Baker was average but he was sold enough. The type of squad player that is useful as opposed to last season when we had Garrett and Buckley in reserve when Travis and Wharton left. Buckley is a liability. Doesnt work hard, poor attitude, petulant and has far less footballing ability than certainly he thinks he does and even still some fans think. Takes far too long on the ball.

So we need another player now on top of what we already needed. Baker was average but average is a lot better than what Buckley is.

Its not the same as an ill advised attempt at getting extra income in counterproductive ways that will piss people off. I have no idea where you have got 50k from, theres no way we would have been paying close to that. But either way, I dont see what he would gain from kiboshing deals that have already been agreed. The most logical reason is that the owners didnt The Batth deal last summer was mentioned by @islander200. The owners cut the budget mid window and wouldnt allow his wages or the length of contract so the deal fell through.

With the Batth one, that was in the window where they cut the budget and put a freeze on transfers mid window. So I presume it would have been allowed until they moved the goalposts. So your theory is that the owners would allow deals to happen, Waggott and co set them up then for some reason kibosh them afterwards, for what motive I cant fathom. And they also would spend more but simply arent asked.

Why would Broughton and Waggott have set up deals only to then stop them? Makes no sense. The owners are the ones who have stopped the deals, who require authorising every deal at huge delays and who wont reinvest any money back in.

When they have been willing to spend a fee, its always been a miniscule one. Im sure this window will just be 2 or 3 squad players on loan again and it wont be enough to sustain a play off push. The owners are simply not interested.

Its Venkys aim to cut back as much as possible regardless of the damage it does. Waggott is just someone employed to do as hes told.

To be fair, Jason Lowe was our captain when we finished 8th/9th. Gueye has played plenty this season. Not saying either Hedges or Dolan are on par.

Theres no way that anyone here is on close to 30k.

Again symptomatic of Venkys that people dont seem us as having the resources to participate properly in more than 1 competition. What excites you more. FA cup or nations league?

Versatility is useful but I feel like its going to be instead of getting 2 players for 2 different positions, we need a winger and left back cover, you cant just sign 1 player to cover both because if hes needed at left back we are then left short out wide again. I just dont think hes the type of player we need, more of a utility man than someone to make a real difference in attack. He also wont be match fit so he will need some time to get up to speed if the argument for him is that he can slot straight in.

Notice given as you touch on is much better than it has been but that doesnt offset the fact that so many games are moved in the first place. Public transport wont change and also issues are caused with work etc if the game is moved to Friday night. So I agree that people will potentially reconsider going. I think the most ridiculous element is having so many games at the same time at Saturday dinner time. Theres no need to have 6 or 7 games across 3 leagues at the same time. Who genuinely is going to watch say Plymouth v Stoke, Exeter v Lincoln or Accy Stanley v Bradford as a neutral to the point where it justifies the inconvenience to the fans of those sides.

Agreed. If you loan someone from this country, Schlupp is an example of this. Even though they may not need to settle in terms of being in the country, they are going to take time to get up to speed as they likely wont have played much football lately. The 2 ways to open up the range of potential signings are obviously to have more money which presumably again wont be the case, or to at least consider options outside of the box, potentially from abroad. Although we do need cover defensively, the main area we need to strengthen is in attack and I dont think experience is a primary necessity. If anything, we need energy and pace.

If Schlupp, Kent and Hanley are genuine targets, are they likely to hit the ground running? None of them have played much football recently. I think Hanley has also recently had injury issues. If we have more money, we stand a better chance of getting better players. Im not saying focus on signing players for the future, it was just a side point that years of budget cutting and no reinvestment has left us sorely lacking in assets. I have no idea if Eustace specifically endorses any signings we go on to make, no one knows. Obviously he should and he probably will. But I also anticipate that the choices put before him will be a very limited one due to a lack of budget, so it might have a feeling of best of a bad bunch. Say we sign Schlupp for example, that might be the option Eustace chooses from a list put before him of other potential loans. But if we had 2 or 3 million to spend on that position, that would open up a far bigger range of options and potentially change the choice he would make. I dont think we are currently lacking much in terms of experience, we have brought quite a lot in already. What we sorely lack is pace and goals. I think if Eustace/Gestede was backed rather than just forced to scrape for loans then we would stand a much better chance of bringing in quality, with the added bonus of bringing in players who could potentially benefit us longer term.

Id likely take him but I dont see Eustace being backed which is why I said it will never happen. It will be pick from this list of loanees and hasbeens.

There are often players with 6 months left on their deal that can be picked up cheaper than normal.

Sellable assets doesnt mean young lads who arent ready. Its bringing in higher quality than what is available fishing around to borrow players which isnt backing him.

Hes probably our most valuable player, and im not sure hes that valuable. Currently recovering from a second serious injury, and not young or of sufficient quality to have Premier League interest.

Its good to have experience but we have absolutely no sellable assets or players who down the line we can polish up and sell on should we choose. Problem is, they cost money, and absolutely none is being made available despite all of the sales we have made. We need to have players like that because our squad is full of plasters and they get ripped off in the short term.

I never said they shouldnt give Eustace what he wants. They should, it should be a case of heres your budget, Eustace and associated footballing staff, use it how you choose. Sell and buy if you want. But backing him equates to giving him a decent budget to sign players. Being linked to players is not backing. But assuming we do sign a couple of loanees that he has chosen from a list. That still isnt backing him, thats allowing him to select from a very limited list because he hasnt been properly backed.

Its not about how it affects me or any one individual. And notice doesnt change public transport etc. How many times.

Eustace being backed would be the actual signing of players with a decent fee involved. Backing is not being linked to a couple of old players on loan by a journalist hack. Again, the burden of proof isnt on me. But it reads like a load of all shit to me. Just like the owners never refuse to sign a cheque, teams are sniffing around £10m Buckley and Rothwell's dad telling people on a train that Mowbray had hatched a plan to get all of the players whose contracts were expiring to all wait and sign for his next club. Feel free to believe it. Either way, point is that it is purely down to the owners as to how much money is made available. Thats the top and bottom of it. So compared to the Rothwell situation, we will actually get a fee for Dolan and he might want to stay more. Meaning that comparatively speaking, it made even less sense to keep Rothwell. It turned out to be the wrong one because Rothwell couldnt be arsed with the rest of the season, left on a free and those players we could have had with the money we would have got never arrived. Self explanatory. And we ended up in the Championship. What if Balaji Rao started telling Eustace to play certain players or that he wanted him to sign a specific player? Or that we are selling someone. Im guessing that would be ok if they felt it was right for the club. Nonsense. Give the football people the budget, let them make the footballing decisions. Simple as that. Dont need a long and laborious explanation.

The Preston game has again been moved to a stupid time to allow a presumably small number of neutrals to watch it. Earlier in the season we had one where only 1 running train allowed fans to get there before kick off. You always see these stupids comments about people not atending games. As if every fan should be equally willing to prioritise Rovers over every other potential source of enjoyment in their life regardless of cost.

Selling a centre back who has been outstanding this season in an area of no depth would be something else rather than bold.

This morning has been full of nonsensical theories and supposed ITK stuff that makes your stuff on our lack of budget just being down to Waggott not asking for it seem pretty tame. They are the ones who send whatever budget we have over, end of story.