The College Dropout

Agreed. Ideally selling deadwood. Last year we sold useful squad members but both slightly on the periphery, older and on big wages. This year it’s still older players but pretty key ones. For us it’s all FFP driven. The sales don’t help us on the pitch for the remainder of the season. The logic is that it allows us to rebuild stronger for the following season and long term. Makes perfect sense. But carries risks.

Agreed. If we sell we won’t sign a replacement until summer. We have form. Shelvey would’ve played a fair amount had we kept him. And by January neither Wilson or Isak had been fit at the same time. Wood was getting regular minutes starting or off the bench.

I’ve not said that’s incompetent. You are using the word ‘gamble’. I believe the leadership thought they had invested enough into the squad to be able to do well enough in the CL/Europe and qualify for some type of European football again. *Typically* in football you get what you invest. They invested and planned for 7th ish. We invested heavily in the summer - and most of that money hasn’t added value on the pitch. I don’t understand why we would finish 4th then invest and plan for an 8th place finish outside of Europe. That the alternative you’re suggesting. Again, THE CEO THINKS EUROPE IS A REALISTIC AIM. He would only think it’s realistic if the club have planned to finish in Europe. And if we don’t get it. It’s not the end of the world. We’ll trade. You’re panicking and accusing me of weird things. By all reports we are close to the FFP limits. If we under achieve this season in the league (and yes outside Europe will be an underachievement) we’ll have to trade more than is ideal.

West Ham finished 7th the season after they first qualified for Europe btw. They finished 6th yhen 7th, then Moyes spent 4 months trying to evolve the style of play and ruined their season. January is only an optimal time to sell key players if you desperately need the money. We desperately needed the money for Shelvey and Wood - they were both useful squad members but the money was too good to turn down. Neither Wilson or Trippier will fetch more than £20m and both are key squad members. Any sale for either will be FFP driven. Im not taking player sales as a sign of incompetence as you are. We’ll have to sell really good players sooner or later. We will have to sell players because of FFP limits sooner or later.

The reports of needing a European finish came from decent sources in the summer. The books for the season don’t close until June. I don’t think anyone would’ve predicted we would’ve been 10th in the league come the end of Jan with a squad that doesn’t look capable of getting into Europe. Yes I am speculating. But listening to the CEO he has said - we will need to sell players eventually. And he specifically called out a European finish as being a good season about a week ago so that’s clearly a target. And there seems to be something in the rumours that we are open to sell some fairly key players. It must be close to 40 goal contributions from Wilson and Tripps over the last 18 months.

Linear is a straight line. Finishing 4th then 7th isn’t linear success. It’s a regression. Without that investment we don’t give Howe a fair chance at succeeding. They are not risking a points deduction. If we don’t get Europe, then we sell players to balance the books.

What you’re saying doesn’t make sense. If we have a squad good enough for 7th on paper, why wouldn’t they gamble on finishing 7th? That’s still a regression - just a reasonable one.

We should’ve had a squad good enough to qualify for the conference league like.

I wonder if the club are right up against it FFP wise? I remember in thr summer there was speculation that our spending meant we had to qualify for Europe again next season in some capacity. With how things have panned out plus the Joelinton injury we may have to sell to fund transfers to get us into Europe or sell just to be ffp compliant in any case.

Twitter ITKs saying Wilson and Trippier moves encouraged by players side.

I thought he was Real Madrid bound. He coached one of their youth teams. But Real have given Carlo an extension.

Aye. It’s getting far too much traction in the media. Maybe they are just story starved but something about this feels serious.

Aye it’s the same thing. Neither are fouls imo.

They would hope to go after their own Iraola tbf. Just something to evolve it with intention. I like O’Neill but in that circumstance it’s reactive.

Parish has no ambitious vision. He might sack Roy but he’ll not bring in anyone progressive.

Lost a lot of respect for Parish when he went on the Shearer and Lineker pod. Dude has zero ambition beyond PL survival. It’s a bit like us. The issue isn’t that they aren’t more successful. The issue is that they don’t even try.

Aye. They play the slowest football the PL has ever seen. And Pep rotates.

They won’t pay a fee for him. His wages are pretty high and he has no resale value.

Young players need to play competitive football. They won’t improve by being a permanent sub.

In terms of eloquence he's #1 British pundit. He sounds intelligent and it's not a posh accent (far from it).

Pizza Rob is on the money. Even when he’s wrong - he’s kind of right. I think he said Schar wouldn’t start one game. Schar did start but went off after like 13 minutes. People take things too literally. Things do change.

At some point we will need to sell players to PSR fund further signings. You might not like it but that will happen eventually. We need Europe to increase revenue directly (match day, prize money) and allows for more lucrative sponsorship deals. Both increase spending power in the transfer market. Without it - we have to sell even more players to fund squad investment. IMO if we don’t make Europe - we’ll 100% sell a star player. The odds of selling stars decreases with more success we have in the pitch. Just like any other team. Other European comps aren’t as demanding on a squad as CL and if Howe is going to last he’s going to have to adapt to it or else someone else will.

Eales wants European football next season. He must be thick as fuck.

Lads we picked up on free transfers will be on a good wedge. Ashley paid the football squad v. decent wages. He'd rather pay good wages for proven PL players than big fees for new signings.

Onana? If we sign him, I don't know what Amadou. Seriously though - the profile of player we have been linked too recently are Howe-ball specialists. I think Onana is a Howe signing for sure. At least it seems his job is safe. Personally - I don't like the idea of signing so many players that are specific to a manager's profile atp.