Stadt

Manchester United's stupid decision to spend so much on Maguire had such an inflationary effect on well ran we appeared. It's like the club top brass believed it themselves. The comments after the initial FFP charge said it all.

I looked at the xGD in 18/19 recently - we were 6th (which I guess Rodgers’ strong finish helped massively). 16/17 - 18/19 were pretty serious underperformances. The most haunting signing and biggest sliding doors moment really was Perez. A proper RW would have had us on the top 4 at least once and maybe even a European trophy.

I’m not sure how serious you are with the final point but I’d obviously disagree. Shinji was selected far less frequently year on year even as when we’re getting worse. Being a workhorse isn’t enough. Obviously his role was to work out of possession probably more than it was in possession, so the usual yardsticks matter less. Again, I’m not denying his utility but as you said his actual footballing ability was limited.

They paid a few million less for Livramento the week after

In the Edu example, it's not as if Marinakis is a visionary - he just made an attractive offer with the right autonomy. The autonomy aspect is what should make the DoF role a good opportunity here but Top evidently likes his 5'9 buttplug

He worked incredibly hard and was instrumental for the system in 15/16 but he's just not a good footballer by Premier League standards. How likeable he is means it's an unpopular opinion, rather than it being necessarily wrong. 137 apps, 81 starts, 19 goals and 5 assists is a poor record for an attacking midfielder never mind a striker. Even besides the stats he was a bit of an awkward player hence why most of his goals didn't even hit the net. Again just to labour the point, I like him but I just don't think he was particularly good.

He was a good player and the meme has unfairly tinted his spell here.

Okazaki wasn't very good

If we were midtable and mediocre next season but started with Stolarcyzk in goal, Nelson at CB, Alves or Braybrooke in midfield and Monga/Evans got decent minutes off the bench it'd instil a bit of life into this dead club.

We could - it's just Top won't do it. We could afford to double Barber's salary. Marinakis managed to land Edu. If we allocated just 10% of next season's player wage budget to staff we could have top 10/5/1% backroom staff. It's telling everybody good we've appointed has left quite quickly. Macia, McGuinness, Halajko, Sormaz etc. Even Congerton ffs has done well at Atalanta. The common denominator in failure is Rudkin.

I was completely confused at the time. Makes sense after reading the Friend thread

Food is good but I hate the decor.

Done deal then

I never said he should be on loan? Simmer down

Yep, me too haha. My pinned places on my phone's maps looks like Lamby.

It's really damning on Rudkin that he is BOTH the academy director and DoF - and yet our young players don't get much of a chance and their loans are mismanaged. You might think that if anything we'd be overambitious with giving academy players minutes or loans. Nope, the polar opposite.

I stuck up for Amartey at times but there's a bit of revisionism here. He wasn't a good enough centre back for the PL.

#WhenTaken #343 (04.02.2025) I scored 754/1000🏅 1️⃣📍9.5 km - 🗓️7 yrs - 🥇191/200 2️⃣📍460 m - 🗓️2 yrs - 🥇198/200 3️⃣📍1.1 km - 🗓️7 yrs - 🥇191/200 4️⃣📍501 km - 🗓️8 yrs - 🥈174/200 5️⃣📍11.8K km - 🗓️34 yrs - 🥉0/200 https://whentaken.com 0!

Interesting to know RE Bologna. Maybe a touch sad but Italy's lack of pubs and bars does put me off. Kicking around generic cafe bars or drinking in restaurants isn't quite the same. If you go to Lecce, I'd say do you research in advance. The stumble-ability factor wasn't great when I went after Rome in 2022..

There is so much leverage in just paying a director of football good money. Clubs will spend tens of thousands of pounds a week on back up players. Smithies probably cleared a million in his season here but baulk at the idea of paying backroom staff properly. The director of football is arguably the most important long term role at a club and they probably get paid a few hundred thousand a year. Ironically, for the right director of football the Leicester job would be great because you have too much autonomy. Any semi-competent director of football from Braga, Feyenoord, Union SG etc type clubs would be a big step up for us. Everything I hear down the grapevine about Rudkin is that he seems to think he's some sort of administrator rather than strategic drive behind the club. What's happened to us makes sense.

Liverpool's pubs seem far less revered too, I probably see about 5 sodding photos of the Peveril every week. The Philharmonic is just as photogenic.

I’m probably a 99th percentile KP/Rudkin outer and I even would have said one signing, a £3m right back with 6 months left is on the nose

We’ve had some sacks of shit in our time by this c unt is right up there. The last time he played was for 3 minutes on the 10th of November.

Seemed a bit convenient to me

Have you been? It’s not viable. I agree about the fanbase though.