Rob Edwards Sacked

Yes but surely sometimes people just say what they feel expected to say. Like politicians.

Gieretta’s job is to help assemble the squad, so he’s hardly likely to come out and say it’s poor. Else he’s criticising himself and his own work.

With season tickets to sell, Duxbury is hardly likely to come out and say we are facing a season of mid table mediocrity. He’s bound to want to hype things up. He’s selling the club to you and I and wants us to remain on board.

And as has already been widely stated by others here, Edwards could hardly waltz in and start saying to the media that our squad is poor and needs a dozen new players.

So really I don’t think anybody has said anything surprising. Maybe they’d all have been better keeping quiet but they are in the job of promoting the club (and themselves).

The optimist in me hopes they actually realise the lack of quality in the squad and are facing up to this. We very rarely have quiet summer windows, despite what they might tell us in June. It’s not in the nature of our owners/recruiting team to miss out on playing the transfer market.

The pessimist in me though does think oh **** maybe they genuinely do think we have a promotion winning squad.

 

Literally nothing will change. We're bound to have a rough patch, at which point a story will appear in the Daily Mail about the players being unhappy with Edwards and then he'll be gone. The club has no leadership or plan and as a result the team have no discipline or identity.

How many times have we told ourselves to wait until the end of the transfer window, only for the same sh!te to still be here clogging up the squad list and the wage bill? The task this summer couldn't have been easier, we brought in a head coach with a clear style of play and he made it very obvious what kind of player he wanted. So what have we done? The Bayats have flipped a player for a nice profit and we've got some unknown Albanian bloke. In defence we're going to be watching Cathcart and Kabasele yet again despite young centre backs signing for Championship rivals for peanuts.

I genuinely think our recruitment is guided by agents that are mates of Gino who we owe favours to. It f*cking stinks and I'm sick of it.

 

Going entirely predictably isn't it.

Maybe they are hoping Uncle Elton will decide to blow off the rest of the world tour and get his hands dirty now

 

This is nonsense.

For example, that’s 2 wins, 3 draws and 1 defeat in what is a hard opening set of games. Under a new manager, with a new style and likely bedding in a few new players.

We all know what Gino is like but why some people have to go OTT (especially you) is odd to me.

 

He’ll get 10/12 games before the pressure is really on/we start reading stuff in the Daily Mail.

 

Not anymore, Sami’s source isn’t at the club anymore.

 

Cmon Yorkshire

 

Definitely gone just before the World Cup break. Just got to put the bet in next week.

He’s was never going to last.

 

It would not surprise me or a number of fans.
A classic time will tell moment.

 

Go Somerset

 

Key thing for Edwards is to build a team spirit and get the buy-in from players, as long as he can do that he will be given time. The concern is that if things start badly results wise, and there are rumblings around players unrest etc. Hopefully we will be left with a team/squad that want to be there, which is half the battle

 

You can get a good team spirit in pre-season. I have no doubt Edwards is the right sort of character to form very good bonds across the squad. But, once reality hits and we start losing games, belief and that spirit disappears very quickly. I've seen nothing so far to make me think we're going to be a force next season. Expectation is high, but unless they make some statement signings, the reality is we'll be lower mid-table at best.

The form Sheff Utd are showing in pre-season, they look like they're raring to go. Our first game could be a disaster, a bit like that Norwich one where we had the big fanfare before the game but end up getting thumped 0-3. Of course I hope I'm wrong, but I only see Watford as a club on the slide, going in the wrong direction.

The board have to make some statement signings or show something to prove we are serious about promotion. So far.....nothing.

 

How can he possibly build a team spirit when he is clearly not being backed and already being a puppet on the signings of Manaj and Bayo. Add to that selling Zinc and Cucho. I wouldn't at all be shocked if he leaves on his own accord.

 

Booo

 

Maybe I'm reading more into it, but I did pick up a vibe of frustration/worry in his post-match interview after Bolton. He said we've still got time, but need to learn quickly and that he expected new players to come in. He was being cool about it, but he looked concerned to me. Given what he said right at the beginning that he would like everyone in before the season starts, it's now looking increasingly unlikely that will be the case.

So far, the board have let him down. Even though I like Manaj, and he could be good, he is really a punt and someone who really should be an addition to the squad, not the main man. Same applies to Bayo. Might come good, but we can't rely on him being the guy who will score loads of goals. If we are serious about going up, we need serious players who can achieve that. We've not got it, even with the best spin in the world, everyone can see we are well short. All we have is the unlikely notion that Sarr and Dennis stick around. If that does happen then of course it changes the picture dramatically, but I feel for RE here.

He'll be under pressure to play both Dennis and Sarr, as they are miles better than any other option, even if they play with their slippers on. But he'll have to create a team with players who may or may not be around at a drop of a hat. That's tough, and if we're going to bring new faces in now, they've already missed the team bonding in Austria.

I think he's on a sticky wicket. Expectation is high, but the team he has, so far, is not going to achieve it. He could well want to leave, but I think he'd try to stick it out. It won't play out well for him if he walks because a few things are not to his liking. Other owners would look down on that no doubt when they consider him for employment. He's got to make a good fist of it, then get sacked in November. That way his reputation will still be intact.

 

The board's hand will still be tied in the transfer market to a sizeable degree by having sold neither Sarr nor Dennis.

If Sarr and Dennis are still here at the start of the season, then even "with their slippers on" they'll destroy the Championship.

If they're sold, then the board will be able to bring in more players to strengthen other areas of the team.

 

Let’s hope it’s not left till deadline day then

 

Sure, though that could also mean we'll have been able to play them in 6 or 7 fixtures, including some key ones against promotion rivals.

The board will need to have sounded out potential deals which they can get done quickly in case it goes to the wire. Usually it's still feasible to make a couple of signings on deadline day itself.

If they're sold right before the WBA game that'd also be crap, as we'd have neither of them for the following fixtures, and won't have time to get anyone else in and settled in time for WBA and probably Burnley.

 

I agree with most except being overlooked by future employees. I believe it shows great character in a person who tenders their resignation if he can prove he's been lied too.
I walked out of a very good position before after constantly being bullshitted too and that was purely down to monthly bonuses they were always hit then would rise to nothing but impossible figures to hit. My staff were nothing but demotivated in their work and it showed when they lost said contract resulting in lose of jobs. It never caused me problems with finding work. Yes nowhere the same context but you leave with your morals intact

 

I do agree, keeping Sarr and Dennis will impact the budget, obviously, however, if we keep both of these players we wont need to sign anyone else up front. What will still be required is a combative midfielder. This HAS to happen regardless of the sale of these players. I do not believe that Watford, with all their scouting, connections in the football world blah, blah, cannot find a player who is significantly better than we currently have, on loan. We've made money on sales for Cucho, Cukur, Zinc, Richarlison sell on and Sissoko. Wages saved on all those plus King, Gray, Elliot, Foster, Nkoulou and Kucka.

We will sell Dennis and Sarr. That will happen at some point, so it's the interim time, where the owner has to dip into his own pocket if we have no available funds, and finance a new midfielder....then pays himself back from the striker sales.

We are supposed to be showing an ambitious vision, not this penny pinching (we know better than everyone else) attitude.

 

What gets me is that Gino must see that the calibre of players we bring in is crap. I get the idea that we want to sell on for big profits, but it's almost consistently duds coming through the doors these days, which means we don't stand to make much, if anything.

Equally, the revenue in the premier league is huge and yet we seem to do nothing more than assemble a weak squad, with no fight, which is not in the premier league and unlikely to be any time soon.

Can the ownership not understand that the way we have been run, and the personnel involved in running it, are getting us neither big sales and or premier league revenue? For supposed "football people" they seem spectacularly ignorant on the playing side.

 

The more that time goes by, the more I start to think those first few years when we bought in players like Capoue, Prodl, Behrami etc were just complete luck and he’s never actually had a clue what he’s doing, the stars just aligned for him for a few seasons.

Or, there came a point when he wanted out and the ridiculous amount we spend on agent fees and rubbish Belgian players is actually Gino siphoning funds out of the club in some scheme with Mogi.

 

Of course there's an element of luck in any signing but the three you mentioned there and Britos, Holebas had been pretty consistent throughout their careers.
But totally agree with money siphoning and it certainly looks like asset stripping to me.

 

We can always rely on you to overdramatize things, it is pre-season lad.

 

I think the famous scouting network is for Udinese's benefit only. I honestly believe that at the start of a transfer window Gino's agent mates all send him a list of players that they want to move and we then do our best to help them out, no matter how sh!te the player is or whether they fit the squad. How else do you explain the signings of Kayembe and Kalu? I reckon we barely do any scouting work of our own anymore and rely on agents to offer us players.

 

While I can see Dennis going this window, I can well see Sarr staying until after the World cup now and the club presumably feel the same now that he's being included in friendlies again. I agree we need a combative midfielder and Duxberry did say there would be money available to spend on new players though it looks increasingly likey that the 'domino' effect the club has referenced starts with Dennis moving on.

Completely agree, and its a frustrating attitude to recruitment thats holding us back. Even more frustrating when the penny pinching only seems to happen over players that arnt represented by Mogi. I mean we could have signed the likes of Ramsey, Ferguson and Doig who were in the end, individually sold for alot less then what we paid for Bayo and given Kiko's injury record/age and Zinc leaving they would strengthened the team. I would have thought these players would be the sort of player anyway that a club, with apparently an ambitious vision like us, should be after. Instead we get a bunch of highly paid over the hill stop gaps on short contracts last season or a couple of middling career journeymen with 50% sell on clauses - and to top it we had to sell an exciting up & coming player in Cucho, who again you would have thought a team with our vision would have been the sort of player we would want to fill the team with. We didnt need to sell him and we didnt have to get rid of Hughes either for what its worth, he wasnt looking to leave and I'm sure a compromise could have been found, but I suppose we had to try and hard ball again.

We wont stump up a few extra 100k for Ferguson when we had the chance but then blow over £5mil (which is more than his previous 3 clubs combined paid for him) on one of Mogi's players, when the day before he was only worth just over £1mil! I dont know about the money siphoning thats been suggested in other posts, but there are questions to be asked for sure. We could have bought Bayo for the £1.35 mil that Gent sold him to Charleroi for and bought Ferguson for the £2.1 mil that he went for - for less then what we ultimately paid Charleroi for Bayo in the first place (even with Fergusons add on fees)!


For what its worth, I dont think the squad is too far away from having a decent season though we do need to strengthen midfield - if Sarr is staying then there isnt the urgency just yet for another striker. Still , its hard not to look at this squad and think what could have so easily been.

 

Yeah but I think that sums up a lot of clubs now outside of the mega-giants at the top. And in a way there shouldn't be anything wrong with putting out there what kinds of player we're after and then sifting through the responses. The question is who are we asking (just Mogi?) and how competent is the person doing the sifting (presumably an analyst and Giaretta?)

 

Ramsey has always been linked with bigger clubs than us, we never could have signed him regardless of the fee.

We ended up signing Kamara for a not dissimilar fee to what Doig would have cost - you can debate amongst yourselves whether that was a sensible decision, but most fans seem pretty pleased with Kamara.

Ferguson is someone I would have been interested in signing, but the fact that so many of his goals were penalties is a concern.

Also, with the latter two there's no guarantees they'll be a success outside the Scottish league - the last big money sale from Hibs, Kevin Nisbet to Brum, seems a flop so far.

It's worth remembering that none of them even count as homegrown either, so that's no advantage in considering them instead of players like Kamara.

 

I'm not sure I agree with that, when we first put a bid in I dont recall any other clubs making an offer and if these bigger clubs where always genuinely interested then he would have been sold alot sooner considering how small the final fee for him was. Considering one our selling points was to develop players and offer a pathway into first team (potentially prem) football which cant be guaranteed elsewhere then in theory that should be an attractive option to a young player like Ramsey. According to Duxberry it was one of the lessons supposedly learnt after our first relegation.

I rate Kamara, hes been a good signing. The only issue I have is that we didnt sign him before the season started, when I doubt he would have cost any more, but instead we opted for a clearly over weight and unfit (not to mention over paid) Danny Rose who we are now lumbered with. It was yet another poor decision.

Even with Kamara, Doig is still the sort of player we should be looking at with him being of an age where he could have developed behind Kamara and really couldnt have been any worse than the current depth options of Sema & Messina.

I dont see that as too much of an issue given his age & position and its not like we havent just signed a striker with a similar goal scoring history. Can never have too many competent penalty takers.

Thats true, there is no guarantee they would be a success but then again every transfer carries the same risk in that regard. However all 3 are highly rated and are of an age where there's plenty of scope for progression, not to mention were available at a price where even if they hadnt worked out then losses on resale would likely be minimal - certainly when compared to the alternative approach we took of spunking money on obvious gambles Rose, Tufan & Kalu.

I cant remember the home grown rules now, so this might be wrong, but if we had signed them last season when we had the chance instead of trying to low ball the parent clubs for a pittance then all 3 players would have been (2 still are) under 21. Like I say I cant remember the home grown rules, not that it matters as the rule of 11 only seems to apply when we want it to

 

Nope. No chance.

We only inquired right at the start of the last Jan transfer window. Man Utd, Everton and Leicester were among other clubs who had been regularly scouting him since right at the start of last season.

Considering how highly rated he was, there's no way other PL clubs would have just let him come to us - the fact that he wasn't sold in Jan and that he signed for Liverpool right at the start of this transfer window (not many months after our supposed bid) suggests it probably played out that as soon as Liverpool were aware of other PL clubs circling they put a word in to his agent's ear to just wait a few months then join them in the summer. Man Utd were also supposedly seriously considering signing him before he was confirmed for Liverpool so they could have suggested to his agent to wait a few months for the same reason as well.

This happens a lot with transfers - big clubs could have a player earmarked internally as a signing for the future, but not an immediate or urgent priority for them for another window or so. But then another club makes an offer forcing the club's hand, they'll then tell the player to hold tight for a few more months to get a bigger move. Similar seems to have happened with Ekitike lately, for example, with Newcastle chancing their arm in Jan but the player dragging his heels, then low-and-behold, PSG sneak up and take him this summer.

As an additional note, we seemed heading for relegation already last Jan, so really wouldn't have been that attractive an option for Ramsay.

Yes we should have signed a different left-back in the summer than Rose. Doig probably would have done more than Rose but I'm not convinced at all he would have been good enough for the PL last season either.

Ultimately, we attempted to rectify our mistake by signing Kamara in January instead of Doig and that probably made more sense considering we needed a ready-made fix and I doubt Doig would have done any better than Kamara. There's absolutely no point in us still considering Doig now that we signed Kamara instead of him. £3mil on a backup LWB, who isn't even homegrown, when we've hardly got anything to spend and far more urgent priorities, is just a completely farcical idea. Sema is still more than adequate as a backup (Masina will be leaving this summer). Plus how would we even sell that to Doig? Don't go and be a starter in Serie A, come sit on the bench for us in the Champ! Lol.

Well I'm not sold on Manaj either. We need a midfielder who can chip in with a reasonable number from goals (which aren't from the penalty spot). It is also certainly pointless to have lots of competent penalty takers - only one player can take any particular penalty.

Nope, a player needs to have already played for an FA-affiliated club for minimum 3 years by the age of 21 - so any player has to have been signed by an FA club on their 18th birthday at the latest to eventually qualify as homegrown (after another 3 yearss). None of the three could have eventually obtained HG status.

 

I'm going to buck the trend and post something brief.

We're pants.

(Not due to the manager.)

 

Let's wait and see ok.

 

From what I’ve had suggested, there is a data driven department feeding in reasonable signings at the club… they’re just not listened to.

 

I wouldn't be surprised. Gino is probably sitting in his room watching video tapes that Mogi has sent him.

 

Edwards after watching WTE and Kabasele firing passes into the hedges during training.