January 2023 Transfer Rumours, Discussions and Done Deals Thread

[paul_e]

Is there a bit of a concern that with the exception of Ramsey that our academy isn't producing players good enough of competing for the first team? Archer, Iroegbunam might not be too far off I guess but still the club bought Dendoncker in Tim's area and Duran in Archer's spot.

On the recruitment side, let's see how tomorrow goes. The owners were still able to convince Emery to leave CL semi finalists only a few months ago. Likes of Carlos, Kamara, Moreno were all sufficiently impressed by the club's ambition in the not too distant past.

In the last two years we've sold youth products for a combined £120m.  We've got academy players who won the FA Youth Cup (but are still teenagers) who've done well in the Championship. One from that team has already gone for £20m to Chelsea. Another was doing well at Norwich until injury, plus Tim is doing well at QPR.  Then you have Cam, too. I really don't think there is any problem with how our academy is performing right now.  If anything, it's performing well above the mean.

It's also very important to note that our academy was shit in the last few years of Lerner and under Xia (which led to many of the more talented youngsters, including Barry, choosing Blues or Baggies over us). One of the first things NSWE did was to fix that but given the first phase of the academy starts at 9 we're still a few years from those players coming through. However the 'real' academy process starts at 12 so players from that group will be 16-17 now, which includes Kadan Young so he's probably the first product of the new academy structure. Most of the U18s now will have come through with him but there's also the ones that we signed into our senior academy, where we've been really busy over the last few years filling up with some of the best youngsters around to fill that gap.

The 2 big measures of how successful the academy is will be how many of those 16-17 year old signings come through and make it in the next 2-3 years and then from that point on how many kids come through who've been with us since they were 9-10. I'd say summer 27 is probably the right time to judge it. It's feels a really long way off but what we've done is very similar (sorry for the tangent here) to what Northampton did in the rugby about 5 years earlier and they now have a squad packed full of incredibly talented players in their early 20s and seem to have a couple of new players breakthrough every season. Matching that will be tough but it's the only good way to handle the homegrown player rules. A core of 6-7 players from our system deals with that almost completely and gives us reliable squad depth for minimal costs.

[eamonn]

European football is European football. Or am I missing something?

Nah, you've got it wrong. We should opt out of football matches in general, until we get our invitation to the Champions League final.

I want us to win the FA Cup and later that summer UEFA decide to scrap the Conference League and reintroduce the Cup Winners Cup.

[Toronto Villa]

Europe. You're having a laugh. I just want us to fucking finish in the top 10. Fuck me we've been utter shit for so long now.

[Hookeysmith]

I expect a very quick fire sale at Chelsea towards the death when the realise they can only field 11 players at any one time.

Havertz
Pulisic
Ziyech
Gallagher

Any of those would make us stronger

[algy]

European football is European football. Or am I missing something?

Nah, you've got it wrong. We should opt out of football matches in general, until we get our invitation to the Champions League final.

We’ve been opting out of the FA Cup for a few seasons already

[Ger Regan]

Ziyech going to PSG, so can cross that one off.

[paul_e]

I expect a very quick fire sale at Chelsea towards the death when the realise they can only field 11 players at any one time.

Havertz
Pulisic
Ziyech
Gallagher

Any of those would make us stronger

I have their squad as 33 players (with them desperately trying to make in 34). Of those 7 are U21 qualified so, if they get Fernandez, they will need to move 2 players on just to be able to name 'everyone' in the squad. Add on that a couple of those youngsters are inevitably going to be in the matchday squads they're still likely to have a fair few players on big wages not making the matchday squad. The only thing that might stop them letting more than 2-3 go is that they do have a few fairly long term injuries. I reckon Ziyech and Gallagher will be somewhere else this time tomorrow but that might be it for this window. Fire sale in the summer though.

[pablo_picasso]

A push for Europe would have been nice but if we are sticking, rather than twisting it makes a mockery of the FA and league cup exits
What an absolute fucking shambles that was

Also, what is the point in qualifying for Europe and then playing the reserves as some have suggested

The way the cup competitions are treated is the the thing I hate most about football nowadays

Because it gives them first team experience & rests the first team. Its called squad management...

It’s called winning fuck all in 26 years

I cant argue with that fact. Although Im not sure how many of those 26 years we were actually in European competition.

[paul_e]

Ziyech going to PSG, so can cross that one off.

That's a shame but we can't really compete with that, which I suspect is a big problem for us in this window, Too many champions league level clubs signing players as squad filler and leaving us with limited options.

[Bent Neilsens Screamer]

Who has moved that we’d like and is a realistic target? 

The main one I can think of is Manduek, other than that we might have tried for felix or Depay before the big clubs bid.  I don’t think we missed out on much which suggests buying might be harder than usual.

Who’s Manduek?

[DB]

He is trimming down the squad ok fine, but we need a striker, but then Jan is a tricky period to get who you want in.
We could do a Chelsea and pay way over the odds…

Think most would be happy with six month loan and then look again during the summer.

I remember West Ham signing Lingard two years ago. Was met with ridicule at the time but he played a big part in them finishing 6th in the end and they made the europa SF the following season.

Good point.

[paul_e]

Who has moved that we’d like and is a realistic target? 

The main one I can think of is Manduek, other than that we might have tried for felix or Depay before the big clubs bid.  I don’t think we missed out on much which suggests buying might be harder than usual.

Who’s Manduek?

Madueke, signed for Chelsea from Holland, looks a very good young player.

[Smithy]

I expect a very quick fire sale at Chelsea towards the death when the realise they can only field 11 players at any one time.

Havertz
Pulisic
Ziyech
Gallagher

Any of those would make us stronger

I'd take any of those, but suspect Gallagher is being pushed out as his homegrown status has a lot off added FFP benefits. £40m in for him now roughly offsets the impact of £200m spent on players with 5 year contracts.

[Dante Lavelli]

Who has moved that we’d like and is a realistic target? 

The main one I can think of is Manduek, other than that we might have tried for felix or Depay before the big clubs bid.  I don’t think we missed out on much which suggests buying might be harder than usual.

Who’s Manduek?

(Probably spelt wrong but) the winger that went from PSV to Chelsea.  Looked decent in a few England U21 games I watched.

[pauliewalnuts]

It’s embarrassing to find yourself thinking this but Wolves - Wolves FFS - seem to be immune to the problems we have signing decent players.

I would imagine they also have a higher transfer fee paid than us.

Wolves.

I’m not suggesting we go and spunk 50m on some plodder to fix that, but I am starting to seriously doubt our transfer market ambition.

I’m tired of hearing the club talk the talk, time to start matching words with actions.

Ambitious? Great. Show us.