Literally could have just not bothered with a Jan transfer thread
- Cashed in 600k+ from the Chelsea game.
- Terminated our one Prem loan player.
- Avoided sacking Lowe (even after 5 wins in 21)
- Tied down Hughes, Whiteman & McCann
I think it's been a very successful and profitable month for the club. Strong and stable. Revitt would doubtless approve.
With 17 senior pros contracted til 2025 and beyond this coming summer should be another relaxed affair. No need (or should I say ability) to make wholesale changes.
Just find some squad filler to replace some of Evans, Cunningham, Bauer and Woodburn and we go again aspiring onwards to midtable.
Took a bit longer but…..Riis. We chose not to cash in, rightly or wrongly (the latter in my opinion).
Identifying the players is relatively easy. It’s the lack of direction that’s the problem. No plan, no vision, just hand to mouth trusting to luck with the owners happy enough to bail out as needed.
Yeah, I think if we had one decision maker (rather than the IOM style committee) and if we had a proper replacement lined up - we'd have cashed in Riis that year.
But, we are a reactive club. Not a progressive, modern strategic one. It's why we turned the Callum Robinson money into Stockley, Bayliss, Rafferty, Ripley, Nugent & co.
And have not been able to sell anyone for £1m+ in nearly five years. Whilst other clubs seem to manage to do it on a frequent basis.
Club apologists say there's nothing we can do about our current struggles with FFP. But the answer is to not do, what we have been doing.
Each contract extension to a guy nearing or past 30 just doubles down on it, cementing the next few years to be the same old tedium.