Be honest, should the £12m paid for GR been spent elsewhere?

[surrey1saint]

Good post Minsk!

[BrokenGusBus]

Yeah the defence does need to be strengthened at LB and another CB and organised tactically.

[Frank's cousin]

I guess the answer lies in whether you feel that 12mil on GR was all there was in the pot, or whether its safe to assume we went after additional defensive targets, but were unsuccessful in completing the deals - My gut feeling is the latter.

[Aura]

Change it to J rod and we are taking we could have found a keeper and another defender with that extra 6 mil

 

wasted imo hope he proves me wrong i really do but so far money = wasted

[Dibden Purlieu Saint]

No, however I do believe the £7m we spent on Rodriguez would have been better spent on the defence.

[Matthew Le God]

Personally I was annoyed by the signing as there were other areas that desperately needed attention and £12m would have gone a long way to solving our problems. If the fans could see the areas that needed addressing then why were they ignored in favour of signing unknown strikers and attacking midfielders? £12m would've added depth and quality to the squad. It's great that the club are trying to make a statement of intent but how about doing it after you've got the bread and butter of the team sorted?

I've just read a thread about which out of contract players we should be looking to sign for the problem areas. A list of goalkeepers, left backs and centre backs. The very areas that we all knew were a problem at the start of the season... You have to laugh.

I like Adkins, he's done a fantastic job, but this has raised my first doubts about him. How could he get it so wrong? If this was an episode of The Apprentice his failure to address the problem would have him staring at Lord Sugar's pointed finger and hearing the words, 'your fired'.

 

You haven't even seen Gaston Ramirez or Maya Yoshida play for Saints yet and you start a thread like this...

[notnowcato]

No, however I do believe the £7m we spent on Rodriguez would have been better spent on the defence.

 

I thought Rodriguez was bought as cover / future replacement for Lambert and I don't have an issue with that. For him to come on and be expected to do a defensive job against Utd was fool hardy in my honest opinion and I wouldn't judge Rodriguez on that.

[alpine_saint]

For all those of you who said "of course we were looking, they obviously just didnt come off/werent meant to be" or words to that effect, the reason for that is that our transfer activity is always too f**king late. And when it falls through we are playing catch up to identify and court new targets.

 

Someone has written on here that Fergie identifies his targets and doesnt mess about - he goes and gets them straightaway (ignore the RVP issue, Arsenal fought tooth-and-nail to keep him). The traditional argument here was that Manyoo can afford to pay wages over the summer and we cant. Well, if we are stumping up 12m for transfers now, and considering the supposed resources behind us now, perhaps, just perhaps, we should go out and get our man earlier in order to avoid "didnt come offs/werent mean to bes"...

[alpine_saint]

You haven't even seen Gaston Ramirez or Maya Yoshida play for Saints yet and you start a thread like this...

 

No, but he has seen just how bad Fonte and Fox are at this level...

[Thedelldays]

No, however I do believe the £7m we spent on Rodriguez would have been better spent on the defence.

 

I tend to agree

 

Just seems odd that we have gone mental signing forwards

[Dibden Purlieu Saint]

I thought Rodriguez was bought as cover / future replacement for Lambert and I don't have an issue with that. For him to come on and be expected to do a defensive job against Utd was fool hardy in my honest opinion and I wouldn't judge Rodriguez on that.

 

I'm not. I don't feel we needed him as desperately as we needed a wide player though, and what a wide player.

[Webby]

For me, the GR signing is all about pulling power (of course, he has a great reputation too) and if getting a player of his calibre and reputation to sign for little ol' Saints sees us become more attractive to other players of that ilk then it will prove to be a shrewd signing, and that's without what he does on the pitch.

 

Yes we need to strengthen at CB and LB, but perhaps we had high profile targets that didn't find us appealing, despite the DVD, and they perhaps doubted our ability to sign GR themselves.

 

Hopefully, yoshida can step in and provide a much needed improvement in the centre of defence. I'd also like to see Luke Shaw fast tracked to the first 11. Good enough. Old enough.

[saint1977]

Do you really think Fonte and Fox can reach the required standard with "better organisation" ?

 

Fonte, yes I think he could but also a top quality sports psychologist could probably help as well. Jose panicks and makes poor decisions, with 10 minutes to go yesterday he was already kicking into touch like a rugby player and had well and truly choked. He's not quick but he's not as slow as some fans make out. Jos has looked more comfortable but has to stop diving in because Kelvin won't save every penalty he gives away and yesterday's challenge was moronic. Clyne does make positioning errors as he gets used to this level but he has the recovery pace to compenste and is going to be an England player. Fox - no, I just don't think his positional sense is up to it and he just looks so laboured. You can make a player more aware and fitter but you can't make them into an athlete. We all said it was a strange signing at the time and I'm not sure he's better than Dickson, let alone Harding.

[Saint Garrett]

I tend to agree

 

Just seems odd that we have gone mental signing forwards

 

I just feel J-Rod was bought by Adkins and Mayuka and Ramirez were Cortese signings. Nothing wrong with that but it has left us with too many forwards. Is J-Rod any better than Sharp?

[pingwing]

Spend 12m on one of the hottest prospects going forward at the moment, or over spend on someone like scott dann who is no better than fonte in the first place.

 

Judgement should be reserved to when we see Gaston play but we cannot waste money over spending on average players on the off chance it helps.

 

6m for Buttland is a joke (going on his league performances so far), 6m for Dann is an even bigger joke seeing how poor he has been. 6m on a currently injured Martin Ollson wouldn't have helped in the opening few games. Gordon released for a good reason and isn't an upgrade to Kelvin...

 

It sort of goes on like this, we have shown we are not afraid to spend money, but we are not being forced into overspending because we are the premier league. We could copy Sunderland and waste god knows how much this summer on a few over paid/under performing players or Liverpool and get lumped for years with a squad we couldn't afford to even offload.

 

As the squad looks so far it is ok, the only thing we are really lacking is composure over the 90 mins. We should see how it goes with the other CB before completely dismissing our transfer policy here...

[Matthew Le God]

No, but he has seen just how bad Fonte and Fox are at this level...

 

And Yoshida could soon be replacing Fonte, so why not sign Ramirez and Yoshida?

[Sidney Fudpucker the 3rd]

Originally Posted by Sidney Fudpucker the 3rd

He's not the answer. Let's face facts. We have a real problem. A problem that should've been addressed before we started spunking £12m on a player who is largely unknown and may not even be cut out for life in the premiership.

 

 

Show us why "He`s not the answer" having played err.. no games for us yet?

 

Show us the "facts" from your "let`s face facts" line

 

Posted this on another thread but you seem to have missed/ignored it..care to answer?

 

I said 'let's face facts, we have a real problem' which I believe we do. Did you not see the game yesterday? We are defensively inept and signing GR for £12m is not the answer to that! It doesn't matter how good he turns out to be. If we don't stop leaking goals were doomed.

 

I hope that makes it a bit clearer for you.

[Saint Troy]

i for one am glad we pulled out of the buttner deal purely to put all our efforts in to getting ramirez, so what you cant look for more than one player on once it was the right decision. Its clear that the number of pages on a thread he directly relates to the effort wasted by the club in signing a player. We know for a fact that saints had a limited budget and couldnt afford a defender if we bought the if players we did and good decisions made too. It was definitely best to ignore all the top class defenders knocking at NAs door at 5pm on the last day of the season and try to complete deals in a mad rush at the end of thewindow like everyone else.

 

Maybe a defender or two short, maybe unlucky in the window maybe not, maybe Yoshida will be great maybe not, maybe we'll bring in a transfer maybe not, maybe a forum is for discussion opinion or maybe its for speculating so that your opinion is validate - we'll see - enjoy the ride numpties

[Olallana]

Ramirez unknown?

Yeah if you don´t follow international football.....

 

This signing was the first step to attract better and better players to our club in a bit longer perspective, and he will be dynamite for us I can assure you.

 

Yeah I would also like some strengthening on defence but not at the cost of not signing Ramirez, no frickin way.

[SaintBobby]

I'm perplexed that we're so light at the back.

 

But less despairing of our back 5 as some appear to be.

 

I think a player like a Ramirez is such a coup that you have to snap him up.

 

He is a gamble, but potentially revolutionises the team.

[alpine_saint]

Ramirez unknown?

Yeah if you don´t follow international football.....

 

This signing was the first step to attract better and better players to our club in a bit longer perspective, and he will be dynamite for us I can assure you.

 

Yeah I would also like some strengthening on defence but not at the cost of not signing Ramirez, no frickin way.

 

Bottom of the table with 0 points because you cannot keep the opposition out, probably manages to totally negate the effect of signing Ramirez, in the eyes of big-name transfer targets..

[saint_ed]

You make it sound like nothing else happened/was happening.

 

 

Mayuka and Yoshi both came in also. As was also mentioned above, there may also have been other deals that fell through, as NA hinted at.

 

So no. Clearly there was still the ability to get other deals done (but why bother looking at that eh?) and perhaps it just didn't go the way we wanted. Happens for clubs all over the world at every professional level.

 

I'd suggest getting the jerk in that knee looked at.

 

That's the crux of the problem though, there is no excuse for deals falling through as an explanation as to why we have only signed one CB who is untested at the highest level (hopefully he will be excellent!). Deals will always fall through which is why we needed several back up options. They simply have not been as big a priority as signing attacking players.

 

I am delighted with the signing of Ramirez but I really do not think it was a case of sign him or invest in defence. We clearly had more money to spend with the other players we were supposedly in talks with (Phillips) etc so there is no defending the fact we have apparently not strengthened such key areas sufficiently.

[doddisalegend]

Do we know if Gaston was an either or or situation to be able make a judgement on the OPs question? It seems there was other money to spend elsewhere. Gaston might be s hit hot and might help get us enough goals to counter act our leaky defence but as yet he hasn't kicked a ball for us so we can't really judge?

 

As someone else pointed out the club made noises about the defence yet we didn't strengthen there as much as many of us hoped LB in particular looks very weak. I'd love to know why we didn't sign another CB and a LB while adding more attacking options and then sending Sharp out on loan but I doubt we will ever find out.

[alpine_saint]

FWIW I dont think the money was really the issue here (although one can never be certain) that meant "Ramirez or defence"

 

I think it just wasnt as much in focus or had as high a priority. Which is bizarre.

[Matthew Le God]

FWIW I dont think the money was really the issue here (although one can never be certain) that meant "Ramirez or defence"

 

I think it just wasnt as much in focus or had as high a priority. Which is bizarre.

 

Why are you overlooking the purchase of Clyne (who has been superb) and Yoshida a centre back you have never seen play?

[alpine_saint]

As someone else pointed out the club made noises about the defence yet we didn't strengthen there as much as many of us hoped LB in particular looks very weak. I'd love to know why we didn't sign another CB and a LB while adding more attacking options and then sending Sharp out on loan but I doubt we will ever find out.

 

This is a superb point. Someone was obviously looking closely enough at Billy Sharp to decide he wasnt PL material to do something about it, but no-one was looking that closely at Danny Fox.

 

Proof, it seems, that the focus was wrong.

[carljack]

Lets just wait and see!

 

sent from my smartphone using one finger

[doddisalegend]

Ramirez unknown?

Yeah if you don´t follow international football.....

This signing was the first step to attract better and better players to our club in a bit longer perspective, and he will be dynamite for us I can assure you.

 

Yeah I would also like some strengthening on defence but not at the cost of not signing Ramirez, no frickin way.

 

Doesn't mean it will translate to English football wasn't Delgado a top international? We have no idea how Gaston will adjust to the PL one things for sure his price tag is going to put him under huge pressure from the word go.

[wild-saint]

Without someone setting the record straight, the efforts on defenders appear half-hearted compared to the landing of GR.

 

I was told on here a couple of weeks ago to shaddap and the defenders would come.

 

Guess what ? They havent.

forgive me if I am wrong but did we not sign a defender. International captain if I recall?

[alpine_saint]

Why are you overlooking the purchase of Clyne (who has been superb) and Yoshida a centre back you have never seen play?

 

I'm not. Clyne is the only one of the back 4 who is firing on all cylinders, but he cannot do it alone. Yoshida may well turn out to be brilliant, but I feel he is quite a high risk signing.

 

But the problem with Fonte and Fox has been apparent since the footballing lesson we got from Reading at SMS last season.

[tajjuk]

In a word NO

 

For me one of the biggest problems after the FA cup final highs of 2003 was the lack of investment in 'quality'. We bought players but arguably only maybe Kevin Phillips and Crouch improved the squad, but we didn't sign a lot of players.

 

Surely the 'mantra' for player recruitment should be - 'improves the squad' + 'is value for money' = attempt to sign.

 

We were linked with plenty of CBs and LBs in the window, we tried to get Buttner, who the obviously thought would be better than Fox and a good value, it didn't go through for whatever reason. We were linked with the likes of Curtis Davies, Rhys Williams, Dawson, Huth etc. for about £6 million, all of whom would have been better than what we had and good value at that price. However look at Williams, Borough fans were talking £12-14 million, what if we made the bid and Middlesbrough came back with that price, would you have been happy with Rhys Williams at £12 million because he covers a position we need?

 

Simply you don't know who we went for and how much money we offered, or how much budget we had left. There isn't an endless list of top quality centre backs out there who will come play for a newly promoted team. Half the teams in the premiership are struggling with defenders in my opinion. Look at Agger and Skrtel for pool, even Vidic and Ferdinand where severely troubled yesterday by what is effectively a championship attack. Full backs are even harder to come by, we have signed a very promising one. How many quality left backs are there in the premiership?

 

We have signed a 21 year old, full international, who is highly rated by most 'experts' in the game, who has a two full seasons of top flight football experience and has impressed against the likes Juventus, Milan and Inter and scored goals in one of the most defensive leagues in the world. A player who was wanted by Champs league teams and you are moaning that we signed him? (A similarly 'rated; player in Pastore went to PSG from Palermo for close to £30 million, £12 million seems a steal)

 

One quality player can make a huge difference between success and failure, look at RVP, Arsenal would not be in the Champions League without him. Give Ramirez a chance before you write him off.

[Dan Johnson]

Adkins said yesterday in his post match interview

 

"Thats why defenders cost so much at this level"

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/19458521

 

Pretty sure that translates to we were in for a few & were effectively priced out of the market.

 

We also must not forget, 2 of our last 3 games were against 1st & 2nd in the league, mistakes will get punished.

 

A better result against Wigan & we'd have been saying we've got what we expected.

 

you can't panic after 3 games, we certainly have showed enough (in 2 out of the 3 games) that we'll be OK at this level.

 

Just because we didnt sign any more defenders, doesnt mean we didnt try, or indeed that we spent the money we had for defenders elsewhere

[alpine_saint]

In a word NO

 

For me one of the biggest problems after the FA cup final highs of 2003 was the lack of investment in 'quality'. We bought players but arguably only maybe Kevin Phillips and Crouch improved the squad, but we didn't sign a lot of players.

 

Surely the 'mantra' for player recruitment should be - 'improves the squad' + 'is value for money' = attempt to sign.

 

We were linked with plenty of CBs and LBs in the window, we tried to get Buttner, who the obviously thought would be better than Fox and a good value, it didn't go through for whatever reason. We were linked with the likes of Curtis Davies, Rhys Williams, Dawson, Huth etc. for about £6 million, all of whom would have been better than what we had and good value at that price. However look at Williams, Borough fans were talking £12-14 million, what if we made the bid and Middlesbrough came back with that price, would you have been happy with Rhys Williams at £12 million because he covers a position we need?

 

Simply you don't know who we went for and how much money we offered, or how much budget we had left. There isn't an endless list of top quality centre backs out there who will come play for a newly promoted team. Half the teams in the premiership are struggling with defenders in my opinion. Look at Agger and Skrtel for pool, even Vidic and Ferdinand where severely troubled yesterday by what is effectively a championship attack. Full backs are even harder to come by, we have signed a very promising one. How many quality left backs are there in the premiership?

 

We have signed a 21 year old, full international, who is highly rated by most 'experts' in the game, who has a two full seasons of top flight football experience and has impressed against the likes Juventus, Milan and Inter and scored goals in one of the most defensive leagues in the world. A player who was wanted by Champs league teams and you are moaning that we signed him? (A similarly 'rated; player in Pastore went to PSG from Palermo for close to £30 million, £12 million seems a steal)

 

One quality player can make a huge difference between success and failure, look at RVP, Arsenal would not be in the Champions League without him. Give Ramirez a chance before you write him off.

 

You make some good arguments (though no-one is writing Ramirez off, FFS). Point is, while we are waiting for our epiphanies, our defence is still sh*te.

[alpine_saint]

Adkins said yesterday in his post match interview

 

"Thats why defenders cost so much at this level"

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/19458521

 

Pretty sure that translates to we were in for a few & were effectively priced out of the market.

 

We also must not forget, 2 of our last 3 games were against 1st & 2nd in the league, mistakes will get punished.

 

A better result against Wigan & we'd have been saying we've got what we expected.

 

you can't panic after 3 games, we certainly have showed enough (in 2 out of the 3 games) that we'll be OK at this level.

Just because we didnt sign any more defenders, doesnt mean we didnt try, or indeed that we spent the money we had for defenders elsewhere

 

Defensively we didnt.

[ALWAYS_SFC]

I said 'let's face facts, we have a real problem' which I believe we do. Did you not see the game yesterday? We are defensively inept and signing GR for £12m is not the answer to that! It doesn't matter how good he turns out to be. If we don't stop leaking goals were doomed.

 

I hope that makes it a bit clearer for you.

 

To make it a bit clearer for YOU...you posted it in the Jose thread and were referring to our new centre back..

Where you stated he "He's not the answer. Let's face facts" without him having kicked a ball for us yet

 

SO....?

[pingwing]

This is a superb point. Someone was obviously looking closely enough at Billy Sharp to decide he wasnt PL material to do something about it, but no-one was looking that closely at Danny Fox.

 

Proof, it seems, that the focus was wrong.

 

Well not that the focus was wrong, we sold Harding and clearly showed intention to buying someone to replace/upgrade the LB options but that fell through.

 

Loaning Sharp out clearly was a case of Forest would like to loan you, you can see the pecking order at the club, do you want to go out and get games or bench it here? He's probably not happy that he has been told he's 4th/5th choice in a system that doesn't suit him and chosen first team.

 

It's not a case of being unattentive, there is a clear worry over Fox but whinging on about it would do nothing for his performances or confidence and would be horribly unprofessional from the club.

 

A LB will be signed in January, but it will be the right LB for the club, not who ever we could get in a hurry, we aren't run by 'Arry logic any more.

[ALWAYS_SFC]

I'm not. Clyne is the only one of the back 4 who is firing on all cylinders, but he cannot do it alone. Yoshida may well turn out to be brilliant, but I feel he is quite a high risk signing............ WHY?

 

But the problem with Fonte and Fox has been apparent since the footballing lesson we got from Reading at SMS last season.

 

Sorry but not really

[alpine_saint]

Adkins said yesterday in his post match interview

 

"Thats why defenders cost so much at this level"

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/19458521

 

Pretty sure that translates to we were in for a few & were effectively priced out of the market.

 

 

Right, so it was about money then. Our management identified targets and couldnt/wouldnt pay for them.

 

Then maybe our attack that was equal to that of the two Manchesters didnt need a 12m reinforcement, and that money used to keep theirs out ?

 

(playing Devils advocate here - I'm greedy and want GR, a LB and a CB)

[doddisalegend]

Adkins said yesterday in his post match interview

 

"Thats why defenders cost so much at this level"

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/19458521

 

Pretty sure that translates to we were in for a few & were effectively priced out of the market.

 

We also must not forget, 2 of our last 3 games were against 1st & 2nd in the league, mistakes will get punished.

 

A better result against Wigan & we'd have been saying we've got what we expected.

 

you can't panic after 3 games, we certainly have showed enough (in 2 out of the 3 games) that we'll be OK at this level.

 

Just because we didnt sign any more defenders, doesnt mean we didnt try, or indeed that we spent the money we had for defenders elsewhere

 

That goes back to the OPs arguement I suppose. If Nigel is saying we looked at some quaility defenders but they cost to much so we spent 19 million on Gaston and J-rod instead you have to question that. Still until the new signings have bedded in and we can see the effect they have on the team it's to early to tell if our new signings were right or not.

[alpine_saint]

In addition, there wasnt a lot of bank bursting CB transfer activity going on over the summer that I recall.

 

So what were we priced out of ?

[Saint Billy]

I think that since we lost Le Tiss we have been lacking a player that has those special skills that can turn a game. How often did MLT save or even win a game by doing something absurdly genius with the ball.

 

We need that something extra and in Ramirez hopefully we have found it. These type of players do not come cheap but hopefully we have found our MLT/Ronaldo to make all the difference.

 

The outlay is a gamble but well worth it if it comes off as far as results and having a valuable asset is concerned.

[tajjuk]

You make some good arguments (though no-one is writing Ramirez off, FFS). Point is, while we are waiting for our epiphanies, our defence is still sh*te.

 

 

Yes but point is even without Ramirez it still would be sh*te if there weren't any suitable replacements.

 

I'm delighted with Ramirez at £12 million, I think it's a great signing. I would have been horrified if we had not bought him and instead spent £12 million on Rhys Williams or Michael Dawson.

 

Bids went in for defenders whilst we were negotiating the Ramirez deal, that's enough for me to suggest that funds weren't being diverted from defensive signings to the Ramirez deal like the OP is suggesting.

[alpine_saint]

I think that since we lost Le Tiss we have been lacking a player that has those special skills that can turn a game. How often did MLT save or even win a game by doing something absurdly genius with the ball.

 

We need that something extra and in Ramirez hopefully we have found it. These type of players do not come cheap but hopefully we have found our MLT/Ronaldo to make all the difference.

 

The outlay is a gamble but well worth it if it comes as far as results and having a valuable asset is concerned.

 

Oxlade-Chamberlain ?

 

Walcott ?

 

Bale ?

[Wes Tender]

I agree, but I will indulge the OP anyway.

 

Another typical Alpine exaggeration, where were these 'hissy fits' on this thread at the time you posted this?

 

And now to answer the OP:

 

1. I am amazed that any Saints fan could have felt 'annoyed' over the signing of such a highly rated player.

 

2. Yes, there were, and still are, other areas that needed attention. In particular goalkeeper and defence. However, we did sign two goalkeepers (admittedly one was for the development squad), an England U21 international RB and a full Japanese international CB. So we didn't exactly ignore those areas.

 

3. You state we ignored those areas in favour of 'unknown' strikers and attacking midfielders. I presume you mean 'unknown to you' as I had certainly heard of all our signings before they were recruited. In fact, I am sure the majority of posters on here had heard of Ramirez (the prime 'annoyance' of yours) and Mayuka before they were linked with us.

 

4. Why do people still think that the signing of any and all new players at football clubs, and particularly at Saints, is all down to the manager? That sort of thing went out of the window many years ago at most clubs. It has been widely stated that Saints have a committee for the recruitment of new players. I am sure Adkins does have a high degree of say in that committee but it is not all down to him to identify players, negotiate with them and their agents and hen to get them to sign on the dotted line. This does not mean anyone is a Cortese signing either; it is a group effort. And, in any case, Adkins clearly admitted, on a number of occasions, that he wanted to bring in 2 CBs; it is also pretty clear that he would have also liked to bring in a new LB, so any criticism of him 'not buying enough defenders' is well off IMO.

 

5. I have kept the most pertinent answer to your post until last......... Where has anybody said that Ramirez was signed at the expense of signing other possible options, especially in other positions (i.e. CB and LB). How do you collate, and justify, our signing of a fantastic young creative attacking player as being the reason we didn't sign any other defenders apart from the full international CB and the U21 international RB? Please find me a statement from Adkins or Cortese that says this is so. Also, please give me a list of all the players we asked about or negotiated with and the reasons as to why these deals didn't come off, particularly indicating those that were scratched solely because of the funds being used to purchase Gaston!

 

I was going to respond to the OP, but you have comprehensively responded to each and every point in much the same way that I would have argued it.

 

The OP says that it is a forum and that everybody is entitled to their opinions, but then those who disagree with the scepticism shown by a few posters is labelled as viewing the situation through rose tinted glasses. And yet, as you so astutely point out, the trouble with some of those opinions, is that they are formulated without concrete evidence of the facts, unless of course they have inside information regarding the way that decisions are made at the club, what the budget is, etc.

 

What really takes the biscuit for me though, is the fact that Ramirez hasn't even kicked a ball for us yet, neither has Yoshida and we only had a short glimpse of Mayuka and yet judgements can be made about whether Ramirez was worth it?

 

In much the same way that for the past couple of seasons there were those who felt capable of commenting that we had thrown our hopes of promotion away after a paltry handful of games, it has to be pointed out to them that validity is only added to such opinions by the passage of time. It is a marathon, not a sprint. Equally without inside knowledge, it is futile believing that it is possible to make all of your signings at the early stages of the window. And in any event, there is still the possibility of bringing in out of contract players.

 

So I am perfectly content to wait and see how it turns out. But I expect that Ramirez will turn out to be an inspirational buy and have the doubters eating their words.

[Webby]

When he's says cost too much, I'd say it's more about wages than fee.

[KelvinsRightGlove]

In addition, there wasnt a lot of bank bursting CB transfer activity going on over the summer that I recall.

 

So what were we priced out of ?

 

The market maybe?

 

A lack of activity in the market as a whole would suggest that perhaps market as a whole (CB's I mean) was over-inflated and therefore not many clubs felt it prudent to pay over the odds for CB's?

 

It is often said that the transfer market is similar to the housing market, in that it is often a chain effect - one needs another for lots of deals to go through.

 

Maybe?

[alpine_saint]

I was going to respond to the OP, but you have comprehensively responded to each and every point in much the same way that I would have argued it.

 

The OP says that it is a forum and that everybody is entitled to their opinions, but then those who disagree with the scepticism shown by a few posters is labelled as viewing the situation through rose tinted glasses. And yet, as you so astutely point out, the trouble with some of those opinions, is that they are formulated without concrete evidence of the facts, unless of course they have inside information regarding the way that decisions are made at the club, what the budget is, etc.

 

What really takes the biscuit for me though, is the fact that Ramirez hasn't even kicked a ball for us yet, neither has Yoshida and we only had a short glimpse of Mayuka and yet judgements can be made about whether Ramirez was worth it?

 

In much the same way that for the past couple of seasons there were those who felt capable of commenting that we had thrown our hopes of promotion away after a paltry handful of games, it has to be pointed out to them that validity is only added to such opinions by the passage of time. It is a marathon, not a sprint. Equally without inside knowledge, it is futile believing that it is possible to make all of your signings at the early stages of the window. And in any event, there is still the possibility of bringing in out of contract players.

 

So I am perfectly content to wait and see how it turns out. But I expect that Ramirez will turn out to be an inspirational buy and have the doubters eating their words.

 

Yes, its a marathon and not a sprint. But its a marathon with a lot of f**king distance between the drink points.

[itchen_dan]

There is no reason why we couldn't have got GR and also strengthened the defence. It sounded like Adkins was expecting a busier last evening on deadline day, going by his interview during the day, therefore get the impression that we failed with a few defensive targets.

 

There was some reports from up north that we did fail with a deadline day attempt to sign Martin Olsson from Blackburn for £3m but that wasnt accepted. I know we were going to go for Williams but obviously got his injury and that bid wasn't submitted. If he wasnt injured and we got him we would've had Fonte, Jos, Yoshida and Williams as our 4 CB's which would've looked much better but obviously only Yoshida came in.

[alpine_saint]

The market maybe?

 

A lack of activity in the market as a whole would suggest that perhaps market as a whole (CB's I mean) was over-inflated and therefore not many clubs felt it prudent to pay over the odds for CB's?

 

It is often said that the transfer market is similar to the housing market, in that it is often a chain effect - one needs another for lots of deals to go through.

 

Maybe?

 

Well, possibly. But then I dont know what targets we were talking to, and which of those were angling for a move and which of those were dug in deeper than an Alabama tick.

[SaintBobby]

Might the problem Adkins/Cortese faced have been something like this:

 

1. Mr X is better than Fox at left-back, but the transfer fee demand is £5m and the salary demand is £40K a week on a three year contract. That's a total outlay of £11m. Although we'd definitely be a better team with Mr X than with Fox, we don't think we'd be £11m better. It just isn't worth the outlay.

 

2. Mr Y would be a better choice centre back than Seaborne. But the total outlay would be, say, £3m. That would be £3m well spent if we had to rely on Mr Y for 10 or 12 games, because Seaborne is quite sh1te frankly. But, in all likelihood, we aren't going to have to rely on Seaborne at all. We basically think that Fonte-Hoovield-Yoshida can do an acceptable job (and replacing them runs into the sort of problems outlined in the Fox scenario above).

 

3. We know we're taking a bit of a gamble here. We may regret it. If we do, at least we can revisit it in January.

 

4. We might just peruse the free agents to see if we can pick up a value for money offer to mitigate some of this gamble between now and Xmas.

 

5. Ramirez could revolutionise the team. He has genuinely world class potential. £12m is a steal, frankly. We weren't really expecting to be able to attract him, but he seems well up for it. To be honest, we rate him as a £20m+ player and just the sort of bloke who could, over 2 or 3 years, take us to the next level.