I wonder is it the case that big clubs have a higher failure rate when it comes to successes, or is it just that we notice it more because of the money involved.
It's easy to highlight Southampton and Dortmund as the team's that got great value for money in their transfers, but I'd be surprised if it wasn't the norm to have more failures than successes.
All clubs have transfer failures there's no doubt about it, it's the nature of it but I honestly think that we are somewhat in a bit of a different situation to a lot of clubs in terms of us falling between 2 stools.
I'll try to get out what I mean as its a bit of a scramble in my head exactly what I'm trying to get at.
The top level of clubs right now, either in our league (City, Chelsea, Utd, Arsenal) or the very top sides around the world in other leagues (Barca, Madrid, Bayern) or the attractive clubs around (Dortmund, Juve, Atleti) are in a different boat to us as we stand in recent times.
The likes of those either have settled squads of the better talent due to long term success and are only adding one or two of that top level player or an up and coming talent who they can nurture.. They also have the pull for the players knowing they get regular CL football.. They also have better climates etc that attract players and their families. They can pay big money in wages which we simply can't and even the ones not on massive money, that you would call maybe that step down from the elite will be attracted there over us for any of the aforementioned reasons
We are right now not a regular CL club challenging for the title, we also can't pay the wages to tempt players from those others clubs which is a massive factor, we can offer very good wages but even if it's comparable to those other clubs it's not enough to outweigh the CL football pull or the climates or the teams that maybe we are a bigger name still than but they regularly finish top 2-4 in their leagues where we don't currently and to really turn their heads we can't afford the massive pay packets of say what City were offering prior to them becoming a regular at the summit of the game to attract those players to bully your way into that.
As a knock on we are shopping at the level below the world class level and below the level of those just below that, we are shopping in a market that we are hoping to find a bargain or an unearthed gem (Suarez-Coutinho) we are shopping in a market paying over the top prices in the most part for teams below us better players and paying them big wages to come but in reality probably 75% of our incomins wouldn't be considered by those above us, the reality is without a fantastic strategy and plan which in my opinion we lack then you are hoping more than expecting to be able to get into that next level.
The amount of transfers we do in recent years will never ever be giving us a level of consistency to even give us a chance either.
You need a manager and people doing the player recruitment with a great plan, a great eye for talent and a great pull for the players.
In essence for me we are buying in the level of players that gives us a greater chance of gamble than say the real top clubs.. We are doing it blindly without an end goal, look at City when they went from mid table to CL to champions, they had a plan of how to do it and I honestly believe we haven't got one. The turnover in gambles that wouldn't be of interest to the clubs we want to compete with is too much, I'm frustrated this summer with the likes of Markovic, yes he had a poor season, but to throw it away and start again brining in another 5-6 new faces into a side at the beginning of the season shows no real leadership in any aspect of the club, no overriding plan of how we get there.. Just those ones didn't work, let's try a new load.
Look again at City in that period of growth they were buying players who would have interested those above them, we aren't and that indicative of the amount of flops we are having for me.
Yes a transfers are gambles, all clubs make mistakes but ours in the last say 6 years are too many
