Summer Transfer Window

[Doogs]

Tony tony give us a break. I am fed up playing Brasil every week...

[RevidgeBlue]

Just now, blue_n_white99 said:

In front of an unknown keeper, with Bell at LB? Don't know about doable, we'll ship tons every week

No change there then.

[bluebruce]

1 hour ago, JoeH said:

Somebody offers £750,000 for Scott Wharton I'd definitely consider it, I'm not saying definitely sell, but you have to assess it on its merits.

We're paying let's say £260,000 a year anyway just to have him on the books and not playing for our first team, plus a £750,000 transfer fee, that's a million pounds onto the budget. If that million is the difference between being able to afford Dillon Phillips' transfer fee or not, its a no brainer. A million onto the budget is a Bradley Dack if you get your recruitment right.

If Wharton is on 5k a week, the club is being even more criminally mismanaged than I thought. I'd be surprised and a little concerned if he is on half of that. I don't see us fetching 750k for him yet either, regardless of what his CH partner just went for.

[Bigdoggsteel]

Just now, Richard Oakley said:

Happy? No. If it's all we've go, hope for the best. We've got Carter. Okay his first goalscoring effort was into his own net, something he shares with both Bruce and Pallister. If he's half the player either of them was, we'll still have a very good CB, Johnson's own goal was more from the Duffy playbook.

Unfortunately scoring an OG on your debut doesn't point to you being as good as 2 top level PL center halves, but we can all hope for the best. 

[Richard Oakley]

Just now, Bigdoggsteel said:

Unfortunately scoring an OG on your debut doesn't point to you being as good as 2 top level PL center halves, but we can all hope for the best. 

I'm seeing a straw, I'm clutching it! Their debuts, too.

Edited August 19, 2020 by Richard Oakley

[Bigdoggsteel]

1 minute ago, rigger said:

Plus Carter and Magloire. I wouldn’t say I am happy, but it is pooable.

Changed that for you.

Ah no, that would be very risky. Lenihan is nervy anyway, I can't see a young keeper and CB partner helping that. 

[Exiled_Rover]

13 minutes ago, Bigdoggsteel said:

Grim , isn't it? 

Any owner worth their salt would read that quote and think "Tony, you've spent £14m+ in 3+ years and your opinion is that Doncaster is going to be a tough game? Get my accountant on the phone, I need to know how much it'd cost to sack this knob immediately".

[bluebruce]

17 minutes ago, Richard Oakley said:

@Paul Mani Club has denied any offers have been made. Mowbray has already seen what happened to the money from the Platt transfer. I think he is determined to keep the squad together.

Money from the Platt transfer? Barrow just came up from non-league in the midst of the covid crisis. If they paid 50k for him, they've done well. That money doesn't need to have 'gone' anywhere, it just isn't going to buy much of anything. Be lucky if it pays for an agent fee.

[islander200]

21 minutes ago, Richard Oakley said:

@Paul Mani Club has denied any offers have been made. Mowbray has already seen what happened to the money from the Platt transfer. I think he is determined to keep the squad together.

Where has the club denied having any bids in?Do you have a link or source for that?

[Tyrone Shoelaces]

8 minutes ago, BlackburnEnd75 said:

That home game in League one was the worst rovers performance I've ever seen. Mowbray completely overreacted to the loss at Southend by playing the most insanely defensive team for a home game against a team newly promoted from League 2.

The team he picked was that bad I think I can remember it all.

                                Raya

   Caddis  Nyambe  Ward  Mulgrew   Williams

                   Smallwood   Evans

        Whittingham                        Bennett

                              Graham

Jesus, no wonder we lost !

[Exiled_Rover]

14 minutes ago, RevidgeBlue said:

Unbelievable isn't it.

If he's bigging up Doncaster like they're Bayern Munich already I dread to think what he'll say when we come up against Championship opposition.

I dread to think what he'd say if we came up against a decent PL team in the FA cup.

"Lucky to be on the same pitch as them" most likely.

[Richard Oakley]

8 minutes ago, BlackburnEnd75 said:

That home game in League one was the worst rovers performance I've ever seen. Mowbray completely overreacted to the loss at Southend by playing the most insanely defensive team for a home game against a team newly promoted from League 2.

The team he picked was that bad I think I can remember it all.

                                Raya

   Caddis  Nyambe  Ward  Mulgrew   Williams

                   Smallwood   Evans

        Whittingham                        Bennett

                              Graham

Yeah, that was the game I posted my ott 'Three and out' comment calling for the sacking of Mowbray in the LT.

@islander200You get to demand nothing.

[Tyrone Shoelaces]

28 minutes ago, Exiled_Rover said:

I'd sack him just for that.

Pathetic.

I'm sick of hearing this sort of stuff. I never went into a game thinking we couldn't win. Lots of time I was wrong ( including a 16-2 defeat as a kid ) but I didn't start the game thinking like that.

Edited August 19, 2020 by Tyrone Shoelaces

[islander200]

1 minute ago, Richard Oakley said:

Yeah, that was the game I posted my ott 'Three and out' comment calling for the sacking of Mowbray in the LT.

@islander200You get to demand nothing.

What you on about?

You said the club had said no bids had been made.

They haven't said that, publicly anyway so your making stuff up 

[Richard Oakley]

Just now, islander200 said:

What you on about?

You said the club had said no bids had been made.

They haven't said that, publicly anyway so your making stuff up 

https://www.lancashiretelegraph.co.uk/sport/18652352.no-rovers-bid-charlton-goalkeeper-dillon-phillips/

[Tyrone Shoelaces]

9 minutes ago, bluebruce said:

Money from the Platt transfer? Barrow just came up from non-league in the midst of the covid crisis. If they paid 50k for him, they've done well. That money doesn't need to have 'gone' anywhere, it just isn't going to buy much of anything. Be lucky if it pays for an agent fee.

I would have thought the " Platt money " would have bought the lads a round of drinks.

[islander200]

Just now, Richard Oakley said:

https://www.lancashiretelegraph.co.uk/sport/18652352.no-rovers-bid-charlton-goalkeeper-dillon-phillips/

No bid for Phillips that doesn't mean we haven't made any bids.

Sharpe said yesterday, after his meeting with the club that we did have bids in .

Fair enough it's most likely cheap deals but at least we must have a little money 

[RevidgeBlue]

5 minutes ago, islander200 said:

No bid for Phillips that doesn't mean we haven't made any bids.

Sharpe said yesterday, after his meeting with the club that we did have bids in .

Fair enough it's most likely cheap deals but at least we must have a little money 

Sounds like the usual MO of derisory bids in whilst the selling Club are rolling about on the floor PTSL.

"Have you seen this?"

"I know, it's another one from Blackburn!"

[Richard Oakley]

2 minutes ago, islander200 said:

No bid for Phillips that doesn't mean we haven't made any bids.

Sharpe said yesterday, after his meeting with the club that we did have bids in .

Fair enough it's most likely cheap deals but at least we must have a little money 

I haven't read anything by Sharpe today. After 75% of the teams in the division have signed, at least, a player, a club has to say it's got bids in. Serious bids, I doubt it. Sharpe in his tweets, I did just have a quick look, said we'd know more in a day or two. If nothing happens, the club's just trying to give the impression things are happening, when they aren't.

[phili]

6 minutes ago, islander200 said:

No bid for Phillips that doesn't mean we haven't made any bids.

Sharpe said yesterday, after his meeting with the club that we did have bids in .

Fair enough it's most likely cheap deals but at least we must have a little money 

We don't have any money until Venky's do the next share issue, last one was June for £4m. We have since had the £2m from the EFL for media deal etc. 

Looking at those figures and the amount we have had to spend on things such as the next Bereton instalment, Gallagher, player bonuses and also having to pay players for their wage deferments.

I would say at the moment we can just about pay this months wages and that is about it. 

[Richard Oakley]

15 minutes ago, Tyrone Shoelaces said:

I would have thought the " Platt money " would have bought the lads a round of drinks.

Mowbray taking a leaf out of Sam Allardyce's book.

[tomphil]

54 minutes ago, Exiled_Rover said:

I'd sack him just for that.

Pathetic.

That's his mentality though, arse cover first and foremost.

[Blue blood]

What annoys me about this situation is that it's so flipping unnecessary to be caught so short. 

I get that injuries happen, transfers don't work out, and clubs couldn't have foreseen the pandemic, but even accounting for this the squad is in remarkably bad shape. 

For starters we knew Mulgrew and Graham, two of our best players when TM started, were heading towards the end of their career even as we headed to promotion in league 1. Their age alone meant that replacements were needed. One we haven't tried to replace, and the other 12 million later hasn't got a like for like replacement. 

The goalkeeper situation, we've known about for ages, and yet had no one lined up. It was patiently obvious Walton was a short term solution - if he were any good he'd stay with Brighton next season, if he was bad enough to be released, then he's not good enough for us. With several years of experiencing Leuts as well, and recognising he wasn't worth a new contract i find it astounding that we hadn't done some groundwork at the very least on a second keeper prior to now. We've had over a season to plan for a good pair of keepers and instead are left with none. And this is the one position players can't do a job in or be converted to. 

Defensive numbers are thin on the ground. We've had years of knowing Bell and Williams aren't good enough at lb,  We've known Cunningham isn't likely to be the solution for a fair while too (both through the fact he is a loan, and we didn't have a buy agreement, and also because he was injured for most of the year.) Likewise we know Lenihen has injuries, Mulgrew has been fading, and Williams can't cover one position much less two (which is a tall order for anyone tbf) leaving us thin on the ground, and yet defensive reinforcements are minimal. We've limped along with 3 centre backs for a lot of the season, and yet we don't have any defensive reinforcements. 

Midfield there's still no natural partner to Travis. Evans I guess, but there's been a number of clues he isn't going to be available to on a regular basis. So three years on there's no natural first team quality upgrade in this position. 

Then there's the wide forwards. Taking away Armstrong who is a raging success, and a credit to TM, who else plays the wide forwards or the wide midfield roles? Assuming we are still with the 4-2-3-1 - because if it's 4-3-3 with false 9s as a way forward TM should be shot for ripping up three years of dubious progress and starting with something even more unweildy - who are the wide attacking players? Downing I guess but that's not a long term fit/solution. For the rest - Rothwell, Holtby, Bennett, don't really look comfortable there at all. You'd think we have someone who could call that position their own, bar Armstrong, three years in. As for Gallagher there, don't get me started on how terrible an idea that is. 

Then up front. We are in a position where we have one striker who can be depended upon to score. (And if we count Armstrong as a striker, it makes the wide forward/midfielder position look all the more threadbare.) Three years in to have one striker we can rely on to score goals. In Bereton, Gally and Samuel (*appreciate he's now left mind) there might just be a decent player in there if you merged the three of them, but none could be relied on to score regularly, or cause regular problems for the opposition. 

The only bit of the plan that seems to be covered and have some longer term thought to it is the Dack/creative player in the hole position, with Dack covered by Holtby and Buckley - the latter of whom could develop to ensure the system works for a fair amount of time. Outside of this though, and what annoys me the most, is that there seems no long term, or even medium term planning whatsoever. 5 of our 6 signings last season were short term and liable to not be useful/available for us next season. Many of the threadbare areas of the squad have been threadbare for ages. Slow build? I don't see any thought to the future whatsoever in building this squad. Which is why we are up without a paddle this summer as many of our short and long term issues are laid bare at the same time. 

That said, and I get working for Venkys must be hard, the not knowing budgets stuff is a bit of a cop out. There's a school of thought that you can plan for different eventualities. So if you have a budget of X, you buy Y, if your budget is less, then your target changes to Z. It's not a complicated principle, people do it every day in budgeting.  It feels like we won't even start making a list until we know what budget we have which is the wrong way round imo. Get the lists, have your A list good budget target and your B list cheaper canny options and crack on with it. All the rumblings are the budget is low, so start working on getting that list of players in. 

[rigger]

TM would be better saying we are better than Donny so should win. The onus is then on the players to prove him right.

[TimmyJimmy]

23 minutes ago, Tyrone Shoelaces said:

I'm sick of hearing this sort of stuff. I never went into a game thinking we couldn't win. Lots of time I was wrong ( including a 16-2 defeat as a kid ) but I didn't start the game thinking like that.

Come on Tyrone, I normally love reading your contributions but isn't this a little extreme?

Reading the guy's comments there's stuff like:

... there are no easy games in football

... they'll come with a game-plan, they have good individuals and we'll have to take our chances against them

... it's preparation for this season

... seeing it is as an opportunity to blood some young players

There's nothing defeatist there just respect between managers. If the game is tough for us then it's likely to be because we're taking a look at several kids before the season starts to see if they've got what it takes.

Also how many recent losses are down to us not converting our chances? Lots. He's not saying anything we wouldn't.

I'm getting a bit tetchy with the constant Mowbray out stuff. What's he supposed to say that will get a favourable response other than I'm leaving.  The team has holes in it  I contend this is not his fault. He saw the chance to onboard some great young prospects for a lot of money knowing we already have the likes of Dack  Cunningham and Tosin in the team. Not his fault two were then crocked for most of the season. Tosin is a great player that we couldn't afford but Mowbray somehow landed him on loan. I don't see he did a lot wrong. Raya was constantly being pilloried for his errors/distribution. Walton was a reasonable stopgap until this years transfer funds came around to buy a proper keeper.

The world falls off a cliff. The transfer budget disappears. If clubs won't sell we can't buy!

IMO he's making the best of a bad job. Just because he's a decent guy who says respectful things about the opposition doesn't mean he's a surrender monkey.