Yes. That is the point that I was trying to make.

By getting rid of Ward and keeping Wan Bissaka as our number 1 reserve you are introducing a real risk. The only way to deal with that risk is to spend £20 million plus to get proven Premiership quality. By keeping Ward and Wan BIssaka you have an experienced Premiership defender and some potential. Less risky and it allows you to buy someone else, a cheaper option from the continent with potential and let him bed in. If it works out then you can sell Ward, if not you are still in the same place. If Wan BIssaka develops you can make the £20 to £30 million Matteo was talking about and still have 2 options.

The key to moving forward has to be to keep our £60k a week players, mix in some home grown talent, reserve the £100k plus for proven quality and take a chance on some cheap gems. Getting rid of Wardis not the way.

Absolutely class player we have in WB.

You can get better right backs than Ward for very little money, no need to spend 10 million. Just browse the first pages of this thread. And if there will be someone brought in, absolutely no need to keep 3 players for 1 position.

Edited by mattteo (05 Mar 2018 10.31pm)

Either I am not making my point very well, or you are missing my point, or both.

There are two choices in my mind, first we sign Ward on an extension and then look to build a succession plan involving W-B and another (hope) signing that might take us forward OR we don’t sign Ward on a contract extension and sign a proven Premiership quality replacement that will take us forward, with W-B.

Your view, I think, is that we can get rid of Ward for nothing and then sign a cheap replacement as back up to W-B.

I understand your third option, but I don’t agree that it is the way to go. I think it is not dissimilar to the approach we have tried elsewhere (for example Pape Souare, with Zeki Fryers as back up) and it left us hopelessly exposed.

As for your view that we don’t need 3 players for each position - I think that is exactly what we need. But we also need to expose our third choice to the chance to come through.

Yet, none of the Football ‘experts’ we have on here, that throw players names around like confetti, have ever mentioned him as being a contender? What’s his rating on FM or FIFA?

Edited by Helmet46 (07 Mar 2018 8.04am)

Why not keep ward for a season whilst both WB and another replacement bed in.

Why get rid of Ward, until we have two RB proven over time to be better than him. Anyway will let you two go round in circles...