January transfer window 2020

[Bbrovers2288]

18 minutes ago, Ricky said:

It’s a good job we didnt have a load of people ITK on here telling everyone we were going to sign players otherwise people might be a bit miffed..... oh wait....

Sorry think my words were club made an effort for a substantial prem league player - I never got a name but we can assume this was atsu. Was getting the same info as the club were giving to the media that deals were happening. Don’t take your frustration out on me, I am fizzing like everyone else. 

[magicalmortensleftpeg]

Some fans need a reality check. It’s easy to be negative. If you want to look for faults, you’ll always find them. But look at the squad Mowbray inherited and look at it now. He’s done a reasonable job. Will he take us up? Probably not, but based on our revenue, debt, attendances etc. we’re doing well to compete with the top 6 at all. 
He’s made big mistakes and Brereton is certainly the headline. But to expect us to constantly spend big money every window is delusional. 

[SBlue]

This is one of the shittest hours I have ever had.

[Bbrovers2288]

Not a link before folk jump down my throat- just an opinion 

I’d take Tom Carroll on a 6 month to cover for evans, see if it would be worth longer contract in summer, released from Swans earlier 

[Exiled in Toronto]

15 minutes ago, RevidgeBlue said:

I think you're being argumentative for the sake of it there.

I'd have sacked him long ago and if it was my money wouldn't give him a bean.

However as it appears that the owners seem happy with the job he's doing, his job appears relatively secure and the owners don't seem overly concerned either that he has wasted millions of pounds of their money, it stands to reason that a poor manager with superior players will fare better than a poor manager with worse players!

Not if he doesn’t buy better players, doesn’t pick them for months until they “learn how we play”, plays them out of position, picks Bennett and Bell alongside them etc etc.

FFP means that transfer decisions today will impact transfers in Summer 2022 and all windows in between. I am hopeful we’ll have a better manager by then who can spend the money better. We were never going to go up this year no matter who we bought, too many average/inconsistent players, dodgy keeper, top scorer crocked etc etc,

[Bbrovers2288]

1 minute ago, magicalmortensleftpeg said:

Some fans need a reality check. It’s easy to be negative. If you want to look for faults, you’ll always find them. But look at the squad Mowbray inherited and look at it now. He’s done a reasonable job. Will he take us up? Probably not, but based on our revenue, debt, attendances etc. we’re doing well to compete with the top 6 at all. 
He’s made big mistakes and Brereton is certainly the headline. But to expect us to constantly spend big money every window is delusional. 

Don’t think fans were asking to spend big to be fair, just to keep us from derailing second half of the season, who knows perhaps a wee go at promotion, imo league is weak this season 

[J*B]

3 hours ago, Paul Mani said:

@J*B you seem to have a pretty clear idea on ffp. How close are we to the limit? How will that effect the summer bearing in mind a third of the current player expenditure (wages) are set to be out of contract? Will be able to spend back up to that mark? Will sales be necessary?

If nothing else, this window shows that we are VERY concerned with FFP. Absolutely no way have Venkys completely ruled out any spending.

Clearly, close enough that we can’t bring in without letting go. Every penny is accounted for due to either big transfer fees (Brereton and Gallagher) or high wages on players not wanted (Mulgrew, Smallwood). 

We lose a lot of wage commitments in summer - Walton, Tosin, Bell, Mulgrew, Smallwood. That will give us some room to flex, but not one of the players leaving shows any return which is really what we need. While it does release some budget, no club has a ‘transfer budget’ like in Football Manager, they work to a ‘players’ budget which will cover transfer fees, agent fees, new contracts, signing on fees, wages - it doesn’t provide any transfer excess for FFP.

We will be judged over our first three year cycle, 18/19, 19/20, 20/21. As it stands we have spent circa 16M in that period (not accounting for any fees over the summer) and brought in circa 4M through sales. That’s +12m going into year three. 
The owners will give their maximum financial input, but I don’t see how we buy for any substantial amount of money without selling someone. Hopefully United buy King in summer for 50m as I believe we have a 15% kick back in his next move. 

[magicalmortensleftpeg]

5 minutes ago, Bbrovers2288 said:

Don’t think fans were asking to spend big to be fair, just to keep us from derailing second half of the season, who knows perhaps a wee go at promotion, imo league is weak this season 

I agree that the league is weak. My thinking is that we’ve spent reasonable money over the last two summer windows and very little money has been brought in. We’re over £150m in debt and FFP is a major factor. We have some of the cheapest tickets in the league and barely get more than 12k at Ewood each game. I really don’t see much scope for any significant spending, regardless of Venky’s intent or Mowbray’s negotiating skills. 

[Boroblue]

4 minutes ago, magicalmortensleftpeg said:

Some fans need a reality check. It’s easy to be negative. If you want to look for faults, you’ll always find them. But look at the squad Mowbray inherited and look at it now. He’s done a reasonable job. Will he take us up? Probably not, but based on our revenue, debt, attendances etc. we’re doing well to compete with the top 6 at all. 
He’s made big mistakes and Brereton is certainly the headline. But to expect us to constantly spend big money every window is delusional. 

Why do people endless down play us like we are some little minnow trying hard to get by. We are more successful club historically than most if not all of the clubs in this league. I’m not going to go through a list because facts are facts. I will not downgrade my expectations. Will he take us up no but not for the reasons you give but because of a total lack of ambition. 

We are top of the current form league which suggests we can compete but that had to be built on but again like last season the opportunity will pass us by. 

Let me just repeat this we are not a small shit club lucky to be sat at the same table has the big boys we are equal if not better and pretending differently does not excuse management.

[Wegerleswiggle]

Jesus that Jamie McConnell on twitter is so full of shit!! 

[savage90]

I understand not adding to your squad if you're happy with it but we are clearly not, so it's inexcusable. We haven't had 30 days, we've had 5 months and this is the result. 

[Bbrovers2288]

Just now, magicalmortensleftpeg said:

I agree that the league is weak. My thinking is that we’ve spent reasonable money over the last two summer windows and very little money has been brought in. We’re over £150m in debt and FFP is a major factor. We have some of the cheapest tickets in the league and barely get more than 12k at Ewood each game. I really don’t see much scope for any significant spending, regardless of Venky’s intent or Mowbray’s negotiating skills. 

I’m afraid the buck stops with the manager if it’s his decision on recruitment in that case- bought big- hasn’t developed or resold big. As a result we are crushed under financial constraints 

[matt83]

Our back 5 vs burton in Tonys first game was Steele, Williams, mulgrew, lenihan, nyambe. 3 years on could have sent an sos to Brighton and got the band back together. On the basis Tosin/Walton will leave at the end of the season and Bell is turd that’s a worrying lack of progression.

Front 2 of a younger graham and better form Gallagher. So in 3 years there’s pretty much been improvements to the midfield. 

Edited January 31, 2020 by matt83

[JHRover]

We can spend all night talking about FFP rules or whether these owners want to spend or not.

The reality is that Mowbray has once again failed to deliver on the grandiose talk that he so often comes out with.

For months, no years now we've listened as Mowbray has talked the talk about building over a few years, delivering this super duper new scouting system and tapping into European markets - he's been here 3 years now and there's about as much evidence of progress on that front as there was the day he arrived.

There's only so long you can talk the talk without walking the walk and for me Mowbray is at that point. FFP rules haven't suddenly appeared overnight. After promotion Mowbray and his mate Waggott knew full well what we were going into and have had 4 windows yet really have struggled/failed to deliver in all of them. 

We all know January is a tough time and players are expensive. So what do we do about it? Never improve our squad mid-season ever again whilst rivals around us find ways of doing it?

After promotion Mowbray claimed Venkys wanted to 'go for it' but he felt it was his job to talk them away from that and instead sell them a medium-long term vision of a 2-3 year build to promotion on a solid footing. Now we're at the tail end of that timescale - we've a thin squad deficient in numerous areas, reliant on 2-3 loans and facing major upheaval in the summer whilst moaning about FFP rules at every turn. 

I'm not saying it is easy, but it is disappointing to see little progress being made. The entire operation appears ill-equipped for the demands and pressures of a narrow transfer window. And what on earth we are doing with European scouting I don't know but what I do know is it doesn't take 2 years to sign players from outside the UK and it doesn't take 6 months to appoint a European scout. I suspect they are playing the fans for fools on this front as they don't seriously want or intend to exploit this market - as they haven't since 2010 - but it sounds good to the fans who hang on every word with optimism.

Both on and off the pitch the momentum and positivity of promotion has been squandered and we seem to have owners and management happy to plod along without rocking any boats.

If you are unwilling or unable to strengthen mid-season the reality is you'll probably never get promoted. West Brom have been busy, as have most others up there, adding to their ranks.

Our attitude seems to be cart on, hope we get lucky but if not then 'oh well'. I'm afraid there's a lot more to it than that.

[jim mk2]

Wigan signed 3 players in the final half hour.  Forest showed the way for a high-flying club by being active; in fact most championship clubs have been busy. 

Surely, Mowbray and Co could have juggled the squad without spending a penny - sent a few out on loan who aren't getting a game and bringing in reinforcements on loan where they're badly needed?

Perhaps they couldn't be arsed because they know we won't go down and are nowhere near good enough to go up so it's easier and more convenient to stick with what we've got.

Either way, everyone seems to be on cushy, easy street at Ewood. 

Coupled with the the Brexit suicide mission, it's been a miserable end to the day.

I only hope we get a good result at Boro tomorrow.

Edited February 1, 2020 by jim mk2

[Mattyblue]

30 minutes ago, magicalmortensleftpeg said:

We have some of the cheapest tickets in the league and barely get more than 12k at Ewood each game. I really don’t see much scope for any significant spending, regardless of Venky’s intent or Mowbray’s negotiating skills. 

You keep saying this. Maybe in 2012 we did.

Our tickets are now at least standard price for the league and in fact considerably expensive than a good number in the division. Match tickets, £22-£40. Season tickets £350 -£500.

Now we’d all like to see bigger numbers through the gate for a whole host of reasons, income generation but one, however they ain’t ‘cheap’ these days.

Edited February 1, 2020 by Mattyblue

[47er]

1 hour ago, Exiled in Toronto said:

If he’ll never get us promoted it doesn’t matter who he buys. 

Well he could get us relegated couldn't he? 

[47er]

49 minutes ago, magicalmortensleftpeg said:

But to expect us to constantly spend big money every window is delusional. 

But he's spent NO MONEY!

[Blue blood]

Positives: 

We didn't loose any of our best players. A defence bereft of Lenihen would be scary, ditto a midfield without Travis. Not sure how we'd do without Armstrong's goals either so these chap's staying is an encouragement if nothing else. 

Perhaps outr lack of incomings and injuries could lead to a second Travis situation, who got his chance due to suspensions. Perhaps JRC will go the same way... 

We actually have a 4th centre back who isn't a kid who is not good enough to go out on loan. 

Negatives: 

We didn't improve the team whatsoever.

This was especially poor in the blatantly obvious positions that needed strengthening. 

We didn't massively improve the depth either. We do have another centre back which is better than nothing, but only just. I mean how limited can an improvement get. Better than nothing is both a positive for us and a terrible indicement of  how thin the defence is.  Its not a big step up at all. We're also one injury away from a creek without a paddle in a number of positions. 

Bereton didn't go out on loan. Apart from him being poor he ain't going to improve at all with limited cameos on the wing. A loan away even if we paid all his wages would have been better for Rovers. 

 

So yeah, the positives are few and far between in a bad and disappointing window. However under the clowns I know it can always get worse, and we've still a decent team, so that's a step up and positive from some windows. All in all though combined with long term injuries it suggests the second half of the season will be a huge slog. 

[Wegerleswiggle]

So it's clearly to early to start a Summer Transfer thread but this is how I see our squad come the end of the season.

Looks like an almighty job to sort out. 

[Vilesinner]

19 minutes ago, Wegerleswiggle said:

So it's clearly to early to start a Summer Transfer thread but this is how I see our squad come the end of the season.

Looks like an almighty job to sort out. 

Need 1 GK and 2 centre backs imo. I do see why Thompson would be in the squad and not Vale, Hilton and Buckley.

And Downing and Johnson may still be here.

[Guest]

Lenihan, Nyambe, Travis, Dack, Holtby, Rothwell, Armstrong, Downing.

That’s literally all I’d keep for next year. Everyone else (barring youngsters who may come good like JRC) can leave in a perfect world.

Smallwood, Samuel, Evans, Bennett, Bell, Johnson, Gallagher, Graham, Chapman, Brereton, Walton, Leutwiler, Mulgrew & Williams can all get gone at the end of this season - not a single one of them are Top 6 players.

If we start with a backbone of those top players, bring in experience around them, we have a chance next year.

[Husky]

It looks like I didn't miss much.

[yellowsubmarine]

Forget Atsu, wages was always a stumbling block. Personally, the one whom i wanted us to sign is Marcus Maddison. 

[windymiller7]

Ok. Been on my missus works do. Plenty beers so prob not the best time to post.

I've always held my tongue & complied with the political etiquette! I've had enough! Fuck off Tony! Fuck off Steve. I'm sick of this 'we nearly' , "if it hadn't been for".

Ban me now! Fuck off Venky's fuck off tony!  

Those on here who know me. Know it takes a lot!

No effort no nothing!

Edited February 1, 2020 by windymiller7
If I'm gonna have a rant....