BRING ON THE UNKNOWNS

It was going to say that it is interesting to read what is written about who might join the club in the close season. Actually “amusing" would be a better word. Surely we observers of the scene have realised that practically all the players we sign, whether on loan or permanently are never the subject of media speculation. Of course we are “linked" with players, but usually there are several other clubs mentioned and apart from Billy Sharp whom you might say had already “bonded" and one other recent exception (Killgallon) we never sign the man in question. These are the lessons of history.

For the typical successful Rovers signing, 3 conditions are usually present:
1. The media are unaware.
2. No other club has apparently expressed an interest.
3. The majority of fans will never have heard of him.

For example (Billy apart) no one knew that our most high-flying loanee, JET, was coming. Who had heard of Shackell, of Ward, of Friend, of Mutch, of Gillett, of Stock, of Chambers, of Shields, of Keegan or of Dumbaya?

I contrast this with past times. I know it is going a very long way back, but after getting relegated from the equivalent of the championship in the fifties we bought numerous moderately famous players, most of whom performed as though they were paid to concede goals rather than score them. We even had one particularly notable manager, Jack Crayston whose previous post was at Arsenal; he had to be good we thought, but he presided over the slide from Division 3 to Division 4. The arrival of all these people was preceded with much speculation and we paid over the odds for all of them. Almost without exception they proved to be on the decline and were for the most part, failures. A familiar pattern was repeated more often than not in that pre Conference era. And even then it was the ones who you had never heard of who were the most successful.

We sit outside the current 22 in the “Rich List" in the Championship. In fact unless Peterborough rejoin from the Play-offs we will be the sole inhabitant of an “Unclassified" section, lodged in the space between 23rd place and League 1. So we really ought not to try to join in the cash contest for players.

Therefore established names should be totally excluded from the reckoning. Translated into DRFC economics it means that we should not rely on experienced (= older) players. History, ancient and modern, shows that like old cars, they may be cheap to acquire, free usually, but not cheap to run. Yes, they can bring “good attitudes" to the team environment, and that value is obviously unseen by us, but looking at the most recent crop, with the possibly exception of Thomas, they have brought little to the performances on the pitch. As individuals you can appreciate in hearing them talk what SOD would see in the likes Taylor, Fortune and Elliott, but all of them have spent significant time injured and not one of them has really been up the standard required. Only Sullivan could be regarded as a success.

What SOD and ROK do best is develop players and for an outfield player, once past 30, this is almost impossible. If on the other hand they are young, and unknown, they have the added advantage of not expecting massive financial rewards, so will be keen to work hard recognising the opportunity they have been given to develop.

So let's get used to the fact that we will never know who we are chasing in the transfer window. We have to steel ourselves to the reality that we will never have heard of anyone who will sign this summer. I would almost go as far as to say that if anyone comes whose name is familiar I might get a little worried.