Yes it can. You haven’t considered that Rice might have believed he could get a better player than Aaron in on a permanent deal, hence only offering a loan deal.
Ian Evatt is quoted in the Bolton news as saying we offered a loan deal but not a permanent deal on the 29th December. That marries up with what I’m being told happened.
Again it is possible to want to sign someone on loan to plug an immediate gap but not want to sign them permanently and sanction the spend for a permanent player. Those two things can co-exist together. It happens in football all the time. I believe this was Rice’s position on Aaron Morley from what I have been told.
I do not know if we subsequently made a permanent offer in the summer, as I have not been informed about that. Perhaps it is because Rice tried and failed to get some targets and then had to come back round to Aaron Morley who was further down the list of his potential signings. I’m fine with Rice coming back to Aaron later in the summer and trying to sign him permanently. If anything it shows he might be learning something as he goes along.
Lots of Clubs (Managers/Chairman/Directors of Football) talk about having numerous targets for a position and deals falling through so having to adjust or re-assess. I believe Rice changed his mind after MB left the building. It is frustrating as many of us believe Morley was the key to last season and Rice inexperience showed in that decision.
Out of interest how do we know it was “definitely true” that Dan Rice told Bloomfield the data didn’t stack up in Morley,or is it from the same “evidence” pile that says he “definitely” pushed Bloomfield out?
My understanding was that Bolton simply asked for far more than he was worth.Our response was to prefer offering more on the loan terms.
In Richie Wellens’ post-match interview, below, he is asked about the half-time changes and, at 1:42, he says “…I’m not making excuses for the players but we looked leggy and maybe that Astroturf pitch, I was umming and ahhing about whether to make four or five changes…”
Normally if you compare a grass pitch to a plastic one it’s a criticism but is he saying the grass was so lush, or maybe too long, that it was tiring out his players?
I have been told by three separate people, all with significant connections to either the club or league football. I’ve sponsored a number of players down the years.
I have no reason to disbelieve any of them. As I have said, this type of decision gets made all the time and sometimes you get it right and sometimes wrong. Morley was wrong as he was pivotal to our season.
I’ve also said Anders wasn’t fancied and said the other day Rice may have got this right. I’ve also said some of his recruitment now looks reasonably good that we have a proper first team coaching set up. Some of it is not.
I’ve also said if he learns in the job and reflects on his mistakes then that is good for the club and first team. He is clearly skilled at Academy set up.
He has done some good things, some rubbish things and some inbetween.
Anyway I don’t have anything else to add and do not want to derail any further a match day thread.
Back on the subject of the game, I thought Grimmer was absolutely fantastic yesterday. Yep he’s still likely to shank the occasional forward pass out of play but he was absolutely everywhere yesterday, probably the best I’ve seen him play in a while. And Michael Duff…what a turnaround since he’s come on board, and one of the chants yesterday ‘We’ve got our Wycombe back’ was really heartwarming to hear. Up the Duff!!
At the risk of being very unpopular, I think both cautions on the keepers were correct. Norris’ incident was quite clear, his challenge was one were he was trying to win the ball and then tangled up afterwards. There was also 2 covering defenders and the attacker never had complete control of the ball.
As for the Orient keeper, I think Fred has helped him stay on the pitch. His touch was too heavy & he was going away from goal with at least 1 covering defender. His next touch would have been at least 5-10yrds further on and the angle would have been more difficult
So in other words it is precisely the same pile of “evidence” as I thought it was. There is no evidence until either Rice of Bloomfield come out and say it publically.Otherwise it is conjecture.
By all means say you are confident it happened as you have been told so but presenting it as a fact when it isn’t a fact is really not cricket in my opinion.
If we want to have a serious chance of pushing for the top 6 we need at least two players per position of decent quality.
Goalkeeper:
GK: Norris/Van Sas/Moore
Def:
RB - Grimmer/Back/Huggins
LCB - Hagelskjaer/Allen
RCB - Taylor/Casey
LB - Harvie/Allen
+Skura as auxiliary cover
Mid:
CM - Leahy/Westegaard
CM - Henderson/Boyd-Munce
AM - Mullins/Lowry
+Scowen (inj) +Abbot (inj)
Att:
RW: Fred/Quitirna/Mcneilly
CF: Woodrow/Fink/Mcneilly
LW: Bell/Mcneilly/Tilley
Based on that squad depth I think the big risk is in attack. Two starters are on loan. The back up options are either young, unproven, haven’t had many minutes or rarely make the match day squad.
In defence I think Huggins probably leaves but Skura stays to provide cover, or we loan him out and sign someone experienced to cover for on a 6 mth deal. There’s a slight risk lack of cover if Harvie gets injured but we can probably reshuffle with Allen moving to LB.
Midfield I think stays as is. If a serious upgrade were available you might bring someone in. But if Scowen & Abbot are fit in the Spring we’ve ample depth there.
From Matt Bloomfield point of view - I would 100% agree with you. It’s more evidence - should we need it - that he was being marginalised from the transfer purchasing process and not being privy to the data DR was using to base transfer decisions.
But if fans are using it as evidence that DR doesn’t know what he is doing, without knowing what data he was using to base that decision on, that position is pretty weak and you’re just parroting a reason to hate him without knowing the real truth/detail.
And there’s no real reason for anyone outside of the select view to know the actual data the transfer team uses. That would be privileged and sensitive information. Info MB should have had access to, it’s it’s clear the relationship between those two had broken down - so I’m not surprised he was being separated from.
a shame to be relitigating Aaron Morley for the 412th time when Ewan Henderson is sat in our midfield playing the sort of line splitting passes we missed in the second half of last season