There is always some value to be had even if that value is that it provides us with a good player that enhances the team for now but with no likelihood of making anything for them in the future (a good cup run or the play offs would have bought money in another way). I really do not buy into this we have a good budget we have money to spend but there was no one out there we could afford that was worth it. If that is truly the case we weren't looking hard enough and we need a better manager or scouting set up to do so.
It is a different matter if you say that we couldn't persuade anyone decent to join us as that would indicate that there is something pretty wrong behind the scenes we do not know about (something I am beginning to think may be true ever since MApp and our head scout left in the summer).
What could the club have done differently? Well not sold all of the silver when you are unable to replace it. Or how about sticking with the policy that has worked so well for the past few seasons (No, I call BS on the statement that is was now impossible to find that sort of player any more). Lastly we could have looked for established players from League 1 that were available, and good players from lower leagues. Instead we decided to buy in some untried players from all over, and some old players looking for a final pay day. This is without addressing the glaring lack of pace, cover in certain areas which had the most injury prone players (could have predicated Ribero and Hall), and lack of tactical options.
Looking at the players we did bring in few if any any seem worth even their wages so even without spending money we have managed to waste it.
The first paragraph is caveat central. The manager could have spent the money and I wouldn't surprised in that alternate reality if he did that, that fans were complaining that player x or player y was no better than what we have and they'd wish he'd waited to spend on better players.
Let's face it. Lundstram wanted to leave. Johnson wanted to leave. We could have said no, but what would that have done to team spirit? Pretty much shat all over it. It was bad enough with Johnson's transfer okey cokey. That for 4 months... Unbearable for all. At our level, you can't keep 2 players in the squad that want out, and the players know that. Saints could afford to leave Van Dijk training with the U23s and on the bench. And they got 25 million more from doing that. Not enough credit goes to the club for extracting what they did for a player like Johnson that everyone in football knew was off.
It's worth keeping in mind we had a transfer plan in place and then MAPP decided to b****r off at probably the worst time of the year. Targets move on at the prime buying time while we are looking for a new manager and the new manager wants different things in the squad. Too many fans don't appreciate how MAPP screwed over that transfer window for OUFC. It's Pep's fault, DEs fault, etc, etc.
One can argue that a player like Tiendalli is a short term band aid signing that does not commit us to anything past the end of the year, meaning we aren't locked in on an ok player like Aaron Martin for multiple years.
The coming transfer window is where Clotet really needs to target the right sort of player, as when we signed MacDonald in League 2. He has to get this right, and I am sure Clotet is aware of that.
