? Liverpool's?

Not sure any of those teams are a fair comparison. We spend far more of our time trying to win the ball back than any of those teams ever will. For those teams, the ball playing skills of their holding midfielders are far more important than ball winning skills. I'm not sure the same applies to us.

I do like to look of Petrovic but I just don't see him and N'Zonzi as a natural partnership. I'm still not sure what would happen if N'Zonzi missed an extended period of time. Hopefully Jason Lowe is as good as some people on here say he is, I've got a feeling he's going to be needed at some point this season.

It's a shame we couldn't lure Jermaine Jones back for another season long loan. For me, Petrovic should have replaced Andrews as the backup midfielder, not Jones as the engine of the midfield. Petrovic would still have seen plenty of games covering N'Zonzi and someone else, but he wouldn't have faced the pressure he now has trying to replace one of our best players last year.

The possible solution to all this is Grella keeping himself fit enough to share the burden with Petrovic. He's obviously never going to be fit enough to start week-in, week-out, but if we could get 15-20 games from him this year it would go a long way to correcting the mistake.

[philipl]

Something to be aware of about the CL level teams (four of whom are now due at Ewood) is that they may play pretty posession football when they have the ball but they are incredibly strong in getting it back when the opposition has it. Even effete twinkle toes Arsenal are no slouches at out-muscling 75% of the PL opposition in pressing and tackling.

The idea that ball winning in midfield is not as important as other aspects of the game is alnmost certainly part of the Kean cannon but then look at our loss percentage under his management. If midfield is unable to stop the opposition running at our defence at pace it won't matter how superhuman Dann, Samba and Robbo are or how sharp our counter-attacks, we will still lose much more than we will win.

[imy9]

There is little point debating the merits of this summer's player signings until Kean's replacement has bedded them down (yes I know there is an assumption in that sentence and I know I was hasty in my comment about Petrovic).

However, two points are worth making. Whilst cogitating on my lunchtime sandwich, it struck me it as all but impossible until (if ever) Grella is fit to put out a Rovers team from the current squad without at least two glaring weaknesses (bite in midfield and full back vulnerability).

And irrespective of marquees etc., we had been repeatedly promised a NET investment of £5m per window in the transfer market. Accepting that includes wages, we were at least £15m shy of that number in this summer's window. It is actually almost certainly worse as it appears we received higher percentages of incoming transfer fees up front than we were willing to pay for incoming transfers.

Having listened to the podcast (which was superb by the way lads- again), we paid £1.6 million in agents fees for Rochina and a similar % mark up for Rochina which means that we have paid at least £10 million for both players not £5 million. Is this not money spent by Venky's?

Kamy also said that including signing on fees and agents fees we paid about £25-26 million in this window- you can see where I am going with this, we have spent the £5 million promised by Venkys (I have discounted the wages paid for RSC and Jones even though that amounted to £4 millionish), was it spent wisely, well that is the issue. They have also spent a lot in infrastructure at the club so money has been spent.

A key difference with the trust is that Jones aside (there was a clause included), they have kept true to their word and our top players have remained at the club- they have not been sold to balance the books.

A point about the money being received up front- we did this with Kalinic but Nicko has said that we also paid most of Goodwillie's £2 million up front so there is a balance to be had. All in all an excellent window IMO and I am especially excited about Petrovic and Simon based on what Kamy and Glen have seen of the players over a number of years.

[67splitscreen]

Having listened to the podcast (which was superb by the way lads- again), we paid £1.6 million in agents fees for Rochina and a similar % mark up for Rochina which means that we have paid at least £10 million for both players not £5 million. Is this not money spent by Venky's?

Kamy also said that including signing on fees and agents fees we paid about £25-26 million in this window- you can see where I am going with this, we have spent the £5 million promised by Venkys (I have discounted the wages paid for RSC and Jones even though that amounted to £4 millionish), was it spent wisely, well that is the issue. They have also spent a lot in infrastructure at the club so money has been spent.

A key difference with the trust is that Jones aside (there was a clause included), they have kept true to their word and our top players have remained at the club- they have not been sold to balance the books.

A point about the money being received up front- we did this with Kalinic but Nicko has said that we also paid most of Goodwillie's £2 million up front so there is a balance to be had. All in all an excellent window IMO and I am especially excited about Petrovic and Simon based on what Kamy and Glen have seen of the players over a number of years.

" we paid £1.6 million in agents fees for Rochina and a similar % mark up for Rochina which means that we have paid at least £10 million for both players not £5 million. Is this not money spent by Venky's?"

A similar mark up on (Rochina) Formica would make the total cost for him 14m, Rochina was 400% of the headline transfer. 16m in total for both players.

[Veevs]

Not sure any of those teams are a fair comparison. We spend far more of our time trying to win the ball back than any of those teams ever will. For those teams, the ball playing skills of their holding midfielders are far more important than ball winning skills. I'm not sure the same applies to us.

I do like to look of Petrovic but I just don't see him and N'Zonzi as a natural partnership. I'm still not sure what would happen if N'Zonzi missed an extended period of time. Hopefully Jason Lowe is as good as some people on here say he is, I've got a feeling he's going to be needed at some point this season.

It's a shame we couldn't lure Jermaine Jones back for another season long loan. For me, Petrovic should have replaced Andrews as the backup midfielder, not Jones as the engine of the midfield. Petrovic would still have seen plenty of games covering N'Zonzi and someone else, but he wouldn't have faced the pressure he now has trying to replace one of our best players last year.

The possible solution to all this is Grella keeping himself fit enough to share the burden with Petrovic. He's obviously never going to be fit enough to start week-in, week-out, but if we could get 15-20 games from him this year it would go a long way to correcting the mistake.

It's a tough call in regards to Nzonzi and Petrovic as a partnership, under keans stewardship and with his tactics we have suffered greatly because despite a few pretty forwards there has been no one able to play it from defense/defensive midfield with any real purpose so, even under Kean we seem to play a fair amount of hoofball.

Petrovic is supposed to be a player who almost plays the Tugay type role, defensive midfield/deep lying playmaker but not really all action picks up the ball and pings it to the forwards, which theoretically would work well with a more standard defensive midfielder like NZonzi (who really does not have much vision nor is his passing range that great).. however neither of them have the presence/experience needed, this of course is mainly down to their ages (it's a very rare thing to see a kid with that unique attribute) but it will come in time (which we don't have). In an ideal world we would of kept hold of JJ and been able to play him with Nzonzi or Petrovic depending on the opposition.

There are a few good examples out there of this system working extremely well but our lads are no where near the level of those partnerships (Pirlo/Gattuso or Hargreaves/Carrick).

Another problem for me is how Nzonzi plays, he really seems to struggle imo if he does not have someone in midfield to hold his hand... just a personal opinion I guess but he did look far better with certain midfield partners (JJ being the main one) and there is no way he comes accross at the same level as JJ/Savage etc.

Overall in a year or two I reckon they will may become a formidable partnership but I don't think (would love to be proven wrong) that they are ready to take on that level of responsibility.

So I guess my summary in regards to this is I feel its great introducing young lads but you need that balance and with Grella as the only other experienced ball winning midfielder we are a bit stuffed in that respect.

[imy9]

" we paid £1.6 million in agents fees for Rochina and a similar % mark up for Rochina which means that we have paid at least £10 million for both players not £5 million. Is this not money spent by Venky's?"

A similar mark up on (Rochina) Formica would make the total cost for him 14m, Rochina was 400% of the headline transfer. 16m in total for both players.

I was trying to be conservative, as we do not know the exact amount I said "at least £10 million".

However going by your version Venkys have spent £16 million in the last window (excluding wages) and a further £25-26 million this window, thats over £50 million with about £23 million coming in...

[67splitscreen]

I was trying to be conservative, as we do not know the exact amount I said "at least £10 million".

However going by your version Venkys have spent £16 million in the last window (excluding wages) and a further £25-26 million this window, thats over £50 million with about £23 million coming in...

Yep! 50% is certainly airing on the side of caution.

Not my version just correcting the math for you.

Even allowing for the alleged third party ownership with Jorge Messi, 10.5m over the headline fee is a tad hard to believe don't you think.