Enjoying that ecstasy pill?

Well, I'd been starting to think and say that we should only extend his contract if he would take about half his present reputed wage, due to his increasing age and a few signs of slowdown at the end of the season. Then I saw the stats in this article: https://www.lancs.live/sport/football/football-news/blackburn-rovers-downing-contract-transfers-18670814 Stats don't tell the whole story, but... Highest number of accurate long passes of any Rover Second highest short passes (first was Lenihan, mostly easy passing in tons of space at the back) Highest assists (8, which is 2 more than Arma who was second, and is the same as Benrahma and Eze More than TWICE the 'key passes' of any other Rover (again Arma second) 94 accurate crosses - the second highest was only 20!! All whilst shunted around different positions (although that's the Mowbray Mantra). I bet his experience has been valuable behind the scenes too. Makes me wonder if it might be more important to secure another year from him than I thought. I definitely think he started to lull after Jan though, and again, he could become a liability at a moment's notice because of his age. There's also the argument people have made, which I think at times is true, that he slows our play. This possession based stuff isn't working as far as I'm concerned, so maybe we don't need somebody who keeps that ticking, I don't know. The key passes and accurate crosses are two things we already don't do enough of to break teams down though, and he absolutely dominates those stats. It's an interesting one. If, as believed, he is on about 20k a week, I'm not sure we can afford the risk at that price (plus whatever signing on fee), but still. Best thing would certainly be if, in the current climate, he accepted his wage needs to drop dramatically and re-signs more affordably. He probably doesn't really need the money anymore and surely wants to finish his career playing as much football as possible?

I haven't been watching Wigan, and I know they've gone down, but they actually conceded 7 less than us, in fact less than everyone except for 8 of the top 9 placed teams, and their run of clean sheets near the end of the season was phenomenal. It just makes me think their back four and keeper situation has to be worth a close look. I know they had the lad who was Milan-bound, and we obviously have no chance of him, but the rest...Wigan will be very vulnerable to lowball offers right now. Anyway know if they have anyone who could do the job for us? I know a few on here wanted us to get the keeper they signed last summer, Marshall wasn't it?

Fair shout. Don't remember that one specifically but that magic man ripped us up a few times. Still Henry for me, but all these years later I struggle to remember specific performances for anyone. Van Persie and Torres always used to put the fear in me too.

It'll be Henry. That guy used to embarrass us. Terrified me every time he ran with the ball. Not that Vieira wasn't an exceptional player who ran the engine room.

I didn't say you were discrediting the poster, personally, just that you were discrediting his suggestion. Obviously you're fine to disagree. However it did come across (to a neutral here) as a bit dismissive, and for reasons bound in fuzzy and inconsistent logic tbh. Anyway, we all move on. Personally I saw the post and initially thought 'Eh, why would we pay 2 million for Bristol's third choice CB', but I think the poster justified his opinion well. I just want someone who, at the end of the day, fixes this problem position. Cost is almost immaterial. You can get a fantastic player for cheap or free, or a total flop for 5 million, we all know that by now. Lots of our least inspiring buys have turned out to be great ones. I'll never forget that Samba was rotting away in Hertha's reserves or that Nelsen came from the MLS, which was even weaker at the time. We spent a pretty penny for the likes of Peacock and Dailly who were gash on toast.

He isn't particularly the defensive screen type though is he, @Sparks Rover ?

I like you as a poster Joe. But you seem to be simultaneously arguing that this guy is too expensive for us, but also can't be good enough due to his price (from this and also the other posts). You're also saying his great youth CV makes him too expensive, but downplaying his actual CV. Tbh if you haven't seem him play, as I haven't, I'd stop trying to discredit the suggestion the poster made. I look at players based on their background off a quick search too, but personally I think you've expended too much energy arguing against this one if you're not already well up on him. Apologies if you've already let it drop, I haven't refreshed the thread ?

I like you as a poster Joe. But you seem to be simultaneously arguing that this guy is too expensive for us, but also can't be good enough due to his price (from this and also the other posts). You're also saying his great youth CV makes him too expensive, but downplaying his actual CV. Tbh if you haven't seem him play, as I haven't, I'd stop trying to discredit the suggestion the poster made. I look at players based on their background off a quick search too, but personally I think you've expended too much energy arguing against this one if you're not already well up on him. Apologies if you've already let it drop, I haven't refreshed the thread ?

Most likely, but if (this first being the biggest of ifs given recent history) the defensive situation gets fixed, Armstrong fires all season and Dack returns like his old self, I'd definitely fancy us for the playoffs. It's small margins in this league. We know TM won't fix the defence and GK situation adequately and we might sell a key player to stockpile more CMs or just pay the bills, but let me have 5 seconds of optimism eh?

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/championship/top-scorers Noticed he has the highest shots on target rate of anybody on this page. I found that especially interesting since he shoots from distance so often. Hoping for big things from Arma next season if we can keep him. A full season like his second half of this season, and we're either getting promoted (defence permitting...) or he's off for big bucks. Hopefully he gels with Dack rather than their styles clashing.

Ahhh, so we ARE making offers

Already said it but will say it again. Even if theres no sell on clause, we are due a development fee on every cash transfer he has in future. That's the rules of the game now, we don't need to write it into a deal. So that would explain us being due a slice even if we didn't negotiate one through our usual sheer fucking incompetence.

Ok but I was talking about what Rich Sharpe said. Which is that we profit if he is sold. I've already said in another post how both could be true though.

Had a thought about Raya's sell on. It could be true that we have no sell on clause, but still benefit from him moving again. You get a development fee for all future cash transfers a player has throughout the rest of his career if you had him through a certain age range. You get more based on how many years you had him. We had Raya since he was 17 right? So there's definitely a fee for us every time he moves now. Still hoping we have had the sense to insist on a sell on though, we were already selling too cheaply. If you have a sell on, you still get the development fee too.

Then I'd much rather just plug the gaps.

Tbh if that's the FUP situation, then as long as the owners are willing and able to back us I say fuck it, go for broke on going up this season and buy proven quality. We aren't raising and saving that amount of money in this climate without risking relegation again anyway.

Allocating a budget to each position is fine as a vague outline, but if you then go spend what you allotted on the CM, and subsequently find out the CB or GK costs more than you thought (as we seem to find out with players every year but still don't cotton onto how off our valuations are), you end up in trouble buying or loaning dross instead. A CM shouldn't even be on the list anyway unless we also expect to be able to shift at least one more of our current crop of them. One of the well-paid ones at that. Which I struggle to see unless Evans' old boss has been sniffing around him.

Nobody told Rich Sharpe. Who is also a reporter (even if sometimes that definition is stretched). It would be abysmal business if we sold such a young and promising keeper without a sell on of at least 20%. Assuming we had one at the time was one of my only minor consolations.

That kind of thinking is probably why we have umpteen CMs and a threadbare defence with no GKs. I mean what you're saying makes sense, amongst your 2-3 ish main priority positions or if you have an infinite budget. When you just apply it to whatever position you can find a player you like, it becomes a scatter gun approach with no strategy. It's simple enough Paul. We probably don't have a huge budget. We sorely need a GK, probably two. A CB, probably two. An LB, some would also say two. We just lost two squad strikers. All of these are bigger issues, and if the first thing we do is collect another CM, then at the end of the budget are all 'oh, guess we have no money to buy the best CB or GK we found after all, here's Bournemouth's 3rd choice on loan' it's going to be groundhog day again and people will absolutely have the right to be furious.

We have way too much of our squad concentrated there. We have no defence to speak of. We have no goalies at all. We have nobody who can actually play this wide striker thing TM insists on well (or if we do, putting him there leaves us with zero consistently good strikers). We have no real budget. We shouldn't be looking at CMs unless we can clear some out. Which we should try to do if at all possible. Even if we shifted Johnson I'd still see CM as the last position for us to look to. One consistently good CM is more than most areas of the pitch have.

You can guarantee the players are on that list who could be obtained for the right wages and more than adequately plug our gaps and help us kick on to promotion. It's just about picking the right ones and selling it to them. That's the hard part, and that's where I see us falling down. Then again I see us falling down even if we have a decent budget, we have before.

Christ I just thought about how much money that would save us. Probably 50-60k a week*. Up to 3 million a year. Enough to pay Whiteman's fee and wages just in the first year with money to spare. And Johnson is a liability (cracking maybe 20 percent of the time, useless or worse the other 80). Downing has started to fade and may get worse over the next year. Evans has done well when played this season but has shown inconsistency in the past and injury-proneness in the always. If Whiteman is as good as Sparks says, or we got another player who is, I wouldn't say we would really miss them. We also still have a whole batch of others who can or do play there, in reserve. * Unless SD's new deal is on far far less than the last one

Ah that's different. Then I would only slap him with Waggott's severed hand.

I'd hunt Mowbray down and hit him with Waggott's decapitated head if they sold Travis for a couple of million.