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Bill

We don't need to spend...

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1 minute ago, Bill said:

oh dear, oh dearie dear me

do you think that Buendia and Onel were free ?

do you think that players in the PL are on lower contracts ... because they are young ?

what do you thing our signing of some many young players is about, are you away of how Aarons, Gordon, Lewis and Mair joined us ?

and nothing you or anyone else of this thread has posted suggests that we can progress with no heavy risk by spending beyond our means

 

Really not sure what your point is here?  You sure as heck didn't answer my question.  In fact, in attempting to dodge it, I think you've unintentionally come full circle because I think you're proving my point.  Onel and Buendia are both young players that we got in for small sums of money (albeit with add-ons for promotion) which have proved to be a success.  Webber obviously saw these players (and previous scouting teams saw Max/Jamal etc) with the view of them being a low risk signing but with potential for development. 

THIS IS EXACTLY WHAT I AM ADVOCATING WE SHOULD HAVE DONE IN THE CLOSE SEASON.  The difference is, if you want to do that at this level, you cant get by shopping for players in the £1m bracket in the European lower divisions, but you are still looking at buying players who are on the up in their careers.  Perhaps you're giving them a 3 year contract at £30,000 a week, that works out at £1.5m a year.  A relative drop in the ocean when your TV income alone is £100m.  And if you get relegated, you still own a young player on the up in their career so either you sell them or the £1.5m doesn't make a massive dent in the parachute payments and you have a player who can help gain promotion.  But the key thing is if that doesn't work out, he's out of contract when the parachute payments end.

Look at the players that got us into the mess we got in over the last couple of years.  Naismith (aging, no real sell on value, huge wages, contract 1 year longer than parachute payments) and Jarvis (aging, notoriously injury prone, decent wages, contract 1 year longer than parachute payments) caused the main issues but look at some of the other players we signed ready for the first team around that time?  Robbie Brady (bought for £7m at the age of 23, sold for £13m), Nathan Redmond (bought for £2.5m at the age of 19, sold for £10m after helping us regain promotion), Alex Pritchard (bought for £8m at the age of 23, sold for similar).  These are exactly the types of player that I'm talking about.  It's brilliant that we've scouted players from a young age like Godfrey, Jamal and Max and hopefully there are more to come of that production line but they aren't ready now and not spending anything means that we're relying on the players who we bought in as Championship players to make a further step up.  So far, it looks like most of our midfield aren't doing that.

1 hour ago, Bill said:

So is it lack of ambition that keeps Leeds, Derby, Forest, Boro, Swansea, Stoke, Sunderland, WBA, Pompey....even the binners out of the PL, and even out of the Championship in some cases ?

All of which I would say are equal to our size as a club, and many who have had greater funding than us.

Similarly with QPR, Blackburn, Hull and Bolton......what caused their demise ? Lack of ambition - or maybe over reaching themselves as club's with 'hambition' ?

Ours is not some 'ever so 'umble little ole Norwich attitude but a hard faced recognition of where we are in football's pecking order, and the dangers that could befall us long term should we ignore those dangers - and I would add for all the wingining on here I would suggest that there a fair few hundred thousand fans of the clubs mentioned above who would swap our last season, and where we are now for their supposed ambitious position

So why not enjoy the football, apprecate whats been achieved and understand how far we have come since Sept 2018 and look forward to carrying on that progress ?

My issue with our lack of ambition is that we've had 3 promotions now in the last 10 years and not capitalised on it because we've tried to do it on the cheap each time.  "Whatabouttery" is never a valid argument.  I don't care what any of those teams have done or are doing or how similar in size or investment they are to us.  I care about our potential and with some sensible investment in scouted players that are on the rise in their careers, we give ourselves more of a chance at capitalising on this promotion than we do by spending a couple of million.  If you're looking where we are in football's "pecking order", seeing that as below "bigger" teams or those with more investment than us (which fwiw would put us close to the bottom of the 92) then sorry, but you are looking as us as "little ole Norwich".  By refusing to take opportunities to improve that for fear of something that happened because of bad decisions made 4 years ago only compounds that.

3 hours ago, Van wink said:

It’s a perfectly reasonable point you make.

I wouldn’t worry about Bills comments, he doesn’t bother to actually read what is said and is not capable of discussing anything without behaving like a 🐓😉

Dearie, dearie me.  By not managing to answer my question and the confused waffle that followed, Winky might have a point.  I would keep batting these back but what is it Mark Twain said about arguing with a fool?

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1 hour ago, BarclayWazza said:

 

Funnily enough, a pub discussion topic from the other night.  I'm just old enough to remember the UEFA Cup run and the days of finishing 3rd/4th/5th in the top division which is probably the closest we can say we've been to that.  But you're right, there's something extra special being a Norwich fan and turning over a Man City or the one trip to Wembley I've had in my time following Norwich.  I'd suggest that a Man Utd fan in the mid 90's to mid 00's didn't get the same pleasure out of yet another PL title.

Personally, both in terms of football and elsewhere in life, I like the feeling of overachievement and progression.  In the short term, we've certainly progressed but if you go back further, we're still not learning from previous relegations.

Not a lot I think I can add to that, Wazza - other than that I totally agree with you 👍🏼

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2 hours ago, Dean Coneys boots said:

There is middle ground and palace are a good case study. Similar size club historically - Went up and made it work. Now thriving after a few years settled.
 

Ultimately spending as little as we did was suicidal in terms of staying up-a few got carried away with the over achievement last season of a side made up to challenge for playoffs. They now have much more expensive contracts but we don’t have a better side..

Exactly my point.

I don't understand why we've dished out contracts to so many players untested at this level, its obvious upon promotion that some are going to find themselves a level too high. Often not the obvious ones.  

The youngsters I completely understand, particularly as they were likely starting from a much lower base. 

Other than that, the pressure was really only on extending those who had 1 year remaining on their deals. The rest could have waited until at least January for us to take stock and work out what is working and what isn't.

We sacrificed our transfer budget in order to reward our existing players, some of whom it is obvious we need to upgrade if we stay up (or indeed, to have any chance of staying up).

I'm not sure why some aren't understanding this. It isn't just this summer though where we have been rash with new contracts, Russell Martin handed his before having a training session with his new gaffer, Hanley given 4.5 years after a decent half a season when it must surely have been obvious that he didn't have the finesse that we were looking for in the longer term? 

Edited by TeemuVanBasten

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4 hours ago, Ian said:

So you didn't use the phrase "Premier League standard"?

The other quotes, clearly attributed to @TIL 1010, but top trolling to avoid the whole post on that basis.

ps. Hanley.

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33 minutes ago, TeemuVanBasten said:

ps. Hanley.

Anyone would think you were avoiding the main point.

Just to ensure the absence of any doubt, what major strategic decisions would you have made in the summer, given the obvious financial constraints and overriding goal of maintaining a sustainable squad? 

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40 minutes ago, Ian said:

Anyone would think you were avoiding the main point.

Just to ensure the absence of any doubt, what major strategic decisions would you have made in the summer, given the obvious financial constraints and overriding goal of maintaining a sustainable squad? 

I've already explained that quite clearly, rather than sacrifice a transfer budget by rewarding our entire team with a new contract I'd have held fire on a lot of them and taken stock in January. Not the valuable young British players of course. 

You realise we will need to shed some of these players in order to bring in new ones? And that by giving them a pay rise you may have priced them out of moves in the process? Ben Marshall's stock fell so quickly after his £1.25m move and mutual termination that he is unemployed and on trial at a League Two side. He's 28. 

Take Marco Stiepermann for example, we are paying him for the next 2.5 years but its clear we need an upgrade. You think a Bundesliga 2 side is going to be able to afford to take over his contract? We'll be paying him for that 2.5 years even if he's nowhere near the first team, at best somebody will give us a fraction of his wages.

I'm not sure why we didn't tell players to prove themselves to earn a decent new contract. You may think they should be 'rewarded' for promotion. They were, they shared a £10m bonus and would have had a 40% promotion rise automatically.

You can point at Hernandez and Buendia if you like, but we've not got room in the squad for any more. We literally have to get rid of a foreign player in order to sign one in January. 

It looks like we're going to end up with a fair bit of deadwood and I dread to think how we're going to end up paying them off, presumably the same way Webber paid off the last lot (by flogging a player or two).

ps. You talk about "financial constraints" but I thought it was widely accepted that we were in for a £15m player. How much of it is a simple failure to land somebody? We're in a pretty desperate situation now where either Farke/Webber need to show us why they signed Patrick Roberts and make Buendia a #10, if they don't then surely simply having Buendia pegged in his own half all game is in itself a poor "strategic decision". 

People keep talking about the centre backs, but we''re not scoring either.... 2 goals in 6 games, both late consolation goals in games already lost. If the answer is a player who has scored 7 career goals in the #10 spot then clearly something has clearly gone wrong. 

Perhaps that is simply a terrible decision to bring in Patrick Roberts instead of somebody more suitable, or perhaps it is a terrible decision not to play him, however it has happened... how Buendia hasn't been moved to #10 yet is beyond me, but I'm glad it makes sense to you. 

Edited by TeemuVanBasten

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3 hours ago, Dean Coneys boots said:

There is middle ground and palace are a good case study. Similar size club historically - Went up and made it work. Now thriving after a few years settled.
 

Ultimately spending as little as we did was suicidal in terms of staying up-a few got carried away with the over achievement last season of a side made up to challenge for playoffs. They now have much more expensive contracts but we don’t have a better side..

Leaving aside the fact that one could pick any number of supposedly similarly-sized club (and bigger) that would kill for our record over the last two decades (not such much case studies as basket-case studies), Palace are owned by billionaires, which gives them a financial safety net if things go wrong. And that applies to pretty much every club we are in competition with not just in the Premier Leaguer but in the Championship as well.

We cannot take what I have frequently seen here wrongly described as the 'calculated risks' - actually pure gambles - that other clubs can - risks that those posters would never dream of taking with their personal finances. Nor can we cope so easily with the player acquisition mistakes that all clubs make.

Is this an argument for having richer owners? Probably (to be put alongside the argument against). Providing posters understand the risks of a corporate-culture ownership. From which it would be hard to switch back if it didn't work out.

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9 minutes ago, PurpleCanary said:

Leaving aside the fact that one could pick any number of supposedly similarly-sized club (and bigger) that would kill for our record over the last two decades (not such much case studies as basket-case studies), Palace are owned by billionaires, which gives them a financial safety net if things go wrong. And that applies to pretty much every club we are in competition with not just in the Premier Leaguer but in the Championship as well.

We cannot take what I have frequently seen here wrongly described as the 'calculated risks' - actually pure gambles - that other clubs can - risks that those posters would never dream of taking with their personal finances. Nor can we cope so easily with the player acquisition mistakes that all clubs make.

Is this an argument for having richer owners? Probably (to be put alongside the argument against). Providing posters understand the risks of a corporate-culture ownership. From which it would be hard to switch back if it didn't work out.

This is something I’ve said for a couple seasons now. To progress or keep up to where we are now might be more difficult next relegation. Teams like Oxford have a billionaire on their board, teams in the 1st division have infrastructure and investment which is restricted by the FFP but over time will possibly overtake our long term self funding model. I’m not saying it’s wrong to be self funding but we could be looking at a longer stint battling in the championship next time round.

Football is unfortunately not a self funded business, especially not in the top flight, but we don’t have any other option and we certainly didn’t have mega bucks to buy much better than we have now.

Edited by Indy

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Haha, so Crystal Palace are the yardstick now are they? Wow, how thrilling.

 

I’ll take our last 10 years against their last 10 years, and see who’s club has created the most drama for the football supporter. I’ll put money on it that it isn’t the Eagles supporters who’ve had the most excitement filled with highs and lows...  BUT... they do have a billionaire owner so... that’s pretty mega, isn’t it? 👍🏼 🎉 

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29 minutes ago, TeemuVanBasten said:

I've already explained that quite clearly, rather than sacrifice a transfer budget by rewarding our entire team with a new contract I'd have held fire on a lot of them and taken stock in January. Not the valuable young British players of course. 

You realise we will need to shed some of these players in order to bring in new ones? And that by giving them a pay rise you may have priced them out of moves in the process? Ben Marshall's stock fell so quickly after his £1.25m move and mutual termination that he is unemployed and on trial at a League Two side. He's 28. 

Take Marco Stiepermann for example, we are paying him for the next 2.5 years but its clear we need an upgrade. You think a Bundesliga 2 side is going to be able to afford to take over his contract? We'll be paying him for that 2.5 years even if he's nowhere near the first team, at best somebody will give us a fraction of his wages.

I'm not sure why we didn't tell players to prove themselves to earn a decent new contract. You may think they should be 'rewarded' for promotion. They were, they shared a £10m bonus and would have had a 40% promotion rise automatically.

You can point at Hernandez and Buendia if you like, but we've not got room in the squad for any more. We literally have to get rid of a foreign player in order to sign one in January. 

It looks like we're going to end up with a fair bit of deadwood and I dread to think how we're going to end up paying them off, presumably the same way Webber paid off the last lot (by flogging a player or two).

ps. You talk about "financial constraints" but I thought it was widely accepted that we were in for a £15m player. How much of it is a simple failure to land somebody? We're in a pretty desperate situation now where either Farke/Webber need to show us why they signed Patrick Roberts and make Buendia a #10, if they don't then surely simply having Buendia pegged in his own half all game is in itself a poor "strategic decision". 

People keep talking about the centre backs, but we''re not scoring either.... 2 goals in 6 games, both late consolation goals in games already lost. If the answer is a player who has scored 7 career goals in the #10 spot then clearly something has clearly gone wrong. 

Perhaps that is simply a terrible decision to bring in Patrick Roberts instead of somebody more suitable, or perhaps it is a terrible decision not to play him, however it has happened... how Buendia hasn't been moved to #10 yet is beyond me, but I'm glad it makes sense to you. 

Oh, thanks for engaging. And if these players you mention (Steipermann/Leitner) for instance, had hit the ground running in the Prem - I'm sure you wouldn't be the type of fan who would moan at the club for not putting them on longer contracts when we had the chance? Re: the comments about goals and positions; I thought we were talking about recruitment errors, rather than strategic errors this season?

It's very easy to seem wise after the fact, but it seems your sole bugbear is the extra, shall we say, few million quid per season committed to rewarding the "borderline" players. Bearing in mind a lot of the ongoing costs will be legislated for in the parachute payments in the event we are relegated, and certainly not a capital expenditure, you have to ask yourself where that extra money could have been spent this season if not on those pay rises. At most, you would think they would have covered the transfer fee and wages of one average player at this level. Would that really have made very much difference given that our problems have really been caused by an unprecedented injury crisis?

My personal opinion is that the club did absolutely the correct thing in the summer, and may very well be vindicated come the end of the season. The fact you're acting as if this was a clear and obvious (VAR?) error, without really have any sort of substantial alternative, kind of makes me think the club were pretty sensible overall.

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1 hour ago, Ian said:

 I thought we were talking about recruitment errors, rather than strategic errors this season?

You were the first person to use the term "strategic decision" you fool, that's why I put it in quotation marks. 

I'm not sure where you are drawing a distinction between the two and I now suspect will just turn into a debate about semantics if we continue it, so what's the point? 

Edited by TeemuVanBasten

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1 hour ago, Ian said:

 At most, you would think they would have covered the transfer fee and wages of one average player at this level. 

Well we have no idea whether the club has money to spend on transfers in January.

But we do know that if it is to be an overseas player we have to get rid of one, and there are only a couple who weren't given a new contract a few months ago. And one of those who wasn't is Tettey, who is indispensable. 

I hope that is a simple way of explaining my reasoning behind believing we should have held our fire on the contract spree. 

What are your thoughts about Grant Hanley being on the payroll until summer 2023 by the way? Where was the need for that extension? It wasn't this summer, but what was the "strategic decision" behind that one? He had a good half a season before that, but how did he ever fit into our masterplan of fluid possession football?

And if we did stay up, are we just going to sub his wages while he goes out on loan for three years? Or would he get a £3m/£4m lump sum to leave?

Is the idea that if we do go down and fail to come back up that its OK having a 30 year old Hanley after parachute payments because we've given up on playing nice football because it failed, or is this in fact exactly the same as the time we were stuck paying Jarvis and Naismith beyond parachute payments?

ps. There was never any danger of me thinking Stiepermann would set this league alight, I wouldn't have bet a penny on that.

Edited by TeemuVanBasten

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1 hour ago, PurpleCanary said:

Leaving aside the fact that one could pick any number of supposedly similarly-sized club (and bigger) that would kill for our record over the last two decades (not such much case studies as basket-case studies), Palace are owned by billionaires, which gives them a financial safety net if things go wrong. And that applies to pretty much every club we are in competition with not just in the Premier Leaguer but in the Championship as well.

so how come so many are in the Championship ?

are their fans 'over the moon' knowing that although they are not in the PL they cannot go bust ?

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7 minutes ago, TeemuVanBasten said:

Well we have no idea whether the club has money to spend on transfers in January.

But we do know that if it is to be an overseas player we have to get rid of one, and there are only a couple who weren't given a new contract a few months ago.

Klose will not be in the squad this Jan so no need to 'get rid of one'

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Just now, Bill said:

Klose will not be in the squad this Jan so no need to 'get rid of one'

We'll need more than one player in January though.

Other options are loaning Srbeny to Rotherham or something, and leaving McGovern out of the squad if we have two fit keepers (risky). 

That would make room for a couple. 

But if we then stay up, what about next summer? We can suddenly afford to spend £26m on an average English centre back or will we need to try and dispose of players with 2/3 years left on their deal? Never easy, not if they are Championship standard but on Premier League wages. 

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5 hours ago, BarclayWazza said:

 

Funnily enough, a pub discussion topic from the other night.  I'm just old enough to remember the UEFA Cup run and the days of finishing 3rd/4th/5th in the top division which is probably the closest we can say we've been to that.  But you're right, there's something extra special being a Norwich fan and turning over a Man City or the one trip to Wembley I've had in my time following Norwich.  I'd suggest that a Man Utd fan in the mid 90's to mid 00's didn't get the same pleasure out of yet another PL title.

Personally, both in terms of football and elsewhere in life, I like the feeling of overachievement and progression.  In the short term, we've certainly progressed but if you go back further, we're still not learning from previous relegations.

I think those top five finishes need to be put into context. 5th in 86/87, 4th in 88/89 and 3rd in 92/93. 92/93 was the only top half finish in the PL and rather than build on that we followed it with 12th and relegation. In our 117 years we only had two other top half finishes, 10th in 75/76 and 10th in 89/90. 

In 92/93 our opposition included Blackburn, Coventry, Wimbledon, Sheffield Wednesday, Oldham, QPR, Leeds, Middlesbrough, ipswich and Forest. All of whom are currently in our shadow.

It's also worth bearing in mind that 29 clubs currently outside the Premier League (since 92/93) have had at least one season in it.

And as for the criticism of being a yoyo club it's worth noting that many clubs with rich investor owners get relegated and don't come back.

On balance ours is not a "bad lot" and better than average. And we have no right to hold the current club to account against what we see from an unrelated rose tinted past.

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3 hours ago, BarclayWazza said:

 Webber obviously saw these players (and previous scouting teams saw Max/Jamal etc) with the view of them being a low risk signing but with potential for development. 

THIS IS EXACTLY WHAT I AM ADVOCATING WE SHOULD HAVE DONE IN THE CLOSE SEASON. 

Obviously you have little grasp on fooball or our club.

There is not a supermarket shelf where suitable players can simply be picked off the shelf. There are also a huge number of other clubs out there looking to do the same.

We have brought in 'promising' young players who have not been able to step up for one thing or another so your guff about simply signing young players that are then guaranteed to succeed is just that guff.

If I have not replied to the rest of uour nonsense that is because it is nonsense, aimed at an argument fir arguments sake - where you are unavle to address the points others have made, instead spinning their words so as to 'be right'.

So ta ra.....whoever you used to post as

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2 hours ago, nutty nigel said:

I think those top five finishes need to be put into context. 5th in 86/87, 4th in 88/89 and 3rd in 92/93. 92/93 was the only top half finish in the PL and rather than build on that we followed it with 12th and relegation. In our 117 years we only had two other top half finishes, 10th in 75/76 and 10th in 89/90. 

In 92/93 our opposition included Blackburn, Coventry, Wimbledon, Sheffield Wednesday, Oldham, QPR, Leeds, Middlesbrough, ipswich and Forest. All of whom are currently in our shadow.

It's also worth bearing in mind that 29 clubs currently outside the Premier League (since 92/93) have had at least one season in it.

And as for the criticism of being a yoyo club it's worth noting that many clubs with rich investor owners get relegated and don't come back.

On balance ours is not a "bad lot" and better than average. And we have no right to hold the current club to account against what we see from an unrelated rose tinted past.

You might have missed the part where I said on another post that I hold little value in whatabouttery. I have no interest in how teams that were in those divisions at that time fare now - in fact, rather than a stick to beat the club with (which is what I've assumed you thought I meant by that) I only brought those years up as a reference to a time where we could be possibly considered a top side, and even then from what I remember given my young age, we were considered to be relegation fodder. 

What I was saying was that the view that we should respect our place in some kind of football hierarchy and that we should consider ourselves grateful to even be in the PL is symptomatic of the "little ole Norwich" mentality many display. Why shouldn't we strive for further improvement? Why shouldn't we highlight failings in past approaches and identify ways to learn from that in the future, and if we dont learn from our mistakes, question why?

 

As for Bill.... I really dont know where to start with that but my aim from my post before was to completely destroy your ridiculous argument with fact and logic.  I think most will agree that I highlighted extremely clearly that there is a viable low risk third way which is in between the aforementioned two extremes that appear to be the only outcomes you can envisage.  If you deem that nonsense then that's on you old chum.  Just know that all you've done in that post is to REALLY prove Wicky correct 😘

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I'm off work today and a bit bored so went through the numbers to see just how low our first season spending has been in context.

To do that I looked at how much the three promoted sides spent in the summer window after they went up. I used Transfermarkt (which I know is far from perfect) which let me go back to the 14/15 season.

According to them, we spent £3.75m (this does include a loan fee for Fahrmann but not for Roberts/Amadou).

This is by far the lowest amount of any team in this sample. For context, the next lowest is Burnley back in 2014 who apparently spent £9m.

The average overall spend is £38m. This has increased substantially over the last two or three years with two teams breaking the £100m mark.

So we're not talking about us just spending a bit less than most but spending by far the lowest figure. This is coming after financial results in 2018 which saw us make an £14m profit after tax and vastly increased revenue from promotion. I don't think it outlandish to suggest we could have looked to cherry-pick a couple of players from the Championship without risking bankruptcy...

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21 minutes ago, king canary said:

I'm off work today and a bit bored so went through the numbers to see just how low our first season spending has been in context.

To do that I looked at how much the three promoted sides spent in the summer window after they went up. I used Transfermarkt (which I know is far from perfect) which let me go back to the 14/15 season.

According to them, we spent £3.75m (this does include a loan fee for Fahrmann but not for Roberts/Amadou).

This is by far the lowest amount of any team in this sample. For context, the next lowest is Burnley back in 2014 who apparently spent £9m.

The average overall spend is £38m. This has increased substantially over the last two or three years with two teams breaking the £100m mark.

So we're not talking about us just spending a bit less than most but spending by far the lowest figure. This is coming after financial results in 2018 which saw us make an £14m profit after tax and vastly increased revenue from promotion. I don't think it outlandish to suggest we could have looked to cherry-pick a couple of players from the Championship without risking bankruptcy...

I did much the same yesterday but I looked at the players bought by those teams and do you know what? Most of them were in the 21-25 year age range and most were in the £5m - £15m bracket. 

Imagine if we go down this year having spent next to no money and sell Godfrey/Aarons in the summer.... we'd be the richest Championship club in history!

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10 minutes ago, BarclayWazza said:

I did much the same yesterday but I looked at the players bought by those teams and do you know what? Most of them were in the 21-25 year age range and most were in the £5m - £15m bracket. 

Imagine if we go down this year having spent next to no money and sell Godfrey/Aarons in the summer.... we'd be the richest Championship club in history!

Yeah you'd expect both of those players to fetch over £20m even if we go down. 

It would be interesting to see what our strategy is in that situation- if we go down without any major January spending we should be in position to flex our financial muscle in the Championship. 

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Question is if there were any Championship players we wanted who we thought were worth paying what would be, a substantial figure for. Webster a prime example. 

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1 minute ago, hogesar said:

Question is if there were any Championship players we wanted who we thought were worth paying what would be, a substantial figure for. Webster a prime example. 

Of course- personally I think if we'd gone for a couple of players like Jared Bowen or Matt Grimes we'd be in a stronger position right now. But what I don't believe is that there is nobody who we could have got that would have improved the team for £10-15m.

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1 minute ago, king canary said:

Of course- personally I think if we'd gone for a couple of players like Jared Bowen or Matt Grimes we'd be in a stronger position right now. But what I don't believe is that there is nobody who we could have got that would have improved the team for £10-15m.

Possibly. I'd have liked Bowen personally. Not sure that would have had much of an impact on any of the results so far this season where attacking hasn't really been our main weakness.

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3 minutes ago, hogesar said:

Possibly. I'd have liked Bowen personally. Not sure that would have had much of an impact on any of the results so far this season where attacking hasn't really been our main weakness.

For me he'd have given us an option to mix things up either off the bench or from the start- he plays out wide as well as through the middle so could have allowed us to try something different. 

I'd also say attacking has been a weakness of late- we started well but since Chelsea we've managed 5 goals in 7 games.

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48 minutes ago, king canary said:

For me he'd have given us an option to mix things up either off the bench or from the start- he plays out wide as well as through the middle so could have allowed us to try something different. 

I'd also say attacking has been a weakness of late- we started well but since Chelsea we've managed 5 goals in 7 games.

Maybe so, but we've still scored more than:

Watford

Southampton

Newcastle

Everton

Sheffield United

I still take your point on board, but I think our attacking has only been weak because we've been weak in the defensive midfield side and not been able to control games in the same way as we could say vs Newcastle, or even Chelsea for long periods.

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1 minute ago, hogesar said:

Maybe so, but we've still scored more than:

Watford

Southampton

Newcastle

Everton

Sheffield United

I still take your point on board, but I think our attacking has only been weak because we've been weak in the defensive midfield side and not been able to control games in the same way as we could say vs Newcastle, or even Chelsea for long periods.

Agreed but if you've got one of the worst defences in the league you need to be outscoring more than 5 teams to make up for it.

I agree the two are interlinked, I just think we're struggling to mix things up in attack. Adding someone like Bowen at least gives us something different. 

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On balance ours is not a "bad lot" and better than average. And we have no right to hold the current club to account against what we see from an unrelated rose tinted past.

Exactly. I expect, despite the usual crowing, that a good few of teams in the EPL are preparing a Plan B should they face the drop. In most cases, I expect it is "sack the coach" but others will be now looking at January in a different light.

And sensibly, our club has assessed, and I'm sure it must have been with the knowledge of DF and Webber, that the way we approached this season had to be measured, not only against the past, but against the future. And also the very real possibility that we might only be up for one season.

Accept what this season brings. What is the worst can happen? We go down a division. A division that so many of us think is a better one for all round value than the EPL.

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10 hours ago, BarclayWazza said:

You might have missed the part where I said on another post that I hold little value in whatabouttery. I have no interest in how teams that were in those divisions at that time fare now - in fact, rather than a stick to beat the club with (which is what I've assumed you thought I meant by that) I only brought those years up as a reference to a time where we could be possibly considered a top side, and even then from what I remember given my young age, we were considered to be relegation fodder. 

What I was saying was that the view that we should respect our place in some kind of football hierarchy and that we should consider ourselves grateful to even be in the PL is symptomatic of the "little ole Norwich" mentality many display. Why shouldn't we strive for further improvement? Why shouldn't we highlight failings in past approaches and identify ways to learn from that in the future, and if we dont learn from our mistakes, question why?

 

As for Bill.... I really dont know where to start with that but my aim from my post before was to completely destroy your ridiculous argument with fact and logic.  I think most will agree that I highlighted extremely clearly that there is a viable low risk third way which is in between the aforementioned two extremes that appear to be the only outcomes you can envisage.  If you deem that nonsense then that's on you old chum.  Just know that all you've done in that post is to REALLY prove Wicky correct 😘

So now I'm totally confused about why you highlighted our three best seasons from 117. Every club has three best seasons. I'm also confused about who you think has a little old Norwich mentality. I'd be very interested in a quote or something to back that up.

 

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I'd have liked Webber and Farke to have considered a couple of freebies in until January, as soon as our injury crisis was realised. 

For example, Joe Ledley. Defensive midfielder with experience. Not a player we'd normally dream of signing, sure, but a 3 month contract - what's to lose? James Morrison another... Might just have helped to sure things up a bit in the short term. Of course I'm being hypothetical, but in hindsight it does seem to have been a little irresponsible to simply sit back and ride out the injury crisis when we were so threadbare. Our current form is a direct consequence of the injury crisis - should (or could) we have tried something to mitigate this? 

Edited by Il Pirata

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