We’ve gone from squad rebuild (new midfield) at the end of Jurgen’s time and then winning the league with a hybrid old-new squad, which at that point of time looked pretty damn good.
Then along came Hughes and, even taking into consideration the impact of losing Jota (the emotional one being the biggest, but also very importantly we lost an ace striker who could play effectively in our existing playing system) what he did in terms of squad restructure was unequivocally disastrous.
Players are players and they are also human beings. We react and interact differently based on situations but also our internal makeup. I get that. And you can’t browbeat someone into good performances. If all the things don’t line up for them, they can’t produce, no matter how good they’ve been in the past.
And now we come to the transfer price. Of course just because someone is £100M+ doesn’t mean they will automatically perform. They’re not robots. But the price should be an indication of talent plus the ability to apply those talents. So, I see the fan frustration there as well and I get it.
I know weve had at-length conversations about “we pay that extra bit to get the finished article”…well now I think we are well past the point where that “extra bit” is value for money. Which is why we were looking at the multi-club model. Morgan Rogers and Elliot Anderson are in no way £100M plus players.
There was also the issue that Slot had already said he didnt want him. Bringing him back would have turned the problem into Slot’s (“Arne, your team is shit and you continue to ignore Harvey. Can you speak about that?”)
So basically we swerved a manager because we didn’t want to give him too much control over directors on transfers, with our directors now fucking off. Maybe we also didn’t want to change formation and buy wingers, only to find out that the wingers market is shit.
Depth is probably worse than last year, Barcola or not. All seems to be cobbled together with little logic. Unless something unexpected happens this week, it looks shite.
Note that Anderson and Rogers transfers happened after a successful World Cup AND after we ourselves broke the transfer market with Wirtz and Isak last summer. Ohh, and I will easily choose Rice and Anderson over our midfielders without blinking my eyes.
Also, it is understandable that Anderson and Rogers carry English tax, which explains their inflated price tags. The same cannot be said with Wirtz and Isak, and on top of that Wirtz did not even have PL experience. Someone else on this forum also mentioned that we easily shut him down in our match against Leverkusen in 2024-2025 UCL group stage.
My guess is it’s a stop-gap solution to a problem we’ll return to in a year when likes of Rayan will be available for a more sensible price (think it’s an £80m-odd release clause next summer?) with another year in the PL to analyse.
Or if he and Munoz perform well for the next 3 years then it might allow us time to allow a clearer pathway for Abe to move into the first team squad and focus on spending on other areas if needed?
Fair enough, but it’s also quite convenient for them. Players and coaches have to front up and be questioned on performances. There are suits paid a fortune to quality assure and plan squad building. They should be available to answers questions such as why all these bids weren’t going in 2 months ago!
I was on a toilet this morning, reading about Ismaila Sarr not being in the squad as he’s angling for a move. I was thinking to myself: “Fuck no, I hope Hughes missed the news..”
