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Going down.....
at 12:02 16 Sep 2018

The big thing I’d say in Hurst’s defence when it comes to signings is that we needed to bring in numbers everywhere but central midfield (where we have a lot of players for 2-3 positions). But with Evans’ spending record over the last five years, he was never going to get all the Webster/Waghorn et al money to spend. He needed to replace McGoldrick, Smith and even Berra, as well as bring in wingers for his system, even before he had to decide whether he rated our existing players. Given the money that appears to have been at his disposal, the question is does he try and bring younger players from a lower division, or spend more on one or two players with Championship experience and fish out of the free transfer bin for the rest.

McCarthy did the latter (apart from the being able to spend anything more than nominal amounts), and picked up some really good signings (Chambers, Skuse, McGoldrick, Murphy for example), some that didn’t stay long but made important contributions (Chaplow, Vardy) and lots of players that weren’t worth the wage like Leon Best. But McCarthy knows this division well, and doesn’t get to see much of the lower divisions, with Hurst its vice versa, so both took the best approach for their knowledge. But the handcuffs of our budget are really exposing Hurst and some of his signings.

My biggest issue with Hurst’s signings is that they’ve all dropped into non league at some point during their career, and since bouncing back, haven’t established themselves at the level they were playing at, let alone this one. There isn’t a big jump in class between League One and Two, or even the bottom of the Championship and League One, but there’s an enormous leap between the top and bottom of the Championship, and (Villa and amuch changed Derby apart) we haven’t played the top sides yet.

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