Personally I don't think this window was too bad ... we kept two key players, Cairney and Sessegnon. and brought in two decent new ones, the adaptable midfielder Petsos and a striker in Cyriac (albeit both on loan). But it could have been so much better. I say that not just because more squad strength would help in a push for the play offs but because this is our last season on parachute payments. Not even Derren Brown could predict how the FFP paranoid Mr Khan will react next year. Anyway to summarise, we brought in 2 and let 8 go; 1 sold 7 on loan, making it a total of 13 out on loan. Admittedly a fair few of the players on loan are youngsters and in fairness their time out should be healthy for the future. Nonetheless in leaves the main squad mighty thin. Setting aside possible U23 candidates (there are few left), this is how it looks: please log in to view this image
Cottager, yes we haven't an abundance of players but they are all (each and everyone of them) good quality that can come in and out of the team seamlessly. A far cry from where we have been in many a year. And we do have the U23's where further good quality players are emerging and putting pressure on the players ahead of them.
I'm a little frustrated that Humphrys went out on loan. I know he'll get more gametime at Shrewsbury, but we are painfully light at that CF position (especially if we do end up in the playoffs!).
The local paper is reporting today that Jokanovic did indeed want two strikers in the window. And other sources are confirming that Cyriac was his fourth choice: No.1 was Sergi Enrich But that fell down on Tuesday afternoon for the money reasons already mentioned. No.2 was Yohan Boli Not one that certainly I was aware of. He’s a 23 year old French striker currently playing for Sint-Truidense V.V. in Belgium. With 6 goals so far this season (just 1 a pen!). Fulham offered €3m plus bonuses. But that also fell down on Tuesday afernoon because his club were not willing to sell and the player himself was unprepared for the bid saying, "it all happened too quickly for me" No.3 was Aboubakar Kamara Agreement had been reached with his club Amiens, but despite everything else going well by the gong of deadline day we still couldn't agree terms with his Agent. No.4 was Gohi Cyriac And as we now know his loan went through early-ish on Tuesday evening. Interesting that the first three were all going to be outright purchases, not so Cyriac although there is an option to buy. Which presumably - the point Cookie made - gives us time to size him up. The failure to do business on any of those first three and the alleged reasons for the breakdown, never mind leaving every one of them till the last day, has to raise questions about our planning beforehand. We continually get told that "these things take time" and "there's so many people involved these days". Any one of the above reasons for failure should have been obvious from day one of the window if we had done our homework properly..
I can't believe that the people involved left everything to the last minute. Clubs that have the players we want can easily drag things out. Are there players listed above where we've got a pre contract agreement for next season?
Salt in the wound. "Fulham’s deadline day attempts to sign Sergi Enrich from Eibar were certainly ambitious, but ultimately pointless. As had been reported in Spain on January 31st, Enrich himself looked kindly upon the idea and at one stage the transfer looked possible. Fulham would pay Enrich’s €10m buyout clause, agree personal terms, with the player getting far more than he does at Eibar, and that would be that. However, Eibar weren’t too keen on losing a star player on deadline and put as many hurdles in the way as possible. Mid afternoon on deadline day, Sport Witness was informed by someone close to the potential move that it wasn’t happening, because of complications. Eibar insisted that Enrich deposit the clause himself which would have left him liable for a big tax bill. All this can be sorted out without such difficulties, but not when there’s just hours left of the window. If Fulham had started their assault a week earlier then Enrich could be theirs. And that looks like it would have been a brilliant move. Eibar demolished Valencia 4-0 at the weekend, and Enrich scored 2 goals, making that 4 goals and two assists in his last three matches. His performance has found him in Gazzetta dello Sport’s European Team of the Week, where he lines up alongside Romelu Lukaku and Radamel Falcao." please log in to view this image
It gets worse. The same people are now reporting that we wanted to pay the release clause money for Sergi Enrich in installments. Not too surprisingly Eibar weren't happy with that and when we refused to budge that's when they insisted Enrich had to pay the release money himself and in full. Which is why the tax complications came into play. He was keen to join us but not prepared to forfeit the tax bill and the deal fell through.
As I said on the transfer thread Enrich is a very good player. He had the potential to be one of the best signings this club has made since Saha or Dembele. Fact is, we will never get him now. He probably will leave Eibar in the summer but will be snapped up by one of the bigger teams in Spain or possibly another European league, but his price then will be way out of our pocket. The only silver lining for me would be if Sevilla bought him.
He'll be off if an offer comes along, based on his disinterest and not just in this window. Then what will happen to Ali Mac who master minded our strategy?
Wasn't the Enrich signing exactly what the statistics team was supposed to be finding. A player who had gone under everyones radar, that they could pick up for less than it would take to get similar quality from the English game. Yet the club, AliMac/Khan didn't back them by doing 'all that it takes' !!!! There is something really wrong with the non playing side of Fulham. Whether it emanates from the lack of knowledge from the owner or the incompetence of who he has in charge of running the transfer negotiations, this club has conducted itself very poorly on both management selection & player transfer process since Khan has taken ownership.
Well, Ali Mac is the Last Man Standing. He's seen out Jol, Rene, the Crab, Curbs, the Mad German, Kit and Rigg. And seen in the FFP fiasco; but not the Riverside Development Well, Ali Mac's The Man. He was instrumental in convincing Khan about the Club's viability. He has implemented Khan's "sustainability" policy with resolve ever since. He has surpassed himself in not only this window but also the summer window when it came to signing a striker - the wrong one on each occasion; panic buying after deals lef till the last minute failed.
A little more on this has come out in the Spanish press. We offered €10 million euro's for their best player as we all know, but what I didn't know was that we said we would pay it in instalments. This upset Eibar royally and that was why they insisted that Enrich pay his buyout clause himself. Talk about shooting yourself in the foot.
And another one bit the dust thanks to our "last minute" strategy. Sport Witness who clearly find our attempts to sign a striker, "interesting", have this story: "One of the players targeted was Anastasios Karamanos, who’s currently at Feireinse on loan from Greek side Olympiacos. On January 31st, outlets from the Portuguese press reported the transfer as certain, saying Fulham would pay around €1.5m for the player. Feirense would receive part of it for letting the loan be cut short. But the move never happened, and not much has been said since… until now. Today’s edition of A Bola has an explanation as to why the Fulham transfer failed. The newspaper claims that the move was very close indeed, and the player even travelled to London to sign for the West London club. However, Fulham ended up not agreeing a fee with Olympiacos, and given the urgency of the deal, it ended up collapsing. Karamanos returned to Portugal, where he’s highly rated, having scored five goals in the league this season. He returns to Olympiacos in the summer, and his contract there expires in 2018."
So, we had 5 strikers lined up on deadline day and were looking to sign 2. Conspiracy Theory: Step 1 Because we were buying out his release clause, we could confidently leave Sergi Enrich to deadline day. A no brainer, wouldn't you say? Step 2 With Sergi Enrich as our banker, the plot was then to perm 1 out of the other four. With those odds what could go wrong? Step 3 With Sergi Enrich and A N Other signed up, at the 11th hour we dump Chris Martin back on Derby. With his costs buying A N Other, we get rid of a trouble maker and two new strikers for the price of one. Almost like "a problem spared is a problem halved", init? Ah well, "the best laid plans of mac and men gang aft agley".
I do think that the likes of AliMac and Rigg live for the thrill and adrenaline rush of playing the transfer windows, it's a game to them, like being in Vegas gambling at the poker table. It is the club and fans that suffer from the incompetence of these people trying to get their buzz.
