“ Two Cardiff players to leave / one sold & one on loan “

There all for sale or taken for feck all aslong as the wage bull and cost cutting carries on. Let's be honest we've been told this is going on despite the let's spend 20 million posters living on planet Mars. I expect others contracts mentioned will be run down and leave for nothing come next June as we have let others run out who can do a job end of last month so it will carry on I'm my opinion. If we have to go with 11 players pushed through the younger system so be it as there's reason's behind it. I for one won't be on here crying about it as I'd expect to struggle in this league with a side like that and that's where we are going at this rate even with the squad we have now I mid table finish is a bonus to me. It does not make me any less of a supporter as I've seen shitter times in leagues below tbh. The club currently would let the cleaning lady go if it saved 50p an hour on a cheaper replacement even if dalman said she was the world's best cleaner a week before

There all for sale or taken for feck all aslong as the wage bull and cost cutting carries on. Let's be honest we've been told this is going on despite the let's spend 20 million posters living on planet Mars. I expect others contracts mentioned will be run down and leave for nothing come next June as we have let others run out who can do a job end of last month so it will carry on I'm my opinion. If we have to go with 11 players pushed through the younger system so be it as there's reason's behind it. I for one won't be on here crying about it as I'd expect to struggle in this league with a side like that and that's where we are going at this rate even with the squad we have now I mid table finish is a bonus to me. It does not make me any less of a supporter as I've seen shitter times in leagues below tbh. The club currently would let the cleaning lady go if it saved 50p an hour on a cheaper replacement even if dalman said she was the world's best cleaner a week before

That's how I see it all.

Only saving grace is we have is a manager that will make us survive this season and perhaps next season in the hope these youngsters will develop for a push to the Premier in the next 5 years. Personally I feel any of the youngsters that prove themselves will be sold off unless the squad shows potential to go up.

Like the poster above I won't cry over it. I'll continue supporting the team regardless although this bending of the knee is a test of my loyaly.

Don’t rate Brown myself. Don’t think he’s the defender McCarthy made him out to be when playing in Scotland.

Can we sell brown and keep Bennett??

Depending on the fee it would be good business in my opinion. Brown could have left for nothing this summer,. but the club invoked renewal clause in his contract, the result is that if he leaves we get a fee, so well done the club. Maybe McGuinness was signed for that reason , just in case one of the CB departed? We already have, Morrison, Nelson, Flint and Pack who can play there. The danger is he does cover left back too.

He wouldn't be on big wages as he was signed from Wealdstone 3 years ago, so is probably on very low wages and it wouldn't be a huge amount off the wage bill.

Tell him we’ll give him Brown on a free if he takes Flint back for £4m, Murphy for £11m, Bacuna for £4m, Pack for £2m,Vassell for £3m, Tomlin for £3m, Whyte for £2m Vaulks for £2m, and Smithies £4m that’s £35m he wasted! Not forgetting Madine £6m, Glatzel £5.5m, Reid£10m, Cunningham £4m, probably forgot a few but that’s a total of £60.5m wasted!

[quote="castleblue"]Given that contracts will run out next June for Smithies, Morrison, Flint, Vaulks, Ralls, Pack, Tomlin, Murphy and Vassell I was surprised that MM thought letting Brown go for free would be an issue.

How much have the club paid for that lot? probably not far off £30m. I hope MM has a plan for replacing them that goes beyond promoting players from the U23's.


Does offering Brown a new contract translate to both Morrison and Flint being available NOW before they leave for nothing

Yes but most if not all of those names won't want to leave Cardiff at the end of their contracts. None of them are premier league quality so the best they could do is the championship and we pay as well if not better than most teams in the championship. In addition a lot of them will be settled in the area kids at local schools etc and won't want to uproot themselves unless it's for a lot more money. Smithes and Morrison may attract some interest but in Smithies case we have a great alternative and Morrison is knocking on a bit.

One of the advantages of having an ordinary team is people are not queuing up to pinch your players. I would be worried if Keiffer More was out of contact at the end of the season but not really too worried about that list of players

Id hazard a guess anyone could leave for a nominal fee just to reduce the wage bill.

The reset button has well and truly been pushed at Cardiff City.
Hope VT, Dalman and Choo realise the implications of this.

For success to happen there needs to be a feel good factor around the players, staff and most importantly the supporters.

Any feel good factor around the club is quickly diminishing.

When was the last time we were relegated from the championship?

Its not just happening at Cardiff. This is happening at the majority of clubs outside of the prem.

Personally I think it's a shame that its taken a pandemic to force the club to sort out our wage structure and to switch to a drive towards promoting youth.

yep...we could have promoted all those youngsters that have left who are now playing welsh league and played there as a team instead of them playing as individuals.... huge saving in travelling too... win win...

maybe your too young to remember all those relegations but they didnt happen because we were buying decent players ..they happened because we had little money and were buying gambles and promoting kids not good enough....

Any need for the sarcasm?

The youth setup has been neglected for years. If there was more emphasis on it maybe we would have picked up more players like ralls, bagan and sang etc. Not world beaters but add a lot of value to the squad for a fraction of the cost. We are in the financial position we are in because we have a habit of paying over the odds for average players who are on big wages. A club will be more appealing to a released/scouted academy player if there is clear history of youth being given opportunity for first team football.

it wasnt sarcasm ..its where most of our academy players have ended up.... neglected ? seems to mean not thrown in some sort of x factor audition when deemed not good enough... not just not good enough by those experienced professionals in positions to make these decisions at out club but not snapped up by decision makers at other clubs when released...as for the habit of over paying... its kept us as a top end championship club for years not that it is over paying.... thats just opinion.... its always we have overpaid until its time to sell then its the fee was too small and its not unique to us , ALL fans say it...

You've completely missed the point I was making. I am fully aware of the players that have come through our academy and where they have ended up. And I am not saying they would have gone on to do better if they were played. But there has hardly been a drive to bring in and develop younger players in recent years. We had one of the oldest squads in the league last season. And we have pissed away millions. If we havnt then why do we owe tan so much money, despite two promotions? We received 30odd million last season which is more than most teams do in several seasons. Yet we are no better off than them.

i havent missed the point at all... other clubs have also had parachute payments and have run through the cash ..thats championship football for you , its not purely a Cardiff City thing.. and the clubs that get promoted ? generally tend to be amongst those spending and wasting { the 2 go hand in hand } the most money... being competitive or trying to be in this division is a money pit, Stoke, Boro , Weds , Derby along with others who have spent far more than ourselves can atest to that..
as for this drive.... wanting young footballers to be better than what they are doesnt work , they do actually have to be good enough . its the same at every level ..been plenty said about our academy but is it the academy failing or just the better boys in the area dont meet championship level ? i think history suggests the later ... because quite simply if we were producing a stream of talent or had ever , i would imagine our national teams history would be far better than what it is...
we have like other clubs had patches where we produce a number in a relatively short space of time and then dont... i have no idea why... what i do know though is that if it were as simple as having a youth drive everyone would be doing it.. and clubs historically would have been made up of mostly locals... and infact we with our very big catchment area should never have ended up in the lower leagues ,let alone spend all that time down there as we would have had enough local talent to prevent that ...i know we didnt have an academy as such but did have youth teams, reserves and scouts but couldnt muster half a dozen quality boys even at that level to drag us up a lge or 2....now all of a sudden we have 8 in one go ..
i too wish we had this talent tree we could pick players off and have a team of locals { like NH said } representing us... but thats never happened and is unlikely to...

It sounds like you have as you're implying and focusing on things I havnt said. I havnt mentioned local players. Its hard enough getting any youngsters through without limiting yourself to just the local area. If the local talent isn't there, we should continue to bring in players like we have with bagan and sang. Players will be more likely to sign if they can see youth is given an opportunity. Experience comes with increased transfers and wages. Without promotion or player sales it is not sustainable. You either end up in a bad situation with the owner or with ffp. If what we have seen in recent years is the best we could have hoped for from our academy, then it has definitely failed.

If you want to compare us to clubs in worse positions than us, then yes we have been better run than Derby and Wednesday. But I look at teams who have recently been in league 1 whilst we've been in cup finals and the prem twice, who are now in a better position than us which shows how poorly we've spent. Weve had more success in the last 10 years than the majority of the teams in the championship and we did not capitalise on it. Theres a difference between spending money and investing money. And we have definitely pissed away a lot of it.

If Warnock comes in for one of his ex players - then you can be pretty confident - he believes he is more than good enough for the championship. Whereas we dont seem to be able to tell sh1t from sugar as far as players go.

Time will tell - but I would happily bet Boro will finish above us this season - I hope Im totally wrong there obviously.

If Warnock comes in for one of his ex players - then you can be pretty confident - he believes he is more than good enough for the championship. Whereas we dont seem to be able to tell sh1t from sugar as far as players go.

Time will tell - but I would happily bet Boro will finish above us this season - I hope Im totally wrong there obviously.

All opinions mate but I personally don’t think Brown is good enough for championship and I think we’ll be above Boro

If Warnock comes in for one of his ex players - then you can be pretty confident - he believes he is more than good enough for the championship. Whereas we dont seem to be able to tell sh1t from sugar as far as players go.

Time will tell - but I would happily bet Boro will finish above us this season - I hope Im totally wrong there obviously.

Maybe in the past I would have trusted Warnocks judgement but in his last season with us it seemed to go to pot. We payed a comparative lot of money for some ropey players not least the seemingly permanent crock Vassel. Think Neil Warncok is a manager who has possibly reached his sell by date and I would not really trust him to much when it comes to signing players. To me Brown in an adequate squad player and no more than that and if we can get some halfway decent money from Middlesborough for him let's take it.

The bookies think we will finish well ahead of Middlesborough and I suspect they are right.