Mladens transfers

Because the owners have switched data models based on his appointment, they also as mentioned previously do not get involved in day to day recruitment otherwise what was the point in appointing a sporting director?
Regarding the finances last summer it was stated we had a bigger budget than the previous season so the excuse of reducing the playing side, this was also backed up by John Flatmam at the forum last year, they'd made cuts elsewhere to keep the playing budget high.
Your are correct in mentioning he's not the right fit, it's plainly evident.

 

A few things spring to mind here.

Looking at all of those signings, we've thrown a huge amount of money away and I'd say we've only got two good signings out of 14. There are a few who might come good, some who haven't been given a chance much yet, but you look through that list and it highlights how bad decisions translate into significant losses.

I don't think our decision making is logical or progressive. The goalkeeping choices are a prime example. And I've said it before, but it points to a complete lack of strategy at a high level, meaning we come to off the cuff individual choices when they have to be made rather than it being by design.

That ultimately falls at the feet of Parekh. Even if he's devolving responsibility to Sormaz and Flatman, he's still the majority shareholder and Chairman, everything comes back to him. Aside from that, it's obvious so many components don't work. I think part of the reason we don't have many assets to profit from is the recent decision, ironically, not to sell players and letting all of Cole, Cadden, Kane and Williams leave for free was incompetent and hugely damaging both on and off the pitch.

This summer, as much as we don't want to, we have to sell a player, maybe even two and trim down this bloated unbalanced squad. We have to lean on the kids as back up and give them hope they can breakthrough. But it needs a big shift in thinking to get us there. We have to become financially stable. There must be examples in this league of decent success on far lower budgets. We also have to give coaches what they actually ask for. I've no issue in saying our style is X, we recruit a coach to deliver that, and then we empower that coach in delivering that. It feels like too many aspects in our operations conflict and compete.

I'm unimpressed by Sormaz, but I'm also unimpressed with the coach, CEO, Academy and board of directors. There aren't obvious easy quick wins, but just a handful of good decisions between now and next season could set us on a better safer course. The question is, are our owners hearts in it, and if so, are they able to display better decision making?

 

transitioning to league 2 budget

 

The question of if he's limited by budget restraint doesn't stand up because of the number of players we have. This was pointed out recently when the list of playing staff was printed on here. We're hugely overstaffed and countless times in recent posts it's been said if we keep signing "Punts" on low wages instead of one or two better players on decent wages we'll be in L2. The fact we've signed too many "Punts" is just that, a fact and proves Sormez is not restricted by the board as he has spent that money
poorly. He is crap at this job and a roster of 30+ players where the only 2 who were worth signing are 1 who we already knew and 1 who fits the fan favoured system of coming with good proven credentials from the league below us ( Who we paid a fair bit for) proves how crap Sormez is. Get rid of this guy now.

 

If the players are this bad, then surely Clarke has done an outstanding job to get us top half?

You can't have it both ways.

Agree with the lower league signings though- although I'm not sure many were critical of it. That's been our method for years - and quite successfully so.

 

Even if they were both a lot younger. It’s a complete non-starter. We wouldn’t be able to pay the wages that would make the job worthwhile to either. Ones based in Cornwall & the others based in London & everytime the first team had a bad run there would be calls for them to replace the manager.

Mick definitely had a fantastic eye for talent though. Made some huge profits on players in his time at Ipswich & especially Wolves. He did a cracking job at unearthing talent from the Irish league.

 

To me a transitional season is one where we’ve lost several players & have brought in quite a few younger players to replace them & they need a bit of time to find their feet & get used to playing with each other.

This certainly shouldn’t be a transitional season.

De Gevigney, Earl & O’Keeffe in their second season with us, key players like Phillips & Connell who have been here a while, a big signing in DKD, players like Watters & Cosgrove who should be kicking on in their second seasons with us.

You don’t go & fill the squad with loanees in January if it’s a transitional season.

Make no mistake the people in charge expected a promotion challenge this season.

 

Best post to date on the state of affairs at Oakwell.

 

Bit early to judge with Gauci but he was very questionable against Huddersfield & then when I look at Dexter & Rodrigues I’ve not seen anything in either to suggest that they’re a better option than Lofthouse and Cosgrove / Marsh

 

I don't think the players are as bad, maybe the strikers but on paper they were good signings with experience. I think our best 11 is decent I don't think he's got the best out of the group.

Plenty were critical of lower league signings. Experience and older heads ect were real buzz words on here. How times change.

 

I disagree.

I think people were critical of non-league signings from tiers 8/9/10 etc, but everyone understands that our best players in recent years are signed from Leagues One, Two and Conference.

I do agree with your point about getting the best out of the group. I think he's not as good as Collins, who wasn't as good as Duff. But then I think the squad is weaker than those 2 anyway.

I'm not saying he's the greatest manager ever, I'm just sick of us sacking blokes and having to start again. It wastes money, it wastes time and it is proven to not work for us.

 

We signed jack Shepard from the 7th tier everyone was on his back not good enough. Now want him back. Same when we signed pinnock, George Williams. These players seem to get wrote off fast.

Collins football bored me to tears.

 

Sorry but I’m not sure if I’m explaining properly your replies again suggest the issue is with the people who appointed him and chose to change etc surely that’s on them not him?
Again I’m not defending him as the recruitment hasn’t been good enough but I’m interested why everyone is blaming just him and not the ultimate decision makers.
DWLC probably explains it better than me.

 

Awful lot in this I agree with but IMO, the issue with BFC since Cryne left is this one line you said

“I don't think our decision making is logical or progressive.”

 

I didn't say 7th tier.

And Pinnock was Conference which is tier 5.

And I haven't mentioned style of play - I'm judging it by results and league position, not opinions.

 

pretty much our entire squad is aged 23-27 there shouldn’t be any transitioning we should be around 6th based on our wage bill considering we’ve come off the back of two play off runs there was already some foundation to build from

 

I think it's important to recall that Bobby Hassell was acting Sporting Director before Sormaz was appointed. Bobby wanted the job full time, has academic qualifications specific to the role and of course, knows the club inside out.

There's surely no one better qualified in theory for the role. I'd love to see Bobby get a permanent go at it and if it doesn't work, then we gave him the chance and he'd be well positioned to get a similar job at another club.

It could also help embed some of the academy graduates in a first team squad.

 

Not sure we are getting the results from Bobbys present role in the academy tbh pal

 

Who have we signed from the 8 9 and 10th tiers then? Or have I missed those signings?

Plenty of people were shocked and critical of signing pinnock and the fact we paid 500k for him especially when he hardly kicked a ball 1st season and was 4th choice center back.

Like you've already said Duff had a better squad then the quality got less and less for Collins and Clarke. There's a clue there less quality squad lower league finish it's not a coincidence.