Motherwell FC - A Thread For All Seasons

[madwullie]

Louis Moult must be fucking greetin though 

[Jim McLean's Ghost]

I think we have done some good business during this window. It is very early in the season but it looks like Bigi and Tanner are on the outside looking in and I'm not sure where the Lithuanian boy fits at all. But still early in the season and we look like we have great depth in midfield and a lot of versatile players. No players have stood out a duds so it is looking very positive.

 

Those Hartley highlights are superb. Ben Heneghan never attacked a cross like that in his life.

[capt_oats]

2 minutes ago, Jim McLean's Ghost said:

Those Hartley highlights are superb. Ben Heneghan never attacked a cross like that in his life.

There are more. Goal against Chelsea there...

 

Edited August 31, 2017 by capt_oats

[Jim McLean's Ghost]

Just now, madwullie said:

Louis Moult must be fucking greetin though 

There doesn't seem to have been a lot of interest and no one that put in a bid near our valuation. He is still in a great position if he continues to bang in goals to get a sweet pre-contract or even a move in January. I don't think we need to worry about Moult spitting the dummy.

[Swello]

From Moult's point of view, he would be justified in asking himself what more he could have done. He's got the kind of scoring record that most strikers would die for, he's clearly developed and improved as a player and he's been a model pro in every sense. I agree that he's unlikely to spit the dummy (any more than he has already) as it's in his interest to settle down and do what he does best to get himself a move....

[Casagolda]

If we've got anything like 400k for Ben Heneghan it's a cracking bit of business. I mean I liked the guy and he's started this season in fine form but I didn't ever see us making money out of him, especially with some of his performances towards the end of last season. 

As for replacing him I honestly just wanted an experienced, solid, no nonsense, no thrills type who would lead and organize the younger ones around him. Hopefully Hartley fits the bill, over 300 starts down South(predominately in League 1) and an excellent scoring record has me cautiously optimistic. Pretty sure we've signed strikers with worse goals to game ratios.  

As for Grimshaw, I quite liked him first time round and I'm relatively happy to see him re-sign. Fits the profile for the type of player Robinson likes, certainly has the physical attributes he seems to look for and and can cover a number of positions. 

A very good day all things considered, didn't lose Moult or Cadden and a couple of (hopefully)solid additions to the squad. Plus what, a million odd quid raked in for Marvin Johnson and Ben Heneghan? Delightful. 

 

Edited August 31, 2017 by Casagolda

[ropy]

Do you think we have really replaced Joe Chalmers though?

[eddiemunster]

Can I be the first to welcome Ben Henegan back when he returns on loan next year, after he's found out for being slightly better than average.

[ropy]

Someone will pay £1M for him next year so that we can get our sell on fee

[thisGRAEME]

1 hour ago, Gianfranco said:

I've decided we're winning the cup.

Nice. I decided we're ending Celtic's invincible record yesterday. 

[Ludo*1]

Tom Hateley IMO. (I don't care if they play different positions)

We've just released Tom Hateley. Still looking for that 'experienced' player?

[capt_oats]

So over the course of this window:

- Brought in 17 players across both 1st/u20s squads.
- Had 17 released/retired/returned to parent club. Including a player binned after ending up on the front page of The Sun taking a dunt of nitrous oxide with his bird.
- Transferred 3, including a reported £400k for a player we got for nothing a year ago (more than Thistle reportedly got for Lindsay who had another 2 years on his deal and £100k less than Dundee apparently got for Stewart with equally a year left on his contract).
- Dev loaned 5 players.
- Extended McHugh and Kipré's contracts.
- Brought in a shitload of cash, potentially £1m+ including a potential £750k from an initial investment of c.£30k on a player who's not even at the club.
- Heneghan's reported fee is more than we saw from; Randolph, Hutchinson, Nicky Law, Murphy, Reynolds, Higdon, McCormack and Sutton (twice) combined.
- Kept Moult and Cadden at the club (having rejected offers for both).
- Brought the average age of the first team squad down to 24.1. We now only have 1 first team player over 30, last season we had 7.

What a window lads, what a window. Fucking sensational work.

Edited September 1, 2017 by capt_oats

[G-MAN]

[emoji122][emoji122][emoji122][emoji122]

[Desp]

When you see it written down like that, it's superb stuff. Full credit to the management and the board for the work done this summer.

f**k, even the crowds at Fir Park are creeping up.

I'm hoping for the heady heights of 7th place this season.

[Swello]

If I was 'Flow, I'd retire now - as the impossible has happened. It looks like Motherwell supporters are all* happy. At the same time. Unprecedented.

 

 

 

*Unless Ya Bezzer, the 2017/18 Ray of Sunshine award front-runner, wants to prove me wrong

[thisGRAEME]

As the captain says; we've done fucking tremendous business in the window. Lessons have clearly been learned from last year as we ended up hung out to dry as Johnson went. This time Heneghan left last minute and we immediately had a body available to come in and fill the gap. 

Curious at Burrows saying we've tried to get Hartley twice before; presumably when he left Plymouth with McHugh and then Bristol? Wonder if McHugh has had a word in his ear and explained that we're actually quite sound.

Only disappointment (sort of) is that we didn't sell Moult. I mean, obviously delighted that he stayed from a playing perspective, but the opportunity to really cash in on him is gone now. That said, four months of him knocking his pan in and getting his next move is fine by me. 

[Swello]

I thought Moult was the one that we would have to sell this summer to keep the club moving along financially and to demonstrate that our business model is working - but with Heneghan and the Johnson doing that part, there isn't really any pressure to cash in on Moult at all now. Next summer, it could well be Cadden and Kipre that are being targeted (and by then, Moult is no longer our concern) - so we should let Moult run his contract down until next May and enjoy him being here as he will be bursting his arse to get a decent move next summer. There would be literally no sense in us selling him in January as by that point, his worth to the team will be higher than any fee we'd get...

[Desp]

Moult will have a lot more options to choose from in the summer too, so I think he'll be ok to stay another season. Another 15 goals and it'll be a great bit of business all round for player and club.

We're not getting the transfer fee many hoped/expected, but if he walks out of FP next summer with 50+ goals under his belt in three seasons, that's worth plenty.

[capt_oats]

One of the key issues with Moult as far as I can see from our POV is that the sell on % we have with Wrexham kind of screws us when combined with the arrangement we have with Boyle/Hutchison as far as using percentages of transfer income to service their loans. It doesn't really make selling him a viable proposition particularly when clubs in England don't seem keen to meet our valuation. The only concrete interest in him seemed to be from Aberdeen and it'd have been a waste of time accepting a £300k offer, in the end they probably got as good a deal as you could imagine for that sort of budget in signing Stevie May.

The situation with Moult isn't really going to change if he signs a new deal and being honest he's not obliged to get us a fee.

Having said all that I had been wondering whether we had maybe priced him out the market, it seemed odd that there seemed to be zero interest beyond Aberdeen. However if we did actually get £400k + sell on for Heneghan a player who, being kind, had a patchy career at Fir Park then in pitching Moult, our top scorer 2 season running, to the English market at £750k doesn't actually seem that unreasonable. For whatever reason clubs down there just don't seem sold on him. I'd imagine Cadden will be the one we'll be targeting as the next project and Kipré could end up as a possibility in that bracket as well. Upshot is we'll look at the 3 seasons and goals we got out of Moult as smashing business for £30k or whatever it was we paid for him.

Edited September 1, 2017 by capt_oats

[rambunctious]

We're not getting the transfer fee many hoped/expected, but if he walks out of FP next summer with 50+ goals under his belt in three seasons, that's worth plenty.

While I'm sure the board would have loved to have got an extra £500k for Moult this summer it's really not the end of the world. He's been more than worth what we paid for him (possibly worth more than the £500k we've speculated as a possible fee). Would our board have imagined we'd have got to much for Heneghan so soon and so much from Johnson's future fee clause so soon? I very much doubt it.

Looking back I think they will see this window as having gone perfectly. Louis would have been so much harder to replace than Ben (there is a good chance this Hartley may be a more accomplished centre back and might be an improvement in the short term).

With our new transfer strategy of signing youngish players for a small fee to develop and sell on there are really 3 outcomes:

1) Player does well and we sell him for cash and % of future transfer like Johnson.

2) Player does well but our valuation isn't met and he goes for nothing at the end of their contract (99% Moult).

3) Player does shite and we release them. (Thankfully can't really come up with an example!).

As long as the majority of these signings end up with either the first or second outcomes and with more 1s than 3s then we'll be fine. With our recent recruitment (Les era) we seem to be doing just that.