Hearts signings - Pre Contracts

[Hibiza]

Probably best not to mention them , unless we beat them .

[green day]

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3rd and group stage football is a fantastic prize. Id love it to be us.

But presumably you dont disagree with my statement that they have not won anything.

I mean, you cant put 3rd place in a trophy cabinet or get photos taken with it, can you?

[Northernhibee]

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I hope we never stop trying to be clever.

I hope we try to put together the best footballing squad we can to set us up for success.

[Northernhibee]

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So I guess you mean players like:

Jamie Murphy
James Scott
Drey Wright
Alex Gogic
Stevie Mallan
Stephen McGinn
Dan Mackay
Jason Naismith
Mikey Devlin
Danny Swanson

All "known quantity" SPL players, good solid scottish guys with experience

The likes of Gogic and Mallan (and Naismith for that matter) are all harsh - NMW is the first player who has toughened up the midfield since Gogic left, Naismith and Mallan were both fine to good until injury hit them, and McGinn and Devlin were signed as backup only.


You can’t ice a cake until it’s baked and you’ve got something to decorate, and we can’t turn our noses up at someone just because they’ve come from another team in this league.

[MWHIBBIES]

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But presumably you dont disagree with my statement that they have not won anything.

I mean, you cant put 3rd place in a trophy cabinet or get photos taken with it, can you?

Obviously not, no. Its not really a ****ing statement is it? Its like me saying the sky is blue. Adds nothing to the conversation.

Why are we pretending that they're not having a brilliant season and are already doing some solid business for next year? 2 semis, 3rd place wrapped up. Yes please. I'd be delighted if thats us in 12 months, trophy or not.

[worcesterhibby]

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The likes of Gogic and Mallan (and Naismith for that matter) are all harsh - NMW is the first player who has toughened up the midfield since Gogic left, Naismith and Mallan were both fine to good until injury hit them, and McGinn and Devlin were signed as backup only.


You can’t ice a cake until it’s baked and you’ve got something to decorate, and we can’t turn our noses up at someone just because they’ve come from another team in this league.

I actually loved having Mallan in the team because of his shooting power and Gogic wasn't a bad player for us at all.. but the point I was trying to make was that we have signed plenty of decent, workmanlike, SPL players who know the league and it hasn't really brought us success. Absolutely we should continue to sign players from other teams in our league, but I just feel they have to improve us. What I'm not convinced about is that there are half a dozen "slam dunk" signings we could make, from our league, from "lesser" teams that would defintely improve us. I like Blair Spittal. I would have been pleased if we had signed him, but "slam dunk" ? i'm not sure.

We already have a framework of good solid players who know the league well. Marshall, Cadden, Levitt, Newell, Josh Campbell, Squirrel. Let's not get obsessed by buying from our own league, or we will never see the likes of Latapy, Zammama, Malonga, Mixu, Zitelli, Sauzee, Boozy, again.

[Northernhibee]

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I actually loved having Mallan in the team because of his shooting power and Gogic wasn't a bad player for us at all.. but the point I was trying to make was that we have signed plenty of decent, workmanlike, SPL players who know the league and it hasn't really brought us success. Absolutely we should continue to sign players from other teams in our league, but I just feel they have to improve us. What I'm not convinced about is that there are half a dozen "slam dunk" signings we could make, from our league, from "lesser" teams that would defintely improve us. I like Blair Spittal. I would have been pleased if we had signed him, but "slam dunk" ? i'm not sure.

We already have a framework of good solid players who know the league well. Marshall, Cadden, Levitt, Newell, Josh Campbell, Squirrel. Let's not get obsessed by buying from our own league, or we will never see the likes of Latapy, Zammama, Malonga, Mixu, Zitelli, Sauzee, Boozy, again.

Being honest, I think having one wildcard player or two in that Jack Ross team would have seen us with a cup double as well as third in the league. We were very consistent but just lacked a little magic when it counted. There’s a balance that we’ve gotten further away from being right.

We weren’t far away but through the baby out with the bath water and here we are.

[Donegal Hibby]

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Obviously not, no. Its not really a ****ing statement is it? Its like me saying the sky is blue. Adds nothing to the conversation.

Why are we pretending that they're not having a brilliant season and are already doing some solid business for next year? 2 semis, 3rd place wrapped up. Yes please. I'd be delighted if thats us in 12 months, trophy or not.

Be hard for them not to reach the other semi after playing Spartans , Airdrie and Morton though. We will see how they do in the semi . With a little luck in the cup draws semi finals are quite achievable and ain't any great marker to how a teams doing in fairness.

[Victor]

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Shankland signed for Hearts and is likely to go with Scotland to Germany and possibly be a target for Rangers. Did he show a lack of ambition by signing for them?

I think they may be a stepping stone for him. However it has not really worked out for him at other clubs. It’s up to him how it goes from now, but if he is ambitious he won’t find great success at Hearts.

[Donegal Hibby]

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I sometimes wonder if this club has a fascination with being the smartest in the room at times. I find it mental that some people think we're above signing a Blair Spittal for example. If we had the mindset that we wanted better than what was playing in Scotland all the time then we wouldn't have ended up with guys like Yogi Hughes, John O'Neill, Gary Smith, John McGinn.

Don't get the fascination with Spittal or hertz other two signings tbh . Would any of them improve our first team? . Nothing wrong in signing players from our own league's , some work out and some don't like Henderson, magennis , Mackay , Tait etc .

[CapitalGreen]

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Being honest, I think having one wildcard player or two in that Jack Ross team would have seen us with a cup double as well as third in the league. We were very consistent but just lacked a little magic when it counted. There’s a balance that we’ve gotten further away from being right.

We weren’t far away but through the baby out with the bath water and here we are.

What does “wildcard player” mean? Foreign?

We lost at Hampden because Jack Ross was absolutely clueless when it came to setting up a team to play St Johnstone, it wasn’t a personnel issue, our respective league positions demonstrated we clearly had a much stronger squad than them.

[Centre Hawf]

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Don't get the fascination with Spittal or hertz other two signings tbh . Would any of them improve our first team? . Nothing wrong in signing players from our own league's , some work out and some don't like Henderson, magennis , Mackay , Tait etc .

I think if before Emiliano came in you were offered Spittal we would probably all be delighted with that.

[MWHIBBIES]

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What does “wildcard player” mean? Foreign?

We lost at Hampden because Jack Ross was absolutely clueless when it came to setting up a team to play St Johnstone, it wasn’t a personnel issue, our respective league positions demonstrated we clearly had a much stronger squad than them.

Correct. 3 times in a row identical outcome. 1-0 loss.

The league cup semi was a shocker, but I don't think it was entirely him. We started extremely well. The other 3 were dreadful.

[Hibiza]

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The likes of Gogic and Mallan (and Naismith for that matter) are all harsh - NMW is the first player who has toughened up the midfield since Gogic left, Naismith and Mallan were both fine to good until injury hit them, and McGinn and Devlin were signed as backup only.


You can’t ice a cake until it’s baked and you’ve got something to decorate, and we can’t turn our noses up at someone just because they’ve come from another team in this league.

Mallan , quite simply was sub standard , all the best to him though .

[Northernhibee]

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What does “wildcard player” mean? Foreign?

We lost at Hampden because Jack Ross was absolutely clueless when it came to setting up a team to play St Johnstone, it wasn’t a personnel issue, our respective league positions demonstrated we clearly had a much stronger squad than them.

Someone who offers an unknown quality - either someone we don’t know much about, someone like Myziane who has played at a higher level but has had a questions about his attitude from a previous boss, or even someone like Jackson Irvine who had been out of the game for a bit and we didn’t know where they were when back up to speed.

Someone who has that excitement factor about them.

I disagree about JR by the way, I thought he was a good manager and we were lacking the sort of player who could quickly move the ball about in midfield and could unlock a team as stubborn as them.

[Springbank]

Spittal on the Heart of Midlothian is fair game & has been for centuries.

In the 21st century we've taken the logical next step & now,we shower the bxxtards with pies too

Progress

[Donegal Hibby]

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I think if before Emiliano came in you were offered Spittal we would probably all be delighted with that.

I know he's played for Queens park, Dundee Utd , Partick , Ross county, Partick again and now Motherwell. I'm sure he's not a bad player though honestly can't say he's ever really caught my eye were I've thought I hope Hibs sign him .

It will be more first team players I think we will be needing in the summer if we don't keep the likes of Emiliano and our other loanees and I'd be worried if we were looking at what hertz have signed as first team players TBH . Think we can do better .

[Smartie]

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I know he's played for Queens park, Dundee Utd , Partick , Ross county, Partick again and now Motherwell. I'm sure he's not a bad player though honestly can't say he's ever really caught my eye were I've thought I hope Hibs sign him .

It will be more first team players I think we will be needing in the summer if we don't keep the likes of Emiliano and our other loanees and I'd be worried if we were looking at what hertz have signed as first team players TBH . Think we can do better .

He looks like one of those who was a talented youngster, lost his way a bit, has screwed the nut and as he's reached his peak has matured into a good player.

Probably not much of the sell on potential that seems to get everyone so excited these days but I'd definitely have taken him at Hibs.

[Stevie Reid]

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He looks like one of those who was a talented youngster, lost his way a bit, has screwed the nut and as he's reached his peak has matured into a good player.

Probably not much of the sell on potential that seems to get everyone so excited these days but I'd definitely have taken him at Hibs.

I think so. Was really highly rated when he came through at Utd (alongside Souttar, I think), and had to drop down a bit to get to where he is now.

I've just said on the PM board that (as much as I hope I'm wrong), I get the feeling he could have a couple of years for them similar to what Hartley did. 74 goals from midfield by the age of 28 is very impressive.

If we had a midfielder that scored 11 goals and created nine by March in a season, we'd be wanting millions for him.

[Broxburn Greens]

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I'm hoping the biggest benefit from the Foley deal will be through the savings in wages from players in the group.

On the face of it, straight up cash, 2 million has been mentioned as being added to the player budget from the 6 million investment. Hearts have FOH & Anderson donations that more than match it with millions guaranteed from Europe. Shankland and Cochrane will go for decent cash too but will need replaced.

We have to be smart with our investment to close the gap.

On the other side - there's nothing to stop further investment from Foley/Black Knights from the "initial" money quoted.

Just have to see how it unfolds

Isn’t Foley’s stated intent to have us be the strongest “best of the rest” and obtaining European group stage football more often than not?

If that’s the case then those stating we’ll still be miles behind Hearts don’t make any sense.

The only way to achieve the two aims above is to invest heavily in the playing squad and be signing better players than Hearts.

Not saying that can be done in 1 window but that’s the long and short of it, to beat Hearts (&Aberdeen) regularly we will have to be able to outbid them and sign higher quality.

Being smart is a big part as well I agree and we’ll need the right DoF and Head Coach for that, hopefully we already have.


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[WhileTheChief..]

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That in itself doesn’t mean anything though. If we get players on that salary and they play well enough for us to reflect that, then great - but that’s far from a guarantee.

Marcondes is clearly a very talented player, but he’s not been a complete standout. Same goes for Silva at Rangers, a £35M player on paper, not ripping the league up by any stretch. And they’ve been there before with Aaron Ramsay, Diallo from Man Utd. I could go on.

Football doesn’t always follow logic, but there’s plenty of it in signing guys who are delivering the goods/excelling in struggling sides. Probably a safer bet than taking players on loan who are only here because they can’t justify their wage elsewhere, and may struggle to adapt to the game here.

Happy to take our chances on guys earning that kinda money when we're not paying their wages!!

Got to be infinitely better than some of the crap we've signed the last few seasons.

[HUTCHYHIBBY]

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11 goals and 9 assists for spittal this season. Considering how bad Motherwell were for some periods that's a great return. Think he will do really well in a team higher up the league as well.

I never realised that, that's a more than decent effort.

[CapitalGreen]

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I think so. Was really highly rated when he came through at Utd (alongside Souttar, I think), and had to drop down a bit to get to where he is now.

I've just said on the PM board that (as much as I hope I'm wrong), I get the feeling he could have a couple of years for them similar to what Hartley did. 74 goals from midfield by the age of 28 is very impressive.

If we had a midfielder that scored 11 goals and created nine by March in a season, we'd be wanting millions for him.

He’s not a midfielder though, he’s played his whole career as a winger/wide forward or sometimes centrally supporting a main striker.

[Centre Hawf]

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I know he's played for Queens park, Dundee Utd , Partick , Ross county, Partick again and now Motherwell. I'm sure he's not a bad player though honestly can't say he's ever really caught my eye were I've thought I hope Hibs sign him .

It will be more first team players I think we will be needing in the summer if we don't keep the likes of Emiliano and our other loanees and I'd be worried if we were looking at what hertz have signed as first team players TBH . Think we can do better .

Time will obviously tell but I think he would be a first team player for us, his numbers this year are pretty impressive for someone in a fairly rank team overall. I think if we had him and his returns this season in our squad we would probably be a lot closer to the race for third than working out if Dundee might lose enough games to put us top 6.

There's obviously no guarantee that he'll replicate this seasons form into next, but as others have said his stats from midfield over the last few seasons have been getting better and better.

[Stevie Reid]

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He’s not a midfielder though, he’s played his whole career as a winger/wide forward or sometimes centrally supporting a main striker.

He’s played as an attacking midfielder for Motherwell many times this season. But regardless, that just makes the Hartley comparison a bit more pertinent. He was played as a winger until Billy Stark moved him centrally and it transformed his career.

And 74 goals is still impressive, for anyone who hasn’t played as a centre forward.

[Stevie Reid]

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Happy to take our chances on guys earning that kinda money when we're not paying their wages!!

Got to be infinitely better than some of the crap we've signed the last few seasons.

Fair enough. I’d rather we had a proper plan (whilst acknowledging that any transfer carries risk) than taking chances on players based on how high an earner they have been elsewhere.

We need players who are able to make a big impact in this league. We’ve seen many examples of players coming into the SPL on big wages and with big reputations, who don’t live up to either.

Ryan Gauld was on A View from the Terrace the other week, he would have been on a fortune when we had him on loan. He said the other week that he couldn’t see himself ever coming back to Scotland as he didn’t feel he was well suited to the game here.

I’m excited for the summer with the new investment, and very much hope the benefits of the multi club set up can bear fruit for us. But there needs to be a plan in place, and the acquisition of players that are right for us - players who have been deemed not ready for another team in another league (as has been mooted by Foley), won’t necessarily work.

More money is not a guarantee of success. It will be an interesting summer, and we’re certainly going to learn who’s calling the shots in the football department.

[Dashing Bob S]

None of the signings are making me envious and the prospect of them losing Shankland is making me happy.

Such a big hole of them to fill.

[Broxburn Greens]

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None of the signings are making me envious and the prospect of them losing Shankland is making me happy.

Such a big hole of them to fill.

This is where I’m at with this.

None of these guys are a 30 goal a season striker.


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[MWHIBBIES]

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This is where I’m at with this.

None of these guys are a 30 goal a season striker.


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I don't think they're signing a left back and 2 midfielders to replace Shankland mate.

[MelbourneHibees]

5 pages on 3 pish players.