January transfer rumours and squad discussion

[MightyWhites]

Looks like we have signed Pascal Struijk from Ajax. Another centre-half for the U23's. I really want to hear what Radz has got to say about the transfer business this month as it does not make any sense to me at the moment.

[The Subhuman]

Jansson' replacement

[dezzy]

The club clearly has a stratagey, they are looking to build a solid foundation, one the club has not had for a long time, a solid youth squad is an important start, one which they are investing, wisely, who knows.
But can people stop moaning about it! How many times have we seen clubs like Swansea, Burnley etc put the foundations down and build a strong team. Envy is all we had, but they weren’t quick fixes and neither are we. Radz sat down with his team and decided this is the best way forward, that’s good enough for me.
How many first team players did we sign in the summer? All of whom had to adapt to the league.
We have spent nearly 4 million this window on two players for the first team, there was a time when we would be jumping around the place if we signed a player for a million plus!
I can understand the frustration I’m not getting a striker in for the wood money, but there clearly is a plan, what if we spent 10 million on a striker and we don’t go up? For all we know that could really put us under financial pressure.
We have had some shocking owners over the past 20 years, for different reasons, keep the faith.

[1964white]

Jansson' replacement

Funny but probably true

[The Subhuman]

The club clearly has a stratagey, they are looking to build a solid foundation, one the club has not had for a long time, a solid youth squad is an important start, one which they are investing, wisely, who knows.
But can people stop moaning about it! How many times have we seen clubs like Swansea, Burnley etc put the foundations down and build a strong team. Envy is all we had, but they weren’t quick fixes and neither are we. Radz sat down with his team and decided this is the best way forward, that’s good enough for me.
How many first team players did we sign in the summer? All of whom had to adapt to the league.
We have spent nearly 4 million this window on two players for the first team, there was a time when we would be jumping around the place if we signed a player for a million plus!
I can understand the frustration I’m not getting a striker in for the wood money, but there clearly is a plan, what if we spent 10 million on a striker and we don’t go up? For all we know that could really put us under financial pressure.
We have had some shocking owners over the past 20 years, for different reasons, keep the faith.

Don't remember the likes of Swansea and Burnley spending millions in a division not the premiership on U23's but could be wrong.

[8ballali]

The club clearly has a stratagey, they are looking to build a solid foundation, one the club has not had for a long time, a solid youth squad is an important start, one which they are investing, wisely, who knows.
But can people stop moaning about it! How many times have we seen clubs like Swansea, Burnley etc put the foundations down and build a strong team. Envy is all we had, but they weren’t quick fixes and neither are we. Radz sat down with his team and decided this is the best way forward, that’s good enough for me.
How many first team players did we sign in the summer? All of whom had to adapt to the league.
We have spent nearly 4 million this window on two players for the first team, there was a time when we would be jumping around the place if we signed a player for a million plus!
I can understand the frustration I’m not getting a striker in for the wood money, but there clearly is a plan, what if we spent 10 million on a striker and we don’t go up? For all we know that could really put us under financial pressure.
We have had some shocking owners over the past 20 years, for different reasons, keep the faith.

I can see AR's plan, but it's frustrating. I suppose we should be happy when you think how happy we were when we splashed out £1m on a midfielder a few seasons ago.
Then how amazed we were that we spent £3m on a centre-forward.
Then in the summer we spent £3.5m on a defender.
A few years ago, we'd have been chuffed to bits.

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[Cjay]

http://sportwitness.co.uk/second-source ... aid-front/

If true then can someone explain how £5mill up front (forget the 2mil add ons).

How is that a good deal for a striker whose not made it to 50 career goals in 8 years in Serie B?

Thats a lot of money for someone totally unproven at any level.

[dezzy]

Don't remember the likes of Swansea and Burnley spending millions in a division not the premiership on U23's but could be wrong.

We had all but gotten ride of our under 23 squad it was so neglected. That is essentially our second squad where our talent matured before coming into the first team.
Young hungry players learning their trade, surely, if done correctly, the squad will strengthen and the individuals development will benefit.
These are the guys that will be involved in training games against the first team, the better quality you train against the better for the first team, it all has a knock on effect.
My comparison to, Swansea and Burnely was because they are clubs who didn’t throw money at their squad to get into the premiership, they focused their spending on getting the foundations right.
Just my opinion, nobody can tell what our planning is, but from what I see, I like it, Leeds is not a quick fix, budgets maybe tight, let’s enjoy the ride.

[dezzy]

I can see AR's plan, but it's frustrating. I suppose we should be happy when you think how happy we were when we splashed out £1m on a midfielder a few seasons ago.
Then how amazed we were that we spent £3m on a centre-forward.
Then in the summer we spent £3.5m on a defender.
A few years ago, we'd have been chuffed to bits.

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Exactly, I think the more Radz does, naturally the more we expect.

[The Subhuman]

I don't think Radz is the problem though tbh. I'm happy with his performance so far

[MightyWhites]

It's who is picking the players, that's the problem. Then it's Radz's for letting them do it. I'd rather get no-one than pay that amount for a 25 year old with a scoring record that poor.

[dezzy]

Regarding Orta and his selection of players, I think anybody would struggle to defend him, it will always be tough to get the correct players in, but he had a squad rebuilding job and only in his second window, wouldn’t write him off yet

[8ballali]

http://sportwitness.co.uk/second-source ... aid-front/

If true then can someone explain how £5mill up front (forget the 2mil add ons).

How is that a good deal for a striker whose not made it to 50 career goals in 8 years in Serie B?

Thats a lot of money for someone totally unproven at any level.

I looked at his ratings earlier. I wish I could remember where. It said strengths: none
Weaknesses: passing and shooting
He sounds like a real catch.

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[Cjay]

I looked at his ratings earlier. I wish I could remember where. It said strengths: none
Weaknesses: passing and shooting
He sounds like a real catch.

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https://www.whoscored.com/Players/90945 ... ry-Mbakogu

here

sounds promising

[weasel]

Far too early to be judging Orta's record. He has 2 areas to strengthen, 1 being the current first team and the other being the future side of things. For all we know all of the youngsters may become world superstars but impossible to judge any of them for at least 2 or 3 years and even then it might be too early for them.

The current first team is also tricky to judge because we have all seen with Weidweld, Cibicki, Alioski and Lasogga in particular they have looked great at times and awful at others - given a full season to acclimatise and they might all turn into excellent signings. Grot has been the only permanent signing (CBJ being a loan signing thankfully rather than a permanent deal) to have really failed to impress but he is still very young and has a lot of time still to come good. Klich is the only player that you could say has failed but according to many on here they think he is brilliant so they can't then have a go at Orta for signing him.

Yes it can be argued that he has failed to replace Wood and Bartley with like for like quality but have the right players been available that fit into our budget (both transfer fee and wages) - anyone can argue about a signing(s) we could have made based on the hindsight of them doing well elsewhere but equally we were linked with many players who have flopped regardless of previous pedigree. Our two best signings in recent times have been Jannson and Saiz and neither would have been on any fan's shortlist for signing (PJ being written off before we saw him as a typical cheap Cellino signing unable to get into the first team of a mid to lower table serie A side - and Saiz playing for a fairly much unheard of Spanish second division side and at his age why hadn't he been spotted by any club earlier?).

[8ballali]

https://www.whoscored.com/Players/90945 ... ry-Mbakogu

here

sounds promising

Yes, that was it. Thanks.

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[Cjay]

Always willing to give new players a chance in there first season, said that all season.

However all this "spend the Taylor and Wood money" is failing to notice one crucial fact, we have already.

Forshaw – £4.5m
Jansson – £3.6m
(Saiz – £3.5m)
(Alioski – £2m)
(Cibicki- £1.5m)
De Bock – £1.5m
Klich – £1.5m
Sacko – £1.5m (could be as much as £3.5m, depending what sources you trust)
Grot – £1m
(Wiedwald – £600k)
Ekuban – £500k
Ideguchi – £500k
Halme- £500k

That amounts to a shade under £23million.
One in italics are young and either haven't played yet for us or certainly wont play this season.
Ones in bold have no hope, for one reason or another.
Ones underlined were signed to replace one of the ones in bold and a loan that we cancelled.

And the ones in brackets have blown hot and/or cold and have cost us one way or another.

Leaves Pontus Jansson as the one consistent signing this season, and he was here before Radz and Co.

[Cjay]

Always willing to give new players a chance in there first season, said that all season.

However all this "spend the Taylor and Wood money" is failing to notice one crucial fact, we have already.

Forshaw – £4.5m
Jansson – £3.6m
(Saiz – £3.5m)
(Alioski – £2m)
(Cibicki- £1.5m)
De Bock – £1.5m
Klich – £1.5m
Sacko – £1.5m (could be as much as £3.5m, depending what sources you trust)
Grot – £1m
(Wiedwald – £600k)
Ekuban – £500k
Ideguchi – £500k
Halme- £500k

That amounts to a shade under £23million.
One in italics are young and either haven't played yet for us or certainly wont play this season.
Ones in bold have no hope, for one reason or another.
Ones underlined were signed to replace one of the ones in bold and a loan that we cancelled.

And the ones in brackets have blown hot and cold and have cost us one way or another.

Leaves Pontus Jansson as the one consistent signing this season, and he was here before Radz and Co.

[The Subhuman]

Thought Forshaw was around 2.5 which would mean goal shy Mbakogu could become our most expensive out lay at 4.4 million before add ons

[dezzy]

Far too early to be judging Orta's record. He has 2 areas to strengthen, 1 being the current first team and the other being the future side of things. For all we know all of the youngsters may become world superstars but impossible to judge any of them for at least 2 or 3 years and even then it might be too early for them.

The current first team is also tricky to judge because we have all seen with Weidweld, Cibicki, Alioski and Lasogga in particular they have looked great at times and awful at others - given a full season to acclimatise and they might all turn into excellent signings. Grot has been the only permanent signing (CBJ being a loan signing thankfully rather than a permanent deal) to have really failed to impress but he is still very young and has a lot of time still to come good. Klich is the only player that you could say has failed but according to many on here they think he is brilliant so they can't then have a go at Orta for signing him.

Yes it can be argued that he has failed to replace Wood and Bartley with like for like quality but have the right players been available that fit into our budget (both transfer fee and wages) - anyone can argue about a signing(s) we could have made based on the hindsight of them doing well elsewhere but equally we were linked with many players who have flopped regardless of previous pedigree. Our two best signings in recent times have been Jannson and Saiz and neither would have been on any fan's shortlist for signing (PJ being written off before we saw him as a typical cheap Cellino signing unable to get into the first team of a mid to lower table serie A side - and Saiz playing for a fairly much unheard of Spanish second division side and at his age why hadn't he been spotted by any club earlier?).

Great post. Very well put and something which has been said before, for those who attend many games it must be frustrating paying good money to see, players pr the team under perform, a different strategy may see us pay the 10 million on a striker and pay big wages, but then would we see, such an exciting group of players form in the under 23s and other things put in place around the club that is needed to be successful.
I don’t think many of us know what all the cost cutting to all areas of the club, has done to our prospects and what investments are needed to right those wrongs.
From following the club from a far, I get to see Leeds live 2-3 times a year and the handful of games live on sky, so when I watch them it’s a real treat and maybe rose tinted glasses appear!! So it might be easier for me to accept a slower stratagey to promotion, if I was a local lad with a season ticket I might have a different take.