Summer Transfer Thread and Gustavo Cisneros Type Rumours.

[mr underhill]

so as it stands, Norwich have spent more than us in real terms. Its going to be tough simply to stand still.

[ChicagoLion]

The question  is what does this transfer window signal?
Because the idiot left are we in a Lerneresque retreat from trying to break into the Top6?
Developing a youth and recruitment policy with better coaching, acquisitions and strategy is much better than mumble mumble young and hungry.
But it will only take you so far without sorting out the First Team squad and we have not done that.

[Clark W Griswold]

We must be doing something to bolster the squad given Conor has gone.

Sanson was / is Hourihane's replacement, brought in 6 months early than planned.

Except Sanson plays on the right, Conor on the left. Still, no worry, I'm sure Dean can wedge him in.

We managed without Hourihane’s left foot for most of last season. A first choice midfield 3 of Sanson, Luiz & McGinn will do me. Chuck & Ramsey as backup. Nakamba the next to be replaced, when a suitable improvement is available.

That 6 isn’t too bad if your ambition is to avoid relegation but is some distance from mid table.
McGinn is quality, Luiz is good but inconsistent, might be really good in a couple of years. Sanson has shown very little so far when playing and is injured a lot. Nakamba is plainly not good enough and is the only one I’d class as a DM. Ramsey is still in development, even less consistent than Luiz and Chuck is 17.

[London Villan]

And our glaring weakness has been midfield, even more so if we want to play a front 4.

[Clark W Griswold]

Interesting question as well is, taking McGinn out of it, how many PL starts have the other 5 got between them? Then take Luiz out of it and see how the other 4 look.

[old man villa fan]

Defensive midfield is the obvious weakness but, in my opinion, it needs to be better than we currently have.  I am surprised how quickly the young players have developed and I think this season will be the break through season for 2 or 3 of them.  That fills some of the squad places and it may be that the Club think the same.  Bringing in players to make up the numbers will block the progress of the young players.

Players have to be available and they have to be the ones you want if you are planning on them being part of the team for the next 3 or 4 years.  I would prefer to see us bring somebody in on loan if the right player is not available.

[SoccerHQ]

Given who we have sold and brought in, and if Wesley Guilbert and Hourihane go, that for me is a weaker squad than before the summer.

For all this 'ratboy' stuff, he was the best player we've had in decades. We've not done enough to counter the impact of losing him.

Feels very deflating. 10th place at best.

I don't know really.

Last season our back up to Ollie was a joke for team trying to finish top half, now we have two top level strikers in the squad.

This time last season Trez was starting every week. Now we all like Trez but really Leon Bailey when fully fit will be streets ahead of him in terms of productivity. Traore will be a good option off the bench and to start games from time to time, same for AEG.

It's certainly far from perfect in central midfield but ulitimately it's still the same CM options as for our flying start last season.

At the back we have Young instead of Neil Taylor as backup LB and four good CBs, again this time last year Hause wasn't seen as good enough and Engels was hiding in some basement in Nechells.

I would say the squad is stronger and that's without hopefully one of the young players making a good impact as the season goes on.

I've said it before but as a fanbase we simply need to move on from Jack Flipping Grealish sooner rather than later. We fawned over him so much while he was here and now it's gone the other extreme and so many still can't get over him leaving. Save all that for the build up to Man. City at home in a few months. In the short term it simply does us no good to basically link him to every conversation currently.

He was a very very good player....but the club will soon have someone of that standard playing. Who knows, he may already be at the club already. I wish we could get Bailey out and starting matches as he's the sort imo that will really excite the fanbase once we see him for 90 minutes.

Underwhelming start and not sure September will be great either but beyond that I think we'll start improving and climbing the table which will hopefully set us up nicely for second half of the season.

[ozzjim]

Interesting question as well is, taking McGinn out of it, how many PL starts have the other 5 got between them? Then take Luiz out of it and see how the other 4 look.

Piss poor. But apparently our midfield isn't that at all. Young starting there over Nakamba at the weekend shows that beyond Luiz and McGinn, who have both been patchy at best form wise over the last 2 seasons, we are down to kids and players that would not start in most teams.

[SoccerHQ]

Problem is, we can't replace the Rat. The only way we could would be to have been established in the top 4 already.

Yeah that's the thing. Like for like replacement simply wouldn't be interested in joining us as they all play for CL clubs, we did well signing Bailey from europa league team, same for Traore last summer so that's the standard we'll have to accept until we start qualifying for europa.

We need to replace him in other ways and when they're all fit I think it looks a far stronger attack than last season with some real depth off the bench aswell. Up to Smith to work it out but I'm not getting 2015 vibes tbh when we got it badly wrong post Benteke and Delph.

[Clark W Griswold]

If we don’t sign anyone I can only think that he’s going to play the four attacking players and 2 midfield but I shudder at the thought of any of those in a midfield 2 except McGinn. We’ll be in for some high scoring games that’s for sure, not sure if we’ll be on the right end of them. It’ll be like when Spurs had Berbatov, Keane, Defoe and Bent and the manager at the time trying to fit 3 or 4 in at a time. He didn’t last long from memory.

[SoccerHQ]

Potentially. I just think it will take time for him to play there. We did look better with Ollie on going forward.

I still think we lack a left winger too as well but time will tell.

Surely we planned to play Bailey there?  Otherwise our buys were haphazard at best.

Think we'll waste months picking completely unbalanced line ups in final third and then around December/January DS will do a last role of the dice and go Ollie wide left, Ings CF, Bailey right and then Buendia as AM and we'll look alright...at least v bottom half teams.

Bit like when Lambert in his first season stumbled upon Weimann-Benteke-Gabby as front three and we looked a real threat going forward even if we were very average elsewhere.

It's a really good test of Dean anyway. How does he keep all the attackers happy? I know we're not in europe but top level managers don't blink at having to keep 5-6 attackers happy, look at all the options Tuchel has and he still demanded Lukaku, same for OGS with Ronaldo.

[andyh]

After losing ratboy, I have worries over who is next to go.
Ollie, when he came on on Saturday for a few minutes, just oozed class and now carries that ‘presence’ of something special.

No doubt he’ll be the next target for one of the big boys. I hope we have leaned.

[paul_e]

Potentially. I just think it will take time for him to play there. We did look better with Ollie on going forward.

I still think we lack a left winger too as well but time will tell.

Last bit only makes sense if you think we lacked one last season as well because last year we had a leftwing who thought he was best in the centre. This year we have Bailey who has played left regularly but is quoted as preferring the right. Given he's pretty 2footed I don't think it makes much difference.

Regularly is a stretch. He's mainly played on the right. As has Buendia.

I think you might want to check that, for leverkusen he played on the left more often than the right until last season.

[sickbeggar]

Would seem a bit bizarre if Wesley, Hourihane and guilbert all went out and no-one came in. That leaves us 4 free spaces in the squad, so unless we are deciding to blood the youth, I can only imagine the money isn't there whether that's transfer fees or wages. Still think a player will arrive though.

[RamboandBruno]

Given who we have sold and brought in, and if Wesley Guilbert and Hourihane go, that for me is a weaker squad than before the summer.

For all this 'ratboy' stuff, he was the best player we've had in decades. We've not done enough to counter the impact of losing him.

Feels very deflating. 10th place at best.

I don't know really.

Last season our back up to Ollie was a joke for team trying to finish top half, now we have two top level strikers in the squad.

This time last season Trez was starting every week. Now we all like Trez but really Leon Bailey when fully fit will be streets ahead of him in terms of productivity. Traore will be a good option off the bench and to start games from time to time, same for AEG.

It's certainly far from perfect in central midfield but ulitimately it's still the same CM options as for our flying start last season.

At the back we have Young instead of Neil Taylor as backup LB and four good CBs, again this time last year Hause wasn't seen as good enough and Engels was hiding in some basement in Nechells.

I would say the squad is stronger and that's without hopefully one of the young players making a good impact as the season goes on.

I've said it before but as a fanbase we simply need to move on from Jack Flipping Grealish sooner rather than later. We fawned over him so much while he was here and now it's gone the other extreme and so many still can't get over him leaving. Save all that for the build up to Man. City at home in a few months. In the short term it simply does us no good to basically link him to every conversation currently.

He was a very very good player....but the club will soon have someone of that standard playing. Who knows, he may already be at the club already. I wish we could get Bailey out and starting matches as he's the sort imo that will really excite the fanbase once we see him for 90 minutes.

Underwhelming start and not sure September will be great either but beyond that I think we'll start improving and climbing the table which will hopefully set us up nicely for second half of the season.

A great post!!

There does seem to be a degree of a post Grealish existential crisis going on, that was delayed to an extent by the surprise signing of Ings, but now after a poor performance to Watford and a meh performance to Brentford with more than half the first team out, seems to be gathering pace. Areas of the team team that did well last season , such as Cash and even Martinez are being over analysed as somehow lacking. The midfield is the same midfield as last year, except Ramsey has a year more experience and we simply don’t know what Sanson can or can’t do. I would suggest the axis of Bailey, Buendia, Watkins and Ings is key to where we will finish this season.