I'm hearing we've agreed to loan Dennis to Bournemouth with the option to buy. They will pick up 50% of his wages. Medical already underway and should be finalised by the weekend. Good deal if (hopefully) true.
I don’t think Okoye was out of contract this summer? As we could have just signed him on a pre-contract for much less? And the Bayo deal sadly still doesn’t make sense irrespective of the above - the lad was playing under Mogi Bayat’s brother at Charleroi. We could surely have waited to see if Sarr/Dennis moved and then pulled the trigger very quickly if they did. If we spent £5m only to find they remain, then it’s poor planning.
The opportunity to furnish both Bayat brothers at the same time doesn’t come around very often to it’s easy to understand why this transfer for our entire budget was priority one.
I can't think of a single thing Giaretta has done which has been of benefit to us, but how many of these decisions are really his? Bayo and Kalu obviously weren't, and even if Okoye was, in a parallel universe where Bachmann goes (or indeed we don't chop and change between managers with vastly different styles) he's our first choice
True. I don’t disagree that right now, on August 3, both deals don’t look very smart. In my earlier post, I was just trying to caution against reacting too short-term. Both could go on to play key roles this season. We just don’t know yet. Ideally yes you’d like your new signings to go straight into the first season. Just as ideally you want to do well in your pre-season matches. And to start the season with ten wins in a row etc. But the season is long and there’s still plenty of time ahead.
Sorry. My mistake. I think there was a lot of chatter that he was, but I see he was contracted until 2025 so I correct myself.
Where would he play at Leeds? Dan James will be on the right, Sinisterra on the left, can't see them forking out £30m on Sarr when they need a striker far more desperately.
Replace James who is a lot of pace but not much else ? But would Sarr even want to join Leeds - likely to be another relegation battle ?
A club the size of Leeds has a better long-term prem survival prospect than we would have if we were promoted.. The only reason to turn them down would be if he is convinced he can go straight to a top 10 side.
He wasn't but he was out of contract last summer so we could've got him for a free. Then he signed a long term deal and we paid £5m+ about four months later. Winners!
A club the size of Leeds shouldn’t have spent years in League 1 and the Championship. But they did. Not gonna get bogged down in it - but this desire to believe certain clubs are better because they are bigger is strange to me. Because there are so many exceptions to that rule.
Of course there are, but on balance do you think Leeds with their 40k+ support base are likely to be a better or worse long-term prospect, and pay more or less than us ? If size makes no difference presumably he'd be just as happy to join a Brentford/Bournemouth as join an Everton. Similarly any champ player would be just as likely to join a Rotherham as join us. The bigger clubs don't always win out but they have an advantage. Its why the huge clubs are in the prem and the small ones are in League 2 .....generally.
I take into account recent history over a scale of 1-5 seasons personally - and unless there’s is a significant disparity in wealth in that time (Newcastle etc) then I don’t really see Leeds prospects as significantly brighter than ours over a medium to long-term period in this snapshot of time. The longer they stay there and the longer we stay down here, then obviously they gap grows. But right now, with the season coming up that I expect to occur, I don’t see a sea of difference and think there’s significant risk in moving to Leeds, Bournemouth, Fulham, Brentford, Forest and Southampton. In the new found forum way though, happy to agree to disagree.
Ok lets agree to disagree. If I was Sarr had to choose between us and Leeds I would expect Leeds to be better placed than us over the next 5 years. You don't, I've no problem with that, and I hope 5 years from now, you were proved right .
I'm surprised that the work "h.u.n.k" is banned ??? I've always respected others' views, even when they're wrong like yours usually are.
Yes, and Ipswich are in League one, as are Sheff Wed, further proof that the size of a club has no bearing at all where they find themselves in the 92 club structure ? Size is completely irrelevant to long term prospects, 10 years from now Rochdale are as likely to win the premier league as Citeh are ! There are always exceptions to a rule.
That’s the point though, clubs can be run well and clubs can be run badly, Leeds were absent from the PL 17 years and in that time many, many, smaller clubs, in many cases more then once managed to get promoted to the PL and on some occasions stay there. The extra 10/20k fans is really not insurmountable with some smart decision making. Once in the PL the extra fans still don’t account for anymore than 10% of total revenue, so again, smart decisions, or just good decisions can easily overcome this.
Agreed. Past management is less of an indicator or future success than the size of the club though. Everton are still a prem club despite being poorly run. Accrington are a League one side despite being well run.