HAPPY

[Posthorn54]

We should now be called London reserves the amount we have had this Summer from there. 

[ealingfox]

20 minutes ago, Sly said:

Time will tell, however everyone was happy with Souttar, Tete and Kristensen. That window was crap.

 

People were uninspired with Albrighton, Fuchs, Kante and Dyer. That went well.

 

Albrighton was a 2014-15 signing. Okazaki, Inler and Benalouane joined in the same window as Fuchs, Kante and Dyer.

[Pliskin]

21 minutes ago, when_you're_smiling said:

It’s a window where we’ve very much been the least desirable option in the Premier for any player looking at their options.

 

Do we have a squad that’s better than three other teams? Honestly, probably not.

 

But we’ve brought in bits that were needed, presumably while staying in line with FFP, which we had far less wiggle room in compared to the likes of Ipswich whose income has suddenly grown a lot compared to what they had before.

 

All that matters is staying up which would allow us to build next season.

Hmmm really? You don’t think this team is better than Southampton, Ipswich, Everton and arguably Forest? 
 

There’s a mix of premier league experience and exiting young talent….. I think people at the moment are just hell bent on looking down on the team. Vardy is still better than any striker from 12th down, problem is going to be getting consistency due to his age. 
 

I don’t think any of the teams around us have better wide options than Mavadidi and Fatawu either. This team isn’t a bad squad, it just looks like it’s very much in transition at the moment. There’s enough experience in this squad to keep it up. Reflecting I think we’ve more than replaced KDH, and we’ve added….. 

[CloudFox]

I am disappointed with the window overall, but there are a few areas of promise. We still need an understudy to Vardy, and our left back depth is...questionable. But we have a team that should be better than bottom three in theory. The problem is, we have a points deduction coming which will likely drop us in there no matter if we're better than those teams or not.

 

I'm more concerned about us dropping wages and transfer fees on ageing players like Ayew and BDCR. I don't see what either adds.

 

If Cooper actually plays his best players (cough, Ricardo, cough, Mavididi) then our first eleven isn't terrible. I'm more worried about our first few performances to be honest. Arguably Cooper looks like the worst deal we made.

 

Oh, and a shout out for all the players going out on loan. Genuinely looking forward to seeing how they all get on!

[when_you're_smiling]

5 minutes ago, Pliskin said:

Hmmm really? You don’t think this team is better than Southampton, Ipswich, Everton and arguably Forest? 

It’s better than Southampton’s yes, Ipswich’s maybe but it depends how their main core of players makes the step up to this level for the first time. 

 

Obviously there’s a league table to decide these things anyway. Hopefully I’m wrong.

[Suzie the Fox]

Little too soon to judge the incoming's if its a good or bad window but really pleased with the amout of lads going out on loan. Will be interesting to follow their progress.

[Bilo]

9 minutes ago, Pliskin said:

Hmmm really? You don’t think this team is better than Southampton, Ipswich, Everton and arguably Forest? 
 

There’s a mix of premier league experience and exiting young talent….. I think people at the moment are just hell bent on looking down on the team. Vardy is still better than any striker from 12th down, problem is going to be getting consistency due to his age. 
 

I don’t think any of the teams around us have better wide options than Mavadidi and Fatawu either. This team isn’t a bad squad, it just looks like it’s very much in transition at the moment. There’s enough experience in this squad to keep it up. Reflecting I think we’ve more than replaced KDH, and we’ve added….. 

Yeah, I can't disagree with this. Everton already look pretty diabolical and they won't get away with it every year any more than Sunderland did a few years ago.

 

Russell doesn't convince me at Southampton and I'm not sure Ipswich have signed enough quality to stay up, and their failure to sign either Nelson or Broja will leave their fans concerned about a lack of firepower.

 

Brentford could struggle for goals with Toney now gone and Forest's transfer window has been underwhelming with them having made little progress since promotion.

 

Will we be good to watch? On current evidence, we'll be as easy on the eye as newly promoted Forest were. The plus side is that Cooper does seem to have learned that the kamikaze all-out attacking that he tried for the first few months there will get you spanked in this league, and we have at least added some quality. Okoli is rated in Italy, Skipp will add some bite in midfield, Bounanotte looks good going forward and I'm excited to see El-Khannous given the plaudits he had at Genk. 

 

Up front, if Vardy, Ayew and Edouard can each get close to double figures with players like Mavididi and Fatawu weighing in with a few, we'll score enough to stay up. 

 

Keeping Hermansen also means we have a quality goalkeeper, the absence of which was devastating to us in 22-23 while Forest's loan signing of Navas was key to stopping them leaking goals, along with the aforementioned change of Cooper's game plan.

 

The question then remains how many more points can we accumulate over the season than Ipswich, Southampton, Brentford, Forest and Everton. My own feeling is that we're likely to get a six point deduction, so we're going to need to be a minimum of that better than three of those six to stay up. Any more than that and I'm not convinced, as I feel it's likely to be tight down there.

[Sunbury Fox]

1 hour ago, Pliskin said:

Completely disagree. 
 

They’ve signed a lot of players but they’re mostly championship quality. I would say Ipswich has taken a massive risk with their signings. 
 

We’ve had a good window. People at the moment want to moan for the sake of moaning…. The club can do nothing right in some people eyes at the moment. But, this window hasn’t been bad at all.

 

This team is better than Ipswich’s….. 

 

The two big factors are is Cooper good enough to get the team going.

 

And how will we deal with the points deduction. 
 

 

I’m happy with where the teams at, we’ve no choice but to try and get a few savvy deals and we’ve done that. The only question mark is Skipp for £20m+….. 

 

This season is all about survival, this team is capable of a 17th place finish, that’s all we need. 

Not sure it was a ‘good’ window, more of an ‘okay window in the circumstances’. On the downside, in addition to overpaying for Skipp (who I still think will do okay for us, though), we’ve lumbered ourselves with Reid for 3 years and bought a CB who doesn’t look an upgrade on any of the phalanx of other CBs we already have in the squad. We’ve also failed again to shift several unwanted players. On the upside, I’m excited to see what BEK and Buananotte can do and Edouard is a more promising addition than other options we could have ended up with like Broja, Fofana, etc.

 

I do worry greatly about the quality of our manager, though. He’s definitely one of the 2 or 3 worst managers in the league for me and that could cost us. He looks tactically limited, overly conservative and is making some very odd team selections. Whilst I’m not overly impressed with Ipswich’s transfer business (which I think has been driven by the need to try to radically strengthen a starting XI which in their first 2 games still contained about 6 or 7 players who were playing in League One for them 2 seasons ago), I would bank on McKenna to get much more out of his group of players than Cooper. Same for Dyche at Everton and Frank at Brentford, the 2 other clubs most likely to be down at the bottom with the promoted teams.

Edited 31 August by Sunbury Fox

[Dr The Singh]

Regardless of being happy or not.  I will be backing the manager and team 100%

[Stormfox]

Time will tell if it has been a good or bad window. Probably overpaid for some and didn't get rid of the dross so leaking money and previous bad buys. 

 

The great news is the club finally realised they need to send the young players out on loan to develop them and give them some value, either as players or to sell. It's a shame it's so late though... Probably lost some offers on the way but then some more would have come in as teams become desperate to fill a gap. 

 

I'm guessing Alves will get the odd 10-15 mins in the Prem and start in some cup games which is why he hasn't gone. 

 

Nelson gone to championship which is great, Oxford are on the up and they will hopefully survive.. They've been in for him for some time so makes sense rather than a last ditch bid. 

 

Not sure about Braybrooke's.. could be difficult for him up there... And those surfaces!!! 

 

Okoli hasn't looked great, definitely overpaid for him as he will be 4th in line, but nobody really has looked fantastic as there doesn't seem to be a style of play... perhaps it's coming?? 

 

Edited 31 August by Stormfox

[Vacamion]

 

Rudkin offers Cooper a suggestion on how to stay up this season:

 

[ealingfox]

Let's just hope El Khannous turns out to be extremely good is all I can say really.

[ealingfox]

In the same way signing half of a back 4 we beat 9-0 turned out to be a bad idea, signing half of an attack that's struggled for goals for years could go the same way tbh.

[Saxondale]

We knew we couldn’t spend much so - all considering - it’s not too bad. 6.5/10.

 

What has caught me by surprise is how many players in or near the first team have gone out on loan.

[sphericalfox]

 

[Weller Wing]

43 minutes ago, Pliskin said:

Hmmm really? You don’t think this team is better than Southampton, Ipswich, Everton and arguably Forest? 
 

There’s a mix of premier league experience and exiting young talent….. I think people at the moment are just hell bent on looking down on the team. Vardy is still better than any striker from 12th down, problem is going to be getting consistency due to his age. 
 

I don’t think any of the teams around us have better wide options than Mavadidi and Fatawu either. This team isn’t a bad squad, it just looks like it’s very much in transition at the moment. There’s enough experience in this squad to keep it up. Reflecting I think we’ve more than replaced KDH, and we’ve added….. 

I think the 3 that have come up will go back down with Ipswich making the best fight of it.

Forest have got more than us and Everton will do another Everton.

Maybe Brentford could get drawn into it as losing Toney could effect them.

[Pita]

51 minutes ago, Pliskin said:

Hmmm really? You don’t think this team is better than Southampton, Ipswich, Everton and arguably Forest? 
 

There’s a mix of premier league experience and exiting young talent….. I think people at the moment are just hell bent on looking down on the team. Vardy is still better than any striker from 12th down, problem is going to be getting consistency due to his age. 
 

I don’t think any of the teams around us have better wide options than Mavadidi and Fatawu either. This team isn’t a bad squad, it just looks like it’s very much in transition at the moment. There’s enough experience in this squad to keep it up. Reflecting I think we’ve more than replaced KDH, and we’ve added….. 

the trouble is can we keep Vardy injury free and get enough minutes out of him. 

[Bilo]

13 minutes ago, Weller Wing said:

I think the 3 that have come up will go back down with Ipswich making the best fight of it.

Forest have got more than us and Everton will do another Everton.

Maybe Brentford could get drawn into it as losing Toney could effect them.

Forest are not a great side.

 

They'd have finished 17th last season even without the points deduction and only earned 36 points, two points less than in their first season, with three newly promoted sides who were spectacularly out of their depth for most if not all of the season. They've barely added and have Danilo out for most of the season.

 

The likelihood is that they'll be down there come season's end, and probably not with Nuno in the dugout.

 

Brentford's decline has been pretty sharp, and losing Toney without a replacement will only accelerate that. Everton put me in mind of Sunderland between 2014 and 2017, and there's only so long they get away with it. 

Edited 31 August by Bilo

[Tommy G]

Now the window is shut it’s a positive - SC needs to galvanise and work with who he has now. 

[Jobyfox]

38 minutes ago, Bilo said:

Forest are not a great side.

 

They'd have finished 17th last season even without the points deduction and only earned 36 points, two points less than in their first season, with three newly promoted sides who were spectacularly out of their depth for most if not all of the season. They've barely added and have Danilo out for most of the season.

 

The likelihood is that they'll be down there come season's end, and probably not with Nuno in the dugout.

 

Brentford's decline has been pretty sharp, and losing Toney without a replacement will only accelerate that. Everton put me in mind of Sunderland between 2014 and 2017, and there's only so long they get away with it. 

You mean apart from:

 

Elliot Anderson, Nikola Milenkovic, Ramon Sosa, Jota Silva, Marko Stamenic, Carlos Miguel, Eric da Silva Moreira, James Ward-Prowse and Morato 

[Edingleyfox]

I’m a lot happier than I was 3 days ago. I think much will depend on how the 2 young promising attacking midfielders get on. I just hope they have the physicality to take on the roles left by KDH Maddison etc. 

[Tommy G]

5 minutes ago, Edingleyfox said:

I’m a lot happier than I was 3 days ago. I think much will depend on how the 2 young promising attacking midfielders get on. I just hope they have the physicality to take on the roles left by KDH Maddison etc. 

I don’t think either Mads or KDH had any real physicality. More so, hope they are creative enough 

[FLAN]

We have a fighting chance of competing with bottom half teams if all key players stay fit and perform. Let’s see what Cooper is made of now. One thing worries me is are we going to see a Ricardo sat on the bench until Xmas?

[FLAN]

11 minutes ago, Jobyfox said:

You mean apart from:

 

Elliot Anderson, Nikola Milenkovic, Ramon Sosa, Jota Silva, Marko Stamenic, Carlos Miguel, Eric da Silva Moreira, James Ward-Prowse and Morato 

Yes but apart from them they’ve hardly added 😂

[Bilo]

10 minutes ago, Jobyfox said:

You mean apart from:

 

Elliot Anderson, Nikola Milenkovic, Ramon Sosa, Jota Silva, Marko Stamenic, Carlos Miguel, Eric da Silva Moreira, James Ward-Prowse and Morato 

Most of whom are for depth. We've signed Abdul Fatawu, Bobby Decordova-Reid, Michael Golding, Caleb Okoli, Oliver Skipp, Jordan Ayew, Bilal El-Khannous and Odsonne Edouard and most are saying our window has been quite low key.