macphisto

I don't understand people using the example of nearly selling Gordon to illustrate how our strategy wasn't fit for purpose. It was the very same strategy that lead to us buying Gordan in the first place.

People are overestimating City's domination due to money. Obviously played a big part but Pep is the reason for their success. Interesting to see what happens when he leaves.

When did Howe say that?

A good manager calls a spade a spade behind closed doors. He'd also recognise that the previous people in charge, Staveley & Ghodoussi, were inexperienced and if any mistakes were made then they were made in what they believed was the best insterests of the club at that time. He should also know that without the same people he criticised he wouldn't even be at the club as we'd still be owned by Ashley.

It's basic management 101 at any organisation to not openly criticise people still at the club. There is nothing to gain from it other than getting people's backs up; people you have to work with. All he had to say was that they've recruited well but there's always room for improvement or even say we have to be even smarter in our recruitment as the the FFP rules are directly aimed at Newcastle to create a siege mentality at the club to pull every one together.

Have to disagree, a team that doesn't win anything over 3-4 years can not be considered a top team. With regards to the pen, you can say they were unlucky, just like you could say they were lucky to beat Ajax but over a 3-4 year period luck does not come into it. Even if we want to use Spurs as an example, they weren't a threat before the period we are talking about, never won anything at their best, and are now pretty much what they were previously. That is the best you can do through organic growth. You'll have some good and bad years but never be a real threat. Only thing that might change them in the long term is their stadium. One other thing about quoting Spurs and Liverpool when they sold Coutinho. Is that route possible now? A lot of those transfers happened when Madrid, Barcelona and PSG were spending crazy money. A completely different landscape now, would we be happy selling our best players to other PL teams?

What I'm saying is that organic growth to achieve the stated aims of our owners is not possible. PIF will need to either pump money into the club or abandon what they said they were going to do. We are no where near spending what we can as third-party deals are allowed, we're just choosing not to use them. One thing about bending FFP rules, was Odysseas Vlachodimos not an example of what we can do when we really want to? I know that's player trading but I'm sure if we applied the same spirit to commercial deals that we'd be a lot better off. If PIF do not invest significant sums then the other option to me is not organic growth but rather hovering in mid-table/possibly threatening a Champions League place if the stars align every now and again. I can accept this scenario, as that's the way the PL works, but PIF should be a little more clear in what they say and not raise people's expectations.

No there's not, look at the list of winners for the League and Cups, it's pretty much been the same four/five teams for a long time now. Regarding Spurs, so the best team we can come up with as an example of organic growth is Spurs who came close but never won anything. You could argue they are now reverting back to their traditional position of just above mid-table but never threatening the very top of the table.

OK, so my original point still stands that no team has competed at the top through organic growth because in the example of Spurs they weren't even trying to compete for trophies or leagues. I'm not trying to be a dick, but look back at the history of the PL league and any teams trying to seriously overhaul the status quo: Blackburn Leeds (briefly under Ridsdale) Newcastle Chelsea Man City They all chucked money in at the beginning to get going, you can't get away from it. An initial big investment is the only way to get anywhere if you truly want to challenge at the top of the table.

Liverpool was not organic growth, yes they traded well in recent years to get over the line and win European Cups and the League but they never went more than a few years without winning a trophy, appearing in cup finals or Champions League football. Due to their history since Shankley they have world wide support and significant commercial income; they didn't go from mid table or lower obscurity like the journey we have to make. There was even talk on here, when discussing FFP, that Liverpool's position is down to the money the Moore family initially put into Liverpool in the 70's. What did Spurs win during that period? At best you could say it allowed them to hang onto the coattails of the top 5 with a few Champions League campaigns. That's not the stated aims of our owners. Were Spurs ever serious contenders for the title during that time?

All this talk of sustainable, organic growth and buying youngsters is a pipedream. Which club has ever done that and stayed at the top for any length of time? The last possible team would be Forrest under Clough and even then did they challenge much for the league after they won it? Yes, there is a place for unknowns and young players but we still need to splash the cash on big buys if we ever want to get remotely close to the self-declared aims of the owners.

Does that mean much as we've been mostly terrible during the Ashley years?

OK. If you want to believe that, even with money, it's difficult strengthen a team that failed to qualify for Europe and by consensus has a few key areas to improve then fair enough. That's not my view, with a decent scouting network it would not be difficult to significantly improve our team. I don't know what the teams that finished above us were thinking. I'm not too bothered what Howe says in regards to the transfer window as he obviously has to put a positive spin on it but look at the actions of the club. With regards to targets the club was very flexible in terms on CBs, we went from Tosin to Guehi.

If PIF are happy with Eales then I can only imagine he's taking the heat as PIF either didn't want to spend money or our FFP situation is much worse than we think. If we had money then there's no way Eales would still be in his role. If the reports are true then we went from Tosin, a free transfer, to Guehi for £60+million. Not getting a CB in between those values or a RW is just incredulous and insults our intelligence if the money was there. Only thing that makes sense is if the Guehi saga was a cack-handed way to hide the fact money was not there and say we tried to improve.

Is it not widely accepted that PIF sign-off all our deals? That's significant involvement.

For anyone worried about one of Isak, Bruno and Gordon leaving. Is that not now the only way forward? Sellng a top player every now and again for the benefit of the whole? I'd be gutted but would have understood selling Gordon if that meant we had invested across the first team.

Watershed transfer window, comparable to when we sold Andy Carroll. When I say comparable, in the sense that we can see the true intentions of the owners. PIF will not run the club anything like Ashley but at the same time we'll be equally as far away from being the next Man City. From now on it's going to just be about mid-table and possibly a lower European place every now and again. Since we signed Gordon, we have only added one first team player in Tonali, possibly Livramento too now. Do you really think PIF would accept that if they really wanted to achieve their stated goals, particularly when there are so many positions we could improve?

I'm almost at the point where I wonder if PIF like these rules being in place as they don't have to spend huge amounts of money and they don't lose face by not competing at the top of the table.

Is that not the wrong way around? Should it not be consistently compete at the top end of the table to lift our profile? We'll only consistently compete through large investment, there's no other way.

I don't really know the purpose of the Commercial Team? We all know that to grow initially we'll need inflated deals by PIF-related companies like Man City did in the past That's the whole rationale when people on here complain about the related-parties FFP rules. It's only when we're established at the top of the table that we'll be able to switch to real sponsors willing to pay for big deals. Maybe the Commercial Team is in place now for when we get to that stage? I might sound harsh but all our major sponsors are Saudi companies that would have literally taken one call from someone at PIF to put in place. I even wouldn't be surprised if our Adidas deal isn't somehow indirectly linked to Adidas sponsoring most Saudi League teams now (favour for a favour). Their only "notable" achievement is the Stack.

Am I reading these figures correctly? Saudi League 23/24 Transfer expenses: €977,388,774 Expenditures per club: €54,299,376 Saudi League 24/25 Transfer expenses: €255,847,028 Expenditures per club: €14,213,724 I know the league received large investment as a startup, but I wonder if the reduction in investment above and our summer window are a sign of PIF pulling back on their investment in football? Maybe moving the funds to the World Cup? Worth noting that the Saudi government are cutting costs in general across the board.

We will not grow substantially as a club without initial investment well above current levels. Won't happen. why would sponsors put more money into what is essentially a mid-table club?

Surely PIF should be the top thread? Big questions have to be asked about the direction of the club? We claim to want to be number one and yet all the evidence is saying otherwise now. Infrastructure: No movement on new training ground or stadium. They've had all of this time plus the time it took for the deal to buy the club to go through. Newcastle is a small city, not difficult to have at least found a location for the new training ground. No FFP considerations holding them back. Income: There are significant revenue streams that they haven't exploited to get more money into the club even accounting for related-party transactions. Compare to Chelsea exploiting every loophole and their revenue is already much greater than what our revenue is. I'm not saying we should be like Chelsea but PIF could have found ways to put much more money into the club within the current rules. This transfer window. Like under Ashley, the owner drives the club. Do you really think that if PIF wanted to make the club number one that they'd let Mitchell or Howe dictate our transfer policy like this where we've signed no one and it's arguable that the squad is weaker? Wouldn't happen. If money is so tight that we could only buy a CB then they could have got a Saudi club to buy a player for more FFP room as a last resort to boost funds. You can make valid arguments against each area but when looked at as a whole then it speaks volumes. This window reflects a change of priorities for PIF, maybe the Saudi League or World Cup are now their main priorities in regards to football. Going forward, I expect we'll be a well run club bouncing between mid-table and the lower European places; nothing like what we all envisaged when PIF took over.

In isolation, you can take this summer but if it was to stay as it is then that would be three transfer windows where we haven't improved the 1st eleven. You could argue Tonali is an improvement but he was up and down in the limited time we saw him and being an Italian international doesn't mean too much these days so the jury's still very much out on him. Lets see what the next few days throw up.

It depends what your aims are? Apart from Leicester, nearly every team that has won a trophy has paid through the nose for players. At some point you need to take that leap or else you just plateau and won't win anything. Yes, you can find bargains but you can't do that across the whole team. A good example of the mix you should aim for is say Ferdinand & Vidic with regards to transfer fees.