Rodriguez - the first game where I really thought he was worth £7 milion

[david in sweden]

Then like MLG you also fail to miss the point being made, Dave. I'm not writing him off (although I'm starting to doubt if he'll ever be good enough for PL level). What I'm saying is that £7M spent on a player for the future was an ill-advised sum to spend by a team who had just been been promoted and should have been looking to consolidate in this league. It may have been a decent transfer for someone like, say, Fulham; who have been in the division for a while, already have a decent proven strike force and can afford the luxury of bedding in a new developing player. We don't have that luxury; we have Rickie Lambert firing them in (in his debut season) and no-one else with the requried quality to do that right now.m In any case, I think £7M is going to be seen as an overspend; I simply can't see him ever justifying that price tag.

 

You've also made the Beattie comparison before. As I'm sure you've been told Beattie was 20 years old when he came to Saints, and we were an established Premier League side. Jay Rodriguez is 23, and we were a side that hadn't played Premier League for 7 years, and only have 2 players in our entire squad that have previously done so. So its not really a relevant comparison.

 

 

 

 

YES I have seen the " Beattie comparison " before and I don't think that the age comparison can be denied but you may recall that the standard of football we were playing then, barely kept us in the Prem.

 

I think we can all see that the club's present policy is to " buy 'em young " (Clyne, Ramirez, Mayuka, Gazzinga...and JayRod ) and slowly integrate Academy starlets into the side; (Shaw, JWP, Reeves...plus more in line) and creating a "new side" that is the same generation and likely to play together for a longer period (as was the MU side; Giggs, Scholes, Beckham, Butt, and the Nevilles) way back then.

 

As we were in the somewhat unusual situation of having an 11 year-old transfer record (£4 million, which has to be said - was not a lot of money even in 2001) - many fans seem to feel that the Jay Rod fee

was " a lot of money " - whilst not recalling that 7 years on.....we had sold three of our own teenage talents for almost £30 million. In the present day Prem. £7 million is about par for the course.

IF Jay Rod fails to deliver .then it may well be considerd "wasted money " but I equally feel it is wrong to judge Jay Rod (or anyone else ) on the strength of half-a-dozen games against top class

opposition ..and a handful of short sub. apps. I think Jay Rod has potential and ..(at some future time... when he doesn't have to play second fiddle to RL).. we will see that fee justified.

 

(....and you yourself also underlined the poiint that almost the entire squad is also new to the Prem. ......that shouldn't be held against him.

Edited 10 December, 2012 by david in sweden

[Thedelldays]

most of the teams that have come up in the last 5 years...£7m is not the norm...definately not to sit on the bench most weeks anyway.............

[tajjuk]

Then like MLG you also fail to miss the point being made, Dave. I'm not writing him off (although I'm starting to doubt if he'll ever be good enough for PL level). What I'm saying is that £7M spent on a player for the future was an ill-advised sum to spend by a team who had just been been promoted and should have been looking to consolidate in this league. It may have been a decent transfer for someone like, say, Fulham; who have been in the division for a while, already have a decent proven strike force and can afford the luxury of bedding in a new developing player. We don't have that luxury; we have Rickie Lambert firing them in (in his debut season) and no-one else with the requried quality to do that right now.m In any case, I think £7M is going to be seen as an overspend; I simply can't see him ever justifying that price tag.

 

You've also made the Beattie comparison before. As I'm sure you've been told Beattie was 20 years old when he came to Saints, and we were an established Premier League side. Jay Rodriguez is 23, and we were a side that hadn't played Premier League for 7 years, and only have 2 players in our entire squad that have previously done so. So its not really a relevant comparison.

 

Just our of interest who else could we have signed for that sought of money?

 

We all recognise Michu was a very good signing at his price, so we missed out there, but he's very similar in style to Lambert.

 

Aside from that strikers that have been signed recntly by other prem teams:-

 

- Pavel Pogrebnyak was free but reportedly high wages (and high singing fee) and has been poor for Reading.

 

- Andy Carroll high wages and the agreed fee for him is £15 million.

 

- Berbatov was a good deal at £6 million but doubt he would have come to us and also very high wages.

 

- Benteke cost £7 million to Villa, I suppose he's done ok, only 22, 3 premiership goals but had more opportunities than Jay Rod.

 

- Borini cost £11 million to Liverpool, he has 15 career first team goals.

 

- Fletcher £12 million, done wel with 6 prem goalsl but twice the price of Jay Rod

 

- Cisse cost £4 million for a 31 year old, plus his wages.

 

- Jordan Rhodes cost £8 million and he was in league 1.

 

I can't see how we overpaid for him and the only way we would have got someone better was to buy someone much older on higher wages.

 

He's had a handful of games in his starting position and done ok, too little to write him off as a bad signing.

[The Kraken]

Again Dave, I think you're missing my point. Its not an overwhelming "what a waste of money" accusation. Its that Rodriguez was entirely the wrong sort of player for us to go for. You mention its great to buy em young and develop em; we've currently got a first team consisting of Nathaniel Clyne, Luke Shaw, Jack Cork, Morgan Schneiderlin and gaston Ramirez who are all younger than Rodriguez (except Jack Cork who is a month older); plus a skipper in Adam Lallana who is one year older. So I don't buy this "he's one for the future" talk in any case.

 

For a newly promoted side such as we were, my view is that if we were to be spending £7M at that time on a striker it needed to be someone who could come in and instantly provide competition to Rickie Lambert and be a genuine option up front. Rodrriguez isn't that; if Lambert gets injured then the only option we have is someone who is plainly not as good. And that's not acceptable IMO.

[The Kraken]

Just our of interest who else could we have signed for that sought of money?

 

Well we don't know that, do we? We weren't looking to buy someone else, so its a bit of a meaningless comparison.

 

Of those listed I'd suggest that Michu, Carroll (loan), Berbatov (I hear £4M) and Benteke are decent signings. I also quite rate Pogrebnyak but like you have no idea about his wages, he's injured at the mo but has still scored 5 goals this season (albeit 3 of those in the cup). Lukaku also seems to be doing ok at West Brom as a support striker. As to who else we could/should have gone for, we simply don't know as we weren't looking once we signed Rodriguez.

[david in sweden]

Kraken ..in my view, (the flaw in everyone's arguement) about Jay Rod is ......IF... he were " good enough" (others words). WHO would he replace in the present side. YOUR ANSWER IS : ..............Who ?

The fact that.... given we have 10 squad players who have scored in the league - so far...the only accepted strikers seem to be Puncheon and Lambert - would you drop one of them ?

 

Give or take a year ...or three, the age issue isn't a factor for player who is getting games and is " on form" .

Rickie Lambert isn't doing too badly for a 30 y.o striker......and (as we saw to out cost at SMS) . Paul Scholes's age is not an issue either. (No, I'm not comparing them !)

All the Jay Rod criticism seems to be that 23 is TOO OLD ....for someone who is an (as yet) unproven Prem. standard striker.

 

Thankfully ....Lambert is still able to net a few at this level, which gives Jay Rod (and others) time to mentally adjust to the Prem. level ..or as Puncheon (quoted in interview said )... not to be afraid of the opposition. We can still only have 11 on the pitch at the same time... and even coming off the bench the problem remains ....WHO?... does Jay Rod need to replace .....to get in the game ?

[The Kraken]

Kraken ..in my view, (the flaw in everyone's arguement) about Jay Rod is ......IF... he were " good enough" (others words). WHO would he replace in the present side. YOUR ANSWER IS : ..............Who ?

The fact that.... given we have 10 squad players who have scored in the league - so far...the only accepted strikers seem to be Puncheon and Lambert - would you drop one of them ?

 

Puncheon's not really a striker, Dave. Given that we had a bid for Matt Phillips in the summer; and given that Punch has been brilliant in some games but average in others, its not at all inconceivable that we're looking to replace him. Especially so since we've yet to agree any terms on an extension to a contract that expires in the summer.

 

But yes; any additional striker costing £7M should IMO be giving Rickie Lambert a run for his money, and banging on the door to be picked ahead of him or as a genuine option to play alongside him as Rodriguez did on Saturday. JRod got a game not because he forced his way in there, but because Ramirez wasn't deemed worthy of a full 90 minutes.

 

Put it this way; if Rodriguez had cost £1M or £2M, we wouldn't be having this debate. He would be deemed an ok backup to have in reserve; not as good as our first choice but he'll do a job. We're having this debate because he was £7M and, for a side such as us at that time, I feel that £7M should have provided us with a player who was ready to start regularly for the first team in the Premier League.

[Saint Garrett]

It was £6m, and pretty sure it was on appearances, paid over a lengthy time, I'd be surprised if we paid more than £3m up front.

[The Kraken]

It was £6m, and pretty sure it was on appearances, paid over a lengthy time, I'd be surprised if we paid more than £3m up front.

 

As I said to MLG, if there's evidence of that I'll accept it, but the info I have is that the total transfer deal is for up to £7M. Hence its a £7M deal.

[tajjuk]

Well we don't know that, do we? We weren't looking to buy someone else, so its a bit of a meaningless comparison.

 

Of those listed I'd suggest that Michu, Carroll (loan), Berbatov (I hear £4M) and Benteke are decent signings. I also quite rate Pogrebnyak but like you have no idea about his wages, he's injured at the mo but has still scored 5 goals this season (albeit 3 of those in the cup). Lukaku also seems to be doing ok at West Brom as a support striker. As to who else we could/should have gone for, we simply don't know as we weren't looking once we signed Rodriguez.

 

 

I listed the options that went this summer, players like Fletcher cost twice the price and he has scored as many league goals as Lambert, players like Berbatov cost the same amount of money but are on a lot higher wages and are a lot older. As far as I can see £6 million gets you either -

 

- young and unproven at this level with potential (Benteke, Jay Rod, Jordan Rhodes)

 

- more quality and experience, but older with higher wages (Berbatov, Pogrebnyak, Cisse)

 

- A proven Premier League goalscorer of a decent age like Fletcher costs you £12 million, or you make an error like Liverpool and buy Borini at that price.

 

We got a young English striker who was one of the best players in the Championship last year, for about £6 million. Seems a decent deal to me, to have got a striker as good as Lambert we would have had to have paid over twice the amount or got someone of Lamberts age. Essentially whoever we bought would be back up to Lambert, so buying someone like him either means that signing sits on the bench or we waste Lamberts talent as we generally are playing one striker, hence why we went young with potential who would probably be more happy playing second fiddle to Lambert.

[Give it to Ron]

As I said to MLG, if there's evidence of that I'll accept it, but the info I have is that the total transfer deal is for up to £7M. Hence its a £7M deal.

 

Well its hardly JayRods fault he was priced at that...I am more concerned we paid £12m for Gaston.

British young strikers you pay a premium for anyway. Sunderland paid what £11m for Connor Wickam?

I can see some talent in Jay and on Saturday he gave us another option to our forward play that no other striker we have does...apart from Mayuke

who is deemed not a starter either and he cost what £3m?

Our transfer policy this summer stinks of incompetence...non of that is the players fault and nor is the figure put on their heads either.

What if he had been a free but we had paid him stupid wages over the same term?

You obviously don't rate him that fair enough its all about opinions look at TT assessment on UI certainly not one I hold any regard to

and that got shot down. He is young and improving and on Saturday his movement created space for others and I believe he will come good

if he can score a few goals soon and get that confidence up - he would of done already if it hadn't been for a numpty lino!

[Sour Mash]

I listed the options that went this summer, players like Fletcher cost twice the price and he has scored as many league goals as Lambert, players like Berbatov cost the same amount of money but are on a lot higher wages and are a lot older. As far as I can see £6 million gets you either -

 

- young and unproven at this level with potential (Benteke, Jay Rod, Jordan Rhodes)

 

- more quality and experience, but older with higher wages (Berbatov, Pogrebnyak, Cisse)

 

- A proven Premier League goalscorer of a decent age like Fletcher costs you £12 million, or you make an error like Liverpool and buy Borini at that price.

 

We got a young English striker who was one of the best players in the Championship last year, for about £6 million. Seems a decent deal to me, to have got a striker as good as Lambert we would have had to have paid over twice the amount or got someone of Lamberts age. Essentially whoever we bought would be back up to Lambert, so buying someone like him either means that signing sits on the bench or we waste Lamberts talent as we generally are playing one striker, hence why we went young with potential who would probably be more happy playing second fiddle to Lambert.

Well using Benteke as an example, he's shown what you can get for £7m, looks head and shoulders above Rodrigues.

[Dibden Purlieu Saint]

Played very well today, fast skilfull

 

Good workrate, held the ball well.

 

One to watch definitely.

 

Wow, is this all you need to be able to do to look like a £7m player nowadays?

 

Gadzooks!

[Minty]

Does Clyne look like a £1m player? Does Lambert for that matter?

 

I think we need to rise above using price tags as some kind of yardstick of current ability.

 

For me it's simply that Rodriguez has a lot of potential, is *starting* to show some of that, even playing in the Premiership for the first time, but has quite some way to go. His movement is good, his touch and sharpness needs some work (but so did most of our players coming in to this season, and was a key reason for our poor early form), his finishing looks ok to me but he needs a goal or two to get the confidence up IMO.

 

But he's a work in progress, and I fully back him to deliver on that potential under Adkins (and Lambert's) tutelage. The price tag is not his fault and he shouldn't be burdened with it, but I think he'll repay our faith in time.

[Dibden Purlieu Saint]

I listed the options that went this summer, players like Fletcher cost twice the price and he has scored as many league goals as Lambert, players like Berbatov cost the same amount of money but are on a lot higher wages and are a lot older. As far as I can see £6 million gets you either -

 

- young and unproven at this level with potential (Benteke, Jay Rod, Jordan Rhodes)

 

- more quality and experience, but older with higher wages (Berbatov, Pogrebnyak, Cisse)

 

- A proven Premier League goalscorer of a decent age like Fletcher costs you £12 million, or you make an error like Liverpool and buy Borini at that price.

 

We got a young English striker who was one of the best players in the Championship last year, for about £6 million. Seems a decent deal to me, to have got a striker as good as Lambert we would have had to have paid over twice the amount or got someone of Lamberts age. Essentially whoever we bought would be back up to Lambert, so buying someone like him either means that signing sits on the bench or we waste Lamberts talent as we generally are playing one striker, hence why we went young with potential who would probably be more happy playing second fiddle to Lambert.

 

He wasn't even the best striker at Burnley FFS!!

[Dibden Purlieu Saint]

I listed the options that went this summer, players like Fletcher cost twice the price and he has scored as many league goals as Lambert, players like Berbatov cost the same amount of money but are on a lot higher wages and are a lot older. As far as I can see £6 million gets you either -

 

- young and unproven at this level with potential (Benteke, Jay Rod, Jordan Rhodes)

 

- more quality and experience, but older with higher wages (Berbatov, Pogrebnyak, Cisse)

 

- A proven Premier League goalscorer of a decent age like Fletcher costs you £12 million, or you make an error like Liverpool and buy Borini at that price.

 

We got a young English striker who was one of the best players in the Championship last year, for about £6 million. Seems a decent deal to me, to have got a striker as good as Lambert we would have had to have paid over twice the amount or got someone of Lamberts age. Essentially whoever we bought would be back up to Lambert, so buying someone like him either means that signing sits on the bench or we waste Lamberts talent as we generally are playing one striker, hence why we went young with potential who would probably be more happy playing second fiddle to Lambert.

 

What about Kevin Mirallas? Modibo Maiga? Dos Santos?

Edited 10 December, 2012 by Dibden Purlieu Saint

[Saint Charlie]

He wasn't even the best striker at Burnley FFS!!

 

He was. Austin has a good scoring record but not the allround game needed for the Prem. Will be interesting to see if any bids come in for him.

 

Re Mirrallas - he looks like a very good player.

 

Re Maiga - obviously scored a good goal vs us but yet to do anything consistently to show he is particularly great.

[Dibden Purlieu Saint]

He was. Austin has a good scoring record but not the allround game needed for the Prem. Will be interesting to see if any bids come in for him.

 

Re Mirrallas - he looks like a very good player.

 

Re Maiga - obviously scored a good goal vs us but yet to do anything else.

 

He's done more than JRod though...that's the point.

[Sour Mash]

Does Clyne look like a £1m player? Does Lambert for that matter?

 

I think we need to rise above using price tags as some kind of yardstick of current ability.

No, they look bargains. But on the basis we only have a finite amount of money to spend on players, the amount they cost versus how much we get out of them is relevant. Even more worrying that we've also spent £3m+ on Mayuka.

[Dibden Purlieu Saint]

Rodrigo Palacios was only £1.5m more ffs. For £7m you need more.

[pimpin4rizeal]

With jay rod the technique and composure doesnt seem there,

He kind of snatches at his shots instead of trying to place them,

I did think in the first 20 minutes of the game he looked energetic and pacy,but so far he hasnt contributed much for us at,all.

[Saint Charlie]

No, they look bargains. But on the basis we only have a finite amount of money to spend on players, the amount they cost versus how much we get out of them is relevant. Even more worrying that we've also spent £3m+ on Mayuka.

 

Mayuka is clearly talented, we are just being patient with him. Lambert is doing fine so not like we need to have Mayuka playing a lot at the moment.

 

He is only young, I doubt we brought him in to be a main starter this season.

[Saint Charlie]

With jay rod the technique and composure doesnt seem there,

He kind of snatches at his shots instead of trying to place them,

I did think in the first 20 minutes of the game he looked energetic and pacy,but so far he hasnt contributed much for us at,all.

 

Finish wrongly disallowed vs Newcastle had plenty of composure, as did the quality goal at SMS in the cup.

 

We will see more from him once he plays up front consistently which he won't at the moment unless RL gets injured.

[Sour Mash]

Mayuka is clearly talented, we are just being patient with him. Lambert is doing fine so not like we need to have Mayuka playing a lot at the moment.

 

He is only young, I doubt we brought him in to be a main starter this season.

Maybe. But the point is we've spent £10m+ on forwards with "potential" that haven't really delivered anything for us yet and we're nearly half way through the season.

[Minty]

But on the basis we only have a finite amount of money to spend on players, the amount they cost versus how much we get out of them is relevant. Even more worrying that we've also spent £3m+ on Mayuka.

It's only worrying if we have no more money to spend, and/or don't think that these players can step up and continue to improve (as pretty much the whole squad has since the season started, evidenced by the results). But my point still remains IMO... the price tag, and the current ability should not be intrinsically linked. You can only judge a price tag once a player LEAVES a club, and can objectively look back at what they contributed whilst at the club. It is far too early to be making judgements on Rodriguez IMO.

[Dibden Purlieu Saint]

Maybe. But the point is we've spent £10m+ on forwards with "potential" that haven't really delivered anything for us yet and we're nearly half way through the season.

 

I can't remember if it was Saint Charlie or S_Clarke who said that Rodriguez was a top 10 Premiership quality player in the Summer...

[Minty]

Maybe. But the point is we've spent £10m+ on forwards with "potential" that haven't really delivered anything for us yet and we're nearly half way through the season.

 

They're being kept out of the team by players in form. That's a great 'problem' to have in my book.

[Saint Charlie]

I can't remember if it was Saint Charlie or S_Clarke who said that Rodriguez was a top 10 Premiership quality player in the Summer...

 

Wasn't me - he isn't at the moment, but might end up being so.

[Sour Mash]

They're being kept out of the team by players in form. That's a great 'problem' to have in my book.

Not when you think what half that money could have bought us in terms of a decent keeper.

[Dibden Purlieu Saint]

Wasn't me - he isn't at the moment, but might end up being so.

 

Correct, was S-Clarke:

 

Not sure what you expect, we're being linked with Lens who is top half quality without a doubt.

 

Once Rodriguez, Clyne and Davis settle we will have 3 top 10 standard PL players in our team. All 3 of those are coups for a club of our current stature.

 

I'm looking at who WHU have bought and I can't see anyone of any note, Reading have kind of followed the same route as us but lesser quality. Teams like Wigan have done diddly squat.

 

Our business so far as been excellent, if you're not pleased with that then you're never going to be pleased.

[Dig Dig]

Not when you think what half that money could have bought us in terms of a decent keeper.

 

Agree, but the benefit of having players like Rodriguez and Mayuka will become apparent when we suffer injuries or loss of form to our starting 11.

 

Ultimately, I've never understood the "either or" mentality with our signings. I doubt we actively chose to sign strikers over GK's or defenders, just we were more successful in securing forward players.

[pimpin4rizeal]

Finish wrongly disallowed vs Newcastle had plenty of composure, as did the quality goal at SMS in the cup.

 

We will see more from him once he plays up front consistently which he won't at the moment unless RL gets injured.

 

Trouble is I think if lallana is injured ,we will go back to trying to fit him in again,

I do hope he comes good but I say what I see and so far he looks in a rush all the time and just trys to get his shot off as quick ad possible.

I think maybe hes a confidence player if I remember correctly he started slow for burnley then hit four in a cup game and didnt stop scoring after that

[tajjuk]

Well using Benteke as an example, he's shown what you can get for £7m, looks head and shoulders above Rodrigues.

 

Is this is a pun?, Looks like a big lump to me, 3 premiership goals isn't much considering he's started virtually every game for them and it's understandable that Bent is unhappy.

 

He wasn't even the best striker at Burnley FFS!!

 

Yes he was, Austin scores goals buts that about it and he's also about as slow as Lambert, we'll see if a Premiership club takes a gamble on him in January.

 

What about Kevin Mirallas? Modibo Maiga? Dos Santos?

 

Mirallas is a winger, Maiga is third choice striker for West Ham and cost about as much as Jay Rod did. The only dos Santox I think of is Giovanni who was a complete flop.

 

Someone above mentioned Connor Wickham as well who cost £12 million for Sunderland and he has only scored once for them.

 

Young british strikers don't come cheap

[Saint Charlie]

Trouble is I think if lallana is injured ,we will go back to trying to fit him in again,

I do hope he comes good but I say what I see and so far he looks in a rush all the time and just trys to get his shot off as quick ad possible.

I think maybe hes a confidence player if I remember correctly he started slow for burnley then hit four in a cup game and didnt stop scoring after that

 

Agree with the confidence bit.

 

Think how many starts JR has had in his favoured position in our first XI ie not in the cup.

 

I can only think of WH away, WBA away (both when the whole team was dire) and then Saturday. Thats three games. Surely we can only judge him after say 10/15 qames? Thats what I will be doing anyway.

[Sour Mash]

It's only worrying if we have no more money to spend, and/or don't think that these players can step up and continue to improve (as pretty much the whole squad has since the season started, evidenced by the results). But my point still remains IMO... the price tag, and the current ability should not be intrinsically linked. You can only judge a price tag once a player LEAVES a club, and can objectively look back at what they contributed whilst at the club. It is far too early to be making judgements on Rodriguez IMO.

No-one is saying they should be "intrinsically linked" but by your logic we can't consider Lambert a bargain as he hasn't left the club yet? And again, no-one is saying the club has "no more money to spend", but spending £10m on "potential" that we have got very little out of half a season in is relevant for a club our size that is a massive amount of money.

[Mowgli]

Maybe. But the point is we've spent £10m+ on forwards with "potential" that haven't really delivered anything for us yet and we're nearly half way through the season.

 

This sums it up for me. Fans want instant impact from new signnigs. The club are investing for the long haul. Its a bit pointless trying to prove each other right or wrong as to whether J Rod or Mayuka will eventually prove to be good signings. I have not seen enough of the latter to comment but J Rod stilll looks a good signing to me and a worthy successor to Lambert over the next couple of years. He just has to be patient. It's a very different Southampton to the one that existed a few years ago and most of our signings went straight into the team (ready or not!).

[Thedelldays]

No-one is saying they should be "intrinsically linked" but by your logic we can't consider Lambert a bargain as he hasn't left the club yet? And again, no-one is saying the club has "no more money to spend", but spending £10m on "potential" that we have got very little out of half a season in is relevant for a club our size that is a massive amount of money.

if reading had signed rodriguez and he did exactly for them what he has for us this season...we would conclude that they would have wasted their money.........hope he comes good...

[Dibden Purlieu Saint]

Not when you think what half that money could have bought us in terms of a decent keeper.

 

You didn't seem to mind in the Summer to be fair...

 

But we haven't signed a CB or RW yet, so how can you be unhappy with quality of our signings. Would agree that we should get a bit of a shift on with getting in a quality CB, as they take a while to settle, but that wasn't your original point. Probably agree re Keepers, but not massively bothered about having Davis instead of Gordon or McGregor. Who would you have rather we bought than Clyne, S Davis and Rodriquez?

[Minty]

Not when you think what half that money could have bought us in terms of a decent keeper.

 

Well, I think that brings us back to the same points made when the transfer window was open: Why does buying Rodriguez mean we didn't buy someone else? How did one transfer prevent another? How do we know it was one or the other?

 

We simply don't know. It's pure conjecture. All we can do is discuss the relative merits of those who were bought, and I for one think Rodriguez has potential and look forward to seeing him play more and grow. Some can't see the potential, some wanted someone who would make an instant impact, each to their own.

[Sour Mash]

You didn't seem to mind in the Summer to be fair...

Yeah, I expected more out of Rodriguez and thought Davis would be be a match for having either Gordon or McGregor, I'm not sure what your point is?

[Minty]

No-one is saying they should be "intrinsically linked" but by your logic we can't consider Lambert a bargain as he hasn't left the club yet? And again, no-one is saying the club has "no more money to spend", but spending £10m on "potential" that we have got very little out of half a season in is relevant for a club our size that is a massive amount of money.

 

The way I see it is that over time, players contribute to the clubs success... so perhaps my wording was wrong, but just because Rodriguez has not yet done so, does not mean he won't. Clearly Lambert has done so, but it *could* be the case that over the next few years, we start to play him too much and he starts to lose his way and cost us points... unlikely I know, but technically possible. But he has obviously contributed a huge amount to our progress since his arrival.

 

I would also add that the club are clearly very forward thinking... they had a 5-year plan to get into the Prem and I have no doubt that Rodriguez signing was made with the next 5 years in mind, not just the current season. I think they are looking at a longer-term replacement for Lambert and felt the investment NOW, will be returned in the future. We shall see. I have faith in him.

[The Kraken]

I listed the options that went this summer, players like Fletcher cost twice the price and he has scored as many league goals as Lambert, players like Berbatov cost the same amount of money but are on a lot higher wages and are a lot older. As far as I can see £6 million gets you either -

 

- young and unproven at this level with potential (Benteke, Jay Rod, Jordan Rhodes)

 

- more quality and experience, but older with higher wages (Berbatov, Pogrebnyak, Cisse)

 

- A proven Premier League goalscorer of a decent age like Fletcher costs you £12 million, or you make an error like Liverpool and buy Borini at that price.

 

We got a young English striker who was one of the best players in the Championship last year, for about £6 million. Seems a decent deal to me, to have got a striker as good as Lambert we would have had to have paid over twice the amount or got someone of Lamberts age. Essentially whoever we bought would be back up to Lambert, so buying someone like him either means that signing sits on the bench or we waste Lamberts talent as we generally are playing one striker, hence why we went young with potential who would probably be more happy playing second fiddle to Lambert.

 

I still don't think you're getting my point. This is not a question of whether Rodriguez is one for the future; we know that's what he's seen as. But for the money that we spent we could have had any of the players that I listed, all of whom I'd prefer to Rodriguez right now as I believe they would all challenge Lambert for the starting role or make a case to play alongside him. Rodriguez may be one for the future (it's debatable) but he's doing neither of those right now; he is an understudy and that's all. So, just to repeat myself (again) if we were going to spend £7M on a striker then I think our priority at that point in time and (if only for this season) should have been to bring in someone who can challenge right now, rather than in seasons down the line. As I said to Swedish Dave; if Rodriguez had cost £1M or £2M then its an irrelevant converstion, he's well worth the gamble. At the price he was I think it was the wrong gamble at that point in time. If Lambert gets injured then I simply don't think we as a side would have the necessary quality to just replace him with Rodriguez; our side wouldn't be good enough. If Lambert doesn't get injured then we'll have maybe gotten a tiny bit lucky.

[Dibden Purlieu Saint]

Is this is a pun?, Looks like a big lump to me, 3 premiership goals isn't much considering he's started virtually every game for them and it's understandable that Bent is unhappy.

 

 

 

Yes he was, Austin scores goals buts that about it and he's also about as slow as Lambert, we'll see if a Premiership club takes a gamble on him in January.

 

 

 

Mirallas is a winger, Maiga is third choice striker for West Ham and cost about as much as Jay Rod did. The only dos Santox I think of is Giovanni who was a complete flop.

 

Someone above mentioned Connor Wickham as well who cost £12 million for Sunderland and he has only scored once for them.

 

Young british strikers don't come cheap

 

That doesn't mean it's worth spending the money though, Wickham is poor?! Why not buy a better value player from abroad.

 

Dos Santos was a flop for Spurs. So what? Torres has been a flop at Chelsea but I'd still take him.

 

Mirallas isn't a winger, otherwise I am pretty sure he would've attracted a bit more attention scoring 20 goals from 34 appearances (20 in 25 in the League) for Olympiakos last season. This sounds like another Michu discussion to me where a player only plays in the position they last occupied (Downing being a LB for instance).

[Sour Mash]

Well, I think that brings us back to the same points made when the transfer window was open: Why does buying Rodriguez mean we didn't buy someone else? How did one transfer prevent another? How do we know it was one or the other?

 

We simply don't know. It's pure conjecture. All we can do is discuss the relative merits of those who were bought, and I for one think Rodriguez has potential and look forward to seeing him play more and grow. Some can't see the potential, some wanted someone who would make an instant impact, each to their own.

Exactly, we don't know. All that we do know is we sent £10m+ on two strikers we've hadly used, haven't managed to secure a first class keeper and are probably still in need of another CB - that's all we know, so that's all we can go on. I don't think Rodriguez is an out and out bad player, but can I see him going on to be a real threat in the Prem? No. Hopefully I'm proved wrong.

[Dibden Purlieu Saint]

Yeah, I expected more out of Rodriguez and thought Davis would be be a match for having either Gordon or McGregor, I'm not sure what your point is?

 

That you're criticising the way we spent our money yet in the Summer you were more than happy with the way it was spent. Can't really criticise the club for making the same mistake you have?

[Minty]

This debate is also difficult when we don't know what our budget was/is... some are talking as though we have little or no more money to spend, but the club obviously were happy to spend that amount on him and were still chasing other players (according to Adkins at the time).

 

I do accept that we could have bought other players for similar money who would've had more impact than Rodriguez... Michu currently looks to be the best value signing of the summer IMO, and I would've loved to have got him. But as things are, with the formations we've played and other players in form, I think it's a touch harsh to be too critical of the Rodriguez signing.

[The Kraken]

Well, I think that brings us back to the same points made when the transfer window was open: Why does buying Rodriguez mean we didn't buy someone else? How did one transfer prevent another? How do we know it was one or the other?

 

We simply don't know. It's pure conjecture. All we can do is discuss the relative merits of those who were bought, and I for one think Rodriguez has potential and look forward to seeing him play more and grow. Some can't see the potential, some wanted someone who would make an instant impact, each to their own.

 

And there it is. You either believe that Rodriguez was a little bit of a gamble but will be worth it in a year, two years or further down the line. Or you believe that we should have gone for someone who could have made an impact right now. It is completely each to their own; there isn't necessarily a right answer either way (and won't be until we can look back on Rodriguez's career and see what he develops into).

[Dibden Purlieu Saint]

Wasn't me - he isn't at the moment, but might end up being so.

 

A CB of the same level as Rodriguez would be the type of quality you were looking for though...

 

I meant if we signed a CB and a winger that I felt were as good signings as Clyne and Jay Rod then I would feel they had the right sort of quality that we need. Not sure they necessarily need top level experience but agree we need some pace in the team - IMO the key reason we signed Clyne.

[Sour Mash]

That you're criticising the way we spent our money yet in the Summer you were more than happy with the way it was spent. Can't really criticise the club for making the same mistake you have?

What? Of course I can. I'm not paid to run and manage our football club am I.

[S-Clarke]

Correct, was S-Clarke:

 

What's your point? It still stands. Once he's settled I believe he can be. Not sure why people are criticized and brought up for being positive about a player.

 

Hey, sod it, they're all a load of ****, we've wasted ****ing millions on a cart horse. Adkins out, useless ****.

 

There, sorted.