✍️ Welcome Evan Ferguson

[Ozza]

From what I can remember there wasn’t a lot of 9’s available in January and those that were, were overpriced

We haven’t really lost anything apart from the loan fee, I’d much rather we did this than spanking £40m on a bloke who is looking like the injuries are a problem.

I actually feel like the club have made the right prudent decision for once….opinions hey

[Sloop John B]

I actually feel like the club have made the right prudent decision for once….opinions hey

Agreed and they decide to try and sign him in the summer it will be based on his training ground performances, fitness and his character... In many ways if Potter sees a future for him at the club the worst thing he could do is play him...

[Southminster Hammer]

But my point is really, we needed a fit striker in January, we all knew that, we got one nowhere near. Who knows if a different striker would have been good or bad, but we will never know, our league position likewise.

[Ozza]

The point is, there wasn’t one available at a reasonable cost, Potter even said as much…. You cant force clubs to sell you their players at a reasonable price in January unfortunately

[Southminster Hammer]

The point is, there wasn’t one available at a reasonable cost, Potter even said as much…. You cant force clubs to sell you their players at a reasonable price in January unfortunately

Wasn't the Ajax player ready to join? Not sure how good he is myself.

[EastVillageHammer]

I take all of the above points, I just fail to see how having a guy to run around a bit and not do very much else for 20 mins every game adds anything to us either short or long term.

No doubt he’s talented etc, but I’d be surprised if he signs in the summer based on what I’ve seen, and so the question reverts back to, why are we helping to rehabilitate a young player for Brighton?

Anyway, not writing off the young man, hope he has a long and fruitful career, but it doesn’t seem like it will be with us.

[mushy]

I take all of the above points, I just fail to see how having a guy to run around a bit and not do very much else for 20 mins every game adds anything to us either short or long term.

No doubt he’s talented etc, but I’d be surprised if he signs in the summer based on what I’ve seen, and so the question reverts back to, why are we helping to rehabilitate a young player for Brighton?

Anyway, not writing off the young man, hope he has a long and fruitful career, but it doesn’t seem like it will be with us.

I think the plan when we signed him was rather different and it hasn't panned out the way we or the player wanted.
As for rehabilitation for Brighton, I've seen very little of that to be honest.

[Bubbles Fortuna]

I take all of the above points, I just fail to see how having a guy to run around a bit and not do very much else for 20 mins every game adds anything to us either short or long term.

No doubt he’s talented etc, but I’d be surprised if he signs in the summer based on what I’ve seen, and so the question reverts back to, why are we helping to rehabilitate a young player for Brighton?

Anyway, not writing off the young man, hope he has a long and fruitful career, but it doesn’t seem like it will be with us.

This is why we didn't take the obligation though right?

This was just as much us running the rule over him in training as anything else.

[DublinDave]

This is why we didn't take the obligation though right?

This was just as much us running the rule over him in training as anything else.

He's had a torrid time with injuries & I'm sure this is the plan.
We're taking things slowly & making sure he's 100% before risking him. (The same way Ireland are doing).
He has huge potential, as long as he stays fit.
If we had no interest in a permanent deal, we'd be playing him regularly with no thought to his long term health.
Not playing him & allowing him time to fully acclimatise may knock a few quid off in the summer.
Will also make Evan think that we've his best interests at heart.

[yakandyeti]

If Bowen had ended up out for longer, or if he was injured again before the end of the season and we'd been pulled into a relegation scrap without a striker we would be sitting here cursing that we didn't pay the loan fee. See him as insurance that we haven't needed. Hopefully he gets a couple of good run outs for Ireland and he's fit and he get's a few goals for us before the end of the season (unless we decide we want to buy him in which case I hope he's gold in training but scores nothing to keep the fee down).

[funky chicken]

Unless Brighton significantly drop their price on the player in question, I struggle to see how Potter can convince the already tight fisted chairman to agree to even spend £20m-30m on Ferguson, let alone £40m, £60m.

I liked what I saw of him against Brentford, but sadly hasn’t pushed on too much since then.

With the benefit of hindsight it wasn’t the worst deal in the end. It was a loan for a player I don’t believe is earning high wages, so no drama. If anything the biggest losers in this is Brighton as if they had plans to sell the player for big money they’ll struggle to now after this unsuccessful season at 2 different clubs.

[Roby]

No doubt he’s talented etc, but I’d be surprised if he signs in the summer based on what I’ve seen, and so the question reverts back to, why are we helping to rehabilitate a young player for Brighton?

We didn’t sign him to rehabilitate him after an injury.

We loaned him and I’m pretty sure if things turned out differently and he banged in 5-6 goals we’d have signed him in the summer

As it turns out that is now looking very highly unlikely so as Ozza said, we walk away and lose the 1/2 season loan fee and his wages for the six months.

We’ve been burned much worse than that before so maybe in this case the club were sensible, not too often we can say that about West Ham.

[Gsbgsb]

Its is why there was never going to be a viable option to buy him, it was impossible to price. Had he scored a few then at his age £40m would have been cheap so Brighton would always want more, as it is he is not (yet) looking a £40m player.

As someone posted this is far more like an extended medical as much as anything. Can he get back to full fitness, what are the long term risks, is he missing training with niggles etc etc. If he answers all those then somewhere around £30m is looking about right. Delap, whose scoring has dropped off recently, is 18 months older with an inferior previous record and cost £20m last summer. That is the sort of context you have to look at in what is in essence the domestic market for young strikers.

[WCpete]

He will neither rehabilitate nor score 5 or 6 goals if we don’t play him at the business end of games. We should be playing him like we play Tobido. Start him with our best players while they’re fresh. Take him off at 60 minutes. Garbage time with Danny Ings, Rodriguez and the other part time footballers at the end of the game is completely pointless.

[Doc H Ball]

With the benefit of hindsight it wasn’t the worst deal in the end. It was a loan for a player I don’t believe is earning high wages, so no drama.

A BHA fan told me the total cost was around £5m.

[DublinDave]

A BHA fan told me the total cost was around £5m.

Given our recent record with transfers, even if he never plays for us again, it would count as a success

[mushy]

He will neither rehabilitate nor score 5 or 6 goals if we don’t play him at the business end of games. We should be playing him like we play Tobido. Start him with our best players while they’re fresh. Take him off at 60 minutes. Garbage time with Danny Ings, Rodriguez and the other part time footballers at the end of the game is completely pointless.

The alternative view to that is, you bring him on with 20 minutes to go when the opposition have tired legs.
I see little difference.

[Southminster Hammer]

So at the moment he's a flop then

[Bluelighter]

His value on Transfermarket has dropped from 45m to 32m since he joined

[WCpete]

The alternative view to that is, you bring him on with 20 minutes to go when the opposition have tired legs.
I see little difference.

Most of our side is tired as well so transitioning the ball to him is more difficult and ineffective. In our case we like to sit back in the last 15 minutes and defend instead of pushing to score so he gets left on his own with nothing to do.