The owner made deals easy but I had another problem with Stoke City transfers’
Former Stoke manager Gary Rowett looks at deadline day as the Potters prepare to do business and what it is like to be a part of.
The final day of the transfer window is finally here and I suspect Derby County and Stoke will be considering their options ahead of the deadline later on tonight.
As a manager it can be a bit of a strange affair because you’re sat there thinking with some incredulity about how you’ve had 10 to 12 weeks to get business done, but then most of the time it comes down to one final day. In an ideal world, all clubs would like their business done before the last day because there are occasions when you can be forced into a decision that you’ve not really had time to think or reflect on whether they would be the right deals.
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After training is finished, I would have all the analysts in, the whole recruitment department and whatever the deadline is you’d be getting ready to react. You might have deals you are working on that day you’re hoping are going to come to fruition. I had a scenario at Millwall last year where we were trying to sign Kieffer Moore from Bournemouth.
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We thought he was going to be sent out on loan in the summer. I believe the club had agreed a deal, but Bournemouth couldn’t quite get a striker in.
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But you have to be there to react just in case something just drops on you and as you head into the day, if it doesn’t you scurry around to see if there’s another deal out there that can be done. It is a little bit like that and can become a very reactionary day. And I think the only way you can do it is be as prepared as you can and have a list of maybe seven players that you’d be interested in and be ready to make quick decisions.
You just have make sure that you don’t go too outside the parameters of where you see the window as a club because obviously that’s a risky situation to be in as well. I remember being at Derby and I got a phone call from an agent to say this player was available.
You’re sat there thinking this is going to be very expensive but I think it was Nelson Oliveira who was at Norwich at the time. He had a strong season in the season before and the owner at the time was Mel Morris who was sat there thinking about doing it.
We’d gone from doing nothing to potentially paying £8m to £10m. I remember that I said I don’t think we should do this and didn’t think it was the right deal to do. And maybe as a manager, sometimes I should have been a little bit more selfish.
But that’s what happens sometimes. You’re planning for nothing and not spending any money and then the owner thinks, you know what, let’s go for it. You have to hand it to Mel on that occasion because he would have spent the money.
It depends on where you are as a club particularly if you need to strengthen and bring in a player that is maybe regarded as a game-changer. But I think occasionally if you’ve got a squad fully complete and you do something that’s not right it can cause you some problems.
I remember at Birmingham, and I’m not sure if it was a summer window or not, but we had Jon Toral in on loan. The season before we had Diego Fabbrini and he had done really well for us. We had the opportunity to sign Diego permanently. Jon was doing really well and was a really popular lad in the dressing room.
We did the deal for Diego, but he expected to play and it’s a really tough balance to get right. At Stoke, it was a different scenario because the owner there was desperate to get back to the Premier League and he would make it relatively easy to get deals done in that sense. You had a recruitment team there who were used to signing players for double digits in millions from Europe.
That was perhaps more challenging than being a manager with no money and having to think through every deal. When you have a transfer kitty and people helping you to spend it, you think we need another midfielder let’s go and spend another £6m or £7m.
That’s a different challenge and sometimes you don’t get that instant chemistry. We saw that with Leeds last season. It took about 10 games for the group to settle down. They went on a bit of a run but it was just a little bit too late.
That’s what happened at Stoke and it took time to gel all the new players. I think above all with every signing you have to really consciously think it through be it character, physicality, durability and their injury record.
But if they’re not available, it’s irrelevant. You also have to bear in mind personalities. Sometimes you have one who wants to be the main man and that’s why they flourish. Then you sign competition for places and that player doesn’t respond as well. Is there enough leadership? Is there enough energy in the group? There are so many factors to consider. Planning is imperative because it just helps you avoid making kneejerk reactions on the final day but trust me it can be stressful.
