Ethan Wheatley

You do realise that the players we shipped out weren’t in the team and had they stayed we’d probably be no better or worse than we are now.

 

Regardless, we should have been strengthening and we replaced them with shite. Jackson aside and maybe Ashby. Other 5 are utter dross.

 

It’s hard to argue with you on that. The January business has probably cost us automatic promotion. It was there for the taking

 

I think they ended up caught between a rock and a hard place with our league position and didn't want to commit to lengthy deals in January. So we ended with a mish mash of what was available.

I'm hopeful summer will be better prepped.

 

The problem with that is, will we ever get a better chance than we had in January?

A good go in January would have only have meant a couple of additions in the summer would be needed if we missed promotion.

Now it seems likely we will be clearing out at least 8/9 come summer which will need replacing/ upgrading

 

Every chance of going up this season at begining of January so why not put a bit of cash down not millions just some intent thst they look like they are after the next level .........the fact that we have a slight chance of catching Cardiff with our shocking away form shows that

 

Cardiff’s ‘wobble’ started after their top striker got injured late January. They didn’t replace him and are now hanging on to 2nd place.

 

They wanted to replace him with Wheatley but we'd already agreed a deal.

 

Which is quite normal anyway considering the contract cycle and not knowing league we will be in anyway?

 

You are beginning to sound like an Huddersfield fan … “ There for the taking”…Sheer nonsense!

 

Clubs don’t let star players go in January,it’s the most difficult window to strengthen. Who is this star player we should have signed ? We probably spent quite a bit bringing in the players we did ,the fact that Wheatley and Mullin didn’t come off is unfortunate but I don’t recall protests when we signed them. We could have signed someone in January if you can persuade say Burton to let a striker go,but they aren’t going to guarantee relegation by letting him go, and he could have struggled with us the same as Wheatley and Mullin. We are currently 3rd in the league and thats an outstanding achievement for a newly promoted side against the leagues big hitters like Luton, Bolton, Huddersfield and co. We have not missed out on anything this season we have massively exceeded expectations.

 

Hindsight is a wonderful thing. They were astride two stools, investment in our league position as you suggested, or try to keep our powder dry for the summer. They took the second option. Clubs in this league have spent millions more than us and are nowhere or are in the ever increasing chasing pack. It is interesting that they gave Jackson a good contract who has been great for us. Ashby is looking good as well. Given we are much better off than anyone expected. We are all hoping we can gain promotion this year.

 

Ironically the best 2 strikers we have signed in the last decade were signed in January. Ryan Hardie and Nathan Lowe would have been better than the shite we ended up with. I would even throw in Harry Gray. While none of them have set the world alight, they were all available and look better options than what we ended up with.

The replacements for Pattison and Leigh were extremely poor too.

 

I don’t think I saw that anywhere - now, it’s a shame he didn’t go there.

He tried hard at the beginning and I think you could see his obvious attributes but he just can’t shoot!!!

Maybe he’ll still have a part to play and if he does, I hope he gets a goal for his and our sake otherwise I fear it’s L2 for him to rebuild…

 

I think Graydon was the first one we were linked to back in December who left Fleetwood for Salford, they paid half a million for him i think? We were linked to the lad from York too at one stage but again a big fee. Olaofe who was probably always going back to Stockport. Then Beesley was the name linked for a good few weeks, again it seems like the asking fee was a non-starter.

With us linked to strikers all January long, then ending up with Mullin and eventually Wheatley signing the longest linked loan deal of all time, it screams to me that we were always looking for one good striker but a deal couldn't be done. Either players went elsewhere or we weren't willing to sign away any more big fees, so two loans were better than nothing. Also, might be something in the way we were playing back then? If you're an agent of an in-demand L1 striker and you knew we had approached earlier in the window and then you and/or the player watched the Mansfield game at the start of the window or Huddersfield & Lincoln games when we were getting rushed for a player through the door, you'd want you're client as far away from our setup as possible. It felt like our strikers didn't kick the ball for 2 or 3 weeks that month.

 

Maybe it's better he didn't go there. They might've had him scoring already cos clearly he's got talent.
In any case, the Cardiff interest was mentioned by David Sharpe during the BBC Fans' Forum.

 

If you read posts on here after we got beat at Lincoln, Huddersfield, Mansfield and at home to Cardiff we were hanging on to a play off place, yes it was a bad period with regards our form some of the stuff being posted on here was ott players who had got us where we were, all of a sudden weren't good enough, they were bottlers etc etc, it was a frustrating time but no team goes through out the season without a bad run as we saw last season with Walsall and up to a point Cardiff as at one time it looked like they would win the league comfortably.

 

Probably a reflection, despite his assurances to the contrary, that SR does not have the funds (or is not willing to put that amount in) to sustain us as a Championship club. More money to be made if successful via the lottery of the play offs and that is how I see SR wanting promotion without throwing it away completely

 

Never take social media too se

The problem is that the signings, on paper, looked decent. A few lads from Prem teams and a global superstar in Paul Mullin!