January Transfer window 2022

[JHRover]

2 minutes ago, JBiz said:

Throwing the kitchen sink at it guarantees nothing, but losing 39m+ over three seasons will guarantee a transfer ban/points deduction.

The difference in turnover / income compared to teams with parachute payments make our “kitchen sink” negligible anyway, there’s no way we’re in a position to spend millions and 50pw on someone like Harry Wilson, despite @JHRover’s claims or anyone else’s hopes and dreams.

Surely, we all agree that any money like that in our coffers should be prioritised for enabling a wage structure that is enough for the contract “rebels” to renew?

 

Lets see what happens to Bristol City - because they lost £38 million last year alone and no news of a ban or points deduction.

Also as I've said many times before there is no such thing as a transfer ban. There are transfer restrictions whereby the League will interfere and only allow free transfers until losses are reduced but that isn't necessarily a problem - if you ensure you have a quality squad under long term contracts as you can get through an embargo using those players and sell them for big money to achieve compliance.

Don't think I've ever supported or suggested we should be paying anyone £50k per week but when we have billionaire owners pumping in £20 million a year it would be nice to keep our good players on solid contracts to protect the club

There are two sides to FFP - outgoings and incomings. There is an obsession with outgoings - transfer fees and wages and reasons why we can't do things - yet very little attention paid to incomings - increasing those and maximising player values to achieve compliance.

Paying Nyambe £4k a week and letting him leave for nothing might sound good to those who don't want to pay him £8k a week but then deprives the club of millions more pounds in transfer value - such a short term attitude but then again with a CEO like Waggott and manager who has no idea what the plan is beyond May that is only to be expected.

[Tugayisgod]

1 hour ago, 1864roverite said:

they went ape when King Noel signed for us !

And he wasn’t bad !!!

👌👌

[JBiz]

@JHRover said before, will say it again - any figures are completely anecdotal because neither you or I know what the issue is.

[unsall]

1 hour ago, JHRover said:

Don't agree. He might or might not be a good signing. I simply don't know. He might be highly rated but playing in the u23s league is a different game to playing in the Championship or hopefully soon Premier League. My concern would be whether he is a signing going to come in and hit the ground running - which really is what we need right now.

If we are a club going places and pushing for the PL then signing a soon to be out of contract player from Spurs U23s is not a 'coup'. It might be a good signing, I hope it is, but we are Blackburn Rovers, pushing for the PL here.

We can spend millions - if the owners really want to. That would not 'risk the club' - we are £200 million down over the last decade and counting - the only way to stop that is to get over the line to promotion. Truth is I haven't seen anyone demanding huge money be lavished on expensive players - just recognition from most that we are in an unusually strong position to kick on and attract better players than in our usual mid table nothingness.

Middlesbrough, West Brom, Forest have all added experience and quality to their squads and more will follow. This is a really competitive division and we need to compete.

I come back to what I said last night and have said many times before. I am of the firm belief that the only way any substantial funds are released from the owners - be that transfer fees or wage increases - is when it gets the OK in India at the top table. That hasn't happened for a long time.

And do a Derby, sh#% or bust, I don’t think so….

[1864roverite]

42 minutes ago, 47er said:

Well what sort of argument is that? Any player is at risk of serious injury at any time, its a part of the game.

If we can't sign good players because they might get injured, what's the point of it all.

Shouldn't have signed that Shearer ---too risky.

I am on about forest keeping their players who they MAY sell for big bucks in the future IF they get injured in the meantime ala Dack! It was nothing to do with Rovers potential signings!

[Tyrone Shoelaces]

25 minutes ago, BRFC_Polky said:

Buckley attracting some interest from Leeds.

I can’t see it. Burnley need players to get them out of the shit now, not in a year or two’s time. Buckley’s not nearly at that level at the moment. 
Having said that if they’re already resigned to being relegated he’d be a good signing.

[1864roverite]

13 minutes ago, Miller11 said:

Nah, Burnley have money to service their leveraged takeover debt after flogging wood to the Saudis.

That income will be fiddled off to fund some other venture, they know they are coming down and will lose the mega bucks of the PL

[magicalmortensleftpeg]

33 minutes ago, BRFC_Polky said:

Buckley attracting some interest from Leeds.

He’s not a winger and wasn’t Championship player of the month for December. Can’t even give them marks for effort on that one.

[islander200]

Buckley has been at the club since the age of 6 no chance he goes to a relegation threatened Burnley. 

He is under contract for another 3 years if he continues his progression he will be worth at least double he is now in 12 months time

[islander200]

59 minutes ago, Tugayisgod said:

With a bit of creative dealing (which seem to happening)they can be replaced. Just a thought, would you sell Rothwell in this window in order to finance a deal for O’Riley, I know I would.

If we were midtable maybe but i wouldnt be taking that gamble now with the position we are in

[rovers11]

36 minutes ago, neophox said:

Be prepared for a heavy sell on clause if Markanday comes...

40% I'd imagine. I think we have to be creative with deals as we can't afford to pay a big lump sum up front. Small price to pay for luring one of Tottenham's best young players on a permanent deal. Their fans think he should be in the first team squad. Huge coup. 

[Guest]

Promising IF it happens... If any of our boys had this record in the PL2 we'd be screaming for them to have first team involvement so positive signs.

[islander200]

24 minutes ago, Tugayisgod said:

Hopefully, just hate how it alerts other interested clubs, knowing how long it seems to take to get deals over the line

Clubs will have been aware already of his contract situation.That sky piece mentioned other clubs already registering an interest but seems we are far down the line with it.

Hopefully early next week we will have players putting pen to paper

[47er]

18 minutes ago, 1864roverite said:

I am on about forest keeping their players who they MAY sell for big bucks in the future IF they get injured in the meantime ala Dack! It was nothing to do with Rovers potential signings!

My apologies, teach me to read it properly!

[CambridgeRover]

Looks some signing this Markanday, 14 games in pl2 12 goals 5 assists, on a perm and a real threat as striker or right winger

[Russ]

I think most people agree on wanting to spend modestly given the position we're in, but without blowing the bank.

If we could bring in these as rumoured:

Deyovaisio Zeefuik     loan (wav 2m? in summer)
Matt O'Riley        1.7m
Dilan Markanday        500k (to 1m with addons)
Josh Maja        2.5m

We'd be in a much stronger position for the rest of this season, but also going forward as well.
 
Approx 5-6m outlay now with Zeefuik deferred until summer budget, that's really not a lot in modern football terms. Especially given the Armstrong, training ground, and inevitable Brereton sale at some point.

All also fit the investment 'polish up and make a profit' remit so I don't see it as squit or bust. If just one of them is a big success it pays for the others, and some.

Assuming we also kept the near out of contract players until summer, would people be happy if that was all of our business this window?

[joey_big_nose]

12 hours ago, roversfan99 said:

If it is just one, then id like someone with senior experience. 

Ive got mixed feelings about this. Over the last 10 years players without senior experience have broadly performed better than those with. We had a few decent experienced players but a lot of dross. We are where we are because of youth (either from our academy, other teams academies who we've bought in or loans) and lower league players.

[bluebruce]

5 minutes ago, joey_big_nose said:

Ive got mixed feelings about this. Over the last 10 years players without senior experience have broadly performed better than those with. We had a few decent experienced players but a lot of dross. We are where we are because of youth (either from our academy, other teams academies who we've bought in or loans) and lower league players.

Agreed, it's one of those football mantras that sounds nice in theory, but the reality doesn't always match up. I want hungry players more than I want experienced ones. GK and CB are your most important positions in terms of where you need experience, and we have it there.

[SBlue]

28 minutes ago, Mellor Rover said:

Promising IF it happens... If any of our boys had this record in the PL2 we'd be screaming for them to have first team involvement so positive signs.

Like Joe Nuttall?

[Miller11]

Spurs fans not happy at the prospect of losing Markanday. 
 

 

[roversfan99]

Those defending Venkys pre-empting a window with minimal spend seem to focus their argument as if the counter argument is wild, aggressive spending that will lead us into an embargo, something that nobody has suggested.

There is also this constant "reminder" that Venkys are 200m down, and spend 20m a year. (which I believe is a one off and is not a common theme to have a loss quite that high) I think it is a little deceitful in that, I cannot argue that that much has been spent, but it implies that it has been done so out of ambition, which is clearly wrong, lets not get that confused. It is that much because of them, and the "investment" is actually merely them raising share capital in another company to offset the fact that one of their businesses is spending more than it is receiving.

Take the link for this Matt O'Riley for example, I am very much using it as a general example because I do not know the player well, but taking him as a young player starring in League 1. In theory a player of that supposed calibre (not player specific) ticks all boxes, he wouldn't walk into our team now but he would provide much more stern competition and an added dimension to our squad for the promotion push. If we go up, great, Rothwell may sign up long term and we just have another long term asset who has helped us this season. More prudently, if we don't go up, Rothwell most likely leaves in the summer and we have a potential replacement already at the club, one less space to fill. Come the summer, we likely will have another big fee but numerous holes to fill, there is one less. Yet £1.7m is apparently beyond our means.

The key is the timing, and the potential reward. This window seems particularly critical in that in a summer window, you don't know really how a season will turn out. Now we are 3rd, really in a genuine promotion push rather than with a fleeting outside hope of sneaking 6th place. Add to that the prudent potential scenario of numerous gaps in the squad, players will need to be signed in the summer and if we stay down, Brereton will no doubt be off so another substantial fee. Instead of waiting to replace all of the potential leavers to the summer, why not do a few now, sandwiched between (worst case scenario, if we dont go up, being prudent) 2 major sales, to give us much more quality competition in our promotion push?

[RV Blue]

17 minutes ago, S8 & Blue said:

Like Joe Nuttall?

Yes. although I think Nuttall did it in the division below

[RoverCanada]

Just thought I'd again post my FFP estimates as a reminder of where we may or may not stand. Obviously it's ultimately a guessing game and up for interpretation, but perhaps to focus minds for those interested in semi-plausible numbers.

Plenty of assumptions to be shot at, and future sales are obviously an unknown, but the key ones are:

- £10m profit booked on Armstrong for 2021-22 and £8m profit booked on the training ground sale (conservative, but based on a similar sale by Reading) for 2020-21

- I've guessed that the 'new' wage budget is down to £23m, which roughly aligns with £13m/year "FFP-losses" (after assuming £4m/year of FFP cost exemptions)

My suspicion is, after the Armstrong/training ground sales, we will just sneak under a 4-year FFP cycle this year (4 years due to Covid, plus ~£3m of other Covid-related exemptions; definitely blew past FFP for 2018-19 to 2020-21). This meant the EFL left us technically free of any transfer restrictions (as have been imposed on Reading, for example), but we're probably still pretty restricted on what we can actually spend this year.

However, my guesstimates also suggest we have about £6m 'free' to spend over the next 3-years due to the Armstrong/training ground sales. That could make sense of trying for loans-to-buy this year, as is/was allegedly the case for the likes of Maja and Zeefuik (while <£1m purchases like Edun and maybe now Markanday don't move the needle too much). Maybe can't afford/aren't allowed a big-ish purchase this year, but we have wiggle room to do so going forward.

Anyway, speculate away. Hope it helps.

3 hours ago, unsall said:

Thought the Dutch full back would have been over the line now, can’t see the problem re isolation, could still sign, think it might be more getting a work permit, much more difficult after brexit.

They said last season they would have struggled to sign Kaminski these days, it’s now a points system and unless your a full international it’s difficult.

Work permits always have unpredictable elements, but I don't think the post-Brexit restrictions are an issue for Zeefuik. He clears if you plug his minutes played into any GBE points calculator. The points system is definitely a new issue for recruiting from 'lesser' European leagues, or for recruiting Europeans before they get significant minutes, but not for a semi-regular Bundesliga player, which is considered a 'Band 1' league (he also would have easily qualified based on his regular Eredivisie minutes in previous years, which is 'Band 2').

I also don't see how Kaminski wouldn't qualify. The Belgian league is also Band 2, plus he had played a bunch of Europa Leage minutes. Maybe that's referring to a decade ago when he was a young second stringer, but not once he was an established starter.

Edited January 14, 2022 by RoverCanada

[roversfan99]

3 hours ago, Paul Mani said:

Who knows what the point of it is to them? If you want the job, find the cash to buy them out and give it a crack yourself pal?

Im not saying I don’t want exactly what you want. But I also see the risk in in ‘going for it’ not getting promotion and then paying the price.

How would you feel if we spent £10m, missed out on promotion and then had to lay off 50 staff in the summer? These are the risks and conversations that will be ongoing…

Isnt it the biggest strawman argument ever to suggest for someone to buy the club themselves 😂

No one has suggested spending 10m.

[joey_big_nose]

31 minutes ago, bluebruce said:

Agreed, it's one of those football mantras that sounds nice in theory, but the reality doesn't always match up. I want hungry players more than I want experienced ones. GK and CB are your most important positions in terms of where you need experience, and we have it there.

Yes Kaminski has been transformational and obviously experinced.

I would have agreed with you on CB, but we currently have our best defence since the days of Nelsen and Samba (incidentally both themselves from "lower league" backgrounds) staffed by two kids (Wharton, Van Hecke) and one of our kids who has become senior (Lenihan).