- Jun 27, 2012
- 14,649
I know you keep telling me that we spent more than ever last season
Sorry. I’m really just reporting what the club is telling us. Here's something from a few weeks ago.
Barber: "Each year [i've been at the club], the football budget has significantly increased and it did so last year [2014/15]"
That was him on the very good Albion Roar in Apr 2015. Bloom has also said it this season several times. Still don’t think Bloom has “pumped money” into the team last season. ? But yep . Agreed lets wait until the accounts.
A partial way to measure if clubs were competitive given most business these days is a mix of free transfers, season long loans and the like, but if thats the measurement then here goes.I won't be accepting that we were competitive with Derby last season on ...transfer fees paid unless I see it in black and white!
I think Derby signed only 4 players last season that weren't free transfers or season long loans. All were undisclosed fees.
Ryan Shotton (Defender from Stoke City) - made a limited # of appearances
George Thorne (Midfielder from West Brom) - big hit for them ...only report i can find was that he cost "around £1m" but it might have ticked up a bit more.
Stephen Warnock (33 year old Left back) - who only made a few appearances
and Cyrus Christie (a compensation fee as he's under 23 from L1 Coventry)
Whereas we spent, its been reported, £2.5m on Baldock, £1m+ on Stockdale, £350K on Kayal, £600K on COG and undisclosed on Colunga , a striker , and more on Danny Holla. All are on expensive long contracts.
Hard to find out fees these days, there are sometimes add ons and you’d be mad to verify it in black or white before accounts are published so i don't know for sure.. But more than Derby or less ? What do you think ? Seems highly competitive to me.
As for wages. Then a rough guess would mean to even catch up with the Albion given that we know they increased “substantially”. Even if Barber is overcooking it then Derby would have had to increase spending last season by about 30% to catch up and get £1 a head, a pretty hefty jump given that they had a top 6 squad last season to start off with. But yep I say its possible . Of course it is.
As for competitive. Then of course we were competitive in terms of the money TB invested which , like , Derby went on the team.
Did we buy a competitive squad ? Sadly this didn't turn out to be the case. Last season any way. We bought a very expensive one. Bummer.