Wasted windows blighting Bowyer’s ambition to plan for Prem push
LEE WOULD LOVE TO HAVE BACKING HIS PREDECESSOR WAS AFFORDED
INEVITABLY, when runs such as the one Blues are suffering occur in a season, particularly so early in the campaign, attention turns to what happened in the summer.
Were the new recruits who arrived in the transfer window the right ones? Are they good enough? Do they fit the system? All perfectly logical and understandable questions.
The side who lost to Nottingham Forest, their fourth reverse in five games, featured three Craig Gardner/ Lee Bowyer signings.
That’s three of the eight signings the former team-mates made, all without paying a free. Four others appeared on the bench with only one – Juan Castillo – not featuring at all.
At this stage it might be instructive to revisit the starting XI, paying particular attention to the managers/ head coaches who brought them to St Andrew’s...
Matija Sarkic (Bowyer)
Marc Roberts (Harry Redknapp) Harlee Dean (Redknapp)
Kristian Pedersen (Garry Monk) Maxime Colin (Redknapp)
Ryan Woods (Bowyer)
Ivan Sunjic (Pep Clotet)
Jeremie Bela (Clotet)
Tahith Chong (Bowyer)
Scott Hogan (Clotet)
Lukas Jutkiewicz (Gary Rowett) Notice anything? Let’s look at the bench...
Connal Trueman (Home grown) George Friend (Aitor Karanka) Dion Sanderson (Bowyer)
Riley McGree (Karanka)
Jordan Graham (Bowyer)
Chuks Aneke (Bowyer)
Troy Deeney (Bowyer)
A new name appears, that belonging to Bowyer’s predecessor, Aitor Karanka.
One final exercise before we get into the meat of the article, let’s compare how many goes at improving the team / squad the respective head coaches had...
Bowyer, eight new players in one window
Karanka, 14 new players in two windows
Clotet, nine new senior players in two windows
Monk, six new players in two windows (Blues’ activity was limited by an EFL business plan)
Steve Cotterill, zero new players in one window
Redknapp, 13 new players in one window
Gianfranco Zola, six new players in one window
Here are a few points worth considering.
Hogan was brought to Blues first during Clotet’s tenure, on loan from across the city.
Karanka turned that loan into a permanent, so it’s a moot point whose player he actually was. The one constant between the two deals is deposed CEO Xuandong Ren.
Indeed, Ren’s fingerprints are all over many of Clotet’s transfers. The Spaniard repeatedly pointed out he only coached the players given him by the board, ie Ren.
For a couple of years Ren indulged in his experiment with lower-league Spanish players, both working over Clotet and with Karanka.
Other than Redknapp’s summer of
2017, when Blues paid in excess of £10 million for three Brentford players alone, it’s difficult to know which of his successors spent what on fees and wages.
Monk paid one fee, for Pedersen and that landed the club in hot water.
Ren spent money for Clotet, not least on Sunjic but also on Alvaro Gimenez, Gary Gardner and Dan Crowley.
Karanka/Ren forked out on transfers for Jonathan Leko, Hogan, Neil Etheridge and Sam Cosgrove – by recent standards, and in comparison to Bowyer and Gardner, he was handed something of a war-chest.
And yet, not one of his players started for Blues against Forest. Ivan Sanchez and Etheridge might have, had they not been respectively injured or ill – but of the 14 who came in the hectic, shortened summer of 2020, very few are making significant contributions to the squad.
So, where are Karanka’s signings now?
Friend – a sub against Forest and a valuable senior member of Bowyer’s squad.
Jon Toral – released after one season, now at OFI in the Greek Super League.
Sanchez – injured, will return soon to battle for a place in the match-day squad.
Leko – on loan at Charlton.
Andres Prieto – moved on after just one season of a three-year deal, now at Dinamo Tbilisi.
Adam Clayton – registered with Blues but not training with the firstteam squad.
Etheridge – yet to play in the Championship this season after being struck down by Covid-19.
Mikel San Jose – lasted just one year of a two-year contract, now back in Spain with SD Amorebieta.
Alen Halilovic – left at the end of his short-term contract and now at Reading.
Cosgrove – a big-money signing, now out on loan with League One Shrewsbury Town.
McGree – brought back on loan but a fringe player and is set to leave in January.
Jake Clarke-Salter – still a Chelsea player but on loan at Coventry.
Rekeem Harper – sold by West Brom to League One strugglers Ipswich.
Yan Valery – returned to Southampton and has made two Carabao Cup appearances.
It’s difficult to conclude that Karanka’s two chances at bringing in players were anything other than expensive, wasted windows.
Friend has been a positive influence, Etheridge is a very good Championship goalkeeper and Sanchez will hopefully recover from surgery to play a prominent role for the rest of the campaign.
There is a hope that the investment in Cosgrove and Leko will eventually pay dividends as they seek to kickstart their careers in League One.
But, as things stand, three from 14 is a lamentable success rate and the resource that was tied up in these deals hasn’t yet worked its way through the club’s books.
As a result, in his first few months as technical director Gardner had to engineer his own budget, pick up shrewd frees and add quality through the loan market.
Perhaps the first 15 games under Bowyer raised expectations to levels that are unreachable given the tools with which the football department was given to do the job.
However, one thing is becoming clear; that to turn expectation into a reality, the resources given Karanka would be greatly appreciated by his successor. And that’s on the owners.