Yes, your right, it’s just opinions. I just think that this championship isn’t that strong either yet the owners have bought and sold terribly and ruined a massive opportunity to stay up before we kicked a ball. Had they set about the task sensibly and looked for better quality over quantity I think we’d be looking at another season at least in the championship. I just can’t see the foreign contingent brought in from the displays so far doing anything in league 1. Last time we dropped we had mainly English players who had form and had experience in league 1 who took us back up that we then subsequently cashed in on and bought terribly, hence our position now. I’m sure fans of teams like Sunderland and Portsmouth thought they’d pi$$ league 1 too and we know how that turned out. I genuinely think it’ll be a far harder task this time around and I don’t think the remnants of this squad after summer sales will have what’s required. Again, just my opinion.
Yes, I was there. Were you? It was, after about 20 minutes where we should have scored, the worst performance in a long time. Not to take anything away from Portsmouth who were very, very effective. And yes, again against Preston where we should have scored first and dominated the opening 20 minutes we were a horrible mess. Against a very good side it has to be said. But there have been some very good performances in the last couple of months also, such as the wins over Hull, QPR and Huddersfield as well as the draw with WBA which I thought was our best display despite the result. I haven’t failed to swallow facts. I don’t post in a negative manner. That’s all. I love this club and if I felt as down about it as some clearly do, I’d take up something else. Healthy perspective. It’s football and we will win and lose, we will have good and bad times, players will come and go. It’s been this exact way that it is right now, for my entire life. Unless I slept through the years of untold success.
I agree with a lot of what you say. In the past though we've had owners who've also been fans. And some coaching staff. I think we were led to the promised land last season and just thought this season would be a bit more inspiring thanit's proved to be.
One thing that is often overlooked is who we are as a club - our identity and history. It’s easy for fans to become frustrated and angry when the best players leave, but we all need to face the fact that Barnsley FC just isn’t a fashionable team. We aren’t (and never will be) a club that most players dream to play for. We’re a stepping stone for upcoming talent trying to work their way up the football league and, under Cryne, were a club where experienced players came for a season or two after they had peaked. We’ll often get lucky where a group of players gel and, as a whole, the team will overachieve. This then gives fans the perception that we should be performing at that level permanently. The reality is that the best players in that group have done what they came to do - get noticed by a bigger, more fashionable club and move on. The problem we’ve always had is having any kind of ability to keep hold of those players for a little bit longer. However, I think it’s silly to assume that being in a position to offer the same salary to a player about to move to a top Championship/lower Premier League club means they’ll stay with us. Nine times out of Ten they’ll still move on. Perhaps a two-tier structure could work when it comes to player wages. Once a player has proven their talent and is a key asset to the team, they move to the higher wage tier and we offer more than usual to retain them for a few more seasons. But again, we still aren’t going to be the attractive option. The problem under the previous ownership was that any offer for a player had to be taken seriously (due to limited finances and profit margins). We garnered a reputation with other clubs for nurturing talent and selling cheaply and that will always take time to shift. Although players have left in similar circumstances under the current owners, they were all signed prior to their arrival and probably had clauses in their contracts that allowed them to leave if offers from bigger*, more fashionable clubs were made. I do believe the current owners have steadied the ship a little when it comes to cashing in on players, but this will always take time to embed. I genuinely believe Woodrow (and possibly others) would have already left if the profit margins with the current owners were aligned to the previous. Unfortunately for everyone, we haven’t been as lucky as previous years with recent recruitment and the team hasn’t performed as expected. This will always be a risk with the recruitment strategy we’ve adopted. I’m as annoyed as everyone else with how this season is playing out, but I certainly don’t believe the owners are rubbing their hands together and high-fiving each other at the prospect of another relegation. Does that mean that they will plough a load of money into the club to make sure it doesn’t happen again? I doubt it!
I dont think we would tear it up at all we would lose woodrow and mowatt and I'd expect interest in chaplin brown and odour. The defence we have would still concede for fun in the league below. Not just that but league one isnt a easy league to get promotion from, last season was the 1st time in our history we have been promoted straight after a relegation.
This is the first time In my time as a supporter that I’ve lost interest, I’ll still give my support until the end of the season and I’ll more than likely renew my season ticket but to be honest I’ve really stopped caring, for me the difference between these owners and Patrick is that I could see that Patrick was working hard to stop the slide by bringing in experienced loan players like Matty James, I honestly believe that these owners aren’t in it for a quick buck and they want us to survive as much as we do but they’ve got the transfers all wrong , obviously they are brilliant business people but naive when it comes to football matters,
No, I didn’t go, I refuse to fund this folly and watched it on the internet as I do all the games now. Does this make me less of a fan or a fool than you? probably. And that’s why I only watch them on the telly or on streams since the fire-sale of January 2017 when we sold away a potential playoff spot. I too love the club but cannot support the actions of this board and the completely ad-hoc manner they seem to be spending the clubs transfer income. The games you mentioned we have played well in I will argue that going forwards, yes indeed however the potential train-crash at the back was there in those matches too, difference being the opposition didn’t take the numerous chances presented to them hence why we won most of those games imho. I’ve followed them since I was 8, 40 years, a lot of those years home and away but recent years I prioritise where I spend my money. I regard professional football as an entertainment business these days as I’ve mentioned numerous times on here and sadly, last season accepted, there hasn’t been much on show at Oakwell since January 2017 to make me think our club has ambition to be truly successful in footballing terms. Last summers transfer dealings cemented my views on this sadly. If I come across as negative this is because everything coming out of the club under these owners lately and the manner of their tenure-ship has formed my opinion this way. Without any footballing ambition being shown I can’t see their strategy or point in owning Barnsley FC.
There's nothing smart about these owners. In fact they act at times in a self-defeating and stupid manner. They stick rigidly to the spreadsheet approach even to the extent of dismantling the core defence and replacing it with totally inadequate footballers. The decision on Kieffer and his eve of the season replacement by Schmidt was utterly ridiculous. Let's call it for what it was. We had a golden opportunity to consolidate in the championship this season and it's been absolutely squandered. The owners have behaved like complete football novices and their inability to understand the challenge of the championship is breathtaking. The idea this squad we will get automatic promotion next year is far-fetched in the extreme.
The harsh reality is that we are a bottom end championship side, and season objective to beat the drop. We work to a budget that keeps us within finacial fair play rules, unlike most Championship teams. As a result we are: 1. Financially stable. 2. But struggling to compete in a league where majority of teams are playing fincial roulette (sucide). 3. Work to a transfer policy investing in both youth and potential from lower leagues or foreign shores. The stratergy worked in League 1 to get us promoted. In my opinion to succeed in the Championship we needed to keep unit together and build momentum. Instead several players left. We had the best defence in the division and consider at midway point of this season not one of them featuring. Add to that the Stendel departure. This season has become a rebuilding job. In my opinion we have brought in some good young talent. Struber knows the score and the club appear to be backing him, but we still need another 2-3 Championship ready players to come in whether on loan or permanent to get us out of the bottom three. My wishlist: 1. Sam Surridge (Bournemouth - Loan) 6'3" 21 y/o striker england u21, played on loan against us earlier this year for Swansea. 2. Matty James (Leicester - Loan) - midfield general, natural leader. 3. Chris Mepham (Bournemouth - Loan) 6'3" 22 y/o defender welsh int, barely featured this year
The owners are simply business men They have a business plan trying to make money out of buy young , develop, then sell on It is like growing veg from seedlings then selling on matured Are they interested in Us . The fans, are they interested in the clubs fortunes, are they hell. They are interested in making money like any other business If you look at the whole structure of the club with the personel it has no one with football nous at all At least under Patrick we had Ganye who was with us all the way The CEO now is a young yank who has no communication skills or football knowledge Conway has vanished, the rest are probably living in Florida Take managers, apart from Stendel, why could we have not got a good manager out of the English leagues who knows the way we all play These owners threw the dummy out of the pram as soon as we questioned their intentions, and basically vanished They will bow out inside the next couple of years and will be just part of our history The sooner the better for me
We got promoted with hope and optimism to survive in championship, and had we managed team / signings better we would probably be a mid table team now .
Agree communication is a major problem and unfortunately silence leads to anxiety, speculation and a disillusioned fanbase. Credit to previous CEO's Ben Mansford and GG, who both had good rapport and brought feel good factor to the club! Still early days for Dane Murphy but he needs to step up and start bonding with fanbase. As for the board. They are business men without doubt. But no one else came forward to buy us! Its early days. But we are financially stable. They won promotion in year 1, but finding year 2 tough in a higher division. What is the alternative? Administration... reliance on loans season after season. I prefer we don't go there again. But hope the new board learn from mistakes. --------------- In terms of current squad. We are built on youth and raw talent. Great energy and attacking flair, but often fall short due to naivety and decision making our key faults. Leading to the phrase Men against boys is phrase is commonly used when we lose. In my opinion we are not far off from being a good side. We just need to add some players who are experienced and ready to go straight into the starting XI.
My recollection at the time they purchased the club was that the owners talked about growing the club through the acquisition of young talented players who would then be sold at a profit AND by using their skills and contacts to grow commercial income. We're two years on now from the transfer of ownership, a reasonable time imo to start to judge their success in this area. Until the next set of accounts are published we don't know whether it's increased but I'd be surprised if it's much greater, I just don't see the signs of it around the club.
No they wouldn't. Instead of paying a 32 man squad on the cheap, pay a 20 man squad properly. Add a few academy graduates and bingo.
