Signings: The Howe Era

[Kid Icarus]

5 minutes ago, LFEE said:

You mean without doing due diligence? 

That's one way to view it yeah.  On the other hand, he created a smokescreen (Barella) and stole a march on any other potential clubs getting in there, no leaks, and done within 2 days at a good price.

 

Compare and contrast with the endless leaks, tip offs to other clubs and inability to get anything done in the summer gone.

[LFEE]

Just now, Kid Icarus said:

That's one way to view it yeah.  On the other hand, he created a smokescreen (Barella) and stole a march on any other potential clubs getting in there, no leaks, and done within 2 days at a good price.

 

Compare and contrast with the endless leaks, tip offs to other clubs and inability to get anything done in the summer gone.

It certainly is 

 

Last summer was a tough one to fairly judge as we were going for more players so there was a lot of noise especially with Isak’s agent no doubt causing a lot of it. Agents do talk.

 

Could argue Woltemade was similar to Tonali no? Possibly the same lack of due diligence also 

[Nucasol]

2 hours ago, Heron said:

Evidence of Howe's alleged poor performance.

In terms of signings, his time with us or this season? No “alleged” about this season, we’ve been poor in the PL, both points wise and on the eye. He’s been fantastic for us but no need to try and spin this season as anything but a significant regression on the pitch.

[Heron]

5 minutes ago, Nucasol said:

In terms of signings, his time with us or this season? No “alleged” about this season, we’ve been poor in the PL, both points wise and on the eye. He’s been fantastic for us but no need to try and spin this season as anything but a significant regression on the pitch.

Well overall I guess. The criticisms I've mentioned in here span across Howes whole tenure (claims he cannot work with a DoF, that his signings are shite, etc.). It is alleged because the root cause of the issues is to be determined. That's why I'm attempting to break the discussion down rather than us all regurgitate the exact same conversations on repeat after every game. I'm trying to split off some of the critiques for further analysis rather than blanket statements back and forth.

[Kid Icarus]

1 hour ago, LFEE said:

It certainly is 

 

Last summer was a tough one to fairly judge as we were going for more players so there was a lot of noise especially with Isak’s agent no doubt causing a lot of it. Agents do talk.

 

Could argue Woltemade was similar to Tonali no? Possibly the same lack of due diligence also 

I think with Woltemade it was maybe more a case of us paying way above what Bayern had offered and also after the big 6 had had their pick of everyone, whereas Tonali was a mid window signing IIRC.

[Fak]

3 hours ago, The College Dropout said:

You don’t know ball. 

 

TCD you know I think you get a lot of undeserved flack on here but if you want healthy discussion and debate you cant go around saying things like that. Take it easy man x

[TRon]

Not really sure how any of this helps us now though. We can't play the coming season with players who have left or are declining. 

[TheBrownBottle]

9 hours ago, Fak said:

 

TCD you know I think you get a lot of undeserved flack on here but if you want healthy discussion and debate you cant go around saying things like that. Take it easy man x

I agreed with the rest of TCD’s post - but aye, can’t be saying people know nowt; it’s not the case, we’re just looking at stuff from a different perspective 

[The College Dropout]

16 hours ago, LFEE said:

We bought Elanga because we thought he’d work well with Isak. We bought Wissa because we panicked so you are foolish attaching any logic to it. Ramsey has looked one of our best players this season and perfectly fine for a UCL team.

 

You talk some tosh at times to fit your own narratives 

"You don't know ball" is nicer, no?

 

 

[LFEE]

22 minutes ago, The College Dropout said:

"You don't know ball" is nicer, no?

 

 

Answering my question I’ve asked on two separate occasions instead of avoiding it even nicer 

[Fak]

38 minutes ago, The College Dropout said:

"You don't know ball" is nicer, no?

 

 

 

Sorry TCD I didn't see that. Go for the jugular. Kill him! Kill him!!

[AyeDubbleYoo]

14 hours ago, The College Dropout said:

You don’t know ball. 

 

I thought this was a meme

[AyeDubbleYoo]

If you're going to assess signings you can't really just assess the outcome. It was very reasonable to expect that Wissa would score 10+ goals for us this season and Elanga would contribute a decent number of goals and assists IMO.

Of course it didn't happen, if only we could tell the future when we sign someone. 

[The College Dropout]

10 minutes ago, AyeDubbleYoo said:

If you're going to assess signings you can't really just assess the outcome. It was very reasonable to expect that Wissa would score 10+ goals for us this season and Elanga would contribute a decent number of goals and assists IMO.

Of course it didn't happen, if only we could tell the future when we sign someone. 

I mean... you kind of have too.

 

Signing a 29-yo Wissa for a CL campaign, he needed a 20 goals all comps (min. 12 in the league) to be seen as a decent signing. He was signed for right right now.

 

If he scores 20 league goals for us next season all is forgiven. But the outcome is huge.

 

Injuries or not Eden Hazard flopped hugely at Real. The otucome dictates the assessment.

[AyeDubbleYoo]

2 minutes ago, The College Dropout said:

I mean... you kind of have too.

 

Signing a 29-yo Wissa for a CL campaign, he needed a 20 goals all comps (min. 12 in the league) to be seen as a decent signing. He was signed for right right now.

 

If he scores 20 league goals for us next season all is forgiven. But the outcome is huge.

 

Injuries or not Eden Hazard flopped hugely at Real. The otucome dictates the assessment.

The outcome dictates that kind of assessment, but the recruitment team can only decide based on what they knew at the time and what the player could reasonably be expected to do. 

[The College Dropout]

6 minutes ago, AyeDubbleYoo said:

The outcome dictates that kind of assessment, but the recruitment team can only decide based on what they knew at the time and what the player could reasonably be expected to do. 

And they knew Wissa was an overpay that had a very small window to prove his value. It was a high-risk transfer for sure.

[AyeDubbleYoo]

3 minutes ago, The College Dropout said:

And they knew Wissa was an overpay that had a very small window to prove his value. It was a high-risk transfer for sure.

I just don’t agree on this. He was too expensive but the reason we were prepared to overpay was because of his PL proven nature and what we could expect him to produce. 
 

If anything we were investing more money because we thought we were reducing the risk. 

[TRon]

Howe is still making noises that we haven't seen the best of Wissa and he could come good next season. That might just be for PR purposes, but tbh, it would at least be consistent with our reasons for buying him in the first place. 

[The College Dropout]

25 minutes ago, AyeDubbleYoo said:

I just don’t agree on this. He was too expensive but the reason we were prepared to overpay was because of his PL proven nature and what we could expect him to produce. 
 

If anything we were investing more money because we thought we were reducing the risk. 

45 goals in 145 PL appearances. 2 double digit seasons. Never the main man. 1 season as a striker. 29 years old.

 

There was massive risk fro day one. I get the logic he scored 19 open play goals last season but how much weight does that carry? We signed a striker with 6 goals the prior season in a foreign league for more money 2 seasons ago. There's a reason for that.

[r0cafella]

The problem with our recent business is interesting. It's partly hubris (last summer we kinda got carried away and thought we could go head to head with cartel clubs) and pressure (ultimately as we've seen Eddie has to get results and thus going for the premier league proven more players with more experience is much more appealing/ self preserving. 

 

As a general rule of thumb, at this stage we should only really be buying players who can improve and be sold on for potential profit. We obviously need leaders and experience too but we have to be more creative on how we bring that profile in, as paying big fees for such players isn't viable for us. 

[The College Dropout]

1 hour ago, r0cafella said:

The problem with our recent business is interesting. It's partly hubris (last summer we kinda got carried away and thought we could go head to head with cartel clubs) and pressure (ultimately as we've seen Eddie has to get results and thus going for the premier league proven more players with more experience is much more appealing/ self preserving. 

 

As a general rule of thumb, at this stage we should only really be buying players who can improve and be sold on for potential profit. We obviously need leaders and experience too but we have to be more creative on how we bring that profile in, as paying big fees for such players isn't viable for us. 

This is often available for small fees. Trippier, Burn, Welbeck, Norgaard, Xhaka, Henderson etc. Some have big wages.

 

Even the Brighton and the Brenford's realise the value of these types of signings. 

 

 

Edited April 28 by The College Dropout

[Heron]

I think people are making this relatively simple question and task unnecessarily more complicated than required like. Of course all the duds could become goods and vice versa next season, but the question is being asked about everything from the start of Howe 'til now. You can only base that off past and present - not future.

[TheBrownBottle]

11 hours ago, r0cafella said:

The problem with our recent business is interesting. It's partly hubris (last summer we kinda got carried away and thought we could go head to head with cartel clubs) and pressure (ultimately as we've seen Eddie has to get results and thus going for the premier league proven more players with more experience is much more appealing/ self preserving. 

 

As a general rule of thumb, at this stage we should only really be buying players who can improve and be sold on for potential profit. We obviously need leaders and experience too but we have to be more creative on how we bring that profile in, as paying big fees for such players isn't viable for us. 

100% - and it’s the big reason why managers shouldn’t be the ones buying the players, and why the vacuum of management above Howe (as well as his own politicking - he wanted more control than a head coach) was so negligent in just giving him what he wants.  
 

What is good for Eddie Howe (or any manager) isn’t necessarily aligned with the long-term good of the club.  Whenever folks say a manager is trying to do what’s best for the club, they should moderately qualify that in their own head for me.  
 

I’m liable to get people misreading this and jumping on this being a criticism of Howe, but it really isn’t meant as one.  This would apply to Guardiola, Klopp - any manager.  Their interest ultimately is keeping their job - which is usually achieved by being successful in the here-and-now.  A manager is incentivised to buy players for the here-and-now. 

[TheBrownBottle]

4 hours ago, Heron said:

I think people are making this relatively simple question and task unnecessarily more complicated than required like. Of course all the duds could become goods and vice versa next season, but the question is being asked about everything from the start of Howe 'til now. You can only base that off past and present - not future.

If you take a blended average, it’ll all come out ok.  

 

But that’s the problem - the signing success hit-rate was phenomenally high in those first 18 months - and so were the performances.  Then they tailed off, and now the signings and performances in tandem have fallen off a cliff.  The answer would be completely misleading - it would suggest a consistency that isn’t there. 

 

The more say Howe has had, and the more the squad has become ‘his’, the worse the performances have become.  If there was a ‘transition’ occurring, then personally I’d be far more willing to give time - but I don’t see one.  He’s playing the same formation, minus ‘intensity’, and it all just looks very, very flat.  Thinking his time is probably up and also thinking that the man should have a statue at SJP is where I’m at, because of the fact I don’t have confidence that he can rebuild with the limitations of PSR (ironically, I also think PSR is why Howe got the job in the first place and is possibly one of the biggest reasons he might keep it - an NUFC not incumbered by PSR is unlikely to have appointed him, and the fact we’d have to pay him about £10m when we’re dropping millions with every position we drop makes it harder to sack him), and also because of his own limitations as a manager.  You can’t spend three-quarters of a billion on a squad to sit just above the relegation zone and still say ‘I’m the man to fix it - just give me more money’.