Boli Bolingoli-Mbombo

Kieran Tierney on loan.

 

* that, we need our own left back not another stop gap.

 

So cost us nothing to sign or pay then?? All those signing come with wages, loan fees and all other expensives. You sign any international player there's going to be a decent wage involved. Sign 15 players at say 5k a week that's 75k a week, 300k a month on players contributing nothing. And I use 5k a week as a low wage, pretty sure there would be players on a good bit more. Imo most poster seem to be missing my point. We sold 4 players that we made money on, Virgil, Fraser, Vic and Hooper. We bought them for approx 2.6million, 2 million, 900k and 2.4 million combined total of 8 million. We sold them for 15.7 million, 11.25 million, 13.5 million,and 5.6 million so approx 46.2 million in minus initial cost of 8 million leaves 36 million profit on 4 players. That's great but the money wasted on others puts an huge dent in that, its this I have an issue on. We got lucky that those 4 were money makes on a huge scale, but if they hadn't been, would we all have been happy?? You can't ignore some costly signings, I won't go over old ground and I just hope he's learned that a scatter gun approach doesn't always work. So far his left back recruitment is worrying in respect that we spent over 5.5 million to sort a position that he ended up using a player that's been with us for 4 years in Hayes. And even more worrying is the opportunity lately to use a left winger in a left sided position in his new 3-5-2 he plays a left back in Taylor

 

Every player takes a wage, some are just squad fillers and back-up/emergency type's. All decent/big club's have them..

We weren't 'lucky' getting those 4...luck...what a cheek!.

No only did we make massive profits from them overall with the sales but we've also made millions since from sell on clauses from Van Dijk and Wanyama. Van Dijk's alone has probably covered any diddies wages combined that we've signed..

Outside those we've also had gems that were well coveted like Ledley, who was a great signing on a pre contract and there were many more..

You'd be hard pressed to find any elite manager who hasn't signed some right diddies in the past or squandered readies..

Boerigtter was a bad signing but Lenny confirmed he wasn't anywhere near as costly fee wise as made out. 900 grand or something which doesn't make up for it but him and likes of Pukki as we I'm sure were less than quoted. They won't be the only one's either..

Left back position we have let ourselves down this summer but outwith that our business has been pretty good..

 

You need back up keepers and players in general. Just because we didn’t have to use them doesn’t mean we didn’t need them in case. They need to be paid. Every club has them.

You seem to think that every team should have a perfect transfer record. It doesn’t happen like that. You’re talking in ifs and buts, which means your argument is *. What if we didn’t make big profit on these players? It doesn’t matter, because we did. Don’t worry about it.

 

I agree Mac.

why not say sign 15 players at £2 k a week, that’s only £30k a week, =£120k a month.

not so bad now is it. however the squad players they replaced were on say £2.5k per week, that’s £37K a month that’s £148k a month. * me we’re in credit.

Why were we lucky with Vic VVD, Forster & Hooper? Remind me please smythy.

 

At no point do I say or expect a perfect transfer record but Lenny was very hit and miss in his first spell, especially in the forward position. Signing guys like Scepovic, Pukki, Amido Balde, Boerrigter all for good money and sold or released with a very poor return. Imo a 23 man squad, very like a international tournament squad, is what's required filled out with the best youth options. 3 goalies, 2 RBS, 2 LBS, 3 CBS for defence, 2 RW, 3 CM, 2 LW for midfield and 3or 4 CFS dependant on formation. That leaves space for 2 utility players and the likes of Bitton would be one that could fill that role. This is our biggest season since 1967, forget the trebles as they are now history, and we can't afford to get it wrong. That manky mob will never be in as bad a position again in my time so imo it's now or never

 

Scepovic was a deila signing

 

Agree with the squad part but wouldn’t say Lenny was hit and miss with signings. 1 season signings;
-Mulgrew (Free)
-Cha du ri (Free)
-Ledley (Free)
-Murphy (800k)
-Juarez (3 mil)
-Hooper (2.4 mil)
-Kayal (1.2 mil)
-majstorovic (Free)
-Izaguirre (600k)
-Forster (Loan)
-Stokes (1.2 mil)
-Kapo (free)
-Ljungberg (free)
-Watt (100k)
-Commons (300k)
Without a doubt that window was a great one.

season 2;
-Wilson (free)
-Matthews (Free)
-McGeouch (free)
-Wanyama (900k)
-Forster again (loan)
-Bangura (2.2 mil)
-kaddouri (loan)
-Blackman (free)
-Lustig (free)
-Ibrahim (free)
-Brozek (loan)
6 out of 11 good signings. And the 5 that weren’t good...only one cost any money for the transfer (bangura). Would say that’s a good window again going by the success of Matthews, Wilson, wanyama and lustig.

season 3;
-Forster (2 mil)
-Ambrose (1.5 mil)
-Miku (loan)
-kamenar (loan)
-nouioui (free)
-gershon (loan)
-Rogic (400k)
-Noring (loan)
Probably the worst window. 3 good signings out of 8. However even the 5 bad are loans and one free. Not bad financially for us.

season 4;
-Balde (1.8mil)
-Van dijk (2.6mil)
-mouyokolo (free)
-boerigter (3 mil)
-bitton (700k)
-pukki (2.4 mil)
-oberschmidt (loan)
-fridjonson (100k)
-johansen (2 mil)
-griffiths (1 mil)
Balde and boerigter both awful signings for good money too. But in this window; griff, johansen, bitton and Van dijk. I wouldn’t class pukki as a bad signing after seeing what he’s done after leaving us, I would say that’s more a player not performing to his ability...not a “miss” transfer wise.

In that first period as manager if we ever did sign a “miss” under Lenny it was usually at no financial cost transfer wise apart from that last window. Signings under him were great i thought

 

Also needs to be remembered how * awful we were when he came in. Had been pumped 4 - 0 by St mirren and had garbage like McGowan and nguemo playing. He essentially rebuilt the entire squad. Wasn't like when deila or the snake came in and had the tools there to work with

 

Great point. Feel he was a tiny bit fortunate to be getting the job just as McGeady transfer was going through tho, that meant he actually was able to perform the rebuild

 

Yeah fair point could make same case with last season and Tierney, where he had to rebuild the entire defence.

On both occasions he done well tho with the budget he had and got full use out of it. You don't need to go too far back to find a manager of ours who would have made a complete * of both budgets

 

Totally. Didn’t even think of the Tierney sale for the start of his second spell either haha! Lenny knows what he’s doing i do actually reckon Lenny doesn’t have that much input over transfers, he might just say areas he wants to improve and have 1 or 2 he wants signed. But can’t imagine he’s the one who comes up with the cha du ri’s, wanyama, bayo etc. Ronny Deila was to thank for Ajer and dembele as both were set in place before rodgers arrived. The signings during rodgers time in charge were the worst we’ve had during the 9 I actually think

 

I think Lenny is prob 50/50 on the signings. Definitely think guys like stokes, hooper, Griffiths, Mulgrew would of been his own. Same with Taylor and Forster this year. Difference is he's a smart enough guy to know how it works here and trusts the scouting team to deliver him gems and its generally worked well for him.
The rats ego wouldn't allow him to let anyone else find him players unless it was his clueless mate. His signings were pretty poor and where his downfall at Liverpool and likely will be at Leicester too

 

I cant say he didn't make some money on players but he signed 43 players or so in 4 season s. That's nearly a new team every year and it was pretty clear the quality on at least 20 was poor. I had a look back on them and the problem was a large amount of them, probably 20 didn't even start 10 games or less. Even international players like Gershon, Brozek Scepivic hardly played yet had came with decent reputation. Yes in his 1st season it was a rebuild due to the Mowbray era but the next 3 season should maybe have been 3 or 4 quality players but still brought in a * of a lot inferior players.Imo A successful squad is one with a core starting line and maybe 2 or 3 players coming in for certain games and others in for Cup ties. I hope that he's learned from his 1st stint that numbers make for problems and quality is far more important

 

I will tell why imo he was lucky. VVD was a very good player before he signed, there was no doubt. We got lucky that no snobby EPL club were willing to take a chance on him not one. And no one can't tell me that he improved that much by going to Southampton either that he became a 75 million quid player. We took the gamble it paid off. Hooper scored goals in the Championship and League one looked the part and for 2 million quid was a worth while punt. Foster was a goalkeeper that was more of a risk, not many 1st team games and tbh he progressed far more than most people probably expected, Barca game being his big moment. Big Vic was again a good punt for 900k that's no question but did we think that after his 1st game at right back v St Johnstone ?? My point is after signing around 43 players in 4 years that we wasted a lot of money, no denying it, on players that contributed nothing. Its very easy to remember the good ones and forget the bad. Over that period the Zombies were dying and we should have been doing trebles in at least 2 of the 4 seasons. My biggest complaint over signing was always that we went for quantity rather than quality. Imo if would have went for quality first we more than likely would have got at least one treble if not more.

 

Scepovic wasn’t Lenny so don’t know why you included him mate. If any player failed they were usually loans or free signings. Only a few that failed cost substantial money.
Signing players in general can’t be assured to work every time just by trying to sign a few players of quality. Pukki is a player of quality but it just didn’t work out with us, sometimes you can’t assure a player will be quality at the club even if he’s quality elsewhere