shurlock

Quite a young midfield. Not a million miles away from the line-up that saw us relegated (though Cork often played CB)

I assume you didn't bother reading any of the points i raised in an ealier post (163) - responding to each of your points (in bold).

Its a bit more complicated than paying the right money. A player will arguably accept less money from a club if he believes that club is going places and will boost his future earning power -whether because he'll put himself in the shop window by playing for a successful team or he'll earn an uplift by getting the team promoted. Or a player will accept less cash in return for match time - not necessarily for any love of the game, but because he can build a reputation. Things will also depend on the age of the player - younger players will typically place less emphasis on current salary than older ones.

Putting aside the cash, I doubt whether our ability to attract players has much to do with the manager than the fact we're a newly promoted side whose quality is unknown. Even if NA never shrugs off the grinning four-eyed mormon/ex-physio tag, things will improve as we establish ourselves in the championship. The first transfer windown after promotion is always the hardest. As for CMS, it seemed like cash played a big role. I don't doubt some players mean it; but when hasn't a player talked about the manager's and chairman's vision as a reason for signing for a club? Lets not deify Pardew - it didn't take buckets of charisma or reputation to mop up the best of the rest from L1 or feed off a championship club on the brink. After all, Pards transfer record at other clubs isn't much to write home about, especially when he's hit a rocky patch. Has had a tendency to splurge on quantity rather than quality and get trigger happy with loan signings, unsettling his squads.

Should also take into account the various players he got on loan - some very good finds, especially strikers amongst them. Guess lack of funds prevented him from taking some of those deals further. Interesting that there isnt one foreign player on that list.

QPR, Norwich, West Ham, Forest, Leicester (they claim they need 2 strikers)... Think Maynard himself has said that he wont join another championship side.

Which I've taken the time to do if you read the bold...

No doubt, the OP wont engage in any discussion; but simply whine and repeat the same garbage, the next time a knee-jerk opportunity presents itself.

No need to panic

I purposely didn't do a comprehensive list of how teams fared the following years (it wasn't my main goal). I brought Swansea and Forest up as well as Wigan because they were the first examples to spring to mind, not because they're the only ones - also think Hull, Stoke and Blackpool that were promoted to the prem within a few years of getting to the champ (though that raises the question of how long it takes before you start being seen as established championship side instead of a newly promoted one). As you rightly point out, any balanced assessment would take into account the number of teams that having survived the first year, were then relegated Its unclear how far they outnumber promoted teams; though, for many reasons, they are of limited relevance to us (where are Crewe, Luton, Gillingham and Rotherham now?). I guess my main takeaway is that there is considerable mobility in the championship. The consensus on the forum is that most would be happy with a top half finish - when you bear in mind that 15 out of 36 teams have made the top 10 in the last twelve seasons and many of those teams were smaller and less well-resourced than us, possibly we might be setting ourselves a slightly unambitious target? Shock horror, the SWF might be expecting too little

Disagree - Hoskins (for Murray) and Buckley (for Bennett) are replacements - some would say they are better than the originals. CMS is in addition to these two.

Below is historical data on how newly promoted L1 teams have done in the championship. As you can see, there is quite a spread: 15 out of 36 teams have finished in the top ten; 7 made the playoffs or were automatically promoted; while only 5 were relegated. On the whole, there is scope for optimism. If I had more time, I could the standings by attendance as a proxy for size - you can see that the larger teams have tended to do well (or if they had a poor first season like Forest quickly established themselves in the following years). L1 2009/10 -championship position following year Norwich -2 promoted Leeds -7 Millwall -9 L1 2008/09 Leicester -6 went out on pens to Cardiff in playoff semi final P'boro -24 (relegated) Sc*nthorpe -20 L1 2007/08 Swansea -8 and finished 7th and playoff winners the next two seasons N'Forest -19 but finished 3rd and 6th the next two seasons Doncaster- 14 L1 2006/07 Sc*nthope -23 (relegated) Bristol City -4 lost in the playoff final Blackpool- 19 L1 2005/06 Southend -22 (relegated) Colchester -10 Barnsley -20 L1 2004/05 Luton- 10 Hull- 18 Sheff Weds- 19 L1 2003/04 Plymouth - 17 QPR- 11 Brighton- 20 L1 2002/03 Wigan –7 promoted following season Crewe -18 Cardiff -13 L1 2001/2002 Brighton -23 (relegated) Reading -4 (lost in playoff semis) Stoke City -21 L1 2000/2001 Millwall -4 (lost in the playoff semis) Rotherham -19 Walsall- 21 L1 1999/2000 PNE -4 (lost in the playoff final) Burnley -7 Gillingham -13 L1 1998/1999 Fulham -9 champions following season Walsall -22 (relegated) Man City -2 promoted

If you look back the last decade, over half of the teams that get promoted from L1 finish in the top half of the championship and many in the playoffs or better.

Why are people comparing Lambert to CMS - they are different players. Surely a more relevant benchmark is Barny and I doubt even people on here believe Barny is better than CMS. Amusing to see who many people on here change their tune. One day CMS is the bees knees; now he's a waste of money, unproven or unconvincing at championship level, no better than what we have etc etc. You can rationalise anything and this is revisionism that would make even the most deluded, pravda-reading footy fan wince.

Now that CMS is out of the equation and the competition/complications around Maynard/Sharp, surprised Lita isn't being mentioned more. Bags of power and pace. Boro want £3m for him -well within our range if Swansea don't cough up the cash.

Did I say identical? Both teams like to get the ball down and pass and move - biggest difference is that Brighton are cautious and play the percentages. Matter of degree rather than kind. When they want to, they can easily step it up as they did during the 2nd half at SMS last season.

Rupes = soiled tweed, Paul Smith without the irony. beats NC hands-down.

Though Brighton and Posh play similar football - i also have no doubt that CMS is the kind of player NA is after - busy, all action players who are clever with their movement and defend from the front.

Blonde hair and blue eyes, though. Good stock.

And so is Paul Lambert.

Given the teams linked with him, they pulled off a blinder; lets face it, if we had done something similar (not necessarily CMS), we would be creaming ourselves.

Agree

I think they are good players; but a spine is different - a spine implies a few key players who are indispensible to everything we do and give us recognisable strength in the key areas down the middle of the side. Only Fonte and Lallana really meet that definition in my book - and Lallana is a winger. A few other points: With the exception of KD, Fonte and to a lesser extent Adam Lallana, none of the names mentioned by the OP are proven at this level - nowhere is this more obvious or important than upfront. Lambert definitely finished better than he started (and his pens will always put a gloss on the stats); but if his form as a whole last season was extended to next season, we would struggle for goals. Lambert is not a straightforward centre-forward, something required by a spine. Over time he has dropped deeper and deeper, with the team relying more on the likes Guly, Barnard, Connolly or Forte to lead the line, run behind, meet balls in the box. The position they fill is arguably more important than Lambert's. however, whether they are good enough (Forte, Barnard), fit enough (Connolly) or suited to the position (Guly) is unclear. A spine requires strength in the centre of teh park - I rate Morgan but pinning our hopes on him is still a big ask at this stage - people still view Morgan throught the lens of the player they would like him to be rather than the player he is. Its not altogether clear that he's even NA's first choice. NA's thinking has evolved from the days of viewing Hammond and Chaplow as his starting CMs; but the chopping-and-changing (along with our transfer activity) suggests that NA doesn't have a clear idea of our best CM partnership. And for good reason. Interesting that Hammond's name is omitted, even though he's captained the team and played the majority of games. By contrast, can't think of many spines have missed so many games through injury or tactical reasons as Oxo, Morgan, Lallana (regardless whether Oxo is here next season). I definitely agree that we don't need to change the team wholesale - in part, because we have decent players; in part, because we have a strong team spirit. But that's quite not the same as claiming we have a spine in the key areas.

Of course, they would have probably finished higher than 10th if they hadn't got off to such a shocking start under Paolo Sousa (in charge for the first 10 games, yielding only 5 points and consequently sacked). Had Sven been in charge for the whole season, his points average would have seen Leicester finish closer to 4th or 5th - excellent by anyone's standards. Sven had a deceptively strong squad (mainly expired loanees) last season; he's signing some very good but very different players this window. Either way, he'll have his work cut out to improve on a very good first season (and if there's a question mark over Sven, its his ability to maintain good starts and stay for the course).

Yep- admittedly, its something I noticed while he was still injured - and I accept you don't need to jump bubka-esque heights to have presence (you can back in, stand still and make life awkward for defenders); but I still think Lambert is only above average in their air - he's no Grant Holt and Steve Howard- and those limits will be exposed in Championship, requiring us to alter our shape and style (fortunately Lambo has other attributes).