Until they have:
a) cameras that track up and down the side of the pitch
b) cameras with a better frame rate
c) some form of sensor in the ball to pinpoint the contact time
They need to stick it all in the bin.
Only half the story though. Most players we may be interested in will command transfer fees. Just plucking this example out of nowhere, but if Robins decided he wanted a backup RB and wanted to spend £3m on him it’d be a fair challenge to say “is that a worthwhile use of resources?”.
Could the non-attendant get a pro-rated amount back with the club taking the ‘profit’ from the deal? That would be fairer and make more sense. If that’s then administered as credit against future season ticket purchases then it may work.
To be honest, even if we made the switch to a ‘flatter’ 433 I’d still want an AM in the squad to change the dynamic of our play when required. Whether that’s Palmer, Rudoni or someone else is the interesting bit.
I’ll say it again this year but it still won’t happen - get me Steven Alzate.
Edit: when saying that, I didn’t realise he’s out of contract at Brighton. Even tastier.
Does anyone know how many of our squad spaces are being used by those who wouldn’t qualify under the work permit ‘points’ requirement? I’d imagine Torp and Sakamoto are on there, think MvE and Wright are/were fine on the points anyway.
The fly in the ointment is the severe regression over the last 10-15 games. He’s gone from about +3.7 Goals Prevented to +0.9. Still above the average as a season-long metric but the most recent string of games I’m confident would have him at or near the bottom. Unsure whether there’s any data...
No surprise Sheaf has his top button done up. Classy guy. The rest of the scruffs though, pah. You’ve got all the money in the world, but a shirt where you can do your top button up.
Sarmiento only joined in January after being called back from WBA due to lack of game time. You can kind of get away with it for half a season at a time. Williams I’d imagine has a good relationship with McKenna from their Utd days so probably happy to be there for now.
It’d be quite nice, although in practice I have doubts over whether it’d work, to sign players in the summer and sell in January. You’d then hope that the new signings had sufficient time to get up to speed to act more as a ready-made replacement.