Questioning the system

I’m getting far too involved in this and I need to stop. It looks like such a shambles but before I do I’d like to question the system.
We have a spreadsheet that supposedly identifies good players that we can develop and can advance the club and then sell on.
1) Does the spreadsheet work? Where is the evidence?
2) Do we buy the best players from the spreadsheet, or the cheapest?
3) Are we looking to pick up players for next to nothing and sell for 3/4 million, and would we make more by buying players for 3/4 million to sell for 20/30 million?
The example is obvious. It’s Brentford who have a similar plan to ours. Not the biggest of clubs, arguably not bigger than us and yet they are favourites for promotion and always beat us to signings because the sell for more.
Ollie Watkins was bought from Exeter for an undisclosed fee of 1.8 million and sold to Villa for a fee that could rise to 33 million. He helped to take Brentford to the top of the league and scored a hat trick against Villa on Saturday.
My point is not to rubbish the system, but to say that we’re not very good at it. Coaches get frustrated because they don’t have the material to work with. The board balance the books playing safety first with transfers and wages and the team struggle on the field.
The chairman of Brentford is a very rich man (not as rich as ours allegedly) who made his money in the city of London. A man with a vision who makes it work.
My message to our Chief Exec is for him to raise his game and prove to us that he can make the system work, because at the moment he’s not doing it.

 

It should be pointed out that Brentford aren’t exactly spending sustainably though it’s blatantly a push for promotion, will have cost them a heck of a lot losing in the play offs last year...it’s a gamble a club of our size would be less keen to make. The only way we’re going to improve our club is by small steps in the right direction, that doesn’t mean I’m happy with the full picture there’s still a lot to be improved on even by that model but is spending loads of money the answer right now? I personally don’t think so

 

if you look at the system it can/does work solly+mads, when solly goes mads teaches his replacement, mowatt+styles. it all takes time but there's nothing new in it, shankley/paisley did it with liverpool the class of 92 from mufc, you are going toget some misses. people in todays society just want everything now

 

Wigan took that next step to building a top half team, with the idea of making up shortfalls with player sales. Granted, they went further than we would probably be calling for, but I don't think by much. Then Robinson failed a medical and that put them on a tightrope.

Would love to see us tweak our wage structure to allow for 2-3 players to sign one extra contract with us and allow for more continuity. Imagine Mowatt and Woodrow signed and then in a couple of years we can find Styles and Schmidt / Aitchison move into that bracket after the high earners get their big money move. Problem is, it will add a few million onto the wage bill and there's no guarantees of a good fee for the players after we give those improved contracts.

First and foremost, the recruitment team have to do better, with the budget they currently have. And the role of head coach in that recruitment needs some clear definition. Struber seemed to be half head coach and half manager.

 

You can buy a lot if sustainability with a 31 million profit on a single player.

 

Love that first line e-red!!!
Brightened up my day....."I'm getting far too involved and need to stop".... ...when you find the cure to your addiction, please share!!!

 

Not sure Sollbauer is a spreadsheet signing, think he was brought in through Struberq. And yes Mads has improved, but I'm not convinced he's up to it in the Championship. Same with Mowatt, unfortunately. Like the guy, just not sure he's good enough.

 

Are we guilty as fans of putting mediocre players on pedestals?

 

I agree with your second paragraph. It seems blatantly obvious to me that we're trying to get away with not paying Championship wages. We either need to find a way of doing so pretty urgently, or settle for being a League One club. The £6m extra that Championship football apparently brings in would pay for £5k a week extra for every player in a 20-man squad. I'm obviously not saying we should offer that across the board just because we achieve divisional retention, but we're simply not seeing the flexibility that it should give us reflected in dealings with players, and so anybody who's Championship standard leaves or goes elsewhere in the first place.

 

We have to owt over mediocrity and they are gone Kerching.

 

I thinnk the spreadsheet works - I like most of the players that we sign.

But we're not managing to sign players any more. Maybe everyone else has started copying us.

The problem previously was that we relied too heavil on the spreadsheet and had no experienced players, plus we let players go with no replacements. I think they're trying to fix this but it's not working.

 

We dont replace them all, we just get another bod from the squad and try to mould them into a replacement for the outgoing player.

 

pretty much all our better spreadsheet signings were done before the current board joined. Not sure what if anything that tells us.

 

The other successful signing was Moore, who was signed while we were in the Championship.

Maybe there's as much correlation with the person doing the negotiating for the club as there is with the league we sit in at the time.

 

I’d say the League 1 thing is key. We need to adjust budget and algorithm as we go up but lack the financial wherewithal to do so therefore as it stands we are always going to fail. I don’t know the answer and it’s certainly not easy but something needs to change.

We need incremental progression instead we are going backwards. Our current squad looks incredibly weak in all positions. Our best midfield player in Mowatt would struggle to get in any championship Outside the bottom 6. The only player we have of any real quality is Woodrow who for a variety of reasons is well out of form. Recruitment at Chanpionship level looks shapeless and directionless and just hit and hope.

 

I think it (the system) is very clearly failing. We arent making progress. The squad (minus Brown and Ludwig) is weaker than last season when most around us have improved. I think there are four glaring reasons for this:
1. We are shopping too much in the bargain bin. The OP is right, a £2,000,000 investment can mean £10,000,000 plus return. A £200,000 investment won't do that.
2. The players we do sign on the whole take too long to come to any kind of fruition, either as useful players for us or as players to sell to buy more. I think this is exacerbated by a general lack of experienced players and signing lots of players from lower foreign leagues. The step-up is too much on too many occasions
3. When we do sell, we sell too cheaply. Whilst I am not advocating chaining players who want to leave to the dressing room pipes, we do seem to just accept the first offer that comes along. Consider....when was the last time we talked someone into staying and what would Brentford have asked for Jacob Brown
4. We let players go without having viable replacements lined up (still haven't replaced Moore for eg)

 

Do you think poor coaching is playing a part too? A lot of our players don't seem to be improving but rather just play in a system. We have seemed very rigid in our play the last 3 years. Although, it's a criticism aimed at the modern players.