At What Point Do We.................

[GreensGaffer 0]

Stop talking about where we were 2 years ago...................

Serious queston, for the record this is my first ever post having followed the board for as long as I can remember, I log in daily and read with interest peoples views etc.

I''m a lifelong City fan who held a season ticket for 5 years before local football grabbed my attention, and due to my love of grassroots football, I dont get to see the mighty yellows as much as I''d like, however I was at the game last night.

I should point out before I put peoples backs up with my views that I think Paul Lambert is a god, and what he''s done for our football club is amazing, and I hope we hang onto him for as long as possible, however...............................

Something that never comes up on these boards (sorry if I''ve missed it) is just how much money the current managment team have had to spend, I mean lets look at it, over the last 2 years he''s spent roughly the following, and of course we never know quite how much players cost, so I''ve tried to be conservative

John Ruddy £125k, Russell Martin £100k, Leon Barnett £1 million, Andrew Surman £1.25 million, Marc Teirny 50k, Athony McNamee 250k, David Fox £100k, Aron Wilbrahams £100k, Andrew Crofts 400k, Simeon Jackson 600k, Zak Whitbread 400k plus various other Loans and I''m sure the Lansbury loan deal hasnt been cheap either. so give or take a few hundred thousand he''s had the best part of 4.4 million quid in under 2 years plus the loan fee''s. And of course we know he''s got a couple of Million in the war chest should he wish to spend it.

Add to that the cost of getting the manager and his team in from Col U(hundeds of thousands one suspects), are we not within our rights to start to expect us to be challenging towards the top?

I cant remember any City manager having that sort of money available over such a sort period of time, and the board should be praised for supporting the project.

But with ticket prices going up, good amounts of money being invested in the Manager and players, I just think the time has come to stop talking about 2 years ago, Yes Mr Lambert you''ve come along way in 2 years, but the squad that you put out last night, was very, very different to the one you inherited from Mr Gunn..........

Just my own opinion, and like I said, great job done by all to date, the clubs in a great position and long may it continue.

[Move Klose 303]

i doubt we would be paying £1m for Barnett when he could have left WBA for free in the summer and i believe Surman was about £600k plus add ons, like if we get promoted etc, so it might eventually be £1.2m but not £1.2m up front.

[I am a Banana 0]

It is a little picky, but all this that surman cost us £1.25m I think is rubbish. I cant see how we can have gone fron 21.5m debt to 18m debt and still spend £4 million on players. Surman will have cost us 500k with extras that may eventually rise to £1.25m is more likely

[GreensGaffer 0]

I hear what your saying Guys, and as I mentioned we''ll never know the true cost of players, but I doubt very much that Wolves who paid the saints 2.5 million would take a 2 million loss on a young player with potential with plenty of time left on his contract.

I''d be really interested to compare our total spend plus player wages against all the other championship teams, because while I admit the likes of QPR, Cardiff, Scum, Hull may have much bigger player budgets I imagine there are plenty of clubs below us in terms of PL''s budget.

I don''t think theres any issue with a level of expectancy, and its a credit to the job already done, but I just wish we would stop considering ourselves lucky to be there, and start believing we belong there............. you can dress up last night however you like, and again I accept "its football" and players cant perform to the top of their game every week, but we should have won last night, the players were well below par.

Forget 2 years ago, its in the past football is a fast moving enviroment.

[militantcanary 0]

I agree to a point, Paul Lambert has spent decent money in the last two years. However both Roeder and Grant spent a fair bit, you would have missed it with Roeder as it was mostly on v expensive loans.

Siberwski rummoured to be £1M inc wages for half a season and Bertrand rummoured to be £1M for season loans. Grant also spent a bit

I believe the correct figures are Surman 1.2M though that may not be all up front, Ruddy £1000,00, Wilbrahams 75K, Crofts 300,000, R Martin 50K. Source -FM which is pretty reliable. Not sure about Barnett but described as an absolute steal by Manager I am guessing £7000,000. I reckon 4M is more of an accurate spend though that is still a lot considering monies in are probably less than 250K. I would imagine that our net spend is in the top 10 of the division in the two years which is where we will finish this season, perhaps where we currently are. So we are punching above our weight but not by a massive amount, perhaps a few places.

Our ground capacity, training ground all point to top of this league /Premiership bottom half status after all.

[Smudger 0]

Good points by the original poster and Jamesg... [Y]We may well be lucky to get another chance of promotion as good as we have this year for quite a few years.  We need to try and grab it with both hands, not make excuses for us playing people like Wilbraham who quite clearly out of their depth!

[Tangible Fixed Assets anyone? 0]

[quote user="Smudger"]Good points by the original poster and Jamesg... [Y]

We may well be lucky to get another chance of promotion as good as we have this year for quite a few years.  We need to try and grab it with both hands, not make excuses for us playing people like Wilbraham who quite clearly out of their depth!
[/quote]

Its the return of the Smudger! Well it seems that way.

Anyway what do you think of Jackson this season?

 

 

[Beefy is a legend 224]

On what basis do you decide that Wilbraham is out of his depth, given that he has started two games for the club so far. I thought he was impressive at Leeds on Saturday.

[a1canary 0]

I raised exactly this point at the online forum today greens.

This card about how far we''ve come is in danger of being overplayed by Lambert. Fans will tire of it and see through it before long. People can say look how far we have come but you could equally look further back and say look how far we have fallen. In reality, we are where we can expect to be on the basis of our size as a club - that is a top half championship side with the capability to outperform (much as clubs like Blackpool, Stoke and before them Reading have managed to do) and of course the ability to underperform, which we have done more often than not.

[Norfolk Geezer 0]

We are in the position we are in not because of luck but because we are a good side, with a great manager and excellent fans. What must not happen now is to lose focus on the fact that if we put in performances worthy of our potential we can finish in the top two. However, the performance against Doncaster was poor, and no matter where we were two years ago, we should not accept poor performances. There was a distinct lack of urgency with our play and it seemed to me like some players were treating it like a pre-season game.

I hope normal service will be resumed on Saturday, I reckon Lambert behind closed doors was reading the riot act and throwing teacups around.

[lappinitup 629]

[quote user="Smudger"]Good points by the original poster and Jamesg... [Y]

We may well be lucky to get another chance of promotion as good as we have this year for quite a few years.  We need to try and grab it with both hands, not make excuses for us playing people like Wilbraham who quite clearly out of their depth!

 

[/quote]Wilbraham is clearly smudgers current hate figure. Before that it was Russell Martin and Wes Hoolahan before him. Shows just how little our friend really knows about football!

 

He''s not been around much for several months now but ONE poor result and he''s swarming over this board like a wild thing.

 

He is trying to convince anyone who will listen that Lambert is signing the wrong players, playing the wrong players, in fact if you read all his posts he clearly thinks Lambert isn''t up to the job.

 

I dread to think what he''ll be like when we eventually lose two on the bounce,we''ll probably be back to SACK THE BOARD!! [:$]

 

[Webbo118 0]

[quote user="lappinitup"]

[quote user="Smudger"]Good points by the original poster and Jamesg... [Y]

We may well be lucky to get another chance of promotion as good as we have this year for quite a few years.  We need to try and grab it with both hands, not make excuses for us playing people like Wilbraham who quite clearly out of their depth!

 

[/quote]Wilbraham is clearly smudgers current hate figure. Before that it was Russell Martin and Wes Hoolahan before him. Shows just how little our friend really knows about football!

 

He''s not been around much for several months now but ONE poor result and he''s swarming over this board like a wild thing.

 

 

 

 

He is trying to convince anyone who will listen that Lambert is signing the wrong players, playing the wrong players, in fact if you read all his posts he clearly thinks Lambert isn''t up to the job.

 

I dread to think what he''ll be like when we eventually lose two on the bounce,we''ll probably be back to SACK THE BOARD!! [:$]

 

[/quote]

 

I knew it would happen one day if I was patient enough. I have just read a thread that I totally agree with!!  

[Bill 1,788]

"John Ruddy £125k, Russell Martin £100k, Leon Barnett £1 million, Andrew Surman £1.25 million, Marc Teirny 50k, Athony McNamee 250k, David Fox £100k, Aron Wilbrahams £100k, Andrew Crofts 400k, Simeon Jackson 600k, Zak Whitbread 400k "

What a load of old twaddle

You have no idea of any fees, costs or wages however why bother with them when you can make up some old tosh and then speculate on that.

Remember the idiot squeaks about Surnam costing £1.2m and yet the actual figures from the club accounts showed a total of £1.4 for all playersfees etc. Likewise Dave Strivkas much touted £750,000 transfer fee, which turned out to be no more than the sum total of his 3 year contract - presumably the total cost assuming all bonuses, appearance money etc

It is an ''occupational hazard'' of any forum that you get speculative nonsense posted up as fact which is then used to underpin an argument, sadly it is all too often believed by the more gullible who then over exite themselves in attacks upon the club.

Please note - Paul Lambert has not joined Burnley, Michael Brown has not joined from Pompey and Elliot Bennett did not join last week. We did not go into admistration last May, nor was Holt out for three months ...

............. and those were the ones that were the least mad.

[GreensGaffer 0]

[quote user="City1st"]"John Ruddy £125k, Russell Martin £100k, Leon Barnett £1 million, Andrew Surman £1.25 million, Marc Teirny 50k, Athony McNamee 250k, David Fox £100k, Aron Wilbrahams £100k, Andrew Crofts 400k, Simeon Jackson 600k, Zak Whitbread 400k " What a load of old twaddle You have no idea of any fees, costs or wages however why bother with them when you can make up some old tosh and then speculate on that. Remember the idiot squeaks about Surnam costing £1.2m and yet the actual figures from the club accounts showed a total of £1.4 for all playersfees etc. Likewise Dave Strivkas much touted £750,000 transfer fee, which turned out to be no more than the sum total of his 3 year contract - presumably the total cost assuming all bonuses, appearance money etc It is an ''occupational hazard'' of any forum that you get speculative nonsense posted up as fact which is then used to underpin an argument, sadly it is all too often believed by the more gullible who then over exite themselves in attacks upon the club. Please note - Paul Lambert has not joined Burnley, Michael Brown has not joined from Pompey and Elliot Bennett did not join last week. We did not go into admistration last May, nor was Holt out for three months ... ............. and those were the ones that were the least mad.[/quote]

 

I''m sorry City1st but who the hell died and made you Forum god! I''ll tell you the other problem with forums shall I................. people going round demanding that their opinion is the right one.

Firstly, read my original post............ I did actually say that we will never know the full extent of the clubs spending etc, and for your info this thread had been one of the more sensible discussions, nobody slagging off Lambert or the club, yet airing some different points of views, after all thats what these forums are for arent they?

So as for "Twaddle" I suggest you look a little closer to home.......................

[Webbo118 0]

[quote user="Webbo118"][quote user="lappinitup"]

[quote user="Smudger"]Good points by the original poster and Jamesg... [Y]

We may well be lucky to get another chance of promotion as good as we have this year for quite a few years.  We need to try and grab it with both hands, not make excuses for us playing people like Wilbraham who quite clearly out of their depth!

 

[/quote]Wilbraham is clearly smudgers current hate figure. Before that it was Russell Martin and Wes Hoolahan before him. Shows just how little our friend really knows about football!

 

He''s not been around much for several months now but ONE poor result and he''s swarming over this board like a wild thing.

 

 

 

 

He is trying to convince anyone who will listen that Lambert is signing the wrong players, playing the wrong players, in fact if you read all his posts he clearly thinks Lambert isn''t up to the job.

 

I dread to think what he''ll be like when we eventually lose two on the bounce,we''ll probably be back to SACK THE BOARD!! [:$]

 

[/quote]

 

I knew it would happen one day if I was patient enough. I have just read a thread that I totally agree with!!  

[/quote]

 

Sorry, meant to say POST (of course!!)

[Smudger 0]

[quote user="lappinitup"]

[quote user="Smudger"]Good points by the original poster and Jamesg... [Y]We may well be lucky to get another chance of promotion as good as we have this year for quite a few years.  We need to try and grab it with both hands, not make excuses for us playing people like Wilbraham who quite clearly out of their depth!

 

[/quote]Wilbraham is clearly smudgers current hate figure. Before that it was Russell Martin and Wes Hoolahan before him. Shows just how little our friend really knows about football!

 

He''s not been around much for several months now but ONE poor result and he''s swarming over this board like a wild thing.

 

He is trying to convince anyone who will listen that Lambert is signing the wrong players, playing the wrong players, in fact if you read all his posts he clearly thinks Lambert isn''t up to the job.

 

I dread to think what he''ll be like when we eventually lose two on the bounce,we''ll probably be back to SACK THE BOARD!! [:$]

 

[/quote]Russell Martin?   Where''s your proof?  I have always been quite impressed by Russell Martin and have said throughout this season that he has been one of our better players.It seems that somebody agrees me with that Ward was one of our best players on Tuesday night too.I suppose me and Lambert had it wrong concerning the Doc too???  He is doing great again in the 3rd tier though!

[Bill 1,788]

"I''m sorry City1st but who the hell died and made you Forum god! I''ll tell you the other problem with forums shall I................. people going round demanding that their opinion is the right one"

Perhaps you could point out where I DEMANDED that my opinion is the right one. Pointing out facts and errors in your post might lead some to thing that what I posted was correct. That is up to them to decide, not me to demand.

"Firstly, read my original post............ I did actually say that we will never know the full extent of the clubs spending "

Yes, you claimed it was a conservative estimate ie less that what it might be. So you are still stating a figure (or above), whereas the clubs accounts tell a different story - (see item 34, club accounts).

As to twaddle you further gave us -

"just how much money the current managment team have had to spend, I mean lets look at it, over the last 2 years he''s spent roughly the following " or "Yes Mr Lambert you''ve come along way in 2 years"

2 years ago our manager was Bryan Gunn who had only just taken over from Roeder. Paul Lambert has been here just on 18 months - not 2 years.

"I cant remember any City manager having that sort of money available over such a sort period of time"

The signings of Earnshaw and Ashton were both over a far shorter period, if I remember.

"yet airing some different points of views, after all thats what these forums are for arent they? "

yep, warble away

But just airing them doesn''t make them valid, or correct. So as to "are we not within our rights to start to expect us to be challenging towards the top? " Not if they are based on your rather nonsensical claims we are not.