[Albion] This summer’s squad rebuild

[GT49er]

My concern, just from my point of view, is that we're bringing in so many players that I don't recognise the team as 'my team' at the moment; I know that in the wilderness years we'd be getting an influx of loanees and journeymen every season, but this feels different. OK, hopefully in time I'll get used to the new team - guess they'll probably be a departure or two of players I don't want to see going though. C'est la vie, I suppose.
My second concern is the players we're bringing in - are we now buying them at their peak value? Up to now, our main recruitment has been players for about £10M or less and selling them on for upwards of £25M - sometimes a lot above £25M! But now, say £25M for O'Riley - Celtic bought him cheap as chips from MK Dons and will make a huge profit - but will his value increase, or is £25M about his peak? £40M for Rutter (!) - here it was Hoffenheim who 'did a Brighton' and made a huge profit - his value didn't increase much in his time at Leeds. Will we be able to sell him in a couple of years for £80M? I'm not sure - maybe with the new rules the days of ever-increasing transfer fees may be coming to an end.
Am I wrong? - well, I know I'm a born worrier, so maybe! No need for a lecture - I won't stop worrying or change my mind!

 

[joydivisionovengloves]

Whatever happens at our club these days it’s pretty much 99% positive. We loose a manager we get a hopefully fantastic replacement. Love it that we keep away from the ‘usual suspects’ . Tony Bloom we love you !!!

 

[Dawn Korus]

Seems it’s a window of a few seasons in the making, Tony’s financial astuteness has put us in pole position to seize an opportunity where others have gone all in and are up against PSR.

He seems to be sticking to the strategy but rather than £6-£10m youngsters he’s using the Boehly cash to go for another level up type of player.

Exciting season ahead, Tony showing what a clever owner he is

 

[RandyWanger]

In Bloom we trust.

 

[Marshy]

In Bloom we trust.

When in any doubt, remind yourself of this.

 

[ChickenBaltiPie]

OK, OK, let me be more specific… I think many of us thought 100m+ wasn’t so far fetched. (Including myself.) That would’ve been of very little surprise. We’ve come close or even exceeded that in the past I think (maybe?) BUT 200m+ …provide me with a quote to that affect and I will belive your bullshit! (…but I’d still of said you’re deluded haha)

You can’t say that you predicted 200m+ (when infact you only predicted 100m+)

 

[Wozza]

My second concern is the players we're bringing in - are we now buying them at their peak value? Up to now, our main recruitment has been players for about £10M or less and selling them on for upwards of £25M - sometimes a lot above £25M! But now, say £25M for O'Riley - Celtic bought him cheap as chips from MK Dons and will make a huge profit - but will his value increase, or is £25M about his peak? £40M for Rutter (!) - here it was Hoffenheim who 'did a Brighton' and made a huge profit - his value didn't increase much in his time at Leeds. Will we be able to sell him in a couple of years for £80M? I'm not sure - maybe with the new rules the days of ever-increasing transfer fees may be coming to an end.

I think the club has learned that you can't just have young, rough diamonds. They take time to bed-in.

Need to have some relatively established young players too (plus a few very experienced players, of course).

We're still not buying players from other Prem teams, though. Scott McTominay would be an outlier.

 

[Guinness Boy]

My concern, just from my point of view, is that we're bringing in so many players that I don't recognise the team as 'my team' at the moment; I know that in the wilderness years we'd be getting an influx of loanees and journeymen every season, but this feels different. OK, hopefully in time I'll get used to the new team - guess they'll probably be a departure or two of players I don't want to see going though. C'est la vie, I suppose.
My second concern is the players we're bringing in - are we now buying them at their peak value? Up to now, our main recruitment has been players for about £10M or less and selling them on for upwards of £25M - sometimes a lot above £25M! But now, say £25M for O'Riley - Celtic bought him cheap as chips from MK Dons and will make a huge profit - but will his value increase, or is £25M about his peak? £40M for Rutter (!) - here it was Hoffenheim who 'did a Brighton' and made a huge profit - his value didn't increase much in his time at Leeds. Will we be able to sell him in a couple of years for £80M? I'm not sure - maybe with the new rules the days of ever-increasing transfer fees may be coming to an end.
Am I wrong? - well, I know I'm a born worrier, so maybe! No need for a lecture - I won't stop worrying or change my mind!

You say that but we've quietly made a huge profit on Undav this window, who barely played for us.

Watching Minteh online in three games and then live in our last two, he looks like he might have almost no price ceiling at all. I've not seen such acceleration and power in a Brighton player ever, not even Lamptey. Cozier-Duberry was free so any later sale at all will be pure profit. Paying a club record for Rutter is odd, I'll grant you. His finishing stats are appalling and I really hope we're not going to sell Pedro who can finish. Gruda looks a top six club player already. And if we ever sell Hinsh or Fergy those are both pure profit too.

I think there's some 'for profit' deals in our window and others we've simply bought because they're good players and the financial wind is blowing in our direction for a change.

I'm very, very excited TBH. We weren't perfect by any means on Saturday but my word, it was fun.

 

[The red pepper kid]

I do wonder if the growth of the club will ever get to a point where the idea of somehow increasing the Amex capacity (I know it cant really be) goes from being a silly impossible idea to one where Tony thinks we might seriously have to investigate how that might happen.

it is always possible to extend the amex............it will take more money than it cost to build in the first place , patience is needed as the money will not get authorised until this club has got somewhere near the likes of say Villa in terms of revenue stream.

 

[Papa Lazarou]

I'm no EP but it was always clear that two highly profitable sets of accounts not only gave us cashflow but a significant advantage on bigger and richer clubs in PSR trouble (hello Newcastle).

It won't last. City's lawyers and Newcastle's client journalists will soon ensure that you can spend what you like if you have it.

This is TB getting ahead of the curve in a window he knew we'd face less competition for the big targets in. It's a master stroke and RDZ should have understood it instead of sulking, but it won't last. Next summer, back to having our targets poached I reckon.

Totally agree. This window is a perfect strorm of:

1. We have funds to invest from previous windows.
2. We have FFP / PSR headroom to spend a lot and still be well within the limits.
3. Other teams are out of the race for these players due to poor financial controls.
4. We do have some clear gaps to fill & most importantly...
5. The PSR / FFP spending rules will change probably from next season to the advantage of the BIG clubs, so we are getting players for now, next season and beyond this time, while we still can.

If the squad we emerge with is enough to bridge the gap back to Europe then we will be able to keep our revenue higher, allowing us to spend more in subsequent seasons, so it's clearly a very calculated move by TB to maximise the value of our spending ... while we are still allowed to.

 

[chickens]

Haven’t read the whole thread, so apologies if fixtures. It’s incredible and unexpected. I can only think that Tony and Paul have spotted an opportunity.

We are (or were) in the black on player sales/purchases, and the new financial rules have not yet come in, which may limit our spending in the future.

Is it as simple as being that if we wanted to undergo a major squad rebuild, this was the one window where we could actively go about it without falling foul of one set of financial regulations or another?

 

[raymondo]

My concern, just from my point of view, is that we're bringing in so many players that I don't recognise the team as 'my team' at the moment; I know that in the wilderness years we'd be getting an influx of loanees and journeymen every season, but this feels different. OK, hopefully in time I'll get used to the new team - guess they'll probably be a departure or two of players I don't want to see going though. C'est la vie, I suppose.
My second concern is the players we're bringing in - are we now buying them at their peak value? Up to now, our main recruitment has been players for about £10M or less and selling them on for upwards of £25M - sometimes a lot above £25M! But now, say £25M for O'Riley - Celtic bought him cheap as chips from MK Dons and will make a huge profit - but will his value increase, or is £25M about his peak? £40M for Rutter (!) - here it was Hoffenheim who 'did a Brighton' and made a huge profit - his value didn't increase much in his time at Leeds. Will we be able to sell him in a couple of years for £80M? I'm not sure - maybe with the new rules the days of ever-increasing transfer fees may be coming to an end.
Am I wrong? - well, I know I'm a born worrier, so maybe! No need for a lecture - I won't stop worrying or change my mind!

I would worry if you stopped worrying .

 

[jackanada]

It's truly f***ing mental.
Anyone here read The Lathe of Heaven? The protagonist must be a Brighton fan.
Other explanations are that the Tony master plan has been accelerated by PSR and Boehly being a useless dick, or maybe just that the Bloom fortune is even bigger than suspected and he's spunking a load of it in a big two fingers to RDZ for calling him tight.

 

[Papa Lazarou]

Actually to the point a few have made including just above @chickens and @Guinness Boy about more restrictive rules on spending that are likely; can any of our more football finance savvy members / dullards confirm if this is the case? @El Presidente might know a man.

 

[Deportivo Seagull]

I can accept that argument for one of them, Minteh, but then again there are always opportunist deals available in any window. Not sure about any of the others, where we look to be paying market rates - hence why people (not me!!!!) have been moaning on here about Rutter's spend.

The real reason for the spending is we had a bloody miserable time for 4 or 5 months at the end of the season and the case was unanswerable that we needed a big overhaul on quality. It should never have got that bad - but all the same I'm delighted the board finally acted rather than doubling down on trying to get the best out of the plenty of players we did have

TB and Barber have always gone after value. A case of sell high, buy low.
FFP & PSR has led to a number of teams having to sell to balance the books, also clubs are generally short of cash at the moment. This was obvious from the January window so waiting for the summer made perfect sense.
For instance, NUFC only sold Minteh because they had to. In a normal window we would have had intense competition for his signature. Similarly Gruda would have had many suitors for his signature.

For TB it’s always been about value.

 

[ChickenBaltiPie]

Re some of the bigger fees and likelyhood of profit, yes we all know our model BUT, some of these players will just represent value for money ‘now’ I believe, even if any profit made isn’t so substantial. We may even make a loss on a couple but we will get our value out of them on the pitch even if we don’t unlock additional value once we sell. I don’t see us making a substantial loss on them though, which of course is the acceptable norm for most clubs. Most of our purchases have and I believe always will amount to a profit but not all. Doesn’t mean we’ve dropped the existing model completely, we’re just adapting, being malleable and doing what we feel needs to be done to stay where we are and compete for EU, oh and remain attractive to those more profitable signings.

 

[Perkino]

So far we have seen... Rutter, Wieffer, Minteh & Gruda who appear to be first team ready plus Osman, Yalcouye & Cozier-Dubbery

In summer 23 we signed Verbruggen, Igor, Milner, Baleba, Dahoud, Pedro & Fati. 5 first team ready plus Bart & Baleba

In summer 22. Colwill, Estupinian, Gilmour, Adingra, Enciso plus Bouanonatte & Ayari lined up for January arrivals.

We regularly sign players who will add to the team but usually see a large fee arrive from a sale. I'm not surprised at the number if arrivals but I am shocked at the amount arriving for £20m+. Equally surprised that none of our signings have much premier league experience but all highly regarded youngsters who if given the right platform could flourish. If any of them have a decent year their values will almost certainly double or triple if Chelsea are interested.

 

[hampshirebrightonboy]

Mad times. As it ever was following The Albion.

Next, a new 40,000+ capacity stadium with proper transport access? We are going to need a bigger home to start conquering Europe.

No!!

 

[Weststander]

Masterclass from TB.

I think some feared that Winstanley and Jewell going to Chelsea would have a negative impact on recruitment especially if they were aware of targets.

Tony is a genius on so many levels that we are now stronger than ever. Astounding amount of work, and the exit door will now be in operation as well for the rest of the window to balance both squad size and the books.

He didn’t even need to sell Lancing or the women’s team to himself to make it all happen.

TB operates on different levels.

If only they could access the Starlizard methodologies and data.

 

[Beanstalk]

I'm really glad we're spending the money we have but the club have sort of been forced into doing so a bit.

The three-year-cycle of PSR is about to die a very quick death in favour of single year, revenue related rules. Because of this, our profit made over the last two summers would essentially be deemed unusable next summer. I think the club have aimed to a) look to break even across the current 3 year PSR cycle, and b) not dramatically increase wage revenue. They're doing it by taking a step forward and signing the known wonderkids rather than the hidden gems.

I think we're building something great, and expect from next summer, under the new rules, we'll only see serious incomings if we see serious outgoings in the same season.