January 2023 Transfer Rumours, Discussions and Done Deals Thread

[TheMalandro]

Last winter Arsenal got rid of a lot of players. They signed a young back up keeper and a player from the MLS. They then lined up their deals for last summer.

Last winter Newcastle signed a few players, paid a bit over the odds but saw immediate benefit.  They then lined up more deals for last summer.

This just shows that different approaches can work

Is there an example of a club choosing to spend half a season with one senior striker and it going well?

Didnt West Ham have a Champions League spot chase last season with only Antonio?

No. Bowen.

Bowen is a winger...

Let's have a look at what you could have won.

[maidstonevillain]

In
Moreno
Dhuran
Traore

Out
Guilbert
Sanson
Nakamba
Augustinsson
Ings

That out list has, perhaps, one player that would play regularly and he's been criticised repeatedly by most on here for not being that good.

We've brought Traore back who can play across the front line. An attacking left back / left midfield and a promising young player.

We want more, but we've not done badly.

Bednarek?

[PeterWithesShin]

Sanson played just over 10 mins of league football for us this season, he's no loss. Apart from Ings the same goes for everyone else we've moved out.

Archer played less than an hour in the league
Nakamba 0 minutes
Guilbert 0 minutes
Bednarek 100 mins
Augustinsson 90 mins

It's not like we've gutted the first team, apart from Ings we've moved on 1 player with potential and 0 top flight goals and players that contributed the square root of fuck all.

Ings is a risk but I don't think for one second Unai hasn't had a say in things. You don't sack a manager after the final whistle, personally go after one of the best in the business to replace him and then stiff them 3 months later.

[Baldy]

Nearly all of our players were under performing before Unai arrived. In a short period of time, most have improved as results will testify. They will improve even more with the better coaching available.

Get 25% more out of Coutinho, 20% more out of Buendia, 20% more out of Cash, 15% more out of Konsa/Ramsey and so on.

That is better than signing two new players. Give Unai the rest of the season to see who can match his expectation and then, where need be, splash the cash on players that will improve the starting eleven and not just squad fillers.

One more proven striker would have been good but Unai (and me) believe our existing squad has enough 'goal' threat.

Watkins might get injured blah, blah fucking blah. We could buy Harry Kane and Haaland tonight and they both might get injured tomorrow. Who knows.

Bottom line, our current squad is capable of scoring goals.

[Dave P]

I get the feeling we’d have been more active if we were in one or both of the cups.

[Ger Regan]

In
Moreno
Dhuran
Traore

Out
Guilbert
Sanson
Nakamba
Augustinsson
Ings

That out list has, perhaps, one player that would play regularly and he's been criticised repeatedly by most on here for not being that good.

We've brought Traore back who can play across the front line. An attacking left back / left midfield and a promising young player.

We want more, but we've not done badly.

Bednarek?

Archer, especially if we're counting Duran

[pauliewalnuts]

Nearly all of our players were under performing before Unai arrived. In a short period of time, most have improved as results will testify. They will improve even more with the better coaching available.

Get 25% more out of Coutinho, 20% more out of Buendia, 20% more out of Cash, 15% more out of Konsa/Ramsey and so on.

That is better than signing two new players. Give Unai the rest of the season to see who can match his expectation and then, where need be, splash the cash on players that will improve the starting eleven and not just squad fillers.

One more proven striker would have been good but Unai (and me) believe our existing squad has enough 'goal' threat.

Watkins might get injured blah, blah fucking blah. We could buy Harry Kane and Haaland tonight and they both might get injured tomorrow. Who knows.

Bottom line, our current squad is capable of scoring goals.

One more proven striker would have been good. Rather than one less, you mean?

[VILLA MOLE]

I get the feeling we’d have been more active if we were in one or both of the cups.

god don't bring that up , there will be a good Lynching 

[LukeJames]

We went out and made a gigantic fucking statement by appointing one of Europe's most decorated managers. I refuse to believe that this was the plan we sold him to get him here.

[PaulWinch again]

The blah blah bit - yes anyone you sign could get injured, but if you leave yourself with 1 senior striker you’ve got no realistic contingency for an injury. You wouldn’t do that in any other business, so we can rationalise all we want but it’s piss poor risk management. Like I said we might get lucky, but let’s not pretend Ings hasn’t scored important goals (like Brighton which got us 3 points when Watkins was injured/absent).

[pablo_picasso]

Oh yeah, I forgot about all our goal-scoring wingers we can rely on to weigh in with goals.

But the question wasn't about other goal involvements. It was about a club having one senior striker & still doing ok. I am not saying that we will do great with just Watkins & Duran, with Bailey & Traore being wingers used up there as & when (thats a lot of left foots). And I am not saying it was the right thing to do to leave us a tad exposed by signing nobody else (or letting Archer go), but the question was about a club having one senior striker & doing ok. West Ham did with just Antonio.

And didn't Man City have issues when they had Gudodgun (sp?) up top as the false number 9?

Its not ideal for us to be where we are. Especially as we play two up top a lot. Personally, I think the mistake was made by letting Archer go. I can only assume that they were expecting someone else to be coming in for it to fall flat. Probably after the agent realised that we were in need of a striker & took advantage of the situation. I almost congratulate the club on telling the agent to go fuck himself... Almost...

[PeterWithe]

I’m not against any of the outgoings but letting Ings go, without replacement, for a fee which regrettably amounts to pretty much fuck all these days, seems imprudent at best. And that’s not what we expected.

[aj2k77]

We did our business early last summer. Since then our movements have been really poor. Not impressed and never have been by Lange or the recruitment team. They seem very very slow to react to situations. Oh well. Jam next season, again, apparently.

[Dave]

Last winter Arsenal got rid of a lot of players. They signed a young back up keeper and a player from the MLS. They then lined up their deals for last summer.

Last winter Newcastle signed a few players, paid a bit over the odds but saw immediate benefit.  They then lined up more deals for last summer.

This just shows that different approaches can work

Is there an example of a club choosing to spend half a season with one senior striker and it going well?

Didnt West Ham have a Champions League spot chase last season with only Antonio?

No, they also had Yarmolenko, Benrahma and Bowen, who scored over thirty goals between them.

All wingers. The question was about a senior striker...

All three of the played centrally for West Ham last season. Case in point- Yarmolenko playing as a centre forward when West Ham beat us in March.

Either way, if we had a load of wide players who could fill in at centre forward (as West Ham did last season) I'd probably not be all that worried.

But we don't, we're two injuries away from Buendia being our starting striker.

[Toronto Villa]

We went out and made a gigantic fucking statement by appointing one of Europe's most decorated managers. I refuse to believe that this was the plan we sold him to get him here.

I think he was very much involved in how today played out. While it’s disappointing and I won’t sugarcoat that, I read somewhere that last Jan, under a lot of pressure, Arsenal and Arteta shipped out a bunch of dross and only added a couple of players. They then made some astute investments in the summer along with promoting some of their talented kids to step up. Brought back Nketiah from Leeds who has been a very good back up to Jesus. I’m not saying we are about to be Arsenal but trying to be optimistic, we appear to be doing a bit of what they did. We now need to really ramp up in the summer. Won’t shock me to see the back of Lange in the reorganization. We are going to look very different come August.