Staying Positive in the Apocalypse

Pedigree Chum wouldn't sign most of them.

Issue is the “premier league premium”. If any of our list had gone to Germany the price would have been half. If any of their list came here, the price would have been +50%.

Not excusing the club, moneys money and they should be able to gazump these continental teams with hard nosed negotiators…..but we have Bill.

You put a lot of time and effort into this type of stuff Robert, and because football has never been played on paper, I just hope that Everton now start taking a different direction, especially when looking at that depressing list, of the twenty million or over players, who have mostly contributed next to nothing, and must all have at least £5 million in the bank, thanks to Everton FC.

Maybe that word “unfortunately”, that you use in your last paragraph might be the making of us Robert? Who knows, especially if we get off to a good start and continue to have a very passionate crowd behind us?

Between the two of them, and working (hopefully) with a much more savvy board, we'll start building a proper young squad, with the occasion oul arse player who can get the team's rhythm ticking properly.

Those teams who have won who Robert has mentioned, I think have more of a chance of getting into Europe because the competition for euro places are less fierce. I think though that the club might just begin to be run on a professional footing and our management and recruitment team will build out squad up into getting into the top seven in a few years, maybe only a couple of seasons to get us into europe if we do well in a cup competition as well.

Very good detailed analysis as always Robert.

I want a short term approach backed up by a strategy. I acknowledge that statement is contradictory but also makes sense.

Win a trophy and qualify for Europe. Put ourselves on the map and then build on that platform. Something we failed to do previously, the last time being 1995.

But others have done so. The Chelsea and City projects took years before they won the league. But the steadily improved on and off the pitch and won trophies along the way as well as playing European football.

To those who sneer at European football as a Sam Allardyce type inconvenience, I just have to disagree with you. And even regarding the new conference or 3rd level competition. Well, as I've repeated myself many times, one of our greatest nights was lifting Europe's 3rd tier trophy in Rotterdam in 1985. Give me that again any time soon.

We are selling. As long as we recycle and reinvest wisely, it is just how it works. Don't fear selling your best players. Other clubs do it including the one we are selling to with Richarlison. Bale & Modric spring to mind. Kane was rumoured last season and could still go this one.

It's not what you sell or spend that matters. It's how you sell and then re-invest. How you spend, not what you spend. We should know that more than most by now.

I could mention another club good at it, but I won't as I'll get told off.

And please, look beyond this league and these shores. This "must have Premier League experience" tag has frustrated me for years. The vast majority of the most successful players and managers of the Premier League era didn't achieve that success until (guess what) they made their first appearance in the English Premier League without previous experience.

The positivity caper I find impossible because of the unassailable facts governing footy. If you have money you challenge if not you sit in the inconsequential nob'ead bin.

The nob'ead bin is split into two groups historic big clubs like Newcastle and Villa (and now us) cuddling up to rank outsiders like Birmingham, Portsmouth, Wigan, Swansea et al. The latter examples have since departed the Prem but notably all won cups along the way.

The point is you have to fly under the radar and not be seen as a threat to win something from the nob'ead bin. Sneak through unheralded then hope the gods favour you in the final. Us and other "names" can never fly under the radar somewhere down the track opposition wake up to who they are playing and kick their heads in.

As a "name" residing in the nob'ead bin with no money we have the double whammy that takes winning a cup down to the near zero mark. But not being quite at zero we can hope but not be positive. Delusional positivity affects mental health and almost certainly results in erectile dysfunction.

You have been warned

The scouting(?) for lots of the players we have signed at ridiculous prices and longevity of the contract plus the exorbitant wages are bordering on criminal, lots of us on ToffeeWeb after a few looks scouting these players would have swerved them.

Let's hope the new scouting team can do much better than the last few, I'd give them a tip: take you with them when they are looking at any prospective new signing, and that's a genuine compliment, Robert.

I always try to be optimistic, so this latest bout of optimism is attached to Kevin Thelwell making a long overdue difference.

As ever talk is cheap, the proof will be in the quality of recruitment. The next few weeks will tell us more about the new direction.

After selling Richarlison, possibly Kean this window, Mina a maybe we could have 80-100m to rebuild (I said maybe) . As your detailed article points out we could pick up four players for that who would make a real difference.

As much as I loved Richarlison he didn't fully compliment DCL, so bringing a left forward in who does could go some way to compensating his loss. Chip in a few goals and get DCL to 20+.

Zinchenko is in the northwest with his family, we could have an opportunity to sign him for the left sided slot in midfield. Still only 25 and a solid forward thinking positive player . I think he would help give us more stability and control as a team. He should be a big target for us.

Then the priority, a tough quality DCM, you tell me who for 20m ?

Then a loan from Chelsea, hopefully Frank will choose well and essentially get an option to buy too.

I'm glad Lampard has knocked Winks on the head, this will bode well for the future.

So I don't see this as requiring any great scouting revolution. Our scouts will be well aware of the players. And I don't see it as moneyball as such either. It's more a case of looking for good value / low cost when buying players - which typically enables sell on value and other benefits.

Personally I can't see why we'd ever spend more than about £20m on a player. And most should be cheaper than that.

Either Way with potentially new owners comming in and the fact our money pot big is sealed and putting a knife in the slit and tipping it up side down only let's loose change out, I hope Frank can stay and work with our DOF Mr Thelwells and not only implement a style in all our teams weather that be 433 or451 or even 5141 but accept paying less for young players that fit that bill is the only way we can go from now on.

However, my head is spinning (for want of a better word) with twelve managers in ten years and the absolute dross, that they have brought to our club, and unfortunately we are still laden with a few.

If Lampard and his back room staff, can bring in a reputable goal scorers and some creative midfield tough guys, that may change my prospective of the future. Only time will tell.

One thing is for certain. We cannot continue in the same vain of buying less than average players, who either don't play or make up the numbers on the bench.

I'm praying one of Warrington or Onyango can make the step up this season, and ideally both of Dobbin and Simms. With Anthony switched to the left, I'm thinking Dobbin could be an answer on the right. And (whilst not a kid), I also think Broadhead may have a role this season.

5 subs and a limited squad depth = great chance for youth!

Would he have got those games without our injury problems? I doubt it but, now he has, he is obviously one for the future.

I agree fully with you and Robert, that good young players with potential at the right price are the way forward for us, but I think we also need a blend of experienced players, à la Barry and/or Neville, to get the balance right.

Doubt there are many players on the planet who haven't been tentative across first 6 months as pro.

As for “only got games cos others were injured” – I've rarely heard such bollocks in my life. He got games when the negative fat waiter got fucked off, and someone allowed him to be the attacker he is, not insisting on him being a covering winger in a 4-4-2 system that died in 2005.

If he was 16 and playing the way he did last season, then maybe… but he's 21. It's clear that our opinion of him is much higher than those outside the club. He's ours for as long as we'll have him, just like Osman was, and that's great.

I notice the odds on Lingard joining us are shortening.

The reality is that there are probably at least 15 players of the right sort of profile.

The 3 Europa League winners would look at players like:

- Krejci of Sparta Prague
- Kiwior of Spezia
- Danilo of Palmeiras
- Varela of Boca Juniors
- Ampadu of Chelsea
- Fuchs of Peterborough

Wolfsburg have just bought a holding midfielder, Franjic, from Dinamo Zagreb for £6.5m. Leeds have signed Marc Roca from Bayern for £11m.

Not all of these will be a success. But at that price it's fairly low risk. We've been paying £20m plus and big wages for players of the same standard or worse.

It would be like buying Scott McTominay now for £25m. Basically the most expensive average player we can find.

Back in the day we filled this key position with Lee Carsley - and before that Joe Parkinson. Both of these players would walk into our First XI right now and both were really cheap, unglamorous signings at the time.

I thought Gary Jones's point about the 5 subs from god knows how many was a good point. When I first read about it, Andros Townsend mentioned how Klopp had been whining about and I could see Towny's point.

But it could work for us as well, with some decent young players of ours getting more of a chance for first-team action, but being able to come off if it got too much.

£40M+ for Gordon after half a season in the Premier League? You're having a laugh. I'm not saying he hasn't got promise, but he's not there yet by a long way.

Clearly your opinion of him is much higher than others outside the club.

Quick tangent: I read an article earlier this week about the City Football Group, the group that manages Man City and their 9 (!) sister clubs across the world.

Other than maintaining a Global Database of players and staff that are shared amongst all the clubs within the group, there is one interesting fact about using their financial resources well: they actually employ 2 Argentina based full-time scouts, a feat that even the mightiest Brazilian clubs like Corinthians, Santos and Flamengo don't care to do, given they have been able to raid the Argentinian Giants like River Plate and Boca in the past decade with their relative financial might (granted, domestic market in Brazil is already big enough to dig out diamonds-in-the-rough almost every minute).

So, how can we leverage our South Amercian connections (most notably, with our cousin at Chile, Everton de Viña del Mar)? Previously, many have argued that the UK Work Permit is a deterring us from investing resources in signing South American players. Nowadays, after Brexit, it is no longer the case: signing a youngster from Belgium for example has to go through similar hassles as signing someone with similar background from South America.

Despite Brands's best effort (never forget that he was heavily compromised by the dynamic duo of Moshiri & Kenwright), only nominal progress was made in our excursion into the South America market. And now, we might have too many problems domestically for Thelwell to lay out our own International network, but IMHO we are at least 15 years too late and whatever minimal progress that we can only make now is way better than the status quo.

I understand your feeling that the Europa League is no longer to be sneezed at but I think none of the 3 clubs you mention would last a season in the Premier League.

It is a long hard marathon and my first preference is for Frank to stabilize us in the top half before any thought is given to taking risks on cheap signings with potential.

If Brands did anything right, it was bringing in low-cost players into the youth sides for development but very few were first-team successes.

First-team players need to hit the ground running in the Premier League as we see with the so-called Top 6.

Hard work and determination used to bridge the gap but the top sides have sussed this now and it's in their DNA too.

The only avenue we have to be able to improve and compete is teamwork and tactics. Hopefully this is being worked on already but, as we all know, the current squad is not capable of taking us where we would like to be and everbody and his dog know who the up-and-coming players are and agents already know the Premier League is awash with money and that is in short supply for us.

I'm sorry to be so negative but, with Fred Karno's circus in charge of the club, I am getting more depressed every day.

However, we can only start from where we are; and the first thing our management team will have done is sort out who we can get rid of and who we can keep... and who we're stuck with! If it's not rock bottom for us, it's not far off it; but with astute signings, as Robert has indicated, we can start to rebuild our squad.

I think Frank Lampard and Kevin Thelwell are a team who know a lot of decent players and, because of who they are, can attract some of these to our club. But they've got to sell the prospective players a vision, the club has to back them, I'm sure they can.

Just like Howard Kendall did, when he brought in a mixture of Liverpool reserves, young players who he felt woud fit into the team, some of them from other divisions, and a couple of older players, one reputed to be a crock and the other a top centre-forward who was also reputedly past his best.

So we got Kevin Sheedy, Peter Reid, Andy Gray, we had the world's best goalie and mad Pat van den Hauwe. It turned out that, with the other lads who came in, we became the best team in Europe!

Times change but crafty work and a good management team, along with a manager who players wanted to play for; rather than these £20- to £30-odd million useless "steals" we ended up with, can begin the revolution needed in our thinking, our recruitment and our footballing ethos.

Overnight? I very much doubt it; but if we start off right, then who knows. We have to have a longer term vision and live up to our motto. Liverpool have the saying "We are a club who are here to win things." Well, we must start believing in our own motto and, I don't care if it's the Liverpool Senior Cup, a friendly match or a third tier cup, we must have winning a trophy as our aim.

First things first, is to repair the damage Pinky and Perky have left us in. So, if we are not taken over (and I really hope we are!), if we are stuck with "we've had some good times", then I hope he will keep his nose out of our manager's and DoF's jobs of turning our club into where we should be... not where we are.

The young Chelsea defensive midfielder, Ethan Ampadu, is a very interesting player; it's easy to dismiss him based on his early lightweight performances for Chelsea when he was a teenager. I'm probably guilty of that to an extent.

They've had him out on loan, getting hard but very valuable experience into him. Played appx 30 games for Sheffield Utd in 2020-21 and similar for Venezia in Italy, 2021-22. So he passes Frank's robustness requirements. Also growing international experience with some glowing reviews for Wales.

The kid is still 21 and could now be ready to take the next step up. Frank Lampard will be well aware of him, it'll be interesting to see if he rates him highly enough for us to get involved.

He could well fit into the model of a player signed for £12M before they make it to being a big name £30M+. Hopefully we can do that instead of say Brighton.

Thanks, Robert, for painstakingly putting together the key players signing data for Seville, Villarreal and Eintracht. That list shows me that, when money is spent wisely, a competitive squad can quickly be built up.

On the other hand, you list of £20M+ Everton signings over the past 4 or 5 years, is a stark reminder of how things can go badly wrong when using a scatter-gun approach. To your 'horror' list of Everton signings, I would add:

Mina: £27M
Godfrey: £25M
Doucoure: £20M

For the money and wages being paid to them, I would say their playing impact for Everton has been underwhelming so far. Hopefully, the tide is turning with the signings of Mykolenko, Patterson and Tarkowski.

I also note that the club is trying to re-sign the forgotten academy player Lewis Gibson. If they do that, then for me it is a sure sign that Lampard is thinking of selling one, maybe two centre-backs out of Mina, Keane, Holgate, Godfrey.

Personally, I would be happy if we could raise about £40M selling both Mina and Godfrey. And reinvest about 75% of the £100M (£40M + £60M from Richarlison) in the likes of Broja, Zinchenko, and one of the defensive mid-fielders from Robert's list in post #24.

Personally, I would prefer someone like Loftus-Cheek, who is still quite young at 26 years, but experienced enough in the Premier League, and has the right physicality and energy to play in the defensive midfield role. I think he is someone who would also improve under Lampard.

They seem to have found perfectly good alternatives at much lower cost.

Based on the quality of their squad and stature in Europe I reckon Seville would finish between 6th and 10th in the Premier League.

I think we're seduced into thinking Premier League players are much better than they actually are. Many of them, even those getting regular games at Rich 6 sides, are really nothing special at all.

Liverpool do a great job of this – because Klopp has a system and they're upgrading their playing staff all the time. Man City the same – although it's more subtle.

We've just gone out and signed players cos we fancy them, have then changed managers, and the playing staff are effectively in limbo and being squeezed into a system they weren't bought for.

This is why we look so shite and disjointed. It all starts from the top, though, unfortunately.