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January Transfer Window


Kmcalpin
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Interesting that Bowman is being offered around if true. Hasn't had much of a chance as an out and out striker yet and I thought he was brought in as Moults replacement when he inevitably goes. If true he must just not be up to it and it's money down the tubes.

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Interesting that Bowman is being offered around if true. Hasn't had much of a chance as an out and out striker yet and I thought he was brought in as Moults replacement. If true he must just not be up to it and it's money down the tubes.

 

Never really been that impressed with him. Big laddie who tries hard and is committed, but he really doesn't look much of a player.

 

I don't foresee Lucas, and Clay for that matter, costing us the Earth in terms of wages. Lasley has taken a significant drop in earnings from last season as well. McHugh will probably be our highest earning player in that position.

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Not fair on Bowman, being signed without having a professional pre-season on deadline day. He was thrown to the wolves. If we are going to get signing players from that level, the first thing the club should do is drive them through a thirty day tailored pre-season, and only put them into the first team squad in an emergency during that time.

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While I appreciate some of them will not be on huge salaries, we'd still be paying wages to a couple of established professionals (as opposed to the likes of Allan Campbell or Jake Hastie) who'll be nowhere near the starting lineup.

 

If true that Bowman and Blyth are both surplus to requirements, then it reflects really badly on McGhee's performance in the summer market. If you add those two to Belic and Brill, that's four signings that after less than six months have been exposed as not good enough. I make it five other signings in the summer with varying degrees of success. McHugh looks a player but has been unlucky. Heneghan has been good (although maybe not as good as some are making out). Tait will do a job, steady Eddie. Clay and Lucas, have been okay to solid which would be fine if we had a creative midfielder alongside them.

 

So nine summer signings. Potentially four already moving on or surplus to requirements. Two or three decent signings and a couple who the support are unconvinced by. Am I the only one terrified at the thought of McGhee trying to replace Moult, McDonald and Cadden in the summer. His record in the transfer market is patchy at best...

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See to be honest I dont think we need a midfielder as we have a lot of depth in there when all fit but improvement is needed there and up front

I agree we do have a lot of depth there but I would say that its unbalanced and perhaps lacks quality. The arrival of Frear gives us more balance and pace on the left but its in the middle where we are a bit unbalanced. If you take Lasley, McHugh, Lucas and Clay they are all deep lying for one reason or another and they lack pace. What we still lack there is a good box to box attacking midfielder.

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Today made it clear why we need an attacking midfielder and forward.

 

Lost with just moult up top

 

Aye, as I mentioned in a different thread, our attack has suffered since we lost Marvin. Hopefully Frear can replace him and give us a bit more pace and width on the left.

 

We have been missing a creative midfield influence since Nicky Law move on. That kind of player is much more difficult to replace.

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Aye, as I mentioned in a different thread, our attack has suffered since we lost Marvin. Hopefully Frear can replace him and give us a bit more pace and width on the left.

 

We have been missing a creative midfield influence since Nicky Law move on. That kind of player is much more difficult to replace.

Hopefully pearo will address the balance in the centre of the park, 3 players to choose from in there and they are all defensive centre mids in my opinion

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Hopefully pearo will address the balance in the centre of the park, 3 players to choose from in there and they are all defensive centre mids in my opinion

 

As much as I like Pearson I wouldn't class him as creative mid. Although he is a bit more attacking, he's not a foot on the ball and pick a pass sort of player.

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New striker, get McDonald to fuck

Were you at the game today. Without McDonald we were toothless and created absolutely nothing. If he decides after today that he is fed up and decides that he wants to go back to Australia before Tuesday then I fear it is pretty certain we will be relegated.

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New striker, get McDonald to fuck

Were you at the game today. Without McDonald we were toothless and created absolutely nothing. If he decides after today that he is fed up and decides that he wants to go back to Australia before Tuesday then I fear it is pretty certain we will be relegated.

I was yes, we may not create anything when he's not on, but that was the tactics that McGhee set up to play and if he goes we can equally bring in another striker
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When you are shopping in the 50p barrel you are going to get dross.

 

Poor quality signings aren't just a McGhee problem, they go back to the McCall era when the cash was cut and we went from quite good to rubbish.

 

Lee Hollis, Paul Lawson, Josh Law, Mark O'Brien, Louis Laing, Tony Straker, Nathan Thomas, Joe Chalmers, Wes Fletcher, David Clarkson, Jake Taylor, Theo Robinson etc.

 

All brought in by managers in the last few seasons who's impact has been nought.

 

Let's be honest about this, We've signed 3 good players in the last three seasons and 2 of them came in when Barraclough got a wee bit of a windfall with Les Hutchison coming in - something that latter era McCall or now McGhee have never had.

 

Our transfer deals over a longer period than just McGhee have been poor and we need to improve in that area but at the same time I think you also have to accept that at the level we are at you will be doing really well to even get a 50% hit rate of decent players.

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I was yes, we may not create anything when he's not on, but that was the tactics that McGhee set up to play and if he goes we can equally bring in another striker

Do you genuinely believe that we'll be able to just "bring in" another striker of McDonald's standard? He is absolutely crucial to our team.

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When you are shopping in the 50p barrel you are going to get dross.

 

Poor quality signings aren't just a McGhee problem, they go back to the McCall era when the cash was cut and we went from quite good to rubbish.

 

Lee Hollis, Paul Lawson, Josh Law, Mark O'Brien, Louis Laing, Tony Straker, Nathan Thomas, Joe Chalmers, Wes Fletcher, David Clarkson, Jake Taylor, Theo Robinson etc.

 

All brought in by managers in the last few seasons who's impact has been nought.

 

Let's be honest about this, We've signed 3 good players in the last three seasons and 2 of them came in when Barraclough got a wee bit of a windfall with Les Hutchison coming in - something that latter era McCall or now McGhee have never had.

 

Our transfer deals over a longer period than just McGhee have been poor and we need to improve in that area but at the same time I think you also have to accept that at the level we are at you will be doing really well to even get a 50% hit rate of decent players.

Is the budget really as small as you can continuously make it out to be? The rhetoric is we now budget for 10th place but I struggle to believe that. We have an inflated squad at present and we have in all likelihood spent the best part of £100k on transfer fees in the last 6 months - something that seemed alien for many years. It looks like we are bringing in 5/6 players this January - again something that you couldn't envisage pre LH.

 

Just now we seem to be benefiting from the favourable debt repayment terms. As time ticks on though and the debt has to be repaid our budget will become much tighter if we don't hit the jackpot with the likes of Moult or Cadden.

 

While the financial landscape has changed, McGhee looks to have had a favourable budget during his two spells at the club.

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We have one of the best pairing up front in the league IMO.

Problem has been getting someone to help them out, how many times has McDonald come deep to end playing a pass to Moult who has went to the space in the channel?

Hopefully with the boy Frear on the left and Cadden on the right we will see less of the centre forwards floating and leaving no one in the middle if one of Louis or Skippy have dropped/made a run.

 

I agree the squad has a lot of midfield options but as said by someone earlier, it is (or was) unbalanced. Hopefully that is/will be addressed.

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Is the budget really as small as you can continuously make it out to be? The rhetoric is we now budget for 10th place but I struggle to believe that. We have an inflated squad at present and we have in all likelihood spent the best part of £100k on transfer fees in the last 6 months - something that seemed alien for many years. It looks like we are bringing in 5/6 players this January - again something that you couldn't envisage pre LH.

 

Just now we seem to be benefiting from the favourable debt repayment terms. As time ticks on though and the debt has to be repaid our budget will become much tighter if we don't hit the jackpot with the likes of Moult or Cadden.

 

While the financial landscape has changed, McGhee looks to have had a favourable budget during his two spells at the club.

 

I think our budget has dropped significantly this season, maybe not as dramatically as people are making out, but I think we could well be budgeting for 10th. I'd see where our squad is tomorrow before you properly gauge it, but I think we are spending a fair bit less on wages this season than we would have last, but we don't notice it numerically as we perhaps have gone for quantity over quality.

 

Consider that Hammell, McManus and Lasley are known to have taken significant pay cuts and that McFadden isn't costing us a combination of his and Steve Robinson's wage then that's a saving already. Probably only Cadden is earning more this season than he did last year.

 

All over the team I reckon there are savings. McHugh will be on less than Pearson I'd imagine and Clay will be on less than Gomis for example. Heneghan being on more than Hall is probably the exception where the replacement is on more than the guy he replaced. So while we don't see a difference in squad size, we do in player quality and that is probably why we have struggled as much. I don't think McGhee has had a good time of it in his transfer dealings this season and there are parts of the budget I would definitely have been wiser about spending.

 

The transfer fee thing comes from the business model and given we've gathered fees for Johnson, Pearson and Hall over the summer, I wouldn't be too concerned by it. Previous managers didn't really bring in enough money to be given any to spend back.

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What is hurting us is that he came in and immediately tried to force out Ainsworth and Laing to free up their wages and we are still paying them more than a year later.

 

That's massive amounts of money down the drain because McGhee likes to play favourites. We need to get the best out our budget and there is no way Ainsworth couldn't have contributed more and I don't think there is much difference between Laing and Heneghan.

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