Recruitment in the summer...

[Blade56]

No doubt plans are already afoot and could have played a part in convincing some of our recent acquisitions to get onboard the big Blades bus.

What has become evident is CW has a board that backs him and we are not selling to survive, not buying fringe journeymen and not a retirement home for one last big payday players. We have moved to seeking out young quality talent with the security of ”loan to buy” deals (I believe).

I wonder how much Rip Van Winkle has had to do with the scouting?

What next? Man City are reported to be having a clear out, do we start buying proven PL talent, redevelop the academy to grow our own, use the loan system (although PL clubs will be resistant to loaning to us), keep up with casting our scouting net world wide or all of the above?

And without a doubt Wilder must now be considered a big pulling factor.

Oh exciting times.

 

[CarlingBlade]

Sign Hendo and Mitrovic

 

[Davalon]

Depends what money is available.

 

[DerbyStar]

Van Winkle has quite obviously played a big part, and Chris is very happy with that considering him signing that new contract. Makes the rumours put about from the McCabe camp that Wilder wasn’t happy with VW being involved look a complete and utter mockery. We are so much better off without that waster and his cronies than I ever could’ve imagined.

 

[broomhillblade]

I hope we don't buy overpriced established Premier League talent. We need hungry players with something to prove, on their way up. And while we're at it we need to get more out of the Academy.

 

[pommpey]

Van Winkle has quite obviously played a big part, and Chris is very happy with that considering him signing that new contract. Makes the rumours put about from the McCabe camp that Wilder wasn’t happy with VW being involved look a complete and utter mockery. We are so much better off without that waster and his cronies than I ever could’ve imagined.

Kept saying it about McCabe, over and over again.

People may lionise him having 'saved the club' and spunked his munneh to stop it folding. It's bollocks. Even if he'd have walked away sure, we'd have suffered but we would have acquired new ownership and built. You can't build that progress on the personality cult of one man and his fucked up ambitions to be unambitious, or at least show car-crash levels of mismanagement and incompetence. And the way he spun the whole sorry sack of shit in court just to save his arse was pathetic. Like a poor unfortunate woman who suffered years of physical and verbal abuse from her partner, the supporters just got used to it and as long as he had people defending him and falling out with others over his incompetence and bullshit - on here, in pubs and on the terraces - and they weren't demanding his resignation, he endured. Using the woman analogy, her friends would possibly say, 'I don't know how you put up with it for so long', to which the answer is usually summat to do with control freakery and not knowing where to go and what the alternative was. McCabe was that control freak and the club his partner and I suppose we were the kids, caught up in the whole shitstorm.

pommpey

 

[Niceguyeddie]

No doubt plans are already afoot and could have played a part in convincing some of our recent acquisitions to get onboard the big Blades bus.

What has become evident is CW has a board that backs him and we are not selling to survive, not buying fringe journeymen and not a retirement home for one last big payday players. We have moved to seeking out young quality talent with the security of ”loan to buy” deals (I believe).

I wonder how much Rip Van Winkle has had to do with the scouting?

What next? Man City are reported to be having a clear out, do we start buying proven PL talent, redevelop the academy to grow our own, use the loan system (although PL clubs will be resistant to loaning to us), keep up with casting our scouting net world wide or all of the above?

And without a doubt Wilder must now be considered a big pulling factor.

Oh exciting times.

 

[I should coco]

People may lionise him having 'saved the club' and spunked his munneh to stop it folding. It's bollocks. Even if he'd have walked away sure, we'd have suffered but we would have acquired new ownership and built.

Like say, Bolton? Absolutely no guarantees another mug would have come along with £50m.

BTW, I agree with your control freak comment and to an extent the battered wife analogy. He made plenty of big mistakes but the point is, he was pumping money in following the McDonald years, when no other bugger was fronting up.

It's over now, so not sure why you want to keep bringing it up all the time. Can we just move on now, or do we get months more of this anti-McCabe stuff?

 

[Kev Gee]

Good post.
Recruitment wise I can see it being a combination of all the above factors. Not every Citeh player that will be leaving there will be after a last payday. There will be some good EPL level standard pros at the club looking for a new club.
I reckon we will go more foreign but with an eye on young up and coming pros.
The academy also needs looking at. As mentioned by BushBlade many EPL teams have at least 1 academy product in their 25 man squad.

 

[Stevo]

Look at where we are with the loans, who do we try to keep ,who do we let go, pay up the contracts of the surplus fringe players, the GK is the key piece of recruitment,whether that is loaning hendo again or sourcing a permanent deal. Look at cover for Stevens/baldock and maybe a big money centre back. Repel any bids that are under 50m for any of our players and that should do it.......easy this recruitment thing

 

[McGrath]

Sign Hendo and Mitrovic

I would be amazed if we were remotely interested in Mitrovic. Doesn't look like the type of player we are normally after. Besides he might be playing for Fulham in the Prem

 

[Carlton Blade]

We can't afford established Premier league players who would significantly improve the 1st XI

 

[Sheffsteel]

Still find it strange that no one seems to realise that since being outclassed away at Liverpool we’ve lost our confidence on the ball.
Remember....up to Xmas....almost every opposition fan said they had their worse performance of the season when playing us.

Before Liverpool away we were often dominating teams home and away.
Since the Liverpool match we’ve focussed our game on NOT having the ball....we don’t have as much possession and play more long ball than previously.

Why has our style changed? Maybe it’s jut that we played Liverpool and Man City so had a run of games without the ball.

We have some easier games coming up and I’m hoping we revert back to controlling games...dominating possession making the opposition look poor.
A common factor regards our change in style seems to be when McGoldrick is missing..the ball doesn’t stick up front and we lose something.
Next season McGoldrick might be too old....really think we need a player who helps our creativity and build up play.

 

[Sheffsteel]

We can't afford established Premier league players who would significantly improve the 1st XI

True....bet we are one of the lowest payers in the Premier League....how can we attract established PL players? We can‘t.

 

[Yoonited]

Kept saying it about McCabe, over and over again.

People may lionise him having 'saved the club' and spunked his munneh to stop it folding. It's bollocks. Even if he'd have walked away sure, we'd have suffered but we would have acquired new ownership and built. You can't build that progress on the personality cult of one man and his fucked up ambitions to be unambitious, or at least show car-crash levels of mismanagement and incompetence. And the way he spun the whole sorry sack of shit in court just to save his arse was pathetic. Like a poor unfortunate woman who suffered years of physical and verbal abuse from her partner, the supporters just got used to it and as long as he had people defending him and falling out with others over his incompetence and bullshit - on here, in pubs and on the terraces - and they weren't demanding his resignation, he endured. Using the woman analogy, her friends would possibly say, 'I don't know how you put up with it for so long', to which the answer is usually summat to do with control freakery and not knowing where to go and what the alternative was. McCabe was that control freak and the club his partner and I suppose we were the kids, caught up in the whole shitstorm.

pommpey

Good analogy pommpey

 

[gordoncharles]

Still find it strange that no one seems to realise that since being outclassed away at Liverpool we’ve lost our confidence on the ball.
Remember....up to Xmas....almost every opposition fan said they had their worse performance of the season when playing us.
.....
Next season McGoldrick might be too old....

There's a common denominator in there somewhere, Sheffsteel

 

[Snake]

Still find it strange that no one seems to realise that since being outclassed away at Liverpool we’ve lost our confidence on the ball.
Remember....up to Xmas....almost every opposition fan said they had their worse performance of the season when playing us.

Before Liverpool away we were often dominating teams home and away.
Since the Liverpool match we’ve focussed our game on NOT having the ball....we don’t have as much possession and play more long ball than previously.

Why has our style changed? Maybe it’s jut that we played Liverpool and Man City so had a run of games without the ball.

We have some easier games coming up and I’m hoping we revert back to controlling games...dominating possession making the opposition look poor.
A common factor regards our change in style seems to be when McGoldrick is missing..the ball doesn’t stick up front and we lose something.
Next season McGoldrick might be too old....really think we need a player who helps our creativity and build up play.

I agree with you to a certain extent but I think it's deeper than just losing confidence after the Liverpool game. Take the Liverpool and both Man City games out of the equation and we have won 2 and drawn 1 out of our last 3 games, conceding just the 1 goal too. I think we have realised just how bloody good we are without the ball and at locking teams out. We are more than capable of grabbing a goal at the other end too - as obviously Palace and West Ham showed. Although we aren't going to win too many new friends this way, it is an extremely effective way of playing and picking up points. What we need to play this system better is a class holding midfielder and more real pace up front - hence the signings of Berge and Zivkovic.

Also of late teams are much more aware of our overload and overlapping centre back approach and are changing their shape to better cope with this. Tufty is already one step ahead of the game. We now have many more strings to our bow and can find different ways of winning a game.

 

[Sheffsteel]

There's a common denominator in there somewhere, Sheffsteel

It’s a weird one....when McGoldrick plays we usually play some great football and also create some good chances....some falling to McGoldrick himself.
I keep thinking if Sharp had that chance...he’s have scored....McGoldrick finishing has been poor....he struggles to get enough power in his shots.

But when Sharps played he’s not even had a chance to score. Also when McGoldricks doesn’t play we seem to struggle to create clear chances....thought it might be just coincedence...but it in recent matches with McGoldrick out injured our passing hasn‘t been as fluid and we‘ve not created many good chances.

 

[Kanye]

What next? Man City are reported to be having a clear out, do we start buying proven PL talent, redevelop the academy to grow our own, use the loan system (although PL clubs will be resistant to loaning to us), keep up with casting our scouting net world wide or all of the above?

Proven PL talent?
Is there such a thing as proven PL talent? Alexis Sanchez was a proven, elite PL player at Arsenal, then all of a sudden he wasn't. Everton have been signing players with a good record in the PL (players who might be classified as proven PL players) such as Keane, Sigurðsson, Iwobi, Walcott, Delph, etc. - not only are those sorts of players probabaly out of our price range, but I doubt many would get in our team either.

Academy graduates?
As for the academy, I think we should get it up to the best possible standard, and hope it carries on producing the likes of Calvert-Lewin, Ramsdale and Brooks. However, the quantity and quality of academy graduates is still very much down to chance. We can't rely on it to plug specific holes in the squad, though we should utilise it where we can.

Loans?
Loans are a great idea if there is a suitable player available, like Henderson, but the chances of us finding a player in a top 6 team who is both unneeded at his parent club, and good enough for us are getting slimmer and slimmer as we progress. If we were to cement ourselves as a top 6 team, the chances of a "rival" loaning us a player would be practically nil. Non-domestic loans may be an option.

IMO, The only real way we can recruit is to buy promising young players, who are yet to prove themselves in the PL.
If there's any club we should try to emulate, it's LCFC. Like us, they dont have the commercial/matchday revenue of the big 6, yet they manage to stay competitive by buying young players, developing them, selling them, and replacing them at a profit. The revenue generated by the sales of players like Kante, Maguire and Mahrez has been reinvested into the team. Providing they can keep buying players for £20-£30m, and selling them for £60m+, they will continue closing the gap. Easier said than done, obviously.

The signings of players such as Mousset, McBurnie, Berge and Retsos indicate to me that we're moving in the right direction.

 

[Jim Chimmerney]

A lot might depend on players leaving as well, doubtless one or two could be on other teams radars in the Summer.

 

[Tarqs]

First job is to upgrade on Baldock with Matty Lowton

According to someone lmao.

 

[Sheffsteel]

I agree with you to a certain extent but I think it's deeper than just losing confidence after the Liverpool game. Take the Liverpool and both Man City games out of the equation and we have won 2 and drawn 1 out of our last 3 games, conceding just the 1 goal too. I think we have realised just how bloody good we are without the ball and at locking teams out. We are more than capable of grabbing a goal at the other end too - as obviously Palace and West Ham showed. Although we aren't going to win too many new friends this way, it is an extremely effective way of playing and picking up points. What we need to play this system better is a class holding midfielder and more real pace up front - hence the signings of Berge and Zivkovic.

Also of late teams are much more aware of our overload and overlapping centre back approach and are changing their shape to better cope with this. Tufty is already one step ahead of the game. We now have many more strings to our bow and can find different ways of winning a game.

Excellent post.....doubt Wilder would admit this but I reckon his match review data analysts has noticed that some teams are starting to work us out
The alarm bells are starting to ring so he‘s already working on a style/ tactics change for next season.
As you said Wilder is one and even two steps ahead of the game...he obviously sees Berge as a massive factor in our new style.

My theory is that Wilder knows he can’t ever match any of the big 6 for an open expansive footballing style...good quality PL cost 50 million plus.
I reckon his tactics next season will be based on the Athletico Madrid style....totally solid in defense so we hardly ever concede.
Suspect we won’t have much possession but we’ll have excellent defensive players who are great on the counter attack.
Retsos appears to be a centre back version of George Baldock...good (not great) in defence but even better breaking forward.
Berge is excellent defensively but has the ability and desire to break forward with the ball and a good passer.
Think Zivkovic is an experiment at what can be achieved tactically when you have a striker that’s lightning quick...great for counter attack.

 

[Keef Chedwyn]

Still find it strange that no one seems to realise that since being outclassed away at Liverpool we’ve lost our confidence on the ball.
Remember....up to Xmas....almost every opposition fan said they had their worse performance of the season when playing us.

Before Liverpool away we were often dominating teams home and away.
Since the Liverpool match we’ve focussed our game on NOT having the ball....we don’t have as much possession and play more long ball than previously.

Why has our style changed? Maybe it’s jut that we played Liverpool and Man City so had a run of games without the ball.

We have some easier games coming up and I’m hoping we revert back to controlling games...dominating possession making the opposition look poor.
A common factor regards our change in style seems to be when McGoldrick is missing..the ball doesn’t stick up front and we lose something.
Next season McGoldrick might be too old....really think we need a player who helps our creativity and build up play.

Nailed it. I much preferred giving teams their worst performance in years over smash and grabbing. But then again, the points are the main thing.

 

[Sheffsteel]

Nailed it. I much preferred giving teams their worst performance in years over smash and grabbing. But then again, the points are the main thing.

Agree...Keef
I know a Spurs fan and just before playing them away....he said we’d be tough to crack because we’d work so hard and defend really well denying them space.
I was quite blase and assured him “our team would outplay Spurs and it would their players trying to stop us from playing”....he thought I was mad.

Regards the match...we totally dominated the 1st half.....Spurs didn’t have a shot and we were the better team in the 2nd half too playing some lovely football.
Kane hardly touched the ball. Spurs were only good during the 6 minutes of injury time.....when we were holding on.

After the match the Spurs fan couldn’t believe what he’d seen.....Sheffield United outplaying the mighty Spurs on their patch with his team very lucky to draw.

All he could say was his team didn’t try and it was one of the worse they‘ve played in years.

 

[Ricky]

The challenge is going to be maintaining the British/Irish core now we've started down the path of finding superior value abroad.

I'd like to say we only need 3 or 4 signings but a secret of Wilder's success is a relatively high turnover of players on a regular basis. It keeps things fresh.

Henderson/Ramsdale
Jags replacement
Retsos
RWB cover
Replacements for Osborn/L.Freeman if they leave
Grealish
Forward with pace

I think the minimum we'll be looking at is something like that. Apart from Grealish.

 

[Need4speed]

Need a left and right wing backs a replacement for didn’t and another striker