January Transfer Window.

[roversfan99]

5 minutes ago, Miller11 said:

That’s not the argument here at all.

We have turned down bids for at least 2 of the players who have/looked like they will walk away for nothing. There was definitely something we could’ve done in those situations. For whatever reason we didn’t accept the bids. I don’t understand why people assume that the players would’ve dug their heels in and stayed. It wouldn’t be a logical decision, but if they did then it’s an entirely different discussion. Can anyone offer up any examples of one of our players refusing to be sold?

I’ve never advocated the “let them rot” line. Rovers do enough cutting off their nose to spite their face. It’s not a scenario that’s relevant very often as usually players are sold to further their career and earnings. In a lot of ways I’m glad Brereton is still here - Saturday showed things look pretty bleak without him! As you say the problem is our short-termism.

Players walking away for nothing is a huge issue for us. The fact it is happening again is far more irritating to me than the “incessant whingeing” about it. The model/project is not a new one. Mowbray went on for years about “polishing up” players and selling them on for a profit. When the model is repeatedly failing before our eyes there is obviously going to be complaints.

You are absolutely right about us needing to improve the strategy long term, and I absolutely agree with your 12-24 month timescale being a fair point to judge the new regime. I’m probably slightly less impressed with them than you on what they’ve done so far, and quite a lot less optimistic as the root cause of our issues remains Venky’s - you know my opinion on them. Fingers crossed though.

 

Bang on. We couldn't have forced him to sign but we could have accepted bids for him.

[Mercer]

1 hour ago, Paul Mani said:

I think the point being made, and correctly so. Is that this incessant whinging about players leaving on a free is irritating. People somehow think that we have these players under lock and key and can tell them what to do…we can’t - it’s a simple supply and demand scenario….

Rovers have offered every one of those leavers a contract over the last 2+ years. The players have rejected the contracts because the demand for their services is sufficiently high enough for them to realise they can get a better deal elsewhere. Others have signed contracts, because it’s suited THEM. The likes of A Wharton and Phillips signed because they see a pathway to first team football. Make no bones about it, should they both kick on as is expected then neither will be rushing to sign a new £20k per week contract in 3yrs when their agents being told they can get £120k!!

This ‘let them rot in the ressies’ crap is boring too! Who even says that, these days? Why would you let your best assets rot when they could be winning you games!? It’s archaic.

Where we can and must be better is in long term planning and looking to engineer moves for players who indicate they won’t sign extensions in good time (2yrs)….but if they won’t sign, and won’t move then you’re stuck. There’s nothing you can do!

This regime will be judged on that planning over the next 12-24 months. With the extensions they’ve secured, I’d say they’ve made a decent start

For far too long, senior management at Ewood has been on easy street and seemingly anything goes and there is little accountability.

Where is the decisiveness, the creativity, the flair, the nous, the assertiveness and the judgement?

I think the club is devoid of a culture.  For a start, we need a 'can do' attitude and a winning mentality - that is created and comes from your senior management team.

I've been round the block a few times in the course of my work and I can tell you, IMO, I've rarely seen a business the size of Rovers so severely under managed.

All this talk of 'journies', 'projects', 'creating value' etc should be binned as I think it's bullsh1t which Rovers' staff hide behind to deviate from the pressure for success.  Supporters don't want to hear it.  It's ludicrous that JDT has seemingly dismissed promotion this season - that in itself is a sackable offence.

The chief objective for JDT and Broughton for 2022/23 should have been promotion.

If you think Broughton has made a decent start then God help us if he bombs.

Edited January 20, 2023 by Mercer

[Miller11]

Just now, Mellor Rover said:

It's not about acceptable, it's just a weird stance to slate the club and new DoF based on a hypothetical scenario.

I haven’t slated Broughton over it. The root of the problem lies 4,000 miles away. I’m slating the club, and by association them based on the real outcomes - players leaving for nothing.

The club failed to accept the bid. Assuming Brereton would’ve refused to move is as hypothetical as it gets.

[Guest]

8 minutes ago, Miller11 said:

I haven’t slated Broughton over it. The root of the problem lies 4,000 miles away. I’m slating the club, and by association them based on the real outcomes - players leaving for nothing.

The club failed to accept the bid. Assuming Brereton would’ve refused to move is as hypothetical as it gets.

Mercer very much has, which was the whole point of the start of this discussion pretty much.

[Exiled_Rover]

8 minutes ago, Mercer said:

For far too long, senior management at Ewood has been on easy street and seemingly anything goes and there is little accountability.

Where is the decisiveness, the creativity, the flair, the nous, the assertiveness and the judgement?

I think the club is devoid of a culture.  For a start, we need a 'can do' attitude and a winning mentality - that is created and comes from your senior management team.

I've been round the block a few times in the course of my work and I can tell you, IMO, I've rarely seen a business the size of Rovers so severely under managed.

All this talk of 'journies', 'projects', 'creating value' etc should be binned as I think it's bullsh1t which Rovers' staff hide behind to deviate the pressure for success.  Supporters don't want to hear it.  It's ludicrous that JDT has seemingly dismissed promotion this season - that in itself is a sackable offence.

The chief objective for JDT and Broughton for 2022/23 should have been promotion.

If you think Broughton has made a decent start then God help us if he bombs.

Just out of interest, what's your promotion plan?

I assume spend money we don't have and hope to go up automatically - competing against 3 teams with fresh massive parachute payments and half a dozen more multiple years into their parachute payments.

What's your plan if that worked and we went up? You'd have to buy a totally new squad, right, like Forest? What's your plan if you failed to catch Burnley / Sheff Utd / Watford / Norwich et al and had spent £10m in the process?

[roversfan99]

The plan should be to not allow players to run their deals down, selling them prior, giving plenty of scope for reinvestment. Any talk of other plans involving projects and journeys are meaningless as it stands because Venkys are the problem.

Broughton can still be judged on what he has done, and his first window was underwhelming (albeit difficult) but the bigger problems are beyond him.

[RoverInverness]

1 hour ago, Miller11 said:

Why is it suddenly becoming the narrative that Brereton did/would refuse a move? If we’d have accepted a bid in the summer from a team in a top division who’d have multiplied his wage at least tenfold I doubt he’d have turned his nose up at the move.

That is a fair point, but two points:

1. As far as I remember there was nothing concrete in summer and offers even merely talked about were derisory - low enough that they weren’t considered enough, even with him having only one season left. Without his contributions at the start of this season we would be in deep shit in the table, not sitting fifth. With no time or set up to find a replacement, selling him for a stupid low price (if one was even made) potentially could have taken us from play off contenders to relegation candidates. 

2. I seem to remember JDT talking as if he felt BBD might sign a new contract at the start of the year. In fact I think he said something like he’d make him breakfast everyday if he signed a new contract. It was not at all the talk of a manager discussing a player who’d just been offered ‘tenfold’ to move to a PL club.

 

I don’t know what offers were made to the club and/or Diaz before the season started, but if he’d been seriously interested in any offers being discussed in summer 2022, instead of waiting to see what came by summer 2023, he would have got his way - players usually do.

I am not creating a narrative that he refused a move. I am stating the objective narrative that we couldn’t force him to move then or now. Not that it appears we had any sensible offers to move him on to anyway. 

The narrative that needs knocking down is that this is a problem caused by the current management. The previous management left the contract discussions far too late. I think we’ve established that now. 
 

BTW - still just about time to sell him this window and spend the cash, if anyone wants to pay to get him six months early.

[Exiled in Toronto Mk2]

28 minutes ago, Mercer said:

For far too long, senior management at Ewood has been on easy street and seemingly anything goes and there is little accountability.

Where is the decisiveness, the creativity, the flair, the nous, the assertiveness and the judgement?

I think the club is devoid of a culture.  For a start, we need a 'can do' attitude and a winning mentality - that is created and comes from your senior management team.

I've been round the block a few times in the course of my work and I can tell you, IMO, I've rarely seen a business the size of Rovers so severely under managed.

All this talk of 'journies', 'projects', 'creating value' etc should be binned as I think it's bullsh1t which Rovers' staff hide behind to deviate the pressure for success.  Supporters don't want to hear it.  It's ludicrous that JDT has seemingly dismissed promotion this season - that in itself is a sackable offence.

The chief objective for JDT and Broughton for 2022/23 should have been promotion.

If you think Broughton has made a decent start then God help us if he bombs.

And who would provide the accountability to get them off easy street? Surely those very owners you have spent the last decade using your accountancy qualifications and much trumpeted business expertise to annually predict they are broke / will sell up / will cut off funding / will put us in administration. 
 

[superniko]

It's pretty simple. If you decide to spend £8m on an unproven, young, project striker, when you've barely got a pot to piss in, you'd be complete morons to let them leave for free at the end of that 1st contract. Add in the fact he's now an international and has scored 30+ across the last 1.5 years even more so. (I'm not blaming Broughton with this, but a certain David Brent type has been around throughout it all)

[roverstdt]

I feel like this is shaping up to be quite an interesting time in Rovers History. I know many fans are disenfranchised with the style of football, the manner of the defeats, the owners, etc... However, the names that we are going for to me personally are the right kind of player to get us out of this division like a Porteous. The main question I have mentally to deal with is what to do with Diaz? Personally if Villarreal offer us 8M for Diaz i would take it in a heart beat. It allows us to get Undav, Porteous, Haikin, and a someone else like Brannagan then we will be in a far stronger position of developing a squad

The gamble is too great at this moment in time and i always believe finances have to come first to protect the club. If we get Porteous in, I feel like Ash Phillips should be loaned out to get some gets and time or sale off Scotty Wharton but would rather we loan out Phillips. If rumors are anything to go by and we get Haikin signed up, it is time to sell of Pears which i do believe we would get a decent fee. His Cup performance merit getting a fee. 

[unsall]

1 hour ago, Paul Mani said:

I think the point being made, and correctly so. Is that this incessant whinging about players leaving on a free is irritating. People somehow think that we have these players under lock and key and can tell them what to do…we can’t - it’s a simple supply and demand scenario….

Rovers have offered every one of those leavers a contract over the last 2+ years. The players have rejected the contracts because the demand for their services is sufficiently high enough for them to realise they can get a better deal elsewhere. Others have signed contracts, because it’s suited THEM. The likes of A Wharton and Phillips signed because they see a pathway to first team football. Make no bones about it, should they both kick on as is expected then neither will be rushing to sign a new £20k per week contract in 3yrs when their agents being told they can get £120k!!

This ‘let them rot in the ressies’ crap is boring too! Who even says that, these days? Why would you let your best assets rot when they could be winning you games!? It’s archaic.

Where we can and must be better is in long term planning and looking to engineer moves for players who indicate they won’t sign extensions in good time (2yrs)….but if they won’t sign, and won’t move then you’re stuck. There’s nothing you can do!

This regime will be judged on that planning over the next 12-24 months. With the extensions they’ve secured, I’d say they’ve made a decent start.

Yes a very sensible post, you can’t make players sign a contract unless you offer stupid money, which we won’t/ can’t do these days, which is the right decision, the amount of fans saying we’ve screwed up on Brereton is laughable, especially when 80% of fans would have given him away for free not long ago.

[Guest]

6 minutes ago, superniko said:

It's pretty simple. If you decide to spend £8m on an unproven, young, project striker, when you've barely got a pot to piss in, you'd be complete morons to let them leave for free at the end of that 1st contract. Add in the fact he's now an international and has scored 30+ across the last 1.5 years even more so. (I'm not blaming Broughton with this, but a certain David Brent type has been around throughout it all)

Very much a hindsight post. Most on here wanted him gone for 'anything we could get' for him.

[roversfan99]

8 minutes ago, RoverInverness said:

That is a fair point, but two points:

1. As far as I remember there was nothing concrete in summer and offers even merely talked about were derisory - low enough that they weren’t considered enough, even with him having only one season left. Without his contributions at the start of this season we would be in deep shit in the table, not sitting fifth. With no time or set up to find a replacement, selling him for a stupid low price (if one was even made) potentially could have taken us from play off contenders to relegation candidates. 

2. I seem to remember JDT talking as if he felt BBD might sign a new contract at the start of the year. In fact I think he said something like he’d make him breakfast everyday if he signed a new contract. It was not at all the talk of a manager discussing a player who’d just been offered ‘tenfold’ to move to a PL club.

 

I don’t know what offers were made to the club and/or Diaz before the season started, but if he’d been seriously interested in any offers being discussed in summer 2022, instead of waiting to see what came by summer 2023, he would have got his way - players usually do.

I am not creating a narrative that he refused a move. I am stating the objective narrative that we couldn’t force him to move then or now. Not that it appears we had any sensible offers to move him on to anyway. 

The narrative that needs knocking down is that this is a problem caused by the current management. The previous management left the contract discussions far too late. I think we’ve established that now. 
 

BTW - still just about time to sell him this window and spend the cash, if anyone wants to pay to get him six months early.

Nice were reported as bidding £8.4m and Everton with a bid rising to £10m. They may not be what he would warrant with longer than a year but that isn't derisory compared to the inevitable free transfer a year later.

5 minutes ago, superniko said:

It's pretty simple. If you decide to spend £8m on an unproven, young, project striker, when you've barely got a pot to piss in, you'd be complete morons to let them leave for free at the end of that 1st contract. Add in the fact he's now an international and has scored 30+ across the last 1.5 years even more so. (I'm not blaming Broughton with this, but a certain David Brent type has been around throughout it all)

If David Brent is Steve Waggott in this instance, then even he isn't to blame. Venkys have actively intervened and rejected any bids.

Just now, unsall said:

Yes a very sensible post, you can’t make players sign a contract unless you offer stupid money, which we won’t/ can’t do these days, which is the right decision, the amount of fans saying we’ve screwed up on Brereton is laughable, especially when 80% of fans would have given him away for free not long ago.

Who has said that we should or could MAKE him sign? And why should owners of a football club consider fan opinions over business sense?

We have screwed up, firstly we could have potentially gave him a new deal as he started to improve, and then we have had tangible bids on the table to generate a massive fee for modern day Rovers and a profit on investment and turned them down. 

[ben_the_beast]

13 minutes ago, RoverInverness said:

1. As far as I remember there was nothing concrete in summer and offers even merely talked about were derisory - low enough that they weren’t considered enough, even with him having only one season left. Without his contributions at the start of this season we would be in deep shit in the table, not sitting fifth. With no time or set up to find a replacement, selling him for a stupid low price (if one was even made) potentially could have taken us from play off contenders to relegation candidates

The only negative I can say about our current set up is our summer asking price. Though this is based on a lot of hearsay and nothing concrete. 

We know there were bids of 7-8million which I think we were right to reject. They were nowhere near our asking price. However in terms of negotiation it's pretty standard that the first bid will be a lowball offer to test the water. Had our asking price been more reasonable, say 15million I'm sure clubs would have made second bids and we'd have probably negotiated to the 12-13million mark.

With us reportedly looking for a bigger fee than Armstrong, which I'd imagine would have been 20 million it's no wonder those negotiations never progressed. 

There's a lot of ifs, buts, presumptions and hindsight coming into play with this post. Say we get 8million now and it's reinvested, we've done pretty well. Needless to say, not getting a half decent fee for him in the summer has definitely left us in a bit of a pickle.

[superniko]

The "nobody rated him", "fans would have driven him to a bidder for free" stuff is complete drivel too given how long ago that was.

Yes, he looked like Bambi on ice in his first season, but it was 4 and half years ago, and he was 19 years old with an £8m price tag. He's looked good for us for 2.5 years now:

20/21 7 goals and 5 assists

21/22 22 goals and 3 assists

22/23 9 goals and 4 assists

That's a long time to be having contract negotiations. I agree you can't force somebody to sign, but if that was the case 2 years ago then we should have been actively looking for a buyer.

I've seen the example of Pogba or Sterling in here regarding running down their contracts. The difference is, those two weren't their clubs star player, they weren't 23 years old, weren't their only international, and weren't their golden goose for FFP. Do you think Ten Haag or Guardiola are bothered they lost Pogba or Sterling? Of course not, they're over the hill now on their last pay day whilst younger and better players will replace them whilst they get a big earner of the books. Completely different scenarios. It'd be more like Foden or Elliott/Trent or Saka running down their contract and leaving for free which just would not happen at a well run football club

[superniko]

11 minutes ago, Mellor Rover said:

Very much a hindsight post. Most on here wanted him gone for 'anything we could get' for him.

Yeah 4 years ago, not in the last 2.5 years.

[Guest]

1 minute ago, superniko said:

Yeah 4 years ago, not in the last 2.5 years.

So seen as we're debating hypothetical scenarios... let's imagine the scenario of selling an 8million investment for 2million and then he goes on to score the goals he has for another team... is that better?

[Guest]

3 minutes ago, superniko said:

The "nobody rated him", "fans would have driven him to a bidder for free" stuff is complete drivel too given how long ago that was.

Yes, he looked like Bambi on ice in his first season, but it was 4 and half years ago, and he was 19 years old with an £8m price tag. He's looked good for us for 2.5 years now:

20/21 7 goals and 5 assists

21/22 22 goals and 3 assists

22/23 9 goals and 4 assists

That's a long time to be having contract negotiations. I agree you can't force somebody to sign, but if that was the case 2 years ago then we should have been actively looking for a buyer.

I've seen the example of Pogba or Sterling in here regarding running down their contracts. The difference is, those two weren't their clubs star player, they weren't 23 years old, weren't their only international, and weren't their golden goose for FFP. Do you think Ten Haag or Guardiola are bothered they lost Pogba or Sterling? Of course not, they're over the hill now on their last pay day whilst younger and better players will replace them whilst they get a big earner of the books. Completely different scenarios. It'd be more like Foden or Elliott/Trent or Saka running down their contract and leaving for free which just would not happen at a well run football club

Like Rashford you mean?

[superniko]

1 minute ago, Mellor Rover said:

So seen as we're debating hypothetical scenarios... let's imagine the scenario of selling an 8million investment for 2million and then he goes on to score the goals he has for another team... is that better?

You think we'd have only got £2m for him last January?

[JHRover]

40 minutes ago, Exiled_Rover said:

What's your plan if you failed to catch Burnley / Sheff Utd / Watford / Norwich et al and had spent £10m in the process?

Then you sell an asset or two to plug the gap. An Armstrong or a Diaz under proper contracts fetch £15 million a piece. If you do it properly and ensure your assets are under solid contracts you can command big money, which can be used to offset losses and go again.

Once again the 'can't do' attitude prevails. Brentford managed it, as did Bournemouth, Leicester, Palace, Brighton.

[superniko]

1 minute ago, Mellor Rover said:

Like Rashford you mean?

I believe I said "well run football club".

Besides he's got another year and half left on his contract and if they get their act together like they seem to be I'd wager it's heavy odds on he signs longer.

[Guest]

4 minutes ago, superniko said:

I believe I said "well run football club".

Besides he's got another year and half left on his contract and if they get their act together like they seem to be I'd wager it's heavy odds on he signs longer.

Crazy what £200k a week and champions league football will do for a club's negotiating power isn't it.

 

7 minutes ago, superniko said:

You think we'd have only got £2m for him last January?

Who said January? You said 4 years ago

[bluebruce]

7 hours ago, 47er said:

Yes let's look at other clubs. Here's 3!

Brentford, Bournemouth and Brighton! 3 clubs which get it right!

This made me think...we used to be the best ran club in the country probably. Now we aren't even the best ran club beginning with 'B'. Not even close. You'd probably (begrudgingly) have to add Burnley to the list of B named clubs better ran than us.

[superniko]

8 minutes ago, Mellor Rover said:

Crazy what £200k a week and champions league football will do for a club's negotiating power isn't it.

 

Who said January? You said 4 years ago

What are you on about?

I said 2 things:

1) If you let an £8m striker leave for nothing on his first contract as a club in our state then you're a moron (directed at our owners and CEO who was in charge of contracts at that time - although I believe Mowbray said something about Venus being in charge of contracts so if that doesn't validate the point I don't know what would)

2) People saying "we all thought he was rubbish and we'd give him away for free" are not telling the full picture, as this was 4 years ago and he's been good for 2.5 years now.

I didn't say anything about selling him 4 years ago.

[bluebruce]

1 hour ago, Mattyblue said:

I don’t think its ‘irritating’ at all. This is a Rovers forum and a key fall down of the club this past two years has been poor contract planning and the resulting loss of transfer fees as a result, a big issue for a club with well documented FFP issues, so it is well worth a discussion.

On the flipside we now have a new broom, and I’ve already seen plenty of posts discussing how GB will rectify/is already rectifying this going forward (such posts certainly add more than ‘boring’, ‘negative’!)
 

He means it's irritating for those who don't want to see any wrong in how the club operates. Because it's a glaringly obvious and pretty much indefensible failing.