Ian

Is that 7 million a direct quote though? I always thought he was talking about salary rather than directly about fees. It's one thing to be able to afford the transfer fees, and other to be able to match the salary the other club was offering. If Webber was purely talking about transfer fees I would say he's being pretty disingenuous, as there's no doubt the club could afford this if it really wanted. That said, I always think he plays the media a little bit anyway to make his job look just a little bit harder...

Couldn't, or wouldn't? I suspect it is more that they not think that 7 mil was good value for that player and weren't prepared to take the risk.

I think Webber and Farke are are a decent team, and that's why I believe we probably just weren't able to attract those sorts of players at that price point and salary. I know the media love to simplify everything in terms of transfer fees = quality, but we know the importance of recruiting the right sort of player too. Whilst I certainly believe Farke/Webber will have made mistakes in hindsight with certain transfers, I don't believe that between them they would have just decided to "go with what we've got" without making sure there weren't alternatives. I think we are pretty much on the same page with this anyway?

Not really, I'm suggesting that "Crafty" should put up a valid argument rather than slagging fellow supporters off, and that if he chooses to do so in such a condescending manner he should probably have some credentials. This is probably the opposite of what the delightful Roeder had in mind.

Great post, and one that reinforces my disdain for the average supporter who believes we are a "laughing stock". On that point, did you actually have an argument relevant to this thread, or are you just going to continue with your endless list of ad-hominems? You are clearly so vastly superior to other posters on this thread I am surprised you're not in the position of running a professional football club yourself.

My understanding was that the reason our VAR implementation was so delayed is that other leagues' implementations would be used to determine what worked well and what didn't. I think the implementation this season has been nothing short of a disaster, and absolutely incompetent. I don't believe that it's a case of "first-season syndrome", because it is so absolutely flawed that these are not simply teething errors but should probably amount to misconduct (particularly when IFAB themselves say it is being used against their guidance). Don't get me wrong, I would like nothing more than to see someone sue over it, and watch the fireworks in the courts, but I just don't see it happening because it seems almost impossible to prove that a single decision can be directly responsible for a team's relegation.

I have no doubt there will be a margin of error, particularly in sports like cricket and tennis where it's actually predicting things like spin and bounce. The difference is that cricket and tennis legislate for this with "Umpire's Call" and the challenge system, whereby the EPL is apparently run by absolute idiots who don't understand technology.

I don't necessarily disagree with you in principle. I am more sceptical of what we would have got for the £15m mark, but I do understand that spending that sort of money may have slightly improved our chances of competing this season. But that said, if you have faith in Webber, and agree he is the man responsible for our transfer strategy, do you not think it more likely that he actually did look into signing players with that sort of price tag in place? I can't see him being the sort of person who would just say "freebies and loans only this season lads" without having already looked into other options and weighed up whether the squad improvement was worth the financial risk. I suppose what I have difficulty with is fans and pundits who worshipped Webber and Farke like the second coming of Christ last season, only to act as if they are total idiots this season. I don't think there's any question they are trying to build something for the longer term (as per our demonstrable transfer strategy), so for my money, I think the coming season is probably the most important one in terms of validating their overall strategy and spending over the past couple of years.

I just don't see it. It's effectively legal action based on an incorrect refereeing decision, of which there are surely dozens of examples throughout the seasons. Is there not something in the PL/FA rules whereby a team is bound by the decisions made even if incorrect?

Exactly, it's just lazy thinking. Don't get me wrong, I am as disappointed with how this season panned out as anyone. But we are where we are, had we spent 40/50 million we may be in the same place but with a vastly greater set of problems given where we are as a club. It's very easy to criticise and correlate directly in hindsight, but could you imagine the reaction on here had we bought a few Naismith's, but were still fcked by injuries and VAR and went down anyway? Or do people genuinely believe that spending an additional 30/40/50/60 million would really have solved all the problems with our squad? I just don't see that spending that much on 2/3 players would have made much of a difference overall.

I think we've actually seen this season that you can have a great style of play and technically good players, but still lose week in week out to more physical and direct teams who have quality up-front.

Sorry, I wasn't attributing the question directly to you, more the general mantra by pundits, Bilic et al.

So basically, the most important thing is to spend a few dozen million to be in keeping with the money spent in the Premiership? It's not rocket science is it? Any player with a fee North of 10 million would likely also have a large salary attached, and probably wouldn't be interested in sticking around in the Championship either. It's also not a guarantee that these players would improve the squad. We've had recent experience of this, and we just simply didn't have the revenue to make this a risk worth taking. Yes, our tactic of sticking with, and rewarding the players who got us there didn't work out. But so we are not being revisionist, it actually looked pretty good early doors until we got a horrendous run of injuries, which really spanned most of the season, destroying any momentum and confidence we had built up. IMO spending 30/40 million quid on additional players may have bought us a few more points, but I very much doubt it would have changed our fate, and could well have ended up being a real issue in the coming season.

😂

Perhaps, but I doubt he is particularly privy to the clubs' finances and policies. Clearly it hasn't worked out for us this season at all, but equally we can look forward to improving the squad without half a dozen Naismith's crippling our finances for the next few years. It's very easy to be negative about our transfer dealings after the event, but I don't think many people were overly critical prior to the season starting, or indeed, after we spanked Newcastle and beat Man City. Recruitment has no doubt been a major factor in our dismal second half of the season, but I do think the experts like Bilic tend to discount the horrendous injury problems we've had. You know, it would be absolutely terrible if West Brom spent a few dozen million and still got relegated. I absolutely wouldn't want to read Bilic's comments on where it all went wrong (if he's still in charge). No Schadenfreude at all. Definitely not.

You would have taken Wilder over Farke at the end of last season?

Binner!

Honestly, this season not much. It's been absolutely torrid, and not only down to the results on the pitch. The farcical VAR implementation, sudden ability to change rules post-lockdown just to shoehorn the games in, and general lack of entertainment across the entire season pales in comparison to the 2018-2019 season we witnessed what seems like just a few months ago. It had a few highlights over the early part of the season, with the obvious home performances, but I don't really think I'm going to be gutted to not be in the top flight next season.

Absolutely agree with this - if you look purely in terms of survival in the Premier League this season then their comments may have some merit. That said, do they really think this idea hadn't occurred to Webber and Farke, given that these two have are actually having to walk the walk rather than just talk the talk in the newspapers? Considering we're trying to establish a playing style over the long term, and considering we were likely to be relegated anyway, would it really have been the best thing to do to try and alter the style of play we are aiming for (and implemented so successfully last season) just to try and cling onto Premiership survival? I expect next season to give a much greater indication of whether our long-term strategy is going to be successful.

Why does there always need to be someone to blame?

Hit across the ball, early, and used donkey Maguire as a shield. Not sure what they expected Romero to do. Todd looked very sharp this evening. Thought Krul would have got a hand in Igalho's effort were it not for the fact he shinned it in an unintended direction. Still, when Ian Wright can't be arsed to learn our squad's names (except for Hernandez) are we really surprised about the quality of their punditry?

He really does have the attributes. His mobility and strength are obvious, but he's actually decent on the ball and has a good all round game. Would not be at all surprised to see him in an England shirt at some point in his career.

Thought pukki looked fairly decent tonight, but clearly very low on confidence and had absolutely zero support. Cantwell and he were 2 on 1 and the former played a fairly dreadful ball, otherwise Pukki would have been in. Put it this way, how many good chances has Pukki missed in the last dozen games? The fact he's not getting any service probably explains why he looks poor...

He's quality. A matchwinner on his day. All those who said Fahrmann was coming in as No 1 should eat there words. Hope we can keep him for our 2020-2021 promotion tour

Finally we look fit. Three points at the **** on Wed?