I believe part of the initial splurge was to counter the perceived lack of resource at the 19 to 21 level, post Cellino. Whilst there is no doubt the club is in a better place now, it is worthy of note, in the last year of Cellinos tenure the club was profitable and invested net significantly more in transfer fees than we ever have done under Radz. I would also like to highlight that arguably pound for pound the most successful club in the championship; Brentford, largely operate with a 1st team squad only. Their player trading is excellent, and they can afford to pay the likes of Pontus Jansson more than we can.gilesdriveby wrote:What I cant understand is our policy for young players. After the initial Orta splurge which didn't seem to bear dividends, there seems to be a strategy for buying young 17-20 year old players. Here are some examples we buy Miazek, then we buy Meslier, and now we are in the market for another young keeper. We have bought Bogusz, Mc Carron, Mc Calmont, Halme, Kun,Paudi O Connor all of whom were playing first team football in their own country and did well on the under 23 team, but there seems to be limited opportunities for them to break through to the first team. These obviously have an impact on the wage bill and I am not sure we're getting the benefit of same. I also don't think its great for the players either, e.g. has Mc Carron developed better in the last year palying U23 for Leeds rather than playing first team in L1.
My preference is that we buy someone like James who is better than what is currently at the club. Of course we did that with Costa and that hasnt borne the fruits we hoped it would.
Overall I think we’re on the right track, given the stature of our club. We’re also starting to turn a modest profit on players at that level. Most owners come into a club and follow a mantra of recruiting ‘young & hungry who will develop’ - in some respects it would be refreshing to hear someone say we’re going to recruit washed up, p...heads who nobody else will touch, in the hope we can turn their careers around
I exaggerate to make the point however that’s the sort of strategy that served the likes of Warnock & Allardyce well. As bielsa himself would say - there is no one way.