Fair play to Clarkey..

There’s also the geographical element to players moving on which many on here seem to ignore, for whatever reason. I’m sure players look at their options and decide they’d rather be in another location for their next job than in Barnsley. Then you get players like Marc Roberts who would rather go back to his roots than take up other, maybe better, offers.

But it’s all the club’s fault isn’t it? Well, no it’s not….

 

Think it's been well publicised for those willing to see. The board putting 5 million a year just to kinda stand still. What I mean by that is that we're still in L1 while doing so. But I'd say not all that money goes towards the first team but speard around the club as they are fit..
We all know in the past we've had to sell a player to survive. But our poor recruitment as come home to roost where nobody wants our players for any kind of reasonable fee. Infact we've actually overpaid ourselves at times and got our fingers burnt.. obviously McGeehan Kane and Luke Thomas.. spring to mind.. But it's where we are. I hear Clarke banging the drum saying we're a big club and going for it, but maybe he feels just little let down

But I feel what resources we have are being spread too thin.. The under 21s are prime example where we not only fail to produce any sustainable quality from the academy we actively recruit for the 21s then nothing.. There input for the first team is at best.. slight.. They come in with announcements and bells and Whistles then leave in a whimper.

The problem here is what most people can see is hiding in plane sight, its our recruitment.. Until we get better at signings then its going to be a long slog

 

Never made a bid for promise

 

I don't see anything controversial with Clarke's comments. All he's saying basically is its tough to get top players in cos everyone is after top players. We all knew that anyway.
The only rider he could have added is that they wont sign players for the sake of it. Better not to sign anybody at all if the squad isn't going to be improved.
If the club sign 5 more players some people will be happy just cos there's new faces in but if they all turn out to be kak the same people will be slagging the club off about recruitment strategy.

 

That’s the thing that annoys me. We have our own academy to develop young players but there seems to be a big influx of players from outside constantly coming in. The scattergun recruitment has slipped down to the u21s. All that costs money and we don’t seem to be seeing any of them coming through to first team level. Surely the drive right now should be to get players in ready to come straight into first team contention and improve us. I suspect it is but our wage level has probably fallen to the lower end of L1 given how strong the league is now. I sense that Clarke might be realising the job isn’t what he thought?

 

Acceptance is needed for the fact that we haven’t got a piss in so we can’t offer our 1st 2nd & possibly 3rd choice targets more than other clubs. And acceptance of f free fact that we are now in a transitional period & it will take time & continuity if we want to challenge for promotion again.

Hopefully the club haven’t found another dud in Clarke, early signs are promising. Hopefully he doesn’t get poached by a bigger club before he finishes the job with us. Otherwise it’s back to square one & even longer in League 1

 

The only duds are those above him, how many chances do they need. Obviously they still have time this season so we shall wait and see

 

Fair point

 

Being interested isn’t the same as being outbid though.

 

Theres numerous reasons why players choose one club over another.. but
**Cough** Rotherham 12 signings.
Remember Brain Mahoneys waist.. having a little laugh and a pop at Portsmouth this time last year for them having the audacity to sign 12 players.
Remind me how that went last May
All this absolute hogwash about.. "we don't want to rush, it's better to wait and get the right one's" It works the opposite way.. The players you re after you will/should have been tracking for months.. and you strike early before someone else does.. What your left with now is loans.. by definition improving other clubs players. And players who actively don't want to sign too early in the window because they hate preseason training.. if you now go for those for a new head coach who has stated that his teams must be fit.. is he even going to play em..?

Time to bite the bullet here and blood our own 21s.. whether you like it or not that is where our hopes and investments are and further investment leave it till Jan.. and move early

 

Absolutely.

 

We are still one of the bigger sides at this level with a budget bigger than most (not all) in this league. We have lost several key players, most of which were signed when we were in the league above who will have been good earners at this level. Mladen himself said we have a higher than average budget for this level. We are not as skint as people like to make out.

Club is damned if they do and damned if they don't at the moment. I too would have liked to have seen more done but we still have time. They get abuse if they sign cheap non league rubbish and then get abuse when we cant sign good players.

They are clearly altering the plan and addressing concerns around inexperience etc. and they are clearly after quality not quantity and unfortunately quality players are wanted by other clubs. Rather us not sign anyone, than sign players just for sake of it to appease fans.

 

We have to remember that behind every player, there is an agent, telling clubs what transfer fee will be involved, what wage demands will be etc.
At the point of “interest” if either of those two things (or probably lots of other things) are not aligned with the club, then our interest ends, someone else signs them and we are suddenly being “outbid” or “beaten to signings”.
We are in League One. There are up and down the football pyramid lots of players who can do a good job at this level. Some of them are youngsters in the Premier League hungry for a chance. Some an aging championship players looking for a longer term deal to extend their career. Some are League One and Two players looking to step up. Some are foreigners from abroad looking to put themselves in the shop window of English football. When we sign players no one else is interested in they’re crap, and when clubs down the leagues are interested in them they’re crap, if we sign players from the championship they’re probably not championship standard, and no one wants punts from abroad.

It isn’t Football Manager where you can go into the editor, give yourself 100 million and piss the league. Even if you’re Wrexham.

 

I would rather us stick to the plan even when we miss out on targets. A three year plan is fine with me if that's what it is and have a championship able squad to give us a reasonable chance of staying there. To do it all in one window is big ask we have to my mind and just a opinion 3 maybe 4 championship quality players in Connell Phillips Pines and potentially Jalo. I would think we need at least another couple of that quality to give us s fighting chance as frustrating as it is patience may pay off.

 

Anyone know where on the Loughborough University site the training camp will be? Might take my son as we’re pretty close.

 

Ur not allowed in that’s why they do it there

 

Maybe we're missing out because we offer what we can afford and don t dig into the bottomless pit of monoply money like other clubs do!

 

I can't remember having a laugh or a pop at Portsmouth.I remember saying we didn't need as big an overall as them.Portsmouth signed loads because they need loads of new players.
Fair play to Pompey they did really well gelling an almost complete new 11 to promotion.I would say such an achievement is a rarity.
Hindsight is remarkable thing to have.

 

Can't help but think that some of our incoming transfers were dependent on players going out to generate some revenue. No sign of Styles being on his way or, as some have intimated, Adam Phillips moving on.

 

I work on the same site - don’t think it will pose an issue for me.