Not good enough
Plus: The impact of player power
Hello everyone - a disappointing deadline day in the end, but at least the Chris Wood replacement did arrive. First up is me on the window as a whole, then we have the thoughts of Mike Landers on how the transfer market is currently changing.
Not good enough
Jamie Smith
At the end of the summer window, I suggested Burnley’s business was a B grade. I would arguably revise that down to a C with only Maxwel Cornet making an impact of the arrivals so far, but there is no doubt at all the January window did not go to plan.
Burnley were blindsided by Newcastle United triggering Chris Wood’s release clause, which left chairman Alan Pace on the back foot. On the face of it, £25 million for a striker who had lost form and potentially his mojo was good business, but it left Sean Dyche with minimal attacking options for what was a creditable 0-0 draw at Arsenal.
On deadline day, Wout Weghorst’s arrival was confirmed, with reports suggesting Burnley have paid around £12 million for the Netherlands international. Weghorst has an outstanding record in the Bundesliga - only Robert Lewandowski has outscored him in recent seasons - leading to some suggestions he is an “upgrade” on Wood.
Only time will tell if that is true or not, but Weghorst should not find the physicality of the Premier League to be a problem - as he is huge - and he appears to have more to his game than being a lump. You could even say he has a good touch for a big man.
There are a couple of concerns with Weghorst - he was apparently being bombed out at Wolfsburg over his anti-jab views, while his form this term has not been much better than Wood’s - but he is certainly a boost going into Saturday’s key game.
It is possible to be happy with Weghorst coming in but feel let down overall. At the start of the month, most BFC fans probably wanted a new central midfielder as a matter of priority, while a fresh forward and an extra winger would also have been welcomed, adding some much-needed pace, vim and creativity to an ageing squad.
Efforts to convince Mislav Orsic to leave Dinamo ultimately failed and players like Angelo Fulgini who were linked to Turf Moor earlier in the window did not move anywhere in the end, with the midfielder seeing a switch to Gladbach fall through.
Aaron Ramsey seemingly opted for a title race and European football at Rangers over being an odd fit in a Sean Dyche 4-4-2, which our fans think is weird for some reason.
Let’s be blunt: Burnley are bottom of the table and made £13 million profit in January.
Is that not extremely, extremely unusual? How would other clubs react to this?
I’m not saying Pace/Dyche should have gone on a trolley dash, signing any random player going before the deadline, but could we really not find anyone a bit better than Dale Stephens? Or Aaron Lennon? Or Jay Rodriguez? That seems unlikely to me.
All three of those lads are still on the fringe of the team, probably one or two bans/injuries/untimely COVID cases away from starting games in the Premier League.
There is no doubting Cornet is one of the best signings the club has ever made, but Burnley have had three full windows since the Pace takeover, with minimal net spend.
I can only imagine the response if we had spent next to nothing over the past three windows with the former owners still in charge.
Not good enough.
The impact of player power
Mike Landers
Sometimes, when you are looking for the cause of something, it is better to look at what isn’t there than what is. It is easy to say that the Clarets have had a disappointing transfer window – and I wouldn’t disagree – but how did the club’s efforts fit in to the overall context of the transfer market?
It is undeniable that the system behind player transfers is changing. Previously, players would be shipped in or out by clubs at will. A midfielder who wasn’t in the managers plans effortlessly moved to another club. A striker coming to the end of his contract joins someone else as either a spell in the shop window or the selling club recouping funding for replacements.
For many transfers this January, this simply didn’t happen. High-profile players generally didn’t move. Burnley reportedly made strong attempts to get Ross Barkley, who will instead kick his heels for another six months on the Chelsea bench.
Despite apparently doubling his wages and offering a more than acceptable fee to Dinamo Zagreb, Burnley didn’t get Mislav Orsic.
This was part of a larger pattern. Manchester United decided it was better to keep Jesse Lingard and turn down £20 million rather than let him go to Newcastle.
Most high profile of all, Ousmane Dembele is still at Barcelona. Liverpool couldn’t get a deal done in time with Championship side Fulham for Fabio Carvalho.
So, why is that? What is changing?
Player power is becoming more of a factor. There has been a fascinating trend over the last few years of players becoming bigger than clubs. The contracts that a club used to tie a player down are now being turned against them.
Barcelona did everything they could to be shot of Ousmane Dembele, but he is still there, picking up his vast wage. Aaron Ramsey clearly has his eye on getting fit for a potential World Cup campaign with Wales. He’s not going to take a 60-90% pay cut from his Juventus wage to join a Premier League struggle when the low-risk opportunity was to take it easy in Scotland for six months. But the key thing was that it was his decision to go to Rangers and not the Italian giants making up his mind.
Secondly, you only have to look at the finances of clubs of that size to see that the gravy train at the top is being hit by the pandemic. Nowhere is this more obvious that at Arsenal, who were more than happy to dump Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang on Barcelona and leave him to it.
You would expect a club of the Gunners self-perceived stature to at least try to hang on to their (former) captain, but they simply looked at the £25 million they were due to pay him for the next 18 months and shrugged as he snuck out of the door.
Further north, at Goodison Park, Everton’s efforts to keep within Financial Fair Play rules meant that the transfer of Dele Alli had to be structured in an incredibly complex way for them to bring him in and, completely coincidentally I’m sure, get his wage off Spurs’ books.
Finally, I don’t think that we can discount the idea that COVID has changed player attitudes. Just as for most of us, we have got used to a new way of living and working, it is not outrageous to assume that the same goes for a professional footballer.
The Premier League is still an attractive place to come and play, but is England the place to be right now? I’m not going to get too far into the politics, but it is obvious that to people abroad, this country appears pretty dysfunctional right now.
People who are looking to uproot their families are going to be looking at more than just the wages on offer. Speaking as someone who has moved countries for work, it is not just about the money, it’s about the society that you are about to temporarily move yourself and your loved ones into.
Transfers don’t exist in a vacuum, they reflect the trends of not just football, but society as a whole. It would be an interesting exercise to compare with previous windows how many players joined from abroad, left England for abroad and moved between English clubs.
Quiz question
The return of the quiz here - listen to the Watford preview show for the answer:
Chris Wood had a bit of a reputation for being offside, but how many times was he flagged offside in Premier League games, during his time at Burnley?
(Clue: he made 144 Premier League appearances with us.)
Birthdays and anniversaries
Slim pickings for birthdays this week. Richard Chaplow will be 37 on Wednesday.
Our last game #OnThisDay was a 3-3 thriller at QPR back in 2014 with Sam Vokes on target with a double that helped to keep the Clarets right in the promotion picture.
Tweet of the week
Letters
Mark wrote in after the Arsenal game (how long ago does that feel already?):
Was a great point Sunday, we played well and everyone put a shift in, still don't understand why he continues to play Brownhill, he got booked yet again and is suspended for the Watford game. Not a big loss really as I don't like or rate him.
Investment in new players is needed but just hope he doesn't sign the has-beens who have been mentioned the likes of Carroll and Benteke. Were-they-ever-beens springs to mind!!
It’s worth remembering that Burnley did actually play very well against Arsenal. For all the arguing about transfers and how brilliant Pace is or isn’t, if we can repeat those performances in the crunch clashes to come, starting Saturday, hope is not yet lost.
That’s it for this week. What did you make of our deadline day activity? Let me know.