next year

[somerset]

You think Ulloa will still be around next season?

No,... Gus will snap him up,.... or another mid to lower prem side if Gus goes down.

 

[hans kraay fan club]

TCB makes an excellent point about VALUE above. That's how you structure a team on FFP. Hypothetically would you want Bridge on 20k a week (undoubtedly the better player) or Ward on 10k a week? I'd argue that in FFP terms it's the latter, a LB isn't massively important to the team. His point about TK is correct, if we can get someone in who's 80% as good for 50% of the money and then spend that money on other positions that need strenthening, brilliant.

I agree with this too.

TK is a really good keeper. There are a lot of really good keepers out there though, and plenty of them command significantly lower wages. It makes me laugh how every time we fail to win at home, you'll see posters talking about the opposition keeper having had the game of his life. They've not - they are GOOD. They perform well consistently.

Even just this last game - the shot for the first Wigan goal was almost IDENTICAL to Buckley's shot late on. Al Habsi saved ours. ('Game of his LIFE, etc)

 

[spring hall convert]

No,... Gus will snap him up,.... or another mid to lower prem side if Gus goes down.

I'm not sure he's Prem quality, his record in La Liga doesn't really suggest he is. I suspect Gus's targets up front will be a little more ambitious, I don't think Ulloa is even an upgrade on what they have.

 

[drew]

I haven't seen the OP's 9 previous posts but are they full of garbage as well?

 

[spring hall convert]

I agree with this too.

TK is a really good keeper. There are a lot of really good keepers out there though, and plenty of them command significantly lower wages. It makes me laugh how every time we fail to win at home, you'll see posters talking about the opposition keeper having had the game of his life. They've not - they are GOOD. They perform well consistently.

Even just this last game - the shot for the first Wigan goal was almost IDENTICAL to Buckley's shot late on. Al Habsi saved ours. ('Game of his LIFE, etc)

Just as an aside, I'm not sure TK's distribution really suits the way that OG wants to play either. He's too ponderous and prone to innaccuracy. It would be a brave call to let him go but let's not kid ourselves there aren't other decent keepers out there because there are. Leeds have just got a fantastic one in on loan.

 

[Marshy]

I suspect this season Albion will fall just short so there needs to be changes. I think the following probably need to go

Orlandi - lovely footballer but too slow for a team already lacking in pace
Agustien - just hasn't worked
Forster Caskey - not up to a leading championship side with Premiership pretensions
Hoskins - not quite good enough though difficult to tell on limited games
Rodriguez - not good enough on current evidence
Obika - back to spurs
Lopez - might keep as a utility back up player (played well at full back last year)
Stephens - limited on current evidence but might prove himself by end of season

These leaving would create the necessary budget to bring in a couple of fast mid field players and one more striker of high quality. That would move Brighton towards a team capable of reaching for automatic promotion. Quality rather than quantity should be the watchword

You must be on a wind up with Orlandi, Stephens and JFC ?.... surely

I would be offering Orlandi a 2 year deal now
And i dont know how long JFC has on his deal but I would also be making sure he signed.
Stephens is going to be very good, he was superb on saturday and is really jut starting to find his feet.

The rest can go in my opinion.

 

[Marshy]

I suspect passing a medical at another club may be tricky for Kaz...

 

[spring hall convert]

Agreed. There have been a lot of goals this season that Kuszczak could be looked at. I'm thinking of ones like Bolton's at The Amex, Leeds' winner on the opening day, Barnsley's first and Doncaster's in the away game. I'm sure there have been more too. I don't want to sound like I'm criticising him because I do think he's very good, but he's a long way from faultless and I'm no longer convinced he is a cut above most in this division. You are right in that there are plenty of good 'keepers out there. In fact, almost every team in the Championship has one. And I bet 90% of them aren't paying theirs as much as we are Kuszczak. For FFP reasons alone, he might just have to go so that we can use our budget on the positions where you HAVE to spend big money to get quality, i.e. strikers and creative midfielders. Again, I don't know the figures, but I wonder if another player in this boat might be Upson.

TK, Upson, Bruno, Ward, Andrews, Augustein, CMS are all on a fair whack I'd imagine. I'm not saying get rid of them all, far from it, but we need to consider what value there is out there in these positions, their importance to the team, willingness to negociate on a contract and what we have in the DS.

A shrewd negociator will clean up in a couple of years once the dust settles on FFP. (As long as it is enforced.)

 

[drew]

I don't think anyone is saying he is not a decent player. However Albion have too many "decent" midfield players- Forster Caskey, Andrews, Lopez, Orlandi, Stephens and not enough that can impact a game. Given a limited budget they need to concentrate their firepower on fewer but better players

What we need to do is sell absolutely everyone, then sell the ground, the training facility and then for one season buy the best 11 players you can with the entire proceeds (obviously including their wages) and then pray to god you don't have any injuries for 46 games (got out limply in the first game in the league cup and don't even bother entering the FA Cup).

A shrewd negociator will clean up in a couple of years once the dust settles on FFP. (As long as it is enforced.)

I think you could well be right. Need to start looking at the likely culprits and which of their players have contracts expiring in June 2015 as when clubs are on a transfer embargo they can't even re-sign players who's contracts have ended!

 

[spring hall convert]

Andrews is a banker non-renewal, as while he isn't bad, he doesn't offer anywhere near enough to justify a hefty wage. With Wolves likely to be in our division again next season I doubt they'll loan us Ward, so we'll either have to buy him or see him recalled. I think he's done well, but if he's on anything like the wages that are speculated then he's not worth the money. I think Bruno needs to go because right-back is not an essential position so it's silly to be paying a big wage to anyone there. Kuszczak and Upson deserve to stay on performances, but as we've been saying they may easily fail to represent good value (depending on what they earn) and we could get adequate, younger replacements for much less money. CMS and Agustien have another year on their contracts so we can't do anything about them for now.

We also have the likes of Lopez, LuaLua, Orlandi, Rodriguez and Calderon to consider, so as you say it is clear that a tough negotiator could be essential this summer. I imagine it is also why the club are so happy to allow so many contracts to run down to their last few weeks/months, as they know they might just be in a strong position in June when many clubs don't have the spare cash required to be offering contracts to dozens of players. We might even be able to keep some of these players on reduced wages, if FFP really does have an impact.

Consider what happened with Lopez this last off season, we released him and then got him back. I could see that happening a bit more going forward.

 

[drew]

Andrews is a banker non-renewal, as while he isn't bad, he doesn't offer anywhere near enough to justify a hefty wage. With Wolves likely to be in our division again next season I doubt they'll loan us Ward, so we'll either have to buy him or see him recalled. I think he's done well, but if he's on anything like the wages that are speculated then he's not worth the money. I think Bruno needs to go because right-back is not an essential position so it's silly to be paying a big wage to anyone there. Kuszczak and Upson deserve to stay on performances, but as we've been saying they may easily fail to represent good value (depending on what they earn) and we could get adequate, younger replacements for much less money. CMS and Agustien have another year on their contracts so we can't do anything about them for now.

We also have the likes of Lopez, LuaLua, Orlandi, Rodriguez and Calderon to consider, so as you say it is clear that a tough negotiator could be essential this summer. I imagine it is also why the club are so happy to allow so many contracts to run down to their last few weeks/months, as they know they might just be in a strong position in June when many clubs don't have the spare cash required to be offering contracts to dozens of players. We might even be able to keep some of these players on reduced wages, if FFP really does have an impact.

Ward and Andrews aren't even our players!!!!

 

[British Bulldog]

Are you serious or on a wind up Kuszczak is the best keeper we have had during my 65 years of supporting the club by a long way and if any player is irreplaceable it is him.

He's very good but as for saying he's the best we've had in 65 years is debatable as we've had some very good keepers over the years, For all his good points he still has problems with his distribution and at times he's very slow to come and claim a ball which causes confusion with his central defenders. I used to think it was something between him and Greer but I've noticed he's done similar with Upson as well. On one hand it would be shame to lose him in the summer but as others have said there are a lot of good keepers around, It wouldn't surprise me to see both Kuszczak and Ankergren leave with Big Brez staying as number 2, Walton promoted to number 3 and a new first choice keeper signed.

 

[Albumen]

Yes I watch every home game and his "cleverness" has passed me by I'm afraid. He seems to me just another average midfield player. Nothing wrong in that but not what is needed at the moment. I think it is striking how many of the good sides (I remember Forest in particular) have midfield players that are quick and can run at defences. We need one or two of them

Fair enough, just thought I'd ask as a CM (he's not an attacking midfield) is difficult to judge on TV. I was watching him closely, often concentrating solely on him and his reading of the game is very clever. First of all as I said he's not an attacking midfielder, but will pop up in the box like Crofty. Him and Ince have formed a formidable partnership so far in the limited amount of games they've played together, providing a base for our wingers and our attacking midfielders like Lopez and Orlandi (who run at defences, creating spaces for the wingers).

I really can't see your view of our squad, but hey, it's all about opinions.

The knives are out for Stephens, the Nathan Jones mafia are desperate to see him fail. I still haven't had a satisfactory response to what it is they think Jones is doing wrong.

As for Stephens, undoutedly had his best game for us Saturday, he's got better every game so far as you'd expect from a new player who has moved mid-season. I have a good feeling about him.

TCB makes an excellent point about VALUE above. That's how you structure a team on FFP. Hypothetically would you want Bridge on 20k a week (undoubtedly the better player) or Ward on 10k a week? I'd argue that in FFP terms it's the latter, a LB isn't massively important to the team. His point about TK is correct, if we can get someone in who's 80% as good for 50% of the money and then spend that money on other positions that need strenthening, brilliant.

This is where the DS comes in handy as well, you tend to pay players you bring through less than players you sign. Therefore the point on JFC seems a bit silly, I suspect that in comparison to other members of the squad we are paying him peanuts. I'd imagine Agustein/Andrews/Orlandi are on at least 4x what JFC earns so who's the best value there?

Yes, never really understood that. Every good new player isn't Jones', every bad one is, which is a little odd seeing as we probably have the same scouting and buying structure for every player.

I agree with you, Brighton under Poyet strengthened the squad to cope with the top end of the championship, now we're adding value. Having so many young talented players in that squad should be celebrated.

 

[spring hall convert]

Ward and Andrews aren't even our players!!!!

But I think they point is that they could be if we wanted them to be. Ward's a really tricky one, he's done a great job but I can't help but think we could get someone just as good in for less than his speculated wage.

FFP has to change to way clubs think about their use of their playing budget. You can't just go for the best player available in every position now.

 

[Footsoldier]

You think Ulloa will still be around next season?

He best be as we'd be stuffed without him and it's so hard to find a good forward.

 

[drew]

But I think they point is that they could be if we wanted them to be. Ward's a really tricky one, he's done a great job but I can't help but think we could get someone just as good in for less than his speculated wage.

FFP has to change to way clubs think about their use of their playing budget. You can't just go for the best player available in every position now.

Are we talking about his contractual wage with Wolves or the contribution that the Albion make as I don't know whether we are paying the lot or not. Bearing in mind that Bridge was reportedly on about £80k when he was with us albeit that we were contributing a fraction of that and is now reportedly on £30k with Reading shows that you can negotiate wages down, especially when that players contract was originally signed when their parent club were in the premiership!!