I don't disagree. It does become a bigger headache or problem if we get promoted again. Finding 9, 10 or 11 new premier league standard players, rather than aging injury prone, temperamental, confidence driven, players at barging basement pricing, is going to take some doing.
It doesn’t matter. The players in question are so poor by premier league standards that you could build a championship team and do no worse.
Also Sema isn’t out of contract next year. Got 3 years left after this season. What an absurd decision that one was.
Likely to cost too much and be out of reach, but while looking up Zubeldia, the manager of Lanus who we've been vaguely linked with, I noticed the 21 year-old striker Jose Lopez who seems very promising. 13 goals in 24 games last season. Really I'm just posting this as a suggestion of someone we may be able to pull off a coup in signing if we brought in Zubeldia, who promoted him to the first team and got the best out of him recently:
Given we're going down, this is what I think our squad will roughly look like next year based on what we know. I think we'll see a lot more youth integration owing to financial constraints. I'm sure we'll buy / loan in far more than I'm anticipating though, which would see some younger players loaned than kept for the Season: 3x GK: Okoye <New GK> Eliott (Harmless, no risk experienced 3rd GK) 2x RB: Ngakia (U21, just within registration window) Ebosele (U21, Loaned from Udinese) 5x CB: Sierralta WTE Cathcart Kabasele Pollock 3x LB: Kamara Masina Morris (U21) 2x CDM: Etebo (£1.5m purchase option, yes please!) Phillips (U21) 5x CM: Kayembe Asprilla (U21) Cleverley Dele-Bashiru (U21, just within registration window) Kucka 4x Wingers: Cucho Zinckernagel Hungbo (U-21) Kalu 2x ST: Pedro King (U-21) Sold: Sarr (£30m) Dennis (£25m) Pussetto (£2m) Fletcher (£3m?) Sema (Udinese) Quina (£2m, Sell On) Sissoko (£1-2m, He won't be playing in Champo) Femenia (£1-2m) Terminate Contract: Rose Gosling Loan out: Dahlberg Baah Louza (Udinese) Samir (Udinese) Line-up start of Season: ---------------------Okoye--------------------- --Ngakia--Sierralta--Pollock--Kamara-- ----------------------Etebo---------------------- ---------Asprilla---------------Kayembe----- ----Cucho----------Pedro----------Zinck--- Subs: <New GK>, Kabasele, Ebosele, Masina, Kucka, Asprilla, Hungbo, Kalu, King
We should definitely keep Louza and Samir around if they’re willing. Femenia too - a superb player in a possession-dominant side which I hope we’ll be. I think striker has to be a priority - King and Pedro both good players but I don’t see many goals there. CM too as I don’t think Etebo will sign. Would love to get Bielik in from Derby.
We are? I just figured he wasn't fit / favoured by Hodgson. Agree ST would be good area to strengthen. I've done quite a conservative estimate but probably overly so. Pedro I think would benefit from a Season at No. 9 as he's not quite a winger nor quite a striker despite his superb ability and endeavour. He needs a more defined role.
None of Ngakia, Dele-Bashiru or Hungbo will be U21. Would also be surprised if we kept Kamara, Cucho & JP or signed Etebo.
Registration would be end of August, isn't it? Ngakia, TDB aren't over 21 til September so would be fine. Hungbo you're right. Assumed he was younger.
It’s really weird- it’s based on their age as of 1st Jan in the year the league season starts, so in the current season U21 players are born on/after 1st Jan 2000. At least that’s how the PL does it; I’m assuming the EFL is the same. Next season, anyone born before 2001 would have already been 21 by 1st Jan 2022 and so not U21.
I’ll make a more specific and longer list at some future juncture but I’d like us to look at signing players a) currently on loan in the Championship from PL sides who might be seeking a permanent home (and are at sides who can’t afford them) or a loan slightly higher up the pyramid next season and b) squad players of promoted sides. Both of these markets represent good value ways to get good players. Below is a non-exhaustive list of players I feel would be realistic permanent signings in these categories. I have excluded players like Levi Colwill, Morgan Gibbs-White and Neco Williams who are destined for the PL next season. Loanees: Daniel Iversen (GK - though I think we’ll go with Okoye) Ben Davies, Daniel Ballard, DiShon Bernard, Sepp Van Der Burg (sic) and Jan Paul Van Hecke (CBs) Ethan Laird, Ryan Giles, Ian Maatsen, Dujon Sterling(Full/Wing Backs) Cameron Archer, Keinan Davis (Strikers) Ethan Ampadu has been on loan in Serie A too but I doubt he’d be a realistic target. From the promoted sides: Fulham: Ream (I know he’s old but he’s been very good this season), Kebano, Joe Bryan, Chalobah and maybe Seri or Cairney too. Bournemouth: They have a large squad and I don’t know what their plans are for: Jamal Lowe, Ben Pearson, Siriki Dembele and Kieffer Moore and Chris Mepham who haven’t featured too much this season but are all decent and not too old. Also they’re not (yet) promoted but Jack Robinson and Ben Osborn are both top 6 championship level players out of contract this summer. Haven’t seen them alongside the likes of Wallace, Swift, Rothwell etc on the good free agent list. Lenihan at Blackburn pretty good too.
Quite a lot of CBs and LBs in that list - can't really envisage us signing any of either. Also can't imagine Chalobah coming back. Laird has potential but might stay with Bournemouth. Also our RB situation seems very unclear at the mo, especially depending on Ebosele. Cameron Archer seems quite an interesting one - he seems a bit more of a goalscorer than Keinan Davis has been. 6 goals in 16 starts with Preston, plus 1 goal as a sub. He could probably do alright wide in a 3 as well as the CF. Davis might also be alright though might be more likely to return to Forest.
Wasn’t really scouting for positions. Just listing players. I do reckon that Masina will leave but maybe one of those will want to go and be first choice somewhere. Who know how many of the CBs will bin off - I reckon incomings will depend on how many leave. A return to Forest would be a good fit for Keinan Davis, regardless of whether they go up. But we will have more cash than them with parachute payments. As you say though Archer might me more of the goal scorer we need but I think Davis is probably a higher ceiling prospect for his role.
Irrespective of parachute payments we won’t be paying a penny in transfer fees, unless we sell all of Sarr, Dennis, Louza and JP.
We will have more revenue but less cash than them as our cost base (and serviceable debt) will be far higher, even after the 50% reductions kick in in a few contracts. I'd be suprised if we paid anything more than a nominal fee to replace leavers unless we get really silly offers for Dennis & Sarr.
I believe that forest’s last set of accounts showed their wage bill to be 202% of revenue and they lose £35m/year without player sales. Weak though our financial situation will be, it’ll be stronger than Forest’s (unless they get over £25m for Brennan Johnson). Your point re nominal fees may well still be correct though I imagine our financial situation will be a lot stronger than last time given that stage of the pandemic, the wage reductions and the fact that we won’t be saddled with our unproductive highest earners (Deeney and Gray) in key positions. Very few clubs in the Championship have much cash/FFP room to spend so decent talent can be hoovered up for £1-2.5m or for free with higher wages. Daniel Ballard (for instance) is a good player who could be worth £10m+ a year from now but who would be paying £2-3m for him to be a consistent starter?
If Diego Martinez pitches up here would expect him to want to bring some players he's worked with before as he did that at Granada, where he brought in players from Sevilla B where he'd previously coached. Yan Eteki is out of contract in the summer, played 60 odd times for Granada (quite a few of them sub appearances) under Martinez in two seasons but has basically been frozen out this season, only making two starts in the league. 24 year old defensive midfielder so definitely a position we need. Can't imagine his wages are particularly high and he credits Martinez as the coach who gave him his break at Sevilla B. Doubt he's done enough to get interest from other La Liga teams so should be realistic for us. He's Cameroonian though and has only played a couple of times for the national team and I can't remember what the rules are on work permits so that may rule him out.
The Udinese well is getting dryer each year, let’s not forget the best they could offer us as PL club this season was Samir.
A single appearance in La Liga in the last year for a player of any nationality is enough for a work permit.
Forest have 30% of the debt we have post Covid season, and an owner who converts his loans into equity. They are going to be better placed than us . We will be in the free transfer/loan buckets this coming summer, which is standard Pozzo championship mode in any case. I am bamboozled as to why anyone would think we are in a decent spot financially given the low transfer value of so many of our players.
Was at fault for their goal yesterday. He's been "good" for them in the sense that WTE has been "good" for us - can just about get by in the Champ but a complete fraud in the PL.
I have never said that we’re in a decent spot financially. Obviously that growing pile of debt is a huge concern. But we will be receiving parachute payments and Forest will not and we have far more FFP and EFL Profitability and Sustainability headroom than the vast majority of the division. While the value of our potential outgoings is lower than last time, we stand to receive more money from sales than all three relegated sides last season combined. I think he’s been significantly better than WTE. Most metrics have him as the best ball-player of all CBs in the Championship. He was at fault for the goal yes but also put in a peach of a cross late on from an advanced position which almost created a goal which showed his quality with the ball. In contrast, WTE did not excel in any particular ways last year it was just that he played for a defence that was very miserly.
How can NF overspend to that level and not fall foul of the FL net spend rules ? If their owner is richer than ours, FL rules apart, they may not care about how poor their finances look.
