finance Who spends their cash most efficiently in the Premier League

[Badger 2,407]

An interesting article for those of you interested in football finance. basically looks at how much clubs spend and how many points they get for it - points per pound so to speak. Speaks very interestingly about Brentford, but makes what I think is an important point about obtaining value:

"The higher up football’s food chain you get, the harder it is to exploit inefficiencies: while there might be thousands of players who could significantly improve a Championship club, there might only be dozens who could do the same for a side near the top echelons of the Premier League. "

This is the real challenge of the newly promoted clubs - there aren't that many players who will definitely improve them (a few hundred?) - and most of those that would, don't want to go to a newly promoted club.

Well worth reading if you are interested in this stuff. I'm also pretty certain that the telegraph has got one of its graphics wrong - anyone spot it?

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2022/05/06/revealed-manchester-united-spent-57m-per-point-sir-alex-ferguson/

[shefcanary 2,444]

Which makes the buying of players when in the Chumps that much more important - buy players to take you on the journey who can fit a profile required to play pragmatically on promotion. 

[Badger 2,407]

42 minutes ago, shefcanary said:

Which makes the buying of players when in the Chumps that much more important - buy players to take you on the journey who can fit a profile required to play pragmatically on promotion. 

Yes + also buy and keep players of high promise that might not be quite ready yet? I would get in trouble for this but the finance tag will have put off most of "it's all so simple brigade." 😉

[Midlands Yellow 4,038]

Is it us? 

[hogesar 9,720]

13 minutes ago, Badger said:

Yes + also buy and keep players of high promise that might not be quite ready yet? I would get in trouble for this but the finance tag will have put off most of "it's all so simple brigade." 😉

Guarantee the usuals will respond having not even bothered to read the article.

Edit: yep

Edited May 6, 2022 by hogesar

[king canary 7,654]

22 hours ago, hogesar said:

Guarantee the usuals will respond having not even bothered to read the article.

Edit: yep

Paywall innit, not able to read it.

[duke63 545]

42 minutes ago, king canary said:

Paywall innit, not able to read it.

Not only that but its the Torygraph too who only use money to spread their kind of poison.

[chicken 2,640]

On 06/05/2022 at 20:08, Badger said:

Yes + also buy and keep players of high promise that might not be quite ready yet? I would get in trouble for this but the finance tag will have put off most of "it's all so simple brigade." 😉

I've said this for a fair bit of this season.

If we consider that players can take as long as a season, especially if they've not pre-seasoned with us to settle/find their groove, then the previous summers signings become even more important don't they?

 - Placheta, Sorensen, Gibson, Dowell, Mumba.

Those are the only ones to feature in the first team this year. You can probably add Gianoulis to that list. As much as folks want Sorensen and Gianoulis to play, do we think they'd have made enough of a difference? Dowell has been good going forward in the last few games but inconsistent before that. Mumba is still young and promising...

I also think that the higher level you play, the higher the fees people think they can push for.

I think that's where Karsa with Lambert and Culverhouse really did well. We signed some very solid players for free or not particularly large amounts, even for that time. Johnson on a free. Pilkington and E. Bennett for something like £1.5m each. Howson and R.Bennett were £2-3m each I think. Steve Morison was about £2m too. I think you'd make those signings every day for those prices.

Goes to show it has and can be done, even at this club.

So whilst people want to judge last summers signings, I think, perhaps, the previous summer signings are just, if not more, critical. I really do hope that Smith has a good old look at this squad before the season is done, identifies the youngsters we have as part of it already that have that potential, perhaps adds a couple more who have been in and around the squad this year and then selects/adds a good mix of experienced pro's to help them and have a team to take forward to grow together.

That's actually what I feel is the real reason behind Brentford's success this season IMHO.

[Monty13 2,241]

9 hours ago, chicken said:

I've said this for a fair bit of this season.

If we consider that players can take as long as a season, especially if they've not pre-seasoned with us to settle/find their groove, then the previous summers signings become even more important don't they?

 - Placheta, Sorensen, Gibson, Dowell, Mumba.

Those are the only ones to feature in the first team this year. You can probably add Gianoulis to that list. As much as folks want Sorensen and Gianoulis to play, do we think they'd have made enough of a difference? Dowell has been good going forward in the last few games but inconsistent before that. Mumba is still young and promising...

I also think that the higher level you play, the higher the fees people think they can push for.

I think that's where Karsa with Lambert and Culverhouse really did well. We signed some very solid players for free or not particularly large amounts, even for that time. Johnson on a free. Pilkington and E. Bennett for something like £1.5m each. Howson and R.Bennett were £2-3m each I think. Steve Morison was about £2m too. I think you'd make those signings every day for those prices.

Goes to show it has and can be done, even at this club.

So whilst people want to judge last summers signings, I think, perhaps, the previous summer signings are just, if not more, critical. I really do hope that Smith has a good old look at this squad before the season is done, identifies the youngsters we have as part of it already that have that potential, perhaps adds a couple more who have been in and around the squad this year and then selects/adds a good mix of experienced pro's to help them and have a team to take forward to grow together.

That's actually what I feel is the real reason behind Brentford's success this season IMHO.

The Lambert promotion buys were all about building a team of hungry players and leaders.

We plucked the best from League 1 and good fits from the Championship and turned them into a Premier league team, mentality has a huge part to play in that success.

Under Webber we’ve been bargain hunting a lot which isn’t the same thing, we’ve often bought out of favour, overlooked, not deemed good enough for PL, relegated, injured, had a couple of poor seasons etc. players that we can get cheaper than their potential worth with the hope of turning them into stars.

It’s worked incredibly well with some of our signings, especially the overlooked ones like Pukki and Buendia.

But we haven’t bought in that mental strength that Lamberts team had and was so important. A big thing I’ve taken from the last two PL seasons is I’d take a bunch of grafters with a sprinkling of technique laden stars like Lambert had over trying to build a technical side to compete on a budget.

 

[chicken 2,640]

46 minutes ago, Monty13 said:

The Lambert promotion buys were all about building a team of hungry players and leaders.

We plucked the best from League 1 and good fits from the Championship and turned them into a Premier league team, mentality has a huge part to play in that success.

Under Webber we’ve been bargain hunting a lot which isn’t the same thing, we’ve often bought out of favour, overlooked, not deemed good enough for PL, relegated, injured, had a couple of poor seasons etc. players that we can get cheaper than their potential worth with the hope of turning them into stars.

It’s worked incredibly well with some of our signings, especially the overlooked ones like Pukki and Buendia.

But we haven’t bought in that mental strength that Lamberts team had and was so important. A big thing I’ve taken from the last two PL seasons is I’d take a bunch of grafters with a sprinkling of technique laden stars like Lambert had over trying to build a technical side to compete on a budget.

 

I would wager it's for a couple of reasons though. The mental strength is an odd one, as we do have players in this squad who, like some of the Lambert era signings (mainly Karsa I feel for that), had been captains.

I think on both occaisions we have been in the premier league we have been too reliant on youth. Rather than 24-29 which is the ideal age range, we seem to have flooded our squad with 18-23yr olds. And often in core positions down the spine of the team.