When you look at it, to be genuinely self sustaining and responsible, we probably need to reduce the wage bill to that of Preston ( the actual Preston have one of the most reckless wage bills in the league as well ). Which makes us un-competitive with our peers, who are prepared to gamble away. The only way to bridge that without a real sugar daddy, is through player sales. The Adams, Brooks, Dcl and Maguire/Walker sell ons, helped us to expand and replenish a competitive team through the promotions. We invested heavily in young mainly British talent once we were in the Prem, but with no return. We are seemingly heading in the right direction on our own talent again, but struggle in findings value from abroad. The frustrating contradiction seems to be that the best model for staying in the Premier ( and Forest are showing spending 300 million is no guarantee) is keeping the unity of the team you went up with, adding some experienced heads and prioritising a sound defence. On the other hand you are less likely to develop platers to sell on that way. The Prince focused on keeping the team together when we went down, it kept us competitive but we were not able to replenish and develop the squad, ended up selling our our best players at their lowest value at the worst time and arrived in the Premier with many of the team on their last legs and no real market value. Leeds and Southampton, spent a fortune on young players, played attacking football, were relegated, but Southampton were able to sell over 100 million of talent and still put in a competitive promotion bid, if Leeds don't make it up this season they could probably bring in the same and cover the losses. Basically it's all too complicated for me....
