Who do we need the most? We can sign just ONE of these....

[FTPE]

Brayford is making a comeback!
Very close between him and O'Grady now. Looks like I was the only person who give a shit about the lad from Dundee haha

 

[HoodedClaw]

Given the current makeup of the team and the inability for us to get J Wallace fit the priority has to be a midfielder. Whether Coutts is the answer or not I don't know. We need somone to help set and maintain our tempo.

Yes we need another striker, but if its a choice of only one player there's no point going for a striker as we, currently, don't have the midfield to play 442.

No point in going for Brayford, in this league Flynn/Alcock should be good enough to get us out of it. Brayford's one for when we're promoted.

 

[mattbianco1]

Dont fully understand FFP (does anyone?) but if we got £2m on the income then surely we can expend £2m on purchases. Otherwise if we sold several players and amassed £5m could we only bank it rather than buy players with it? Nah, think you've got that a bit wrong m1

The thing is, if Brayford is on the reported £18,000 a week and we are willing to match that (which I highly doubt). We are £936,000 down before any transfer fee comes into it. So in reality if we are paying a reported £1.7m for him, he will really cost £2.6m and ~£1m each year thereafter.

Haven't we just announced that our turnover last year was £11m? £2.6m is 23% of last years turnover.

For arguments sake, let's say that all our main squad of say 25 players earn £8k each that's £10.4m a year. We're only turning over £11m and that included £2.5m from the FA cup run. That's wages alone. No transfer fees at all taken into account there.

If we get out of this division and only then will we start to see the Prince's true potential

 

[Bladesway]

I keep having to repeat myself but... FFP restrict us from being billy big bollocks.

Did you see the article about Messi that there are only 2 clubs who could buy him and meet FFP rules in the world? Those two clubs are Manchester United and Real Madrid. So its fine to have shit loads of money in the bank (MCFC) but unless we are generating enough money in merchandise sales, through the turn styles, TV money, cup runs etc. We aren't allowed to spend it.

The team that finishes bottom of the championship will earn more than SUFC this season even if we make the cup final.

The amount of money you earn in the top two divisions just for competing is scandalous.

But we are under FFP, so that's pony for starters

 

[Bladesway]

The thing is, if Brayford is on the reported £18,000 a week and we are willing to match that (which I highly doubt). We are £936,000 down before any transfer fee comes into it. So in reality if we are paying a reported £1.7m for him, he will really cost £2.6m and ~£1m each year thereafter.

Haven't we just announced that our turnover last year was £11m? £2.6m is 23% of last years turnover.

For arguments sake, let's say that all our main squad of say 25 players earn £8k each that's £10.4m a year. We're only turning over £11m and that included £2.5m from the FA cup run. That's wages alone. No transfer fees at all taken into account there.

If we get out of this division and only then will we start to see the Prince's true potential

Let's say they earn 3k on average each as your figure is once more Pony.

 

[mattbianco1]

But we are under FFP, so that's pony for starters

Which hopefully gives us some cash headroom.

 

[mattbianco1]

Let's say they earn 3k on average each as your figure is once more Pony.

Nobody knows what they're on. Majority will be on £3k to £5k i'd imagine with a few being on more. I can't imagine Murphy, Higdon, Doyle etc. to be on less than £5k.

The post was to give an example to show people who keep banging on about game changing investment and ambition just how easy it is to swallow up all the money before we even start.

 

[SouthEssexBlade]

Game changing investment they said. We haven't spent the Maguire money either so why can't we have all of them?

 

[YES Blade]

The thing is, if Brayford is on the reported £18,000 a week and we are willing to match that (which I highly doubt).

There is no way we should be paying £18k in wages to a full back, that is a lot for a championship club let alone a league one club.

Only way we should be considering going over £10k a week in wages is for a 25+ goal a season striker, that is the type of player that makes a big difference in successful seasons, not a full back.

 

[Fiery Blade]

so either you didn't read my post at all, or are deliberately choosing to avoid my point as, go forbid, you might accept I'm right!

So Mr Doom,
We now believe everything that is printed in the Daily Mail !
If we're already in the bidding for Mr Brayford as intimated by Mr Clough (also bid turned down by Cardiff City) I am sure that both parties realise the wages that would be involved and that they would not prove a stumbling block !

 

[DazBlade88]

I'm not sure the player who's help us most is on the list - it could be Coutts but I worry he's another James Wallace.

The player we need is someone who is capable of playing in central midfield with just one other player, to allow us to break the shackles imposed on us by 4-5-1 and play 2 forwards.

I disagree. 5 in midfield is the way to go to if you want to be effective at both ends of the pitch.The problem is we need one of the 3 central midfielders getting forward more rather than an extra striker.

The key for scoring goals is having someone doing what Coady & Scougall did at the back end of last season and actually support the forward and wingers.

 

[SouthEssexBlade]

I think the OP will be irrelevant. There will be more than one signing.

 

[CopenhagenBlade]

What about O.G. He was pretty prolific for us last year...could we pick him up on loan?

 

[blader]

So Mr Doom,
We now believe everything that is printed in the Daily Mail !
If we're already in the bidding for Mr Brayford as intimated by Mr Clough (also bid turned down by Cardiff City) I am sure that both parties realise the wages that would be involved and that they would not prove a stumbling block !

Ok mate.

 

[Revolution]

I disagree. 5 in midfield is the way to go to if you want to be effective at both ends of the pitch.The problem is we need one of the 3 central midfielders getting forward more rather than an extra striker.

The key for scoring goals is having someone doing what Coady & Scougall did at the back end of last season and actually support the forward and wingers.

Fair enough. In theory, that can work.

However, the 3 central midfielders have scored 1 goal between them in 23 games. It isn't working.

 

[Gavlar]

We score a goal at least every game. There's only been about 3 or 4 games this season where we've drawn a blank. If we'd have kept clean sheets in just half of the games we've conceded, our situation would be very different. One of Ferguson's early successful MUFC teams won titles and cups on the back of 1-0 wins. We don't need to score 3 a game to be top of the table. Also - Sparky McNulty! The lad is coming good, and we will start (and have already started) scoring more per game.

The reason we aren't higher in the league is because we only score a max of 1 goal a game and concede as well. Its been said on this forum many times, we could go up by winning 1-0 for the rest of the season but it very very rarely happens. Most times, the teams who score the most go up. It's no coincidence that the top 3 teams have scored a lot more than us but our goals conceded column is not as different to theirs. The best form of defence is attack. We scored 2 against Preston and won, could have easily been another 1-1 draw.

 

[Grecian2000]

The only ones that I've seen in anger are Beard, Freeman and O'Grady. No doubt in my mind that Beard is the best of that bunch so that's my vote sorted.

 

[Damski]

Which titles?

In 1992-93 they were the second highest scorers in the Premier League.

In 1993-94 they were the second highest scorers in the Premier League.

In 1995-96 they were the top scorers in the Premier League.

Well I saw it on Premier League Years. I can't remember what season it was, but they did a whole bit about it. As an aside, whoever edits that show is a comedic genius. There was one passage of film that represented MUFC's dip in form one season. It was about a minute's worth of shots of Scholes, Giggs, Keane et al all failing to score and getting tacked and holding their heads in their hands and other such things, while Alex Ferguson's superimposed concerned chewing face faded into view, soundtracked by Every Breath You Take. I saw it about a year ago and still think of it sometimes and burst out laughing.

 

[Tezza1889]

It was brayford for me,.and theres only one reason... well i might ramble and it could end up more than one, but, hey! Guys..

The positivity, lift and confedence in our quite average team that brayford brought was unreal, all of a sudden solid players looked unbeatable, and average players looked like confident quality players, brayford put the shits up our opponents when they saw him on the team sheet and he followed it up with outstanding performances which bought all the other players so much space and time on the ball that they flourished and became a team full of confedence and swagger,.we walked out on the pitch and owned it from the first whistle, for me he was the talisman that made our players believe they were capable of anything, It was possibly the first time they worked with a proper 100% professional who wanted it, this rubbed off on the team and look where it took us..

And the fans, we believed as soon as we saw him that first game, the fans and team got a lift, a new air of optimism, a quality player without doubt, he was worth the ticket on his own.

Sorry, but I do love him that much....

 

[Reedy1889]

I voted Chris O'Grady but I would really, reallyyyy like to sign Brayford come to us in this window.

 

[mattbianco1]

Well I saw it on Premier League Years. I can't remember what season it was, but they did a whole bit about it. As an aside, whoever edits that show is a comedic genius. There was one passage of film that represented MUFC's dip in form one season. It was about a minute's worth of shots of Scholes, Giggs, Keane et al all failing to score and getting tacked and holding their heads in their hands and other such things, while Alex Ferguson's superimposed concerned chewing face faded into view, soundtracked by Every Breath You Take. I saw it about a year ago and still think of it sometimes and burst out laughing.

So you must be on about the 96/97 or 97/98 season then. The songs played on the show are from the season. Puff Daddy covered that song in 1997

 

[longinthe toothblade]

The Beard. Scoring goals is not a problem. Conceding them has been.

Are you serious? We've had a problem scoring goals for two seasons now. Have you seen our goal difference? Like last years heroics, I think there were only three teams in the league with a better defensive record and two of them were auto promotee's. There were only four teams with a worse goals record and two of them got relegated.

Not saying it's quite as bad this year, but the problem isn't the defence?

 

[Davie Blade]

Interesting to see what level we have now reached when we fans can't even agree whether we are sh!t in attack or defence.

Some salient and sobering FACTS revels where we are at.

Only 5 out of the bottom 10 clubs have scored LESS goals than us!

What if if we apply two very extreme of scenarios to either attack or defence.
If we had scored an extra goal in every single game we've played we still wouldn't have a better goal difference than any of the top 3 clubs.
Conversely if the defence had not conceded in half the games they did, as was suggested on here, (depending on whether or not you cherry picking the very best games not to concede i.e. /turning every draw into a win ) reveals we'd still be between 5 points best case to 11 points worse case away from the auto places!

So even taking improvements to defence or attack by an almighty gigantic factor shows the length of the journey ahead.

That my friends, is how badly we are really doing or put another way the sheer scale of the massive underachievement this season!