Eddie Howe

[The College Dropout]

11 minutes ago, Keegans Export said:

Absolutely.

 

Our transfer strategy last summer I thought was fairly clear - we wanted depth, ideally 2 players per position, to allow us to keep up the high-intensity from the previous season that saw us finish fourth. Unfortunately our new star CM missed near enough the whole season, our new LW likewise, the injuries started to pile up and that concept ultimately failed. I don't think we signed players like Livramento and Barnes specifically as backups, I think we/Howe wanted to be able to alternate Tripper/Livramento, Willock/Joelinton, Barnes/Gordon, Isak/Wilson etc to ease the workload. 

 

That doesn't explain why we didn't pick up a RW at that point. I assume the players we really liked weren't available at a price we were willing to stretch to and Howe thought that Almiron/Murphy and potentially Gordon was enough cover at RW?

What doesn’t make sense is that Livramento and Hall barely got any minutes from the start. 
 

Barnes was signed to compete with Gordon. That’s a lot of money tied up in one position. Everywhere else we had some quality in depth (RB, CM, ST) one of the players wouldn’t have a crazy high FFP cost. 

[The Prophet]

42 minutes ago, The College Dropout said:

Gordon was bought with the intention of becoming our LW.  Are you suggesting the club doubted Gordon after 6 months?

 

We signed Barnes knowing either him or Gordon would sit on the bench. Thats still a £10m+ bench player.  

 

What we did with Barnes is the equivalent of us going out and spending £30m on a left back because Hall hasn’t cemented the position. 
 

Barnes/Gordon are working exactly as planned. Quality LW options. It’s just not good squad planning considering our FFP position.  

 

I'm not sure he was. At Everton he played a lot of his football on the right. The season before last he'd played RW, LW and CM for us, then played as a striker in the U21 Euros. I think he was brought in as a versatile forward and wasn't brought in to fill a specific position.

[The College Dropout]

1 hour ago, Holmesy said:

The signing of Barnes over a quality right winger was the only signing that on the face of it looked a bit shortsighted. II'm sure he'll turn out to be a worthwhile signing, but it was clear our right side wasn't strong enough at the time, and that remains our biggest issue even now. So, why double up on the left when we had so many others who can play there?

We're like a Ferrari with a space-saver wheel on the front driver's side (Unless Dan Burn plays LB, in which case we've got a space-saver wheel on the front right and a monster truck one on the back left).

I think the Hall transfer was perhaps too longsighted.  We needed someone to come in for Burn straight away. 
 

massive fan of Hall tbf. 

[Holmesy]

19 minutes ago, The College Dropout said:

I think the Hall transfer was perhaps too longsighted.  We needed someone to come in for Burn straight away. 
 

massive fan of Hall tbf. 

I couldn't agree more. The Burn debacle last season had me tearing my hair out and genuinely doubting EH and JT, especially after Livra had deputised their so competently.

Given how calamitous it was at times, I would have fielded a non-ready Hall over a clearly-not-working Dan Burn.
Anyway, hopefully we won't have to endure it ever again.

But yeah, again, when you look at the Barnes signing, the Hall signing and I guess you have to look at Tonali as well, it doesn't shine a great light on the recruitment effort. I think all will turn out to be excellent signings but we were gearing up for a CL campaign and that window doesn't scream "joined up thinking"

 

 

Edited July 23 by Holmesy

[80]

1 hour ago, Holmesy said:

To be honest, i'm not sure why I even get involved in these convos because I have the memory of a fish and don't retain details about anything, especially dates  
But I maintain we should definitely have signed a right winger regardless of the timelines.

I genuinely respect the humility.

 

And I agree about the RW, it was the most glaring gap going into last summer so it was odd and disappointing not to get anything there. But not totally unacceptable - I could understand if we couldn't get the right player.

 

Which makes the Minteh thing so frustrating as he sounds like the player Eddie would grow in a test tube if he could...

[80]

1 hour ago, The College Dropout said:

What doesn’t make sense is that Livramento and Hall barely got any minutes from the start. 
 

Barnes was signed to compete with Gordon. That’s a lot of money tied up in one position. Everywhere else we had some quality in depth (RB, CM, ST) one of the players wouldn’t have a crazy high FFP cost. 

Yes, I'd also assumed the plan was to go into last season almost with two competing first XIs. High rotation and interchangeability leading to high energy and consistency across competitions. So it was a bit weird when that never really happened and, consequently, the fatigue racked up. 

 

You said earlier about us apparently wanting to pivot this year to signing clear first choices, which sounds like a good idea to me. What's interesting is, really, it was last summer that was the pivot, away from firm first teamers like Isak, Botman and Trippier - while still spending big sums. I'd be interested to know how we ended up in that position and who was responsible. Because it didn't seem like an Eddie thing to do.

 

 

Edited July 23 by 80

[Colos Short and Curlies]

38 minutes ago, The College Dropout said:

I think the Hall transfer was perhaps too longsighted.  We needed someone to come in for Burn straight away. 
 

massive fan of Hall tbf. 

 

We probably thought that Targett would be the one pushing/starting at LB tbf

[80]

1 minute ago, Colos Short and Curlies said:

 

We probably thought that Targett would be the one pushing/starting at LB tbf

Maybe, although his card already did seem to be marked by then. Eddie never seemed happy with him.

 

LB, from memory, seemed like our second highest priority after RW going into the summer.

[Lotus]

Tbh, I doubt any of our staff thought Gordon would come on the leaps and bounds he did so quickly. They may have also felt he could do a bit more through the middle if Barnes was to stick to the left. 
I’m guessing the type of RW we wanted just wasn’t available and they had the ASM money in the pocket and decided to put it on a guy whose returns have always been good. 
Should something have happened to Gordon and not Barnes the HB transfer could’ve looked very handsome straight off the bat. 

[Gallowgate Toon]

The few times we've used it, BIG looked pretty dynamic to me. Even with a new RW, I hope we see it more.

[The College Dropout]

53 minutes ago, Colos Short and Curlies said:

 

We probably thought that Targett would be the one pushing/starting at LB tbf

Doubt it. He barely got a look in when fit the previous season.  

 

57 minutes ago, 80 said:

Yes, I'd also assumed the plan was to go into last season almost with two competing first XIs. High rotation and interchangeability leading to high energy and consistency across competitions. So it was a bit weird when that never really happened and, consequently, the fatigue racked up. 

 

You said earlier about us apparently wanting to pivot this year to signing clear first choices, which sounds like a good idea to me. What's interesting is, really, it was last summer that was the pivot, away from firm first teamers like Isak, Botman and Trippier - while still spending big sums. I'd be interested to know how we ended up in that position and who was responsible. Because it didn't seem like an Eddie thing to do.

 

 

 

‘Lack of joined up thinking’. We needed a bigger squad for Europe so we went and got good players for positions we already had good players in. But seemingly Eddie wasn’t fully onboard or pivoted himself to mostly keep to a core of players.  Or we didn’t get players experienced enough for rotation.  
 

He was happy to rotate Barnes/Gordon, Longstaff/Tonali, Wilson/Isak but that’s it. Trippier and Burn were first choice, Livra, Hall, Targett backup.  
 

We needed a LB for the season but we signed an LB for the future.  
 

I think we relied too much on opportunistic transfers. Rather than a great profile match.  We wouldn’t sign a 19 year old LB ideally but Hall was available so we got him. We liked Barnes at the fee, knew Leicester would be willing sellers - let’s get him in.  Trippier might be outright #1 for Howe but Livra is too good to pass on, another £35m.  
 

It’s only Tonali where he was the exact profile and player we wanted for the first team. Which is why he was the only one straight into the XI. Barnes got some minutes regularly when fit even if off the bench. The other 2 though……

 

 

Edited July 23 by The College Dropout

[Ikon]

Not a great source but Harry Redknap has said that he’s heard that The FA will approach Nufc and EH and he thinks he both should and will take it. 
 

I don’t want it to happen but IF it’s gonna happen then asap please. Would be gutted but not the end of the world. Club is more important than one man. We move on. 

 

 

Edited July 23 by Ikon

[The Prophet]

Just now, Ikon said:

Not a great source but Harry Redknap has said that he’s heard that The FA will approach Nudc and EH and he thinks he will take it. 

 

Thankfully he probably knows about as much as we do.

[Ikon]

4 minutes ago, The Prophet said:

 

Thankfully he probably knows about as much as we do.

Yeah probably. Maybe not. 
 

Not because of the source, but I still don’t find it impossible to happen. 

 

 

Edited July 23 by Ikon

[Menace]

Harry Redknapp can never shut his crusty gob can he

[Ikon]

1 minute ago, Menace said:

Harry Redknapp can never shut his crusty gob can he

Yeah I don’t like the old cunt. 

[Kanji]

I could see Howe playing Barnes Isak and Gordon as our front 3 the first match of the season irrespective of who we sign to play RW. Assuming Barnes will be playing a ton of minutes this preseason and Gordon’s versatility will push him there. 

[Holmesy]

38 minutes ago, Ikon said:

Not a great source but Harry Redknap has said that he’s heard that The FA will approach Nufc and EH and he thinks he both should and will take it. 
 

I don’t want it to happen but IF it’s gonna happen then asap please. Would be gutted but not the end of the world. Club is more important than one man. We move on. 

 

 

 

Yeah, sooner rather than later is the key. There are some impressive managers out of work with good PL track records, so it wouldn't be the end of the world but it would be a real shame

[The Prophet]

While Harry has Howe on the blower, can he ask him who our right wing target is?

[80]

35 minutes ago, The College Dropout said:

I think we relied too much on opportunistic transfers. Rather than a great profile match.  We wouldn’t sign a 19 year old LB ideally but Hall was available so we got him. We liked Barnes at the fee, knew Leicester would be willing sellers - let’s get him in.  Trippier might be outright #1 for Howe but Livra is too good to pass on, another £35m.  

 

It’s only Tonali where he was the exact profile and player we wanted for the first team. Which is why he was the only one straight into the XI. Barnes got some minutes regularly when fit even if off the bench. The other 2 though……

 

 

 

Yeah, it does seem as though there was a big focus on buying value. Which is a nice enough idea, but maybe wasn't right at the time.

 

I say 'maybe' as I think I'm right in saying that even if we'd signed literally no one last summer, we'd have still required at least one major sale before the PSR deadline. So there was a solid argument for continuing the momentum and increasing the overall potential value of the squad for future windows - as worked out so well with the Minteh signing, who covered the summer on his own.

[nufc123]

38 minutes ago, Kanji said:

I could see Howe playing Barnes Isak and Gordon as our front 3 the first match of the season irrespective of who we sign to play RW. Assuming Barnes will be playing a ton of minutes this preseason and Gordon’s versatility will push him there. 

Gordon Isak Murphy probably.

[Ben]

55 minutes ago, Ikon said:

Not a great source but Harry Redknap has said that he’s heard that The FA will approach Nufc and EH and he thinks he both should and will take it. 
 

I don’t want it to happen but IF it’s gonna happen then asap please. Would be gutted but not the end of the world. Club is more important than one man. We move on. 

 

 

 

 

If that was Talksport I heard that as well, the same channel had a numpty presenter on this morning saying he's heard Potter is nailed on for it. 

[The College Dropout]

15 minutes ago, 80 said:

Yeah, it does seem as though there was a big focus on buying value. Which is a nice enough idea, but maybe wasn't right at the time.

 

I say 'maybe' as I think I'm right in saying that even if we'd signed literally no one last summer, we'd have still required at least one major sale before the PSR deadline. So there was a solid argument for continuing the momentum and increasing the overall potential value of the squad for future windows - as worked out so well with the Minteh signing, who covered the summer on his own.

It’s become apparent that Minteh didn’t cover the PSR shortfall though. 
 

we added about 40m euros to our amortisation costs at a crude guesstimate in that window.  Excluding Hall.  
 

But you are right we obviously needed to strengthen. But did we strengthen wisely considering the challenges and expectations?

47 minutes ago, Kanji said:

I could see Howe playing Barnes Isak and Gordon as our front 3 the first match of the season irrespective of who we sign to play RW. Assuming Barnes will be playing a ton of minutes this preseason and Gordon’s versatility will push him there. 

I assumed this last season. And it just didn’t materialise regularly. 

[Jaqen]

Think we make Europe last season if Barnes didn't pick up that freak injury. That signing attracts up a weird amount of criticism.

 

I think the plan was always to have Tonali as our 'purple' that window and go big on a RW this summer. 

[80]

20 minutes ago, The College Dropout said:

It’s become apparent that Minteh didn’t cover the PSR shortfall though. 
 

we added about 40m euros to our amortisation costs at a crude guesstimate in that window.  Excluding Hall.  
 

But you are right we obviously needed to strengthen. But did we strengthen wisely considering the challenges and expectations?

No, I'm not saying Minteh covered the shortfall we ended up with, but - off my memory and a fag packet - he would've covered the shortfall we STILL would've had even if we'd spent zero last summer and not got Livramento and co. We still had debts to cover from Gordon, Isak, Bruno et al.

 

So, in a rough sense, we've swapped Elliot Anderson for Livramento, Barnes, Tonali and Minteh (Mr Walking Debt Reduction). Excluding Hall who we've only just bought, of course. 

 

On paper, that doesn't look like bad business, to be fair. It's potentially hugely inflated the amount of realisable PSR value in our squad - in 3 or 4 years' time they might still be worth £150m-200m to us, rather than zero if we'd invested nothing last summer (the Ashley trap). It's fair to call it into question though, particularly in retrospect (can't help but feel we might not be having this conversation had Tonali not been a gambler).

 

My numbers might be a bit off as it's a few weeks since I thought about it, but you get the gist.