Summer 2021 transfer window

[Throbber3]

If someone said to you six months ago (and some of this is speculative, I admit) we'd swap:

Nuno, Rui, Neves and Adama

for

Lage, Sa, Palhinha and Trincao

And then we'll charge you more money to watch it, because we can.

Who is signing up for that?

1. Nuno- Had done exactly what Valencia and Porto fans said he would and did not appear to be able to cure the problems with either the quality of football or the system. It was a ground out 1-0 win or nothing.
2. Rui Patricio- Finished pretty much bottom of the metrics for goalkeepers in the premier league last season with nearly 4 goals conceded more than expected. Last year of his contract and 33 years old. 12m is a good fee .
3. Neves- Young and ambitious and has given us 4 years. Deserves to play in the top echelon .40m plus fee incoming.
4. Divides the forum completely- on a good day he is a world beater on a bad one well he is a liability. Again , a decent fee of 40m likely.

So we will have changed managers , changed style , bought players more suited to fit that style and made significant money to invest in other players like Bolla and Mosquera. We may also find we add Guedes to the squad for Mir plus a few million we made on the GK deals (I am certain he will come and have been for ages). We will sign RAN and ship off Vinagre (upgrade imho). We probably wont be done even then. Crikey, what does it take to excite you? Its mid July and I cant wait to see the new look and new players.

 

[prawnking]

If someone said to you six months ago (and some of this is speculative, I admit) we'd swap:

Nuno, Rui, Neves and Adama

for

Lage, Sa, Palhinha and Trincao

And then we'll charge you more money to watch it, because we can.

Who is signing up for that?

I respect your take on this, but putting it like this assumes that those in the first list are unchanging absolutes, and when they're invoked you're talking about them at their best really, rather than how they all performed in their most recent season.

Apart from Neves, they all had a bit of a 'mare tbh

 

[wanderer89]

There was someone doing the keeping coaching on one of the clips Wolves released the other day. Think it was Roberts (not 100% though)

Presume we are waiting for the final coaches to clear isolation/quarantine before announcing them all in one go

Initials on his tracksuit were TR so I'd say you're right.

 

[Tredman]

There was someone doing the keeping coaching on one of the clips Wolves released the other day. Think it was Roberts (not 100% though)

Presume we are waiting for the final coaches to clear isolation/quarantine before announcing them all in one go

Yeah saw that - big guy? English accent?

 

[Carrotdude]

Sa will get pelters as soon as he makes a mistake this season by anyone who’s unhappy about this bit of business even if it’s the same as something Rui did last season that got ignored. That’s just the way fans are, a lot will be subjective too, I always thought Ikeme was a decent solid keeper for where we were but plenty on here thought he was shit.
I personally don’t think we’ll be much worse off, Rui wasn’t very good last season.

 

[Elephant Pyjamas]

I wonder if Sa will revert to No1 rather than 11.

 

[Kenny]

I wonder if Sa will revert to No1 rather than 11.

I think he will. No attachment to the Ikeme situation at all

 

[BillyDee]

It had already been decided to go back to number 1 for this season.

 

[Kenny]

Yeah saw that - big guy? English accent?

Worryingly dropped a couple of simple balls back to him...

 

[PuntsWolf]

95% of fans won’t give a shit unless he’s RuddyLite as Rui was poor last season, a genuine hinderance on crosses/set pieces, attached to his line by a bungy cord and definitely not worth his salary.

Now I wasn’t desperate for a change, I’d have given him the benefit of the doubt much like Nuno. But if someone is basically going to give us our money back when we were most likely losing him for free/not wanting to re-sign him then I’ll take that.

 

[Newbridge Wolf]

I will miss Rui doing his own thing before a game.

Ruddy - He joins in with the outfield players doing final warms ups with the coach before kick off in each half
Rui - Fuck that shit, I'm going to my goal

He used to do his little workouts whilst the play was upfield, so very focused, looked a bit of a nutter doing it

There's no doubt that we were very lucky to have such a great goalie play for us, he's easily the best I've seen in between the sticks.

I

 

[Tony Towner]

As with Nuno, I'd have kept Rui and worked on the principal that last season was an abohoration, but if it wasn't then his standards had slipped beyond what was acceptable.

Also as with Nuno I worry about the process of replacing him, time will tell on that one

 

[slink]

Yeah saw that - big guy? English accent?

GK coach is Tony Roberts, he's the Wales Gk coach. Pretty sure he was at Swansea when Lage was there.

 

[PuntsWolf]

As with Nuno, I'd have kept Rui and worked on the principal that last season was an abohoration, but if it wasn't then his standards had slipped beyond what was acceptable.

Also as with Nuno I worry about the process of replacing him, time will tell on that one

Like Kenny, I reckon Sa will be good. Will be one of the Mendes benefits. For the rumoured fee then we will have done well.

I understand your reservations though on the “process” though.

 

[The Bear]

Well, I've got two and a bit weeks to make my mind up, haven't I.

There are a lot of things to dislike at the moment.

It's a little bit Chicken Licken for me personally, but then again I've always been the eternal optimist, and you pays your money and you takes your choice. I wouldn't tell anyone how to support their club.

Overhauling the squad was always going to happen at some point once we semi-established ourselves in the Prem. And as Kenny says, at least we are moving quickly and being a bit more savvy in making sure we have replacements lined up and pretty much done deals.

The owners will ultimately be judged on their managerial appointments and transfers, there's not a lot we can do about that but vote with our feet. Which will happen if we don't keep challenging in the top 6-10 regularly.

The season ticket price rises are annoying but not unexpected given where the owners will have seen us starting from in 2017.

 

[slink]

The first season Rui was a massive upgrade on Ruddy, we had a solid goalkeeper that while not being great with his feet and reluctant to come for crosses (when he did he was pretty good though) just didn't make many mistakes. He improved his kicking in the second season but started to be beaten by more shots that you would expect him to save and last season that sky rocketed imo. The disallowed Hungary goal at the Euros summed his season up and his decline over the last year or so.

It could have been a blip but i don't think we could really afford to turn down the Roma offer when we've got Sa lined up for the price we have. From what i've seen he looks a decent keeper and hopefully the club have done their work on whether they think his performances in Greece will translate to the Premier League where he will definitely be busier.

For me i think the club needed changes to be made, from Nuno down to the playing squad. I've always been of the opinion that we needed a change of mindset at some point as safety first only gets you so far (further than i thought i would ever see us go admittedly) and i don't think Nuno could get us away from that, i wouldn't have kicked up a fuss had he stayed but i don't mind the fact that we have gambled. I say this while appreciating it might all go tits up and those that are skeptical will be proven right.

Personally i'm really looking forward to this season and the unknown of it, we might get to see some fantastic football if it all comes off and i'm excited at that possibility. I get why some are glass half empty but after the last year and a half i'm going glass is full until proven otherwise, both home and away season tickets renewed and looking forward to supporting Bruno and the boys.

 

[Throbber3]

I would far sooner win 5 lose 5 playing football that looks good and is exciting , than win 3 draw 6 lose 1. Ultimately its the same points but there is something positive about playing to win , on the front foot and trying to beat all-comers. I am in the half -full camp.

 

[Jinky]

If someone said to you six months ago (and some of this is speculative, I admit) we'd swap:

Nuno, Rui, Neves and Adama

for

Lage, Sa, Palhinha and Trincao

And then we'll charge you more money to watch it, because we can.

Who is signing up for that?

Strange take. We haven't signed Palhinha yet. We haven't sold Neves or Adama yet. Hell, we haven't announced Sa yet!

Come on, mate. You can't have it both ways. You (and many, many others) were telling me (and a few others) last summer that we had to wait until the end of the window before we were allowed a proper opinion (which at the time, mine was fairly negative but no where near your levels of negativity since Nuno went). Now you're making up scenario's that haven't happened yet and using that as a stick to beat the club with. I've said it before, but imagine if I'd been the one to post what you did above.

I'm all for giving our opinions as we see fit, and I said as much last season when I was being told to get back in line for being "too negative". I understand what you're getting at above, but I think it's important to just wait and see on this one.

 

[Kenny]

Olympiacos have their Sa replacement in and announced

https://twitter.com/x/status/1414934590469328896

 

[Paddingtonwolf]

The Olympiacos goalkeeper top is awful!