[Slick_Footwork]

And where do clubs end up after wisely reinvesting? Southampton, mid-table. Leicester, mid-table. Swansea, just escaped relegation.

By all means, do it if you can. But let's not pretend that it's a route to anything significantly better than our current position in the league. The much-vaunted "next level" is, quite simply, unattainable.

Outside of the top 6 it's pretty much a closed shop, barring a miracle.

But my worry is that eventually, failing to invest in line with the competition will in fact result in relegation. This will happen over the period of a few years, because our squad will be deteriorating.

If you stand still, you're moving backwards in this league. If i thought we would make mid table again, with this squad, I'd be happy.

We've been in need of a drastic overhaul for a few years and keep putting it off and every year. As a result the list of requirements gets longer. So far we've lost Fletcher and Olsson, the latter probably should've been replaced 2 years ago; both need to be replaced. We have a 37 year old centre half, who I love, but needs to be replaced eventually. We don't have a recognised left back at the club. And on top of that, we have numerous players past their prime who were nothing more than 'middle of the road' in it.

I worry that the TV money, however vast, isn't enough to compete with our rivals when they are selling top stars for big money and reinvesting. The likes of Everton will be able to buy 5-6 proven players with the Lukaku cash. I can see Leicester doing the same with the Mahrez cash. Swansea probably, if Sigurdsson goes.

At present, I'm worried about the season ahead because we look weaker than last season, where we finished poorly. Very few of these players are getting any better and every time we're linked with someone good anyone seems to be able to gazump us.

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Interesting insight Slick and I don't doubt it for a second - but I love where I work, wouldn't change it for the world. But if somewhere else came calling that were offering me more money I'd have to reconsider, despite my current work having given me my chance and my enjoyment of working there. Of course we'd all of loved another season of Romelu up the Albion, but it didn't happen and here we now are. Still in the Premier League competing with clubs that are paying £75m for one player. Punching above our weight despite our penny pinching which is impressive.

As far as nobody worth selling...

Evans? signed for about £6m (links from Leicester of £20m+ offer as they are desperate for defenders since Morgan and Huth are both not any younger)
Rondon? signed for £12m (links of a lucrative £30m offer from China)
Matty Phillips for £5.5m - would get more than that back if sold.

We've repeatedly broken our club record transfer fees season after season and also during a takeover of the club so I'm not going to criticize the board. From the early 2000's onwards through Thompson, Peace and now Lai we were and are the model of how to run a newly promoted club in the Premier League. Our journey to where we are now was fantastic and too often forgotten. Many involved in the game, especially Sean Dyche to my knowledge have stated they viewed us as an example.

Right now we don't have a Mahrez, a Stones, a Lallana et al that we lucked out on signing at a young age and then went on to sell at huge profit, but that's not to say it won't happen. We could have some very exciting prospects being lined up right now and the paper talk at the moment is just smoke and mirrors. We simply don't know... yet.

And if we were to obtain and then later sell a player of that calibre and couldn't hold onto them we'd be bemoaning letting one get away. Berahino could have been that player if it wasn't for the souring of his relationship with the club and fans.

The club just cannot win at the moment despite having what I'd say was a successful season last term and was only let down by the poor run at the end of it.

In other news. Hal Robson Kanu has signed a three year deal and most fans (judging by Twitter) are not impressed. Personally I thought he did alright despite barely getting any starts, and when he did start he never had a shocker imo. Came up with some important goals and useful to have around the place.

But clearly because his name isn't ChristianoNeymarMessiLukaku and hasn't cost £100m+ he's obviously shite!

Good post, and you're right, in the literal sense I was wrong when I said we had 'nobody worth selling'. There are a couple. However, they are vital players and probably wouldn't give us the big money needed to overhaul an ageing squad.

I guess what I'm getting at is, we fail to push the boat out for someone, when other clubs will. With Lukaku, £20m was a lot at the time but he was 21 and proven. He was only going to get better. Yes he would've left for more money, but we would've made a significant profit that we could build with. We'd possibly have less aging players to replace now.

And that's my worry... with the track record of our board, I don't see how we're going to fund all of the players we need this summer...

Your 1 point I disagree with, I do think our board are historically tight arses and have been lucky they've made good decisions off the field (with staff) to get us punching well above our weight. A lot of people here berate Pulis, but I think he's done a fine job with very limited resource in comparison to our competition. In terms of results, anyway.

But this summer, I do have a genuine worry that I haven't had since the 13-14 season - that our squad is dreadful. That year our summer dealings were a shocker too and we started dreadfully. I remember losing our first 2 home games to Southampton and Swansea and failing to score until match day 4. Luckily we signed Amalfitano, Sessengnon and Anichebe on deadline day in September and turned the corner (Incidentally, this was the year we could've got Lukaku).

I hope we don't leave it so late this time around...

HRK signing is okay, he seems happy to be a squad player and you need a few like that. Unfortunately fans are annoyed because of the lack of activity so far and he gets it in the neck. Rodriguez was a decent spend at £12m, but I think the fact he's started 12 games in 3 years worries people. It does me anyway. If we pushed the boat out for a Carvalho , I think we'd know the club were serious and be chuffed about HRK. But when we keep seeing us lose out to West Ham, Leicester and the like, it becomes frustrating.