You’ll likely get your Jelly and Ice Cream all the same but Esteve signed a new contract, hopefully Beyer and Ekdal are back fit and we’ve added Hartmann, Tuanzabe & of course Kyle Walker so you might argue outfield player wise it’s stronger rather than being dismantled. Obviously need a new number 1 now and will no doubt struggle - but we would have regardless. Still no sign of a striker either

All the ‘loans with an obligation to buy’ are moving purchase all over the place. I imagine it’s done to stay within PSR regs. If we accept transfermkt as a source of truth (it isn’t but probably best we have) then we’ve spent around 45 million in GBP. That would include the purchases last season of Esteve, Tresor covering about 26 million of that. It doesn’t include this seasons loans with an obligation on promotion (Anthony, Fleming and Humphries) so in real terms about 45 million is probably fairly close. We did also sell about 110 million worth of players.

Mask slip? All I said was you’d had the benefit of his money AND parachute payments. I don’t know why the post was deleted to be honest.

we owe the first promotion to Coyle and a massive slice of good fortune but agreed, Dyche was the one who really pulled everything together for us. He was a once in a lifetime manager and I’ll be forever thankful.

Who knows what will happen. It feels more when than if we fail to get promoted within 2 seasons so lord knows what happens then, how much debt we will be carrying, what saleable players we’d have. My point, if I had one, was simply to point out any success we’ve had in the last 15 years was built by getting promoted without massive investment, not by having parachute payments. The club since that first promotion has been managed mostly exceptionally well and this has given us seasons in the top flight and promotions I never imagined we’d see back in the 4th Division days. Other clubs who’ve had PL money and parachute payments haven’t necessarily fared quite so well. Middlesbrough, Stoke, WBA spring to mind - even Swansea and Hull. I know it will end for us but until then I’ll try to enjoy the ride.

I did concede that was hyperbole 🤷‍♂️- & we are still in third and we will drop points before the end of the season just as Leeds did today. I firmly believe we are heading into the playoffs but will be delighted to be proven wrong come the end of the season.

Not little old Burnley at all, a simple of assessment of too many draws and a current top 2 who look fairly relentless. The top 3 are fairly clearly better squads than the rest, the points difference tells that story but one of us has to go into the play offs & that doesn’t always go the way of the ‘best squad’ - look at Leeds last season and many other examples - even us under Coyle who did a Reading side who were far better than us. So my ‘too late’ might well have been hyperbole but simply to demonstrate the challenge as I see it and to provide some balance to the posts suggesting we have the momentum.

Haha, thanks for the vote of confidence but sadly for us I think it’s too late for us. We will lose sooner or later, have arguably the tougher run in (inc Sheffield United, Coventry, Bristol City and a seemingly resurgent Derby). Right now Coventry are the form team in the top 6 and I can’t say I’d feel confident in a play off lottery. I just don’t see the top 2 dropping points as much as I can see us doing. Sheffield in particular are looking relentless with Leeds having had a small wobble. All that said it is in our own hands, if we match Sheffield United’s results and beat them at home we are top 2.

If we keep playing the way we have the last 2 games they might upset the odds in that one. We’ve been all over the place.

Mmm we might also be looking for you to do us a favour last game of the season 😮

Sheff Utd and Leeds can’t both win on Monday and Sheff United have to play Burnley again. In theory it remains in our own hands. Sadly I think you are right though because we struggle to score consistently - although Edwards does look a level above so his addition might help us in that area. I can’t quite get my head around what has happened at Boro - they looked good then suddenly their form falls off a cliff. I know they sold Latte Lath but they also invested. Maybe bringing in so many players upset the dressing room - or is it just they relied on him so heavily? Right now you have to be fancying your chances for the playoffs - imagine if we both made the final …

As I was after the dire Preston 0-0, the Leeds 0-0 … You must have missed those posts I guess.

Only really one stat that counts, the score line. Possesion, xG etc etc are all great and a good way to assess performances but if you are on the wrong side of main one it doesn’t matter. Fair to say first half Wednesday were well on top in terms of chances etc - even at the start of the second. I’m tempted to say we were poor but that wouldn’t give them the credit they deserve but we definitely contributed to our own problems. But as for the ‘Burnley are lucky’ comments. All teams get lucky at various times but you don’t go 13 consecutive games without conceding, 25 clean sheets in 34 games, only 9 goals conceded in 34 games and no team - so far - scoring more than one goal in a game against us by just luck. Just in the same way the dearth of goals at the other end isn’t just bad luck.

Benson has for little (besides pick up injuries) since the Championship season - and even then he was always a 30/40 minute impact sub mostly. We spent on Foster 2 years ago, about 8 or 9 million I think and at the minute he couldn’t hit a barn door - did you see his misses yesterday? Nope, to be honest we’ve looked short since the first couple of weeks of the season. I’m quite enjoying the season, being hard to score against etc - just as long as we don’t fade you in the playoffs, my heart couldn’t take it, win or lose. Well a 20 goal a season in the Championship Striker against the best Centre Half in the division by a country mile - especially once you add the PL tax.

Steal our centre backs and goal keeper, How will that work? Will they come with shotguns and balaclavas? 🤷‍♂️ I would imagine you mean they will buy them of course. Not much we can do. Esteve and Trafford will go for between 30 and 40 million each, that’s good profit and the business model we have. Egan-Riley potentially more painful as he’s out of contract so much less for him. But going up is definitely a bit of almost a Hobsons choice. You want to play at the highest level but know once you get there it’s often a pretty s***e experience - and we know Parker has historically been found lacking in the top flight. PS our whole game isn’t based on defending. It certainly feels that way on Parker. Not sure our best attacking players were on the bench though beyond Edwards who hasn’t played much football recently and Brownhill who’s just back from Injury so that makes sense. On the striker thing I guess it comes down to money. A 20+ a season striker probably costs 18-20 million that we can’t afford to risk, if we even have it to risk. I mean Szmodics had one exceptional season for you and went for what 12/14 million was it?