Are we looking at another January car crash ???

Like the one we had a couple of seasons ago - when it could be argued that Barnsley had the best midfield in the division only to see Drinkwater moved out, Vaz Te sold and Butterfield injured
From that point on - if I remember right - we dropped like a stone through the league

If Coner is sold and Armstrong goes back - are we likely to see this event repeated this coming January???

Surely to goodness the club learnt something during that season
Or did they ???

 

Drinkwater wasn't moved out. He was never our player and it was The Berk's fault if he became over reliant on him.

 

To be fair alot of people thought it would happen in the summer with how we finished. I think the club is extremely well run, we've nothing to be scared about

 

They've probably not learnt anything as our current transfer policy is totally inept. Look when we lost Pearson last January we went into total freefall - I'm sure we'd have achieved so much if he'd stayed :-/

 

The main problem is that alot of the 1st team squad are out of contract next year or will return to their parent clubs, I'm not too concerned about January more next summer

 

I'm not scared of losing Armstrong for one he isn't our player and we have winnall,watkins,bradshaw who can all score at this level. Losing Connor would be bad very bad. But I trust the club to make the right choices and their recruitment has been top drawer scince Wilson left. Also weren't we suppose to fall to bits and concede a boat load when Mawson left?

 

Exactly ,I mean look at PNE now with him in their squad, could have been us soaring those dizzy heights if only we hadn't let him go.

 

We recruited a few of these under Wilson but at that point the manager as now doesn't really pick the transfer targets

 

Seem to remember Pearson creeping further and further back towards our own goal at the end of his time here and lost count how many balls he took direct from our keeper without any end product.
Truth is we improved considerably after he'd gone so something must have been right about out transfer policy then.
It's total rubbish to call our transfer policy inept.... It's what's bringing our current success and surely anybody can see that.
Thanks PC PH and TW long may it continue.

 

I believe he was being sarcastic mate

 

It wasn't a dig at Wilson just scince we started using the "spreadsheet" that brought us ssw,hourhine,Mawson, davies,scowern,robo....ect we seemed to let Wilson and to a lesser extent Johnson go off the sheet. I'm more than happy with the recruitment at this moment in time.

 

I'm not bothered who the hell we lose when the season is over - obviously as long as we get the right price for them

That's not the point

Thing is we have been in this position before - everything looking good up to Christmas and then the rug is pulled from under the club
With Armstrong in the side backed up with others like Coner we could push for a good season
A season where we could finish top 6
A season where we may even reach the Premeirship
How can that be achieved if important players are set to leave half way through the season ???
How can Hecky plan for a push towards the top of the league knowing that this is coming???

 

No I was being extremely sarcastic

 

No

The structure of this club both on and off the field is far better than it was under Keith Hill.

The recruitment plan is evidently better for one. I have faith in us replacing anyone who leaves with someone equally as competent to push us as far as we can this season.

The players we do have, for the large part, have resale value. Even Connor; the likelihood is that we'll get offered no more than half a million for him in January, whether we choose to accept it is another matter.

The sale of Alfie Mawson alone should secure our immediate future if nothing else. If we are to lose Connor and one or two others in January, then we do have the money to make something happen.

Loanees aren't our players to begin with, so we have to assume that they'll all return to their parent club in January and plan for replacements beforehand.

That being said, I can see them all being here at the end of the season (maybe Armstrong being the exception, and Morsy if Wigan get a big bid for him in January).

Let's enjoy what we have going on right now, and think about January when the league has settled down and we can get some sort of reflection of how this season is going to pan out. 6 games in, we're in the top 3, in 6 games time, we could as easily be in a relegation battle.

Not that I think we will be, just saying.

Sent from my phone using my hands

 

We thought we were gonna struggle this year when our loanee's Fletcher and Isgrove didn't return.

We're currently in the top 3 with Armstrong and Kent.

Players will come, players will go.

However, I have full faith in our recruitment team to bring in just as good if not better players than any that decide to move on.

 

No. Next question ?


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If we are in a similar position now in January we will lose Armstrong because by then we can call ourselves a promotion candidate and Newcastle wouldn't be stupid enough to loan one of their players out to someone they can get promoted instead of themselves.

I think now we will have Conor until the summer. With the 17-18 million we've got in since May we don't have to accept the low amounts that would be bid for him with chancers trying to get him cheap with only a few months left.

We know Winnall/Hourihane won't talk contracts but I hope Davies, Scowen, Watkins, Bree ect are sorted sooner rather than later.

 

The big difference is that we relied heavily on the loanees in the past because our team was built on them, even last season it was and while this will be extremely unpopular I think we got extremely lucky last season. Not lucky on the field as such but lucky that we managed to find such an excellent group of loanees all at the same time at the end of the season after having such useless ones at the beginning of it.
This season it isn't about luck, we have got a good strong team which has been added to with a small number of loan players, if they get recalled then what have we lost? Armstrong? He's played a few minutes for us. Kent? Good player but not irreplaceable at all. That's about it really.

 

^^^^This. I'd still take any position outside the bottom 3 if offered now.