Is it time to stop relying on loan signings?

[OnDaBall 141]

We seem to have been dragged into a spiral of loaning in players, it's been a growing trend, I guess as a low risk way of signing players with no commitment of being saddled with another Naismith situation, of uninterested players on high wages, but is it worth it?

Obviously last season, Skipp was a massive success, but when he went back to Spurs in addition to losing Emi, we were on a hiding to nothing this season. Would it have been better if he had never been here and instead we signed a CDM or promoted an academy player for the championship, especially if the club knew that Emi would be leaving in the summer? To lose both of them key players, in probably the most important positions on the pitch, killed any momentum from our brilliant championship season. Also loaning in Gibson and Giannoulis with commitments to sign them was a poor decision, given that loanees were brought in this season for their positions.

Obviously the less said about this seasons loans, the better. Why we are helping other clubs develop their youth players is beyond me, I could understand if we loaned in a proven prem player who had become a squad player at a big club, but players who aren't ready for this level were never going to help us stay up.

[cambridgeshire canary 7,799]

Always said I'm never fond of them unless they have a guarentee to join at the end of a season. They don't care about our club, loanees never do if they know they will be off. It's nothing but a shop window to try and impress ther parent club, we need players who care not that.

[TheGunnShow 7,377]

Thought Gibson was a great one for the Champs (played well for us there, less so in the Premier League), and could also say the same for Giannoulis as they were loans with options to buy which we exercised. Same applied to Kabak and Normann, but not worked out. Can't see either of them in our kit next season. Normann's pretty much said as such, Kabak's crocked now.

Although let it be said that Williams has not played like some would think a loanee would - he's been all-in, to his credit.

[Indy 3,471]

Indeed, I’d much rather try our own, I always think you can’t judge youth players until you’ve given them a good run in the first team, sometimes ordinary youth players can make a big leap by experiencing that first team buzz.

A good loan certainly can help as Skipp, but it’s rarely that good.

[Monty13 2,736]

Without Skipp we may not have been promoted, or at least it would have been tougher.

Theres nothing wrong with loans if you get them right and aren’t overly reliant on them. We’ve done neither this season.

[Danke bitte 1,155]

@ged in the onion bag has long since said this. Their rhetoric regarding Premiership loans is spot on. 

We failed when we signed up Oliver Skipp insomuch that we would never re sign him for a campaign where we needed a player of his calibre. 

Instead we relied on players not physically and mentally capable of providing ballast for our defence. 

Loaning Prem players provides a log jam to our own player development and creates wishful thinking positions - aka on promotion we are left with squad holes we cannot afford to fill. 

[CDMullins 498]

3 hours ago, cambridgeshire canary said:

Always said I'm never fond of them unless they have a guarentee to join at the end of a season. They don't care about our club, loanees never do if they know they will be off. It's nothing but a shop window to try and impress ther parent club, we need players who care not that.

Completely disagree,

And this has been one of our issues this season.

Before we'd kicked a Premier League ball were we're comitted to spending the best part of £20 Million on two players, we then went and brought in two players to be ahead of them.

What a waste of money.

[Move Klose 303]

1 minute ago, CDMullins said:

Completely disagree,

And this has been one of our issues this season.

Before we'd kicked a Premier League ball were we're comitted to spending the best part of £20 Million on two players, we then went and brought in two players to be ahead of them.

What a waste of money.

£14m for those 2 doesn't look great business. Our model of signing players cheap, them progressing and selling them on for a profit won't come into play with those 2. The only new player we have a chance of making a profit on is Rashica and that won't be by much.

Who's going to pay 10 plus million for Tzolis and Sargent, or 5m for PLM

[Dr Greenthumb 794]

Not a big fan of loan signings, but at least we can send them back. We are stuck with PLM for his contract. He is a very poor quality central midfielder, we’d have been better keeping Vrancic.

[OnDaBall 141]

It's also preventing us from implementing our own business model, of bringing in young cheap players, and developing them for profit. Instead we are developing young players for Chelsea and Man Utd's profit, how is the next Jamal Lewis or Max Aarons going to break through, and how is this affecting Gibson and Giannoulis sell on value and indeed their morale?

[Michael Starr 571]

The only issue I have with loan signings is if we back down to a "must play" clause which I'm pretty sure the top 4 teams will always insist on inserting. I'm pretty sure this explains Gilmores game time.

[Yellow Wal 315]

The whole loan system is being massively abused by the top, richest clubs in the Premiership. Chelsea have cut back this season and only have THIRTY players out on loan to be developed by other clubs and assessed by themselves. (I think we have a first hand knowledge of how this works!). Youngsters are being farmed by these clubs to the detriment of all others. Ban all loans, reinstate a meaningful Reserve league and make the clubs develop their own players. 

[cambridgeshire canary 7,799]

1 hour ago, Dr Greenthumb said:

Not a big fan of loan signings, but at least we can send them back. We are stuck with PLM for his contract. He is a very poor quality central midfielder, we’d have been better keeping Vrancic.

No clue why we got rid of Vrancic when he's scoring world class goals for Stoke and being the main reason they aren't down the bottom of the table..

[Samwam27 606]

I'm not against loan players, as last season Skipp, Gibson & Giann were all highly effective for us.

This season, with exception of Williams, none of our loans have improved our squad at all.

What frustrates me, with 8 games to go now, is it's painfully obvious to see that Normann and Gilmour are not adding any value to our performances. A drab draw after 6 straight losses is a slight improvement (not on performance, but results) and whilst we can still stay up, it still looks like an impossibility. Please just drop them and lets play our own players for remaining games as we've got very little else to lose   

[Samwam27 606]

4 minutes ago, cambridgeshire canary said:

No clue why we got rid of Vrancic when he's scoring world class goals for Stoke and being the main reason they aren't down the bottom of the table..

Not sure Vrancic would have the legs for this seasons campaign, but the only thing I'll save in his favour is we've lacked any kind of creativity in midfield this season, and Vrancic would have given us that

[hogesar 10,766]

I think Williams genuinely improves our starting eleven,  so I think he should play.

I'm not sure any of the other loan players really do. Not in their current form.

[OnDaBall 141]

28 minutes ago, Yellow Wal said:

The whole loan system is being massively abused by the top, richest clubs in the Premiership. Chelsea have cut back this season and only have THIRTY players out on loan to be developed by other clubs and assessed by themselves. (I think we have a first hand knowledge of how this works!). Youngsters are being farmed by these clubs to the detriment of all others. Ban all loans, reinstate a meaningful Reserve league and make the clubs develop their own players. 

Let's not forget, we also have 14 players out on loan. No doubt the fans of them other clubs have similar feelings towards our players as we are having.

[Hucks6 186]

Must agree loan signings don’t seem to help, but on the other hand Brandon Williams has been a massive success. Going back a few years Darren Huckerby was a loan player and look what happened 

[priceyrice 133]

I think the cost of the loans really needs to be examined. I understand we paid between 4 to 5m for Kabak to join us on loan for a season. Fahrmann last time round was a similar amount. I don't know about any others, but to pay close to 10m for two loan players who have barely featured is criminal. 

[Ulfotto 800]

Loan signing allow us to get players we would not normally be able to afford. I don’t like it but they are an essential part of our transfer strategy and most championship teams.

The issue is the execution not the plan ( like nearly everything with Norwich) in the first place. We need more Skipps and less Marcus Edwards. 
 

Next season getting the right loans in will be crucial to us being successful.

[Yellow Wal 315]

9 minutes ago, OnDaBall said:

Let's not forget, we also have 14 players out on loan. No doubt the fans of them other clubs have similar feelings towards our players as we are having.

I fully agree what other clubs might think about our players, this is why the system is flawed. We have made some benefits from loaning players but it pales into insignificance compared to the big boys. Without the loan system and meaningful competitive competition for our players they could have been developed by us and also benefited by only being a part of our club.

[BroadstairsR 2,273]

11 minutes ago, priceyrice said:

I think the cost of the loans really needs to be examined. I understand we paid between 4 to 5m for Kabak to join us on loan for a season. Fahrmann last time round was a similar amount. I don't know about any others, but to pay close to 10m for two loan players who have barely featured is criminal. 

If that's true, then it represents a chronic misuse of limited funds.

What amount of self-sustainability is supposed to cope with that level of waste?

Is this why we didn't have a pot to p-iss in when the last window was open?

Is this why we were probably the first team in Premier League history who found themselves bottom of the league in January yet made no attempt at squad enhancement?

Edited April 3, 2022 by BroadstairsR

[Move Klose 303]

49 minutes ago, Yellow Wal said:

The whole loan system is being massively abused by the top, richest clubs in the Premiership. Chelsea have cut back this season and only have THIRTY players out on loan to be developed by other clubs and assessed by themselves. (I think we have a first hand knowledge of how this works!). Youngsters are being farmed by these clubs to the detriment of all others. Ban all loans, reinstate a meaningful Reserve league and make the clubs develop their own players. 

Chelsea currently have 11 players out on loan over the age of 21.

None of them I expect even have a career left at Chelsea anyway.

They have 16 players 21 or under currently out on loan who would still be able to go out on loan under the new rules, so not sure how that stops teams from stock piling players.

 

[Coneys Knee 1,050]

1 hour ago, Yellow Wal said:

The whole loan system is being massively abused by the top, richest clubs in the Premiership. Chelsea have cut back this season and only have THIRTY players out on loan to be developed by other clubs and assessed by themselves. (I think we have a first hand knowledge of how this works!). Youngsters are being farmed by these clubs to the detriment of all others. Ban all loans, reinstate a meaningful Reserve league and make the clubs develop their own players. 

This is exactly how I feel. Of course it could never happen. One, because it makes too much sense, two, because it doesn’t favour the money makers, and three, I’m not sure the egos of footballers would accept plying for “the reserves” in modern football. I could quite imagine constant “down tools” shenanigans from little darlings that believe they are above the reserves! 

[Yellow Wal 315]

14 minutes ago, Coneys Knee said:

This is exactly how I feel. Of course it could never happen. One, because it makes too much sense, two, because it doesn’t favour the money makers, and three, I’m not sure the egos of footballers would accept plying for “the reserves” in modern football. I could quite imagine constant “down tools” shenanigans from little darlings that believe they are above the reserves! 

Perhaps if they didn't like playing for the reserves they might not sign contacts keeping them at clubs longer and look to further their careers by moving to a first team of a 'lesser' club.

[Ulfotto 800]

The whole Chelsea youth system and loan factory started after a conversation between Mourinho and Abramovich where Abramovich wanted to buy Cristiano Ronaldo. Mourinho told him in no certain terms you cannot buy Ronaldo you have to buy “the next Ronaldo” after that any young player anywhere in the world who showed any ability was bought by Chelsea.

The joke is on them though as they had Salah  and De Bruyne but sold them both…..

Edited April 3, 2022 by Ulfotto

[Branston Pickle 4,150]

1 hour ago, hogesar said:

I think Williams genuinely improves our starting eleven,  so I think he should play.

I'm not sure any of the other loan players really do. Not in their current form.

This gets to the point - it’s not loans per se that are the problem, but our use of them has often been mixed.  Williams has been one of our best players, Gilmour has been poor - but who’d have thought that would be the case when we signed him? Most were very much behind the signing and lauding it as a great piece of work. 

In terms of loans with a (possible) commitment to buy, they are completely different - they are in effect a delayed transfer purchase, if things work out.  And they make good sense if finances are tight. I would think if we stayed up we’d possibly keep Normann but not Kabak. 

 

[hogesar 10,766]

2 hours ago, Branston Pickle said:

This gets to the point - it’s not loans per se that are the problem, but our use of them has often been mixed.  Williams has been one of our best players, Gilmour has been poor - but who’d have thought that would be the case when we signed him? Most were very much behind the signing and lauding it as a great piece of work. 

In terms of loans with a (possible) commitment to buy, they are completely different - they are in effect a delayed transfer purchase, if things work out.  And they make good sense if finances are tight. I would think if we stayed up we’d possibly keep Normann but not Kabak. 

 

Yep, loans with an option allow you to make signings that would otherwise be too risky to make. That those signings haven't been that good doesnt mean the theory behind them is wrong.

[Monty13 2,736]

4 hours ago, cambridgeshire canary said:

No clue why we got rid of Vrancic when he's scoring world class goals for Stoke and being the main reason they aren't down the bottom of the table..

He was a more than adequate backup/squad player IMO. We changed way too much last summer, some were forced like Skipp and Tettey but Vrancic was worth another year or two IMO and allow funds for elsewhere.

[TheBaldOne66 768]

Too many of them have been failures recently, and that’s on Webber!

The likes of Fahrmann, Roberts, Edwards, Kabak, Gilmour have all been woeful, I dread to think what the cost of those combined is? I’m sure there have been others too, Passlack maybe? Duda? Yet our illustrious rock climber moaned about the previous CEO spunking money up the wall! There’s also numerous permanent signings that have been crap thanks to Webber too!