The Paul Lambert thread - poll reset after our capitulation to Hull

[Villa in Denmark]

If Kozak is worth £7m then i'm a monkeys uncle, I've seen nothing from the guy to suggest he's in that bracket. He was over priced and not needed either in the bigger scheme of things.

And again blindly accepting figures from the press, who for the majority of the time, we complain we wouldn't trust to get the date right.

So how much do you think we paid for Bent 18M or 24M?

[pauliewalnuts]

If Kozak is worth £7m then i'm a monkeys uncle, I've seen nothing from the guy to suggest he's in that bracket. He was over priced and not needed either in the bigger scheme of things.

An international, coming from Lazio, from a season where he was top scorer in the Europa League, who has scored in half the games he has started for us, at 7m strikes me as not overpriced at all.

Whether you think he's shit or not needed or whatever is neither here nor there, really, those are different arguments - you were talking about what sort of value players would fetch if we sold them now.

Don't get me wrong, I think lots of Lambert's players have been pretty poor. However, I think this season for us is less about the players we did sign, and more about the ones we didn't. I too am as pissed off as the next man at the shambolic tactics, dreadful performances, poor results, embarrassing home form, all of that, I am with you, and I too struggle to see how he's keeping his job, let alone being offered better, longer terms.

Where I find myself parting company with a lot of people, though, is why they feel the need to see that, in that case, everything else must be shit.

There is an obvious issue in how we can spend relative peanuts for untried players, give them time in the premier league, and still manage to lose money on them. It's nigh-on impossible.

Seriously, think about it. Take one player from your list. Bacuna.

You reckon we paid 2.5m for him. Straight away, I reckon that is almost certainly more than we paid for him.

He's a 22 year old Netherlands Under 21 international, he came from an Eredivisie club. He's been here less than one season, but has featured for us 27 times. He's also scored four goals, lest we forget, including two spectacular free kicks. In a team of underperformers, he is hardly ever even mentioned on here as one of the worst. Yet, somehow, you think his value has reduced to 1.5m over that period? You think he's depreciated faster than a Rover 75 used to?

Do you honestly, really believe this stuff or are you just trying to make those figures look as bad as you can?

[eastie]

The transfer dealings of lambert have been not that bad in all honesty considering what he has paid , the ones over £2m have by and large been good deals like benteke, okore, Vlaar, and yes Kozak - he has taken some gambles on low priced signings which been a bit hit and miss but it's not his dealings that are my concern.

It's his tactics, style of play, formations and lack of getting the players to play for 90 minutes that concern me.

[PaulWinch again]

The transfer dealings of lambert have been not that bad in all honesty considering what he has paid , the ones over £2m have by and large been good deals like benteke, okore, Vlaar, and yes Kozak - he has taken some gambles on low priced signings which been a bit hit and miss but it's not his dealings that are my concern.

It's his tactics, style of play, formations and lack of getting the players to play for 90 minutes that concern me.

I agree on the tactics, style of play etc but his signings concern me too. That's not from a financial point of view, because they've been value for money. I just think that a good number don't appear to be good enough as regulars in the Premier League.

[eastie]

The transfer dealings of lambert have been not that bad in all honesty considering what he has paid , the ones over £2m have by and large been good deals like benteke, okore, Vlaar, and yes Kozak - he has taken some gambles on low priced signings which been a bit hit and miss but it's not his dealings that are my concern.

It's his tactics, style of play, formations and lack of getting the players to play for 90 minutes that concern me.

I agree on the tactics, style of play etc but his signings concern me too. That's not from a financial point of view, because they've been value for money. I just think that a good number don't appear to be good enough as regulars in the Premier League.

I think there are a few who are squad fillers at low expense in there - the players he's spent decent cash on have in the main looked decent - his failure to bring in players where it is clear we needed quality though is baffling - he has had 4 windows and still failed to being in a playmaker and  sort the midfield.

Westwood and Lowton and maybe bacuna at low expense are decent enough to be in the squad as cover - the likes of luna and Bowery however are not up to it .

[TheSandman]

If you look at the signings we have brought in, 18 out of the first team squad have been brought in by Lambert (this includes free signings like Guzan and loanees like Holt and Betrand). For our £42million we've got over 2/3s of our first team squad at an average of just over £2.3million. Not many premiership managers have a good hit rate at that kind of money and I'd imagine that not many of the clubs around us have felt the need to bring in that kind of number of players and in the kind of price bracket. That's not to mention that many of these will be on far less than some of the rival clubs.

If these players and Lambert's tactics were so bad we'd probably be cut adrift, so the issue either has to be that we're shit because we've bought a load of cheap, crap players or because the players we've brought in are actually better than they should be for the money but they are hamstrung by weak tactics and coaching that ignores the biggest issues with our play. I'd tend towards the second.

[aj2k77]

If Kozak is worth £7m then i'm a monkeys uncle, I've seen nothing from the guy to suggest he's in that bracket. He was over priced and not needed either in the bigger scheme of things.

An international, coming from Lazio, from a season where he was top scorer in the Europa League, who has scored in half the games he has started for us, at 7m strikes me as not overpriced at all.

Whether you think he's shit or not needed or whatever is neither here nor there, really, those are different arguments - you were talking about what sort of value players would fetch if we sold them now.

Don't get me wrong, I think lots of Lambert's players have been pretty poor. However, I think this season for us is less about the players we did sign, and more about the ones we didn't. I too am as pissed off as the next man at the shambolic tactics, dreadful performances, poor results, embarrassing home form, all of that, I am with you, and I too struggle to see how he's keeping his job, let alone being offered better, longer terms.

Where I find myself parting company with a lot of people, though, is why they feel the need to see that, in that case, everything else must be shit.

There is an obvious issue in how we can spend relative peanuts for untried players, give them time in the premier league, and still manage to lose money on them. It's nigh-on impossible.

Seriously, think about it. Take one player from your list. Bacuna.

You reckon we paid 2.5m for him. Straight away, I reckon that is almost certainly more than we paid for him.

He's a 22 year old Netherlands Under 21 international, he came from an Eredivisie club. He's been here less than one season, but has featured for us 27 times. He's also scored four goals, lest we forget, including two spectacular free kicks. In a team of underperformers, he is hardly ever even mentioned on here as one of the worst. Yet, somehow, you think his value has reduced to 1.5m over that period? You think he's depreciated faster than a Rover 75 used to?

Do you honestly, really believe this stuff or are you just trying to make those figures look as bad as you can?

Firstly, I doubt there are many clubs that look at someones goal tally in the Europa League and value them on that. Kozaks record for Lazio read 10 goals in 58 games. If that's a £7m value player then shoot me. Massimo Maccarone scored loads in the Uefa for Middlesboro, and had a shite record in the league, no one waded in offering £7m for him either.

Second point, Bacuna. Europe is littered with former Holland u-21 players that don't go for money, he played nearly all his u-21 games 2 seasons ago, not last season. That means nothing to his value now. A lot of reports actually had him down as costing £3m, he's not worth that. Nice free kicks, not that much more.

If you dispute all the transfer fee's we've paid Id love to know how they all add up to £42m if no one really cost much money.

Paul Faulkner says we've spent £42m by the way, not me.

[aj2k77]

If you look at the signings we have brought in, 18 out of the first team squad have been brought in by Lambert (this includes free signings like Guzan and loanees like Holt and Betrand). For our £42million we've got over 2/3s of our first team squad at an average of just over £2.3million. Not many premiership managers have a good hit rate at that kind of money and I'd imagine that not many of the clubs around us have felt the need to bring in that kind of number of players and in the kind of price bracket. That's not to mention that many of these will be on far less than some of the rival clubs.

If these players and Lambert's tactics were so bad we'd probably be cut adrift, so the issue either has to be that we're shit because we've bought a load of cheap, crap players or because the players we've brought in are actually better than they should be for the money but they are hamstrung by weak tactics and coaching that ignores the biggest issues with our play. I'd tend towards the second.

I think this season is one of the worst in the last 25 years quality wise for the top flight. With the top 6 creaming most of the talent away to sit in massive squads twiddling their fingers it's left the rest of the division lacking. That is why we will stay up.

[Dave]

A lot of reports actually had him down as costing £3m

His former club say he was sold for a million euros with a sell-on clause, so around £880,000 based on the exchange rate at the time.

You must be delighted to discover that he only cost a quarter of what you suspected.

[pauliewalnuts]

Second point, Bacuna. Europe is littered with former Holland u-21 players that don't go for money, he played nearly all his u-21 games 2 seasons ago, not last season. That means nothing to his value now. A lot of reports actually had him down as costing £3m, he's not worth that. Nice free kicks, not that much more.

Your argument is that he is actually now worth 40 percent less than we paid for him, after a decent PL first season so far, which is nonsense.

And it's not how much you think he's worth, it's the fact that you think these cheap - and 2.5m is cheap - players are actually worth less now.

Does this regime strike you as one which is prepared to pay over the odds for players? Really?

[pauliewalnuts]

A lot of reports actually had him down as costing £3m

His former club say he was sold for a million euros with a sell-on clause, so around £880,000 based on the exchange rate at the time.

You must be delighted to discover that he only cost a quarter of what you suspected.

And even by his own wayward calculations of his current value, he's worth almost twice what we paid for him.

Hurrah!

[Toronto Villa]

I'll tell you what I'll give you credit for fighting a lonely battle. At some point it will dawn on you that pretty much everyone has picked holes in your position and you'll realise you might actually be wrong.

[Villa in Denmark]

I'll tell you what I'll give you credit for fighting a lonely battle. At some point it will dawn on you that pretty much everyone has picked holes in your position and you'll realise you might actually be wrong.

Ever banging your head against a brick wall has one good thing about it.


It's so nice when you stop;-)

[brian green]

I am in no way qualified to put a valuation on a football player but I do get involved quite a lot in the buying and selling of racehorses in a modest way and it has a similar dynamic.   Some years ago I put to the test my notion that there are some very cheap winners being sold every year as foals and yearlings.   I plunged in and bought about as many unproven horses as Lambert bought unproven players last year.   I did my conkers big time.   My theory was sound, there are fantastic bargains to be had but the problem is that to get them you have to buy far too many.   My partners and I will never be able to bid for the blue chip bloodstock but what you do do is buy the best you can for the money you are prepared to spend.

The parable is buy fewer but better quality which is what I hope Lambert does in the summer.

[Villa in Denmark]

If Kozak is worth £7m then i'm a monkeys uncle, I've seen nothing from the guy to suggest he's in that bracket. He was over priced and not needed either in the bigger scheme of things.

An international, coming from Lazio, from a season where he was top scorer in the Europa League, who has scored in half the games he has started for us, at 7m strikes me as not overpriced at all.

Whether you think he's shit or not needed or whatever is neither here nor there, really, those are different arguments - you were talking about what sort of value players would fetch if we sold them now.

Don't get me wrong, I think lots of Lambert's players have been pretty poor. However, I think this season for us is less about the players we did sign, and more about the ones we didn't. I too am as pissed off as the next man at the shambolic tactics, dreadful performances, poor results, embarrassing home form, all of that, I am with you, and I too struggle to see how he's keeping his job, let alone being offered better, longer terms.

Where I find myself parting company with a lot of people, though, is why they feel the need to see that, in that case, everything else must be shit.

There is an obvious issue in how we can spend relative peanuts for untried players, give them time in the premier league, and still manage to lose money on them. It's nigh-on impossible.

Seriously, think about it. Take one player from your list. Bacuna.

You reckon we paid 2.5m for him. Straight away, I reckon that is almost certainly more than we paid for him.

He's a 22 year old Netherlands Under 21 international, he came from an Eredivisie club. He's been here less than one season, but has featured for us 27 times. He's also scored four goals, lest we forget, including two spectacular free kicks. In a team of underperformers, he is hardly ever even mentioned on here as one of the worst. Yet, somehow, you think his value has reduced to 1.5m over that period? You think he's depreciated faster than a Rover 75 used to?

Do you honestly, really believe this stuff or are you just trying to make those figures look as bad as you can?

Firstly, I doubt there are many clubs that look at someones goal tally in the Europa League and value them on that. Kozaks record for Lazio read 10 goals in 58 games. If that's a £7m value player then shoot me. Massimo Maccarone scored loads in the Uefa for Middlesboro, and had a shite record in the league, no one waded in offering £7m for him either.

Second point, Bacuna. Europe is littered with former Holland u-21 players that don't go for money, he played nearly all his u-21 games 2 seasons ago, not last season. That means nothing to his value now. A lot of reports actually had him down as costing £3m, he's not worth that. Nice free kicks, not that much more.

If you dispute all the transfer fee's we've paid Id love to know how they all add up to £42m if no one really cost much money.

Paul Faulkner says we've spent £42m by the way, not me.

Genuine question.  Is this an actual quote? When did he say this as I've missed it?

It strikes me as odd for an organisation as paranoid about their financial dealings as we are, to suddenly start blabbing publicly about our spending.