Confimred new owners of Raeding Footbal Club

[Ian Royal]

I'd just chuck a little more into the ring myself, that I disagree with Vision that the two relegations were different mistakes. On the face of it I'd probably agree, but when you go at root causing it, I think it comes down to the same thing.

Firstly, we survived our first PL season because we had a stonking young(ish) squad full of players who would have played in the PL sooner or later with or without our promotion (Shorey, Sidwell, Harper, and Kitson were among the best rated Championship players and performing season in and season out - there are other possibles too).

The issue was when the older players in that team started losing their powers and Sidwell and Seol left. And what went wrong was that or entire scouting ethos was set up on finding unpolished gems with PL potential and polishing them over a season or so. So when we brought in new players, we either went for that, which wasn't good enough to keep us up - see Kebe, Cisse etc. Or we just bought badly when it came to players we thought would be good enough - see Halford, Rosenior, Fae, Duberry, Matejovsky.

Second time round the circumstances were much harder, because we had a much weaker squad with much fewer players ready to step up. That meant we needed many more player changes, but the promotion had come a little too quickly for TSI to be fully geared up financially. We also really needed to change the way we played, which really meant we needed to shift on even some of our better players.

This time we tried to go mainly with players from other teams who were more like our players stepping up the first time around (Mariappa, Gunter, McCleary) but it's much harder to make the step up whilst also trying to fit in to a new team. Then you get the other style where we once again didn't really get it right with the established players. Though I'd say we did a far better job with Guthrie and Pog than we did with Halford & co.

I just get the impression what the club has most desperately lacked was a scouting infrastructure with some experience at picking an actual PL ready player. They're great at what we do, but like Brian's management, they're found a bit wanting when it comes to stepping up and competing in the big time.

Now we have that guy from Fulham bedded in, hopefully we'll see some difference if we do go back up again. And hopefully we won't go up this season so when we do make it, we'll have a less transitional team and an owner ready for it.

And hopefully we may... just may... be able to hold on to our best players for next season. Or at least not lose more than one or two.

I don't subscribe to the must pay more crowd, we've proved time and again it's not how much you spend but how cleverly you spend it that matters. Deeper pockets opens more targets, but it's not a requirement.

[Wimb]

Can we please stop all this rational well thought out debate, it's not befitting this portal

[Tommy Youlden's Ears]

It's all become disgracefully rational over here! Have you all been on a booze-free January or summink?

[Dick Habbin's hairdo]

Not only has it become incredibly rational, it's also become incredibly verbose. I'm not reading all those words.

CBA.

[winchester_royal]

And thus we return to form

[Extended-Phenotype]

I don't subscribe to the must pay more crowd, we've proved time and again it's not how much you spend but how cleverly you spend it that matters. Deeper pockets opens more targets, but it's not a requirement.

Not spending much at all is not the same as spending cleverly. The amount of money spent is not an indicator of how well you will succeed but decent promise and established talent costs money. Else you are relying on a club being able to spot something other clubs miss (not sure how that could be done to a consistent enough level to make a difference) or treating the transfer windows like roulette.

Deeper pockets not only open more targets, they reduce risk that your investment will bomb. I appreciate we have some lovely examples of spent-big-sucked-ass signings but the same people who sling this logic around are the same who rely on the notion that clever investment (i.e. identifying the right targets) validates cheap spending.

Why is clever investment only applicable to cheap players?

[Terminal Boardom]

I don't subscribe to the must pay more crowd, we've proved time and again it's not how much you spend but how cleverly you spend it that matters. Deeper pockets opens more targets, but it's not a requirement.

Not spending much at all is not the same as spending cleverly. The amount of money spent is not an indicator of how well you will succeed but decent promise and established talent costs money. Else you are relying on a club being able to spot something other clubs miss (not sure how that could be done to a consistent enough level to make a difference) or treating the transfer windows like roulette.

Deeper pockets not only open more targets, they reduce risk that your investment will bomb. I appreciate we have some lovely examples of spent-big-sucked-ass signings but the same people who sling this logic around are the same who rely on the notion that clever investment (i.e. identifying the right targets) validates cheap spending.

Why is clever investment only applicable to cheap players?

Good points and especially the last one. Take Juan Mata as an example. Chelsea paid 21m and sold him for 37.1m and that for the finished article. It's all relative the higher you go.

[Victor Meldrew]

Vision, you're an absolute hero. So calm, rational, insightful and articulate.

Who doesn't care if we play in the Premier League or the Conference as long as there is a team to watch.
I'm with E_P on this in feeling that both times the club has thrown away the wonderful opportunity of remaining a Premier League club.
Unlike a lot of people on here I may not have many years left to watch our team , partly from a serious eye problem and partly because of old age and (selfishly maybe) I want to see us play at the highest level.
I don't want to watch Doncaster and Yeovil-I've seen enough of those clubs and admit to having been spoiled by what we have been able to see at our stadium over the past 5-6 years but want more of it.

In my early years of watching us in Div 3 South, Divs 3 and 4 it was always a case of needing just two more players and we would get promoted.
Here we are some 50 years or more on and the view is that we need to strengthen by 2 or 3 players to have a chance of promotion but will the club (owners, whoever they are) splash out?

The Academy is where we want our future players to come from-it makes sound economic sense and we have come very late to the party as most clubs saw the light many years ago and invested heavily in that area but only recently have RFC woken up and realised that this is the way forward.
In the meantime surely the plan is to get back to the highest level which in turn leads to attracting a better quality of young player rather than losing them to the London clubs or Southampton or even Oxford which has happened in the past.

Having sold two players in the summer window for good money I have to disagree with vision that this is not the window to build-didn't Roberts come at this time to help with the push for promotion?
In the summer the club brought in Drenthe, Williams and Bridge and was a start to building but in losing Mariappa in particular the squad became weaker at centre-back and we have got by with just one left-back so I see this window as an opportunity to bring a better balance to the squad and urgently address the limitations at both left-back and centre- back.
Nobody expects signings costing millions but surely the club (and it is still in existence and trading regardless of ownership) can afford to make these additions without jeopardising it's long-term future with £5 million from sales plus the TV money available-if not then it is being more amateurishly run than I even thought.

[Royalwaster]

Victor - the club is currently making a loss as salaries are higher than income ... so signing any new players at the moment means increasing our debts, so is a big risk.

[bcubed]

And thus we return to form

maybe we need a rational but concise thread?

[Royal Lady]

Didn't Charles Watts tweet that if we wanted to know where the £5 million for Kebe and Marriappa had gone, we needed to look to Russia? Who knows how much else they've taken with them.

[Norfolk Royal]

I heard Anton had essentially cleared the office of paperclips. Somebody had to make a special visit to Rymans to replenish supply.

[multisync1830]

I heard Anton had essentially cleared the office of paperclips. Somebody had to make a special visit to Rymans to replenish supply.

that just sounds like complete made up nonsense. AZ for all his faults did put around 20m in to the club.

[BR2]

Victor - the club is currently making a loss as salaries are higher than income ... so signing any new players at the moment means increasing our debts, so is a big risk.

Most businesses operate with some debt-how do you know BTW what the salaries are and what the income is for the current year?

[WoodleyRoyal]

Victor - the club is currently making a loss as salaries are higher than income ... so signing any new players at the moment means increasing our debts, so is a big risk.

Most businesses operate with some debt-how do you know BTW what the salaries are and what the income is for the current year?

viewtopic.php?f=2&t=121887

[Royal Rother]

Didn't Charles Watts tweet that if we wanted to know where the £5 million for Kebe and Marriappa had gone, we needed to look to Russia? Who knows how much else they've taken with them.

Do you think it's possible that might have been repayment of loans made by Russia?

[SPARTA]

Didn't Charles Watts tweet that if we wanted to know where the £5 million for Kebe and Marriappa had gone, we needed to look to Russia? Who knows how much else they've taken with them.

Do you think it's possible that might have been repayment of loans made by Russia?

Loans for what? The PL money has paid for everything, and there's rumours we've already used this seasons parachute payment which isn't even payable until May, via a loan from Vibrac. If that is true, and someone else on here was confident it was and knew more about the bank and their interest on such loans, then clearly a lot of money seems to have gone AWOL. It's unlikely we'll ever know the truth tho.

[Norfolk Royal]

I heard Anton had essentially cleared the office of paperclips. Somebody had to make a special visit to Rymans to replenish supply.

that just sounds like complete made up nonsense. AZ for all his faults did put around 20m in to the club.

[Terminal Boardom]

[bcubed]

I heard Anton had essentially cleared the office of paperclips. Somebody had to make a special visit to Rymans to replenish supply.

that just sounds like complete made up nonsense. AZ for all his faults did put around 20m in to the club.

20m paperclips?!
now that does sound nonsense