Other teams' forums

Plenty of praise for us from fans of other teams, although most of them are simply putting it down to outstanding fitness, tactics and organisation. I've seen a lot of comments that we don't have particularly good players, or words to that effect. Obviously the way we play and set up is beyond vital, but I don't see us as having worse players than many other sides either. On the contrary, I now see quality all over the field. I think we'll probably fall just short of the top six this season (though it wouldn't be a complete surprise if we do sneak in), but next season I see us as genuine contenders for automatic promotion. I think we've got the potential to be that good.

 

I also like to have a nosey to see what they’re saying about us, we’re getting plenty of compliments at the moment but there’s always one or two use the old “I’ve watched this team for 90 years and that’s the worst performance I’ve ever seen” after we’ve beat them

 

We also have the potential to be unrecognisable in terms of personnel and be starting all over again.

I'm not being unduly pessimistic. I'll happily praise the club for their commitment to the fan base during the Covid-19 crisis, keeping the squad together and adding to it. But this last year has been the exception not the norm. The model is still to buy young and (relatively) cheap and sell at a profit. Transfer dealings throughout the game have been at an all time low during this period. Time will tell if we have the resolve to resist a fire sale if the market picks up.

 

That's true, but I think we're much better placed to absorb the losses now. And I hope we do sell someone for a big fee, as I want us to stay solvent above all else. But just think how good we were on Wednesday after Styles and Woodrow went off. Any talk of losing those two even as recently as the autumn would have had people reaching for their revolvers. Now it all just feels a bit different. Save of selling five first teamers in the summer, I think we'll be just fine. It seems like we're now at the next level of the plan, a la Brentford, where relegation is no longer the big risk it was previously. *crosses fingers nervously*

 

Agreed mate. To put it into perspective how many of that Bristol City team would you put in a Barnsley shirt? I wouldn't have any of them. Kalas £8 Million from Chelsea; Wells £5 Million from Burnley, you can keep them. I'll have my Barnsley players thank you

 

I was mulling over this last night after reading the Wednesday forum.

I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s a common misunderstanding of the ‘moneyball’ concept.

The aim is to ensure the best points per £ ratio, and one of the levers to do this is to have a successful transfer market. But the selling of players at a profit isn’t in itself the aim, it’s a consequence.

The difference is subtle, and might be meaningless from a distance, but I think it helps to understand how the ‘model’ gets tweaked to improve the chances of success.

 

It’s the classic football fan view of a ‘good player’.

Bristol’s team is made up of International players worth millions, to most casual viewers that makes them ‘better’ players than our squad of lower league rejects paid a pittance.

If you only see us play against ‘your team’ of superstars, it’s easy to believe that it was a one off, that your team didn’t play well enough etc.

For fans of Barnsley though; we’re seeing the same thing every game, we know that we’re doing the same every game, making good players look ordinary.

 

If the ultimate goal is sporting success. That isn't the ultimate goal for our owners. We are an investment opportunity and the goal is to make money.

They believe football clubs in Europe are seriously undervalued. With our turnover and the size of our player contracts it would cost considerably more, many times more, to buy us if we were a club in the USA than a club in Europe. They believe, not unreasonably considering globalisation, that the market here will catch up with the US. Paul Conway has said exactly this in an interview. And it's why they're steadily growing a portfolio of clubs across Europe. They don't believe we need to win promotion to make money, they believe we're already worth far more than they paid for us, it's just the market hasn't caught up yet.

If the ultimate goal is to sell, then it makes sense to make the product as attractive as possible, which benefits those of us who do want sporting success. But the primary motivation when signing/selling a player will always be profit rather than the needs of the team at the time because the ultimate goal is profit rather than winning the world series.

That doesn't mean these people are evil or they'll do a terrible job, they may even do a better job than someone making decisions with their heart, but there will always be times when there will be conflict between the owners and the fans because they want different things.

 

I don’t disagree with any of that ; I just have a slightly different view of the ‘player sales’ being simply for profit.
We do have to balance the books, but I think our players are ‘assets’ rather than ‘product’.

 

Going to be very hard to keep hold of VI in the summer me thinks. Be atracting attention from all over.
Don't forget we are still Barnsley... Not too wise to get over attached to anyone.

 

Whilst I don’t agree with that. A club in the prem will be worth considerably more than one in the championship. The amount of money coming in would make the club a much more viable investment, with less risk. So if they’re really in it for that sell on, I reckon they’d want us there. That said, they’re not going to break the bank or change the model to do so.

 

Think the policy will always be to sign, develop and sell players. The difference between when they came in and now is we have a squad of more capable players and hopefully a bit of a production line too, so we can absorb departures easier than before.
As Fans I think what we have to hope is that they don’t have wholesale sales and only one or 2 at a time.

If they have done their recruitment right, we should be able to continue to enjoy the football and them get what they want too.

 

die mannschaft über alles. I’d rather have a plug and play group of players who know their roles then have to rely on your “stars” to deliver. It’s clear these days that with the right team motives and tactics you can overcome a superior team on paper, and that’s the thing football is played on the pitch not on paper.

 

Which is why we need to keep VI and the coaches. The obvious gulf in the fitness of our players and other teams will have a lot of “big” clubs sniffing around. I wouldn’t be surprised to see a Leeds spy at every training session.

 

I wonder if we’re any fitter though? We can’t have access to any sports science that isn’t available on google I wouldn’t have thought. Probably more likely :
1-players don’t run long distances other then probably wing backs and odd front man chase down. The rest is very short sprints from position to close down, then back Into defensive/attacking position depending on if we got the ball.
2- not being afraid to use all 5 subs to change the most pushed positions - forwards and wing backs/midfielder.

I’d be interested to see our average distanced covered compared to the league average, I’m sure that data must be out there.

 

Good players? Well let’s see how many other clubs are interested in our players rather than our rivals’!!!

 

The way to make the most money is to get to the premier league ain’t that worth bearing in mind rather than flog em all.

 

I do like this comment from Bristol City fan:

"Barnsley are not great individually. Really like some of their players but it's not like they'd walk into top teams at this level some of them. But fantastically well organised. Very positive, take risks with such a high line but so well organised that it's actually not easy to get in behind them.
Fans often think it's all about having the best players. I think Barnsley have a good bunch of players but teamwork, cohesion, work rate, it's what makes them so hard to play against."

Pretty accurate summary, we have good players with a certain level of quality-but these are young players and will get even better. The one point I'd disagree with is the "not great individually", probably said because he's never heard of our team members. I think they're pretty good individually, and much better as a team!

 

I think individually we’ve got the 2 Callum’s and Helik who are probably being watched by much better teams, the rest* could get a job at a similar level but they’d probably not be superstars.

*the 2 new strikers may also prove to be amazing but it’s too early to tell for sure.

 

I think we are drilled to be fit at what we do. Also the youth of the squad has a big influence on them being ready for matches close to each other.