Anyone got any idea on how much he was on with us?
There’s suggestions that his starting contract was as low as £800 a week and that then increased to around £2.5k a week. Would sound realistic to me, but I can’t say whether that is accurate or not.
As others have said, definition of a sideways move for Thierry and I wouldn’t be surprised to see his development stunt now.
Like CBT, he blew hot and cold but he was a fan favourite so was probably afforded more patience than he may be afforded at somewhere like Preston.
One more successful season with us in the Championship and he likely would’ve secured a move way above the reported £11k/week. All feels a little short sighted and anti climactic for Thierry who has a high ceiling that may now be much trickier to reach/beat IMO.
I won’t boo him when he’s at The Valley next season as he played his part in getting us out of League One and he seemed to be a good character in the squad.
I just hope we get some pace in the squad now. I’d prefer someone more like Small on the right than Edwards. I really rate Edwards for the LWB position but for the sake of balance, I’d prefer that the RWB replacement to be more attacking with some pace to burn.
I always thought we looked a better team with Small on the pitch. Yes his final pass or whatever could be erratic but he's still only young and will I'm sure improve. I wish him all the best for next season apart from when Preston play us.
We did, you just have to see the Wycombe first play off leg. Regardless of goals and assists he was direct, powerful and caused problems for defences.
Him and TC were our only attacking threat last season, he will be a big player to replace, make no doubt about it.
Ok. So, I’d requested to join this morning but I’ve not long since been approved. Really it was just to give an input from our end on what we’d heard last night. It was mentioned that it had swung in our favour on our forum, yesterday. Which has obviously been proven true now.
I think a lot of our fans persistence with a deal for Small comes from the fact we haven’t get anyone with any pace, mainly due to 3 years of Ryan Lowe recruitment. Plus he did well against us in the cup. Our recruitment is sometimes just, who played well against and might be available. Anyway it seems Heckingbottom has had a touch-on for him since then. Rumour was, in the winter window, we’d pushed hard for him late on and Ridsdale was at your game up at The Lashers, but an injury to our centre back meant we had to switch from Small and get Porteous in from Watford instead. All in all I think our pursuit of him has made him feel loved. Most North End fans genuinely thought he’d be staying with you when you came up. Maybe Jones signing that new deal is what made his mind up to leave? For what it’s worth I really rate Jones. He had one foot in the door here before he joined you. Unfortunately the scouse car salesman talked our owner round and he ended up staying on. Good luck for this season.
Risdale was at Wembley in the royal box , I remember thinking I recognised the dirty Leeds bullshitter
It strikes me as a bizarre move. Not a step forward imo. He looked settled, fans loved him, played regularly. If he signed and performed well in the championship for us he’d most certainly be on the move in Jan or next summer to a more ambitious club than PNE and I mean that with no disrespect to PNE.
Ultimately I'm sad to see him go as he was good to watch at times, but he could also be frustrating too as he had a tendency to overplay. I don't think he's a smart footballer and that could limit him somewhat.
Preston….. Hmmm…. Like Living in Sandbanks and choosing to go to Clacton for your Holidays.
Can’t, see him following in the Yann May or Taylor history of leavers we talk about years later.
The southeast is overcrowded & full of ‘me, me, me’ wankers. On £520k a year, I am sure if he wanted to, he could buy a lovely house in a lovely Lancashire village with lots of character and charm.
He could buy up half of Burnley - who cares ?
Or a really nice house in a beautiful Lancashire village, without a Greggs, vape shop, or Nandos in sight… like I said.
You do know nice villages aren’t exclusively a northern thing.
Having lived Ooop north, I can see why northerners hate southerners with this boring ‘the entire north is a shithole’ nonsense. That was my point.
The southeast is overcrowded & blotted with shitholes like Chatham, Luton etc. Even affluent areas can be oppressive, as often spiralling suburbia.
There are nice and crap areas everywhere. A footballer on £500k a year won’t worry that a move ooop north will mean they’ll be swapping their swanky town house in Mayfair (I assume that is where ALL London footballers live in this troupe) for a bedsit above a vape shop on Preston High Street.
It will be interesting to see how Preston do this season. Immediately after our promotion I targeted them as a club for us to try to finish above. That however is based only on last season which was an exception, because they had become a steady top ten team over the last 5 years. Will they get back to their normal play off hunting ways, or was last season the start of a decline? Is Small good enough to be part of a mid table / play off push team, or just good enough to be scrapping with us for safety?
I think Heckingbottom will get them playing decent stuff after a preseason & hovering around 10th to 15th as per.
If I was 20 and was offered a 4 year contract that meant i could buy myself, mum and siblings houses outright and effectively set them up for life in an industry where that scenario may be a once in a life time opportunity I would not think twice.
Good luck to the lad....gave some great times for us and was very much a popular part of the squad with great rapport with the fanbase.
There is no loyalty in football and we've just let Watson and others go without a second thought and there's never any fan hoo ha when we release players and effectively put them out of work, turn their and their families' lives upside down e.g. potentially having to move areas, schools etc. It's the game.
If I was 20 and was offered a 4 year contract that meant i could buy myself, mum and siblings houses outright and effectively set them up for life in an industry where that scenario may be a once in a life time opportunity I would not think twice.
Good luck to the lad....gave some great times for us and was very much a popular part of the squad with great rapport with the fanbase.
There is no loyalty in football and we've just let Watson and others go without a second thought and there's never any fan hoo ha when we release players and effectively put them out of work, turn their and their families' lives upside down e.g. potentially having to move areas, schools etc. It's the game.
THIS .. and I'll add the obvious, a club should never keep a player who wants away .. as I said well above, he'll be replaced, not by a clone but with a player with parallel talents
Preston….. Hmmm…. Like Living in Sandbanks and choosing to go to Clacton for your Holidays.
Can’t, see him following in the Yann May or Taylor history of leavers we talk about years later.
The southeast is overcrowded & full of ‘me, me, me’ wankers. On £520k a year, I am sure if he wanted to, he could buy a lovely house in a lovely Lancashire village with lots of character and charm.
He could buy up half of Burnley - who cares ?
Or a really nice house in a beautiful Lancashire village, without a Greggs, vape shop, or Nandos in sight… like I said.
You do know nice villages aren’t exclusively a northern thing.
Having lived Ooop north, I can see why northerners hate southerners with this boring ‘the entire north is a shithole’ nonsense. That was my point.
The southeast is overcrowded & blotted with shitholes like Chatham, Luton etc. Even affluent areas can be oppressive, as often spiralling suburbia.
There are nice and crap areas everywhere. A footballer on £500k a year won’t worry that a move ooop north will mean they’ll be swapping their swanky town house in Mayfair (I assume that is where ALL London footballers live in this troupe) for a bedsit above a vape shop on Preston High Street.
been saying for years, the price of housing and living costs in the sarf must put off a lot of players being courted by lower league clubs .. £80,000-£100,000 a year (say) 'goes further' the further north yer go (as does 10 grand a year lol)
Shame to see a young, developing player leave but I don’t think we will struggle to replace him.
As exciting as he could be the end product wasn’t evident yet, so maybe Preston will get the best out of him
Personally he was one of the players on my list who I think will struggle against Championship defenses so I am not overly concerned
This sounds negative but I think TC will struggle unlike Thierry who will flourish against Championship defenders. Really hope I'm wrong about Tyreece Campbell but he was in Grimmer pocket in the semi finals despite TC giving 100% and ever since Nathan's hyperbole about him being as good as the Southampton premier players he worked with his game dipped a tad over the business end of the season. He won the free kick in the final for Macca's Magic moment so TC is in credit and did make progress over the league 1 season.
Not negative at all, I also think TC will struggle but pre season will be the telling factor. After pre season last year he returned fitter, stronger and with an improved game.
Like Small he struggles to beat the last defender, get to the biline and put in a killer cross. However if he works on that pre season and cracks it he will be unplayable
If however he returns as he is I believe he will struggle, Grimmer had him in his pocket for 180 minutes and there are dozens more “Grimmers” waiting for him in the Championship
If I was 20 and was offered a 4 year contract that meant i could buy myself, mum and siblings houses outright and effectively set them up for life in an industry where that scenario may be a once in a life time opportunity I would not think twice.
Good luck to the lad....gave some great times for us and was very much a popular part of the squad with great rapport with the fanbase.
There is no loyalty in football and we've just let Watson and others go without a second thought and there's never any fan hoo ha when we release players and effectively put them out of work, turn their and their families' lives upside down e.g. potentially having to move areas, schools etc. It's the game.
Rodney this is Preston, he can probably buy a street up there!
Most likey leave again next summer to get to his target
This is the first decent contract he has ever been given in his football career. Stop making out he is some money grabbing arsehole. He’s a professional footballer trying to earn a living in a brutal profession.
With Small leaving for £10 grand a week wages ,we now got to up the wages for our better players or there agents will start preparing to move there players on
Disappointing although I’d say his importance to the team was more based on the fact that only him and TC could do what he does rather than his actual ability - he was spectacular when good but rarely came off although the threat it would kept teams doubled up on him - if we can get a couple of similar players but more consistent, then that’s an upgrade - in an ideal world we’d have kept him but Preston have taken a gamble me that we weren’t prepared to do I would say due to the fact he is still a WIP and far too erratic
Is it considered 'chasing the money' when you're getting a pretty average Championship salary at the level you're now at?
If we offered less, surely if anything that's below the going rate and we've made that decision based on how we value him.
10k a week would make Small our highest earner, he is not our best player so we may have decided he’s not worth that
Preston have been at this level a lot longer, 10k a week is probably about average or just above in their squad.
I think we will pay players that kind of money, but they are going to be our best players
Our average wage for playing staff was just shy of £10k a week. I’d imagine he’s around the £8k a week mark. Just a guess.
So, a young player who has just played a whole season and been promoted, signs for u on a free for less than the average wage? Mate you are wide of the mark. My guess would be 12 to 14. That’s the main reason for him leaving for a smaller club
1. In most highly paid professional employment sectors, "job-hoppers" are viewed with some suspicion. Is this not the case in football? if it is, did you advise Thierry to consider this before deciding on yet another move at such a young age?
2. You benefitted from several years at the same club in your formative years as a player. Would it not be good for Thierry at such a young age to benefit from the same stability? Why is it better for him to move now to a club with a very similar profile but located in a very different part of the country? Does Thierry have family/friends links to Preston?
3. How do you benefit financially from this transfer compared with Thierry deciding to accept Charlton's offer?
Not sure i'd class him as job-hopping.
His first pro club was Southampton where he was for nearly 3 years where he didn't play and was loaned out to two clubs. He then signed for us in February 2024, which let's not forget was originally only on a contract until the end of the season. He could quite easily have bombed out and then been looking at league two or even non-league if he hadn't done well.
So technically we're the first contracted club he was at where he actually played. He's now got a better offer and moved on, which whilst the money helped, is also allegedly because Preston want to play him in his natural position.
Why is what he's done any different to say Lloyd Jones, who joined us on a free from Cambridge? At the times we were his 4th club in 5 years, i didn't see anyone calling him a job-hopper. Or what Carey has done in leaving Blackpool to sign for us yesterday?
No, neither am I sure.
However I was doing exec. recruitment for 26 years so I guess about 200 times I had discussions with young ambitious people about looking like a job-hopper if they moved on too quickly. Now, if you are a youngster in the 3rd division and really tear it up then on the CV it looks perfectly understandable if you move on from 3rd division Charlton to, say Sheffield United. But if you move on from promoted Charlton after barely a year, in which time the manager turned you into a player of note, to Preston, then on the CV that looks like a sideways move, does it not?
So I'd simply like to hear from the agent (and I'm not picking on Jon Fortune, this happens so often) about the other mitigating circumstances behind this sideways move. So that we don't just assume that it's all about the money, for both Thierry and the agent.
He was ok carried the ball up the pitch and relieved defence well but sometimes flattered to deliver the final ball would’ve prefered to have kept but not on a 4 year deal we’ve had many players of his ilk over the years in these long deals and struggle to shift them
Comments
Preston Fucking Nob End!
Like CBT, he blew hot and cold but he was a fan favourite so was probably afforded more patience than he may be afforded at somewhere like Preston.
I just hope we get some pace in the squad now. I’d prefer someone more like Small on the right than Edwards. I really rate Edwards for the LWB position but for the sake of balance, I’d prefer that the RWB replacement to be more attacking with some pace to burn.
Yep, and once he matures as he's only 20 the stepping stones could take him a long way up the Pyramid.
We now have both Watson and Small to replace; better than the decent Watson and different from the tricks of Thierry.
I/we want to be whelmed not underwhelmed by the replacements !
Good luck to the lad....gave some great times for us and was very much a popular part of the squad with great rapport with the fanbase.
There is no loyalty in football and we've just let Watson and others go without a second thought and there's never any fan hoo ha when we release players and effectively put them out of work, turn their and their families' lives upside down e.g. potentially having to move areas, schools etc. It's the game.
Like Small he struggles to beat the last defender, get to the biline and put in a killer cross. However if he works on that pre season and cracks it he will be unplayable
If however he returns as he is I believe he will struggle, Grimmer had him in his pocket for 180 minutes and there are dozens more “Grimmers” waiting for him in the Championship
Sometimes watching him you'd think it was not possible to move your feet so quickly!
If he can improve his finishing, he'll deffo be in the PL.
However I was doing exec. recruitment for 26 years so I guess about 200 times I had discussions with young ambitious people about looking like a job-hopper if they moved on too quickly. Now, if you are a youngster in the 3rd division and really tear it up then on the CV it looks perfectly understandable if you move on from 3rd division Charlton to, say Sheffield United. But if you move on from promoted Charlton after barely a year, in which time the manager turned you into a player of note, to Preston, then on the CV that looks like a sideways move, does it not?
So I'd simply like to hear from the agent (and I'm not picking on Jon Fortune, this happens so often) about the other mitigating circumstances behind this sideways move. So that we don't just assume that it's all about the money, for both Thierry and the agent.