Stokes - Season Long Loan to Cambridge

[Silvio Dante]

58 minutes ago, City Rocker said:

LM confirmed we have a recall clause in January. 

https://www.bristolpost.co.uk/sport/football/liam-manning-bristol-city-transfer-9500082.amp

Indeed. It’s well worth listening/watching the presser on this as it’s a very good and well reasoned answer for the loan as well (link in other thread)

[Lorenzos Only Goal]

If he gets regular game time I might go watch him.  Cambridge are not far from me and it's not a bad ground. 

[Boston Red]

Under Pearson.......

1. We didn't send players out on loan. "I would rather they develop with us."

2. We didn't take players on loan. "Why would we develop someone else's player?"

3. We made very few signings. "I am not collecting players."

As a result, squad players had the time and space to become first team regulars. Pring, Semenyo, Vyner, and O'Leary only broke through under Pearson. Also, there was then the space for youngsters to come through. Scott, Conway, and Bell came through under Pearson.

We have sold Semenyo, Scott, and Conway for 35 million and have given a lot of that money to Manning to spend. We now have a big squad again, are not playing youngsters again, are taking in loans again, and sending players out on loan again.

We will have to judge the loans of Earthy and Stokes at the end of the season, but it is definitely back to the previous approach under Lee Johnson.

Edited August 21 by Boston Red

[Dullmoan Tone]

20 minutes ago, Boston Red said:

As a result, squad players had the time and space to become first team regulars. Pring, Semenyo, Vyner, and O'Leary only broke through under Pearson. Also, there was then the space for youngsters to come through. Scott, Conway, and Bell came through under Pearson.

A fair assessment, however, the alternative view is that for every Scott, Conway and Bell there were 3 others given chances who are now nowhere to be seen. Also, and I know this sounds harsh, but with just a few injuries, our bench did not enable us to change games - this is a massive reason why, in my opinion, parachute payments (or idiot American owners in the PL!!) distort the division- it enables teams to have strength in depth.

I love the fact that the opposition are jealous of our bench - I felt the same at Leeds and Leicester last year- if we are serious, let’s develop youngsters under our academy umbrella elsewhere and have a full squad who are all able to add proven ability.

And stop mentioning Pearson as a benchmark- yes he brought stability but rarely hope and excitement!

[Davefevs]

2 minutes ago, Dullmoan Tone said:

A fair assessment, however, the alternative view is that for every Scott, Conway and Bell there were 3 others given chances who are now nowhere to be seen. Also, and I know this sounds harsh, but with just a few injuries, our bench did not enable us to change games - this is a massive reason why, in my opinion, parachute payments (or idiot American owners in the PL!!) distort the division- it enables teams to have strength in depth.

I love the fact that the opposition are jealous of our bench - I felt the same at Leeds and Leicester last year- if we are serious, let’s develop youngsters under our academy umbrella elsewhere and have a full squad who are all able to add proven ability.

And stop mentioning Pearson as a benchmark- yes he brought stability but rarely hope and excitement!

I think my problem with this is less about the players themselves, but the process itself and creating players / players with value.  One homegrown player can fund 3 or 4 windows, and if you can quicken that cycle, all the better.

Its something we have to evaluate in 18-24 months time, if not longer…both on the pitch and in the ledgers.  I’d love to hear the full club strategy explained re this summer.

+++++

I’m not finding it easy to get my head around the change in tack, but for me the signing of Twine made sense, the signing of Earthy I’m not convinced by - from a strategy point of view.  It does make me increase my level of expectation.  Can results / performances match, that we shall find out.

[Boston Red]

It is back to the Johnson/Holden approach and away from the Pearson approach, but this time, with the sheer quality of our new forward line, there is the suspicion that it might work!!!

[Solent Robin]

The club were handicapped by FFP during NP's time and we were close to points deduction as Gould alluded to. 1,2 and 3 was NP's attempt to put a brave face on things given the financial situation and latterly said he wasn't adverse to loans but it depended on the circumstances. This summer the purse strings were always going to be released a little bit I.e. nest egg due to the FFP cycle. The club were not going to extend NP's contract for various reasons which has been done to death. Even if we had a more experienced squad some of those players mentioned would have broken into the team as they were so talented. However it is far from the MA and LJ approach both financially and strategically. Far better targetted to what we actually need. Even the loan signing of Earthy makes sense to some degree. From the opening games the transfer kitty (£10K approx) appears to have been spent wisely in strengthening the areas which were needed. I believe the quality and depth now gives a fair chance of a push for the play offs but there are no guarantees. However with the attacking talent now available I am looking forward to a more exciting brand of football this season which will make a nice change! 

Just on another point regarding the pathway for young players, it was clearly evident that there were no U-21 players who were going to cut it hence their release. The next batch of talented U18's are unlikely to be ready for a season or two unless there is an Alex Scott amongst them. For those that are or become ready for mens football loans to L1 an 2 provides the exposure in readiness for the 1st team. This is a tried and tested strategy. Given that we are a selling club (like most) there will always be opportunities albeit not to the degree as during  the recent period of austerity. 

[mozo]

12 minutes ago, Solent Robin said:

The club were handicapped by FFP during NP's time and we were close to points deduction as Gould alluded to. 1,2 and 3 was NP's attempt to put a brave face on things given the financial situation and latterly said he wasn't adverse to loans but it depended on the circumstances. This summer the purse strings were always going to be released a little bit I.e. nest egg due to the FFP cycle. The club were not going to extend NP's contract for various reasons which has been done to death. Even if we had a more experienced squad some of those players mentioned would have broken into the team as they were so talented. However it is far from the MA and LJ approach both financially and strategically. Far better targetted to what we actually need. Even the loan signing of Earthy makes sense to some degree. From the opening games the transfer kitty (£10K approx) appears to have been spent wisely in strengthening the areas which were needed. I believe the quality and depth now gives a fair chance of a push for the play offs but there are no guarantees. However with the attacking talent now available I am looking forward to a more exciting brand of football this season which will make a nice change! 

Just on another point regarding the pathway for young players, it was clearly evident that there were no U-21 players who were going to cut it hence their release. The next batch of talented U18's are unlikely to be ready for a season or two unless there is an Alex Scott amongst them. For those that are or become ready for mens football loans to L1 an 2 provides the exposure in readiness for the 1st team. This is a tried and tested strategy. Given that we are a selling club (like most) there will always be opportunities albeit not to the degree as during  the recent period of austerity. 

Agree 1000%.

I like how we're spending our money.

Has Pecover gone back to the U18s now? I noticed he wasn't in the U21s this week. 

[Mr Popodopolous]

In theory, some of the Loans and succession planning can slot in relatively seamlessly looking a year and more ahead.

2025- Out of Contract

Bajic

Thomas

Naismith

Benarous

Sykes (Year Option for us)

Wells

This Year- Out on Loan

Knight-Lebel

At Crewe, Naismith out of contract 2024.

Murphy

Time will tell, Academy isn't he plus some injuries. Naismith and Benarous, the latter if fit and regaining some promise who knows.

Stokes

Out goes Earthy, in comes hopefully a full of confidence and newly developed Stokes.

Yeboah

He is a notch further down by dint of age. By coincide, Bell, Cornick Mehmeti all out of contract in 2026 and can play wider forward can't he.

S-P-H

Hopefully flying post Dundee and Newport, new strikers settle.

Decisions to make on Sykes and Benarous, how they do will significantly shape matters.

[SecretSam]

Seems a solid move, he's likely to get plenty of game time and no promotion pressure; good luck to the lad, all the best to Cambridge, too, a decent club.

How's Benarous coming on? I really hope it comes good for the lad, either with us or elsewhere, after all he's been through.

Edited August 22 by SecretSam
Benarous

[Dullmoan Tone]

13 hours ago, Davefevs said:

the signing of Earthy I’m not convinced by

I was very impressed- obviously can’t get too excited about 10 minutes but he slotted in seamlessly- demanding the ball and playing it forward- see winning goal.

I know West Ham have the pick of the talent but it’s something, say, Yeboah, Knight-Lebel, J James etc never did last season- this is why I’m excited by the change of strategy!

Your point about a Scott sale funding 3 windows is spot on but perhaps this time we go (literally) for broke and hope using developed (still cheaper) talent here and developing our talent elsewhere pays dividends

 

[Davefevs]

6 minutes ago, Dullmoan Tone said:

I was very impressed- obviously can’t get too excited about 10 minutes but he slotted in seamlessly- demanding the ball and playing it forward- see winning goal.

I know West Ham have the pick of the talent but it’s something, say, Yeboah, Knight-Lebel, J James etc never did last season- this is why I’m excited by the change of strategy!

Your point about a Scott sale funding 3 windows is spot on but perhaps this time we go (literally) for broke and hope using developed (still cheaper) talent here and developing our talent elsewhere pays dividends

 

I wasn’t referring to not being convinced by the players ability, but the reason for signing, ie signing both.

He looks a real talent.

[Lorenzos Only Goal]

14 hours ago, Davefevs said:

I think my problem with this is less about the players themselves, but the process itself and creating players / players with value.  One homegrown player can fund 3 or 4 windows, and if you can quicken that cycle, all the better.

Its something we have to evaluate in 18-24 months time, if not longer…both on the pitch and in the ledgers.  I’d love to hear the full club strategy explained re this summer.

+++++

I’m not finding it easy to get my head around the change in tack, but for me the signing of Twine made sense, the signing of Earthy I’m not convinced by - from a strategy point of view.  It does make me increase my level of expectation.  Can results / performances match, that we shall find out.

I've got an interesting view on this: 17-20, I think, are critical years, where you spend your time playing in that period can have a significant impact on the level you end up playing at, and although potential doesn't change, the time to realise that potential can take significantly longer (look at Wes Burns we loaned him out time and time again and he's slowly risen back to what we all thought was his original potential).  If you look at the "England Stars", they all had minutes in those crucial years at top clubs, building good habits under top coaches.  I'm all for getting minutes into players, but I would want those players at clubs where the managers play the correct type of football. I'd say no lower than a top-end League One side; I think League Two and Non-League loans can be very damaging for players as they are the wrong type of minutes for players that have come through academy systems. 

I like Stokes going to Cambridge and SPH going to Dundee, but I have reservations about Ephram going to Doncaster in L2. The type of football has a level of physicality that can hurt a player's development, and I like Kyle Robinson's style of football. I think that's a good match, but you have some very physical sides in that division that make it a horrible place to pick up bad habits, and teams often have to revert to less progressive football to cope with those types of sides.

My preference is that if a player is close to ready for the first team, then Championship minutes all day long will accelerate their development; I'd even go so far as to say loaning a decent player to a competitor is preferable to loaning them out to League One. I'd then look at top-end League One and Scottish Premier League sides.  Lower down the football ladder than that, I would be very careful weighing up if minutes with the under 21's is better than minutes in L2 or Non-League as not all minutes are good minutes; you can decondition a player in my view.  There are cases where lower-league teams benefit your players, but I'm sceptical about a whole season, maybe half a season non-League and the other half L2, for example.  

Edited August 22 by Lorenzos Only Goal

[Lorenzos Only Goal]

42 minutes ago, Davefevs said:

I wasn’t referring to not being convinced by the players ability, but the reason for signing, ie signing both.

He looks a real talent.

I think we have signed too many midfielders, which will block the development of some players in the pre-season mix.  

[Ron W]

15 hours ago, Boston Red said:

Under Pearson.......

1. We didn't send players out on loan. "I would rather they develop with us."

2. We didn't take players on loan. "Why would we develop someone else's player?"

3. We made very few signings. "I am not collecting players."

As a result, squad players had the time and space to become first team regulars. Pring, Semenyo, Vyner, and O'Leary only broke through under Pearson. Also, there was then the space for youngsters to come through. Scott, Conway, and Bell came through under Pearson.

We have sold Semenyo, Scott, and Conway for 35 million and have given a lot of that money to Manning to spend. We now have a big squad again, are not playing youngsters again, are taking in loans again, and sending players out on loan again.

We will have to judge the loans of Earthy and Stokes at the end of the season, but it is definitely back to the previous approach under Lee Johnson.

I don't think one approach is right and the other is wrong. Time will tell whether Stokes could've had an impact here but he will (hopefully) be playing regular minutes at a decent level, improve as a player and come back closer to being a Championship midfielder.

[Red Skin]

On 21/08/2024 at 21:08, Boston Red said:

2. We didn't take players on loan. "Why would we develop someone else's player?"

That wasn't the reason Pearson gave for not taking loans.  He said it was something more along the lines of the club's culture wasn't sufficiently developed to enable us to take them. 

[Mr Popodopolous]

3 minutes ago, Red Skin said:

That wasn't the reason Pearson gave for not taking loans.  He said it was something more along the lines of the club's culture wasn't sufficiently developed to enable us to take them. 

A combination of that, developing other players and finances IMO.

The latter, we really were somewhat stuck until such time as we made a decent sale- Semenyo.

Great myth that Loans from the PL, top end ie Parachute Championship or varied top division clubs are cheap tbh.

[Mr Popodopolous]

@Jimmyjimmy

You don't believe PL Loans can be rather problematic financially when we were hugely hamstrung financially for 18 months to 2 years?

Your prerogative of course but let's just blame Nige eh.  

Edited August 22 by Mr Popodopolous

[Sir Geoff]

7 hours ago, Red Skin said:

That wasn't the reason Pearson gave for not taking loans.  He said it was something more along the lines of the club's culture wasn't sufficiently developed to enable us to take them. 

First few windows he cited our culture was wrong  to bring players in on loan. Latterly he said "why should we develop other clubs players."

[Lanterne Rouge]

Came on a minute after half time, Cambridge currently 2-4 down at home to Blackpool (who have Richard Keogh in temporary charge)

[Lanterne Rouge]

Cambridge have got it back to 4-4 since he`s been on.

[bcfc01]

13 minutes ago, Lanterne Rouge said:

Came on a minute after half time, Cambridge currently 2-4 down at home to Blackpool (who have Richard Keogh in temporary charge)

4-4 now.

[Charlie BCFC]

Won the free kick for their second and heavily involved in the third. Looks like he’s made a good impact

[Redtrojan]

On Cambridge forum

”Stokes looks a real gem,what were Bristol thinking “

clearly they don’t realise how far down the pecking order he was here.

But really hope he pushes on and comes back a year older and better for the experience.I guess possibly could have saved a few quid on the Earthy loan and kept him though.I assume they saw him in training and thought not up to championship level yet.

[Phileas Fogg]

2 hours ago, Redtrojan said:

On Cambridge forum

”Stokes looks a real gem,what were Bristol thinking “

clearly they don’t realise how far down the pecking order he was here.

But really hope he pushes on and comes back a year older and better for the experience.I guess possibly could have saved a few quid on the Earthy loan and kept him though.I assume they saw him in training and thought not up to championship level yet.

Sometimes it’s worth a player getting regular games below their ‘true’ level - because regular games are so important. Semenyo at Newport is a great example of this. 

[Bar BS3]

23 minutes ago, Phileas Fogg said:

Sometimes it’s worth a player getting regular games below their ‘true’ level - because regular games are so important. Semenyo at Newport is a great example of this. 

Elliott Anderson was another good example.

Went straight back into playing premiership games for Newcastle after half a season at absolute dogshit level, in absolute dogshit surroundings..! 

[1960maaan]

They seem happy with him.

[The Masked Man]

Playing the gas next week at the minimal patch.

[Lorenzos Only Goal]

15 hours ago, 1960maaan said:

They seem happy with him.

 

Quote

Stokes looks like he's going to be the sort of player we've missed for ages, pleased to see Lavery to get off the mark as we could really do without his first goal for us becoming a monkey on his back, & delighted for Njoku to get his first goal. Not entirely convinced there'll be that many more from him but if he keeps getting minutes & keeps applying himself like that when he does, that could easily change.

Onward to Bristol, where I think we should definitely be thinking we can come away with 3 points. We need to start making in-roads to our away form which has been absolutely shocking for absolutely ages now.

The consensus on their fans forum is he looks good.  They think 3 points are theirs next week.

[GrahamC]

48 minutes ago, Lorenzos Only Goal said:

 

The consensus on their fans forum is he looks good.  They think 3 points are theirs next week.

Pretty brave assumption for a side that’s gained one point all season so far.

[italian dave]

4 minutes ago, GrahamC said:

Pretty brave assumption for a side that’s gained one point all season so far.

Playing the side that’s scored one goal all season so far!!

All the makings of a classic

[1960maaan]

2 hours ago, GrahamC said:

Pretty brave assumption for a side that’s gained one point all season so far.

They are only playing a side that has scored about once this millennium 

[Bar BS3]

3 hours ago, GrahamC said:

Pretty brave assumption for a side that’s gained one point all season so far.

Pretty safe assumption if you look at the rabble that they are playing against next week..!  

[GrahamC]

Just now, Bar BS3 said:

Pretty safe assumption if you look at the rabble that they are playing against next week..!  

Hope so, but that lot often fluke a result.

[Bar BS3]

1 minute ago, GrahamC said:

Hope so, but that lot often fluke a result.

Not very often...!

[HOZDA]

Starting for Cambridge today Vs Mansfield and got an assist. 

One loanee I'm keeping an eye on. Hopefully he does well!

[Rudolf Hucker]

17 minutes ago, HOZDA said:

Starting for Cambridge today Vs Mansfield and got an assist. 

One loanee I'm keeping an eye on. Hopefully he does well!

 

Edited September 14 by Rudolf Hucker

[1960maaan]

3 hours ago, HOZDA said:

Starting for Cambridge today Vs Mansfield and got an assist. 

One loanee I'm keeping an eye on. Hopefully he does well!

Got an assist today.
Knight Label played the 90 for Crewe in their win.
Palmer Houlden started for Dundee , got pulled on 46 , they lost 2-0 at Ross County.