So, the first one is through the door – an Argentine no less. A short(ish), stocky(ish) Argentine to boot. They sometimes work out okay.
A ridiculous comparison of course, but what isn’t ridiculous to hope for is that by the time Emiliano “Emi” Buendía ends his spell in the Fine City we’ll be celebrating him as the most successful Argentine import in City colours.
Not too difficult to be fair.
Clips compilations on YouTube can be – as we’ve found to our cost before – very deceiving but this one at the very least reveals a player who has one or two tricks up his sleeve. Just a glimpse or two of those in the heat of Championship battle would be nice.
Again, the club has taken the route of bringing in a player whose career promised much in its formative years but, for whatever reason, has plateaued – a sensible path in the circumstances. If Buendía can have anything like the impact of Tom Trybull and Mo Leitner – albeit the latter’s spell was hindered by injury – it could be fruitful.
Some have picked up on the fact he spent a year at Real Madrid – but he was 13 at the time! Of far more relevance is the season just gone, which he spent on loan at La Liga 2 side Cultural y Deportiva Leonesa. Despite Leonesa ending up getting relegated to the Spanish third tier, he earned himself a player of the season award, scored six times and chipped in with a very decent 13 assists.
So, all good with the only question mark being over what went awry for Buendía after the season 2016/17. He was awarded a new five-year contract by Getafe in July 2016 – where he had been since he was 14 – but just one year later, with Getafe promoted back to La Liga, he was sent out on loan.
But he’s ours now and, by the sounds of it, is one that Stuart Webber has had in his sights since the departure of Alex Pritchard. One thing we do know however is that the intensity of the English second tier will hit him hard, not to mention a few Championship bruisers, so let’s give time, a là Vrancic, to adjust.
Welcome aboard Emi.
******
I appreciate that not everyone tweets, but those who do will have seen a certain David McNally chirp up last night. As ever, behind 280 characters or less it’s hellishly difficult to put the words and sentiments into too much context, but his description of City’s 14th place last season as “embarrassing” didn’t need much.
Ironically, it was an innocuous tweet from our own Stewart Lewis that stirred McNally from his slumbers, one in which he simply suggested that perhaps City should cash in if a good offer came in this summer for Josh Murphy. Little did Stewart realise the ball he had started rolling.
Be very careful what you wish for …. https://t.co/FM1VoPcgjB
— David McNally (@davidmcnally62) June 9, 2018
McNally’s reply to Stewart was seized upon by others and from there City’s former chief executive – who departed in acrimonious circumstances in May 2016 – indulged in an impromptu and unplanned Q&A.
Clearly, his exit from the club was wrapped up in a confidentiality clause and it seems he’s now champing at the bit to tell his side of the story. Whether replying to a few questions on Twitter is the best way is debatable, but it’s clear he still follows the fortunes of City very closely and is still bruised over the way his time here came to an abrupt end.
He was quick to refute suggestions that the big, lucrative, contracts awarded to the likes of Steven Naismith, Matt Jarvis and Timm Klose – as the club fought an unsuccessful fight to stay in the Premier League – were in any way linked to the club’s current financial state, citing instead that May 2016 saw the club in its rudest financial health ever.
While, at that snapshot in time, it may well have been the case, I’d suggest he was ignoring the financial millstone that was soon to lay heavy as the result of said huge contracts, especially without an immediate return to the Premier League – never a given.
When asked why Alex Neil’s Wembley 2015 squad was not strengthened sufficiently to give it a reasonable chance of survival, his answer was a simple one:
Yes . Cash . & yet directors loans were repaid. Bizarre https://t.co/SIfeebYBua
— David McNally (@davidmcnally62) June 9, 2018
His inference that the directors’ loans were given priority over spending cash on players is an interesting one – one that will no doubt be refuted by the club – but either way it’s very clear that life behind the scenes was far from harmonious once the dust of Wembley had settled.
A few suggested to Mcnally that a reveal-all book would be the ideal way to lay bare all his thoughts on those turbulent 12 months. I’d suggest an interview with MyFootballWriter would be an even better platform 😉
But, thanks to Stew, it was an interesting couple of hours nonetheless. One question that didn’t get asked but for which the reply would have been telling was ‘your view on self-financing football clubs?’
We’ll tuck that one up our sleeves.
I guess a few questions about McNally and his time at the club will remain unanswered.He did mainly do a good job for the club though in his role there.We were only a decent centre back away from staying up in our last premiership season though and that will haunt the club for many years to come.
While it’s true that directors loans were repaid back in 2015, maybe it’s churlish to point out, purely in the interest of perspective, that City were also the recipients of £72m of Premier League TV monies that following season, a significant chunk of which wasn’t actually spent until January 2016. Which of these factors had the greatest impact on what happened next?
C’mon Gaz… this is no time for facts and common sense 😉
Ha – not to mention getting Board approval to spend £107m that season, with an income of just £98m – self funding it was not!
Sounds like the makings of a new MFW piece 😉
Only time will tell who is right. McNally has his promotions to point to but conveniently ignores the big contracts which have helped to pull us down since. The longer we spend in this division with more chance of relegation than promotion the more he will seem to be right. For me we are in a period of managed decline at the moment whatever all the spin says and there is the real possibility that promotion to the Premier league will be something fans in future look back on as a memory like the UEFA cup games as we get left behind all the other clubs who have investment..
I know not every transfer in can (or will) be successful but I still think that while Alex Neil was responsible for the acquisition of James Maddison he also oversaw the purchases of Dorrans, Naismith, McGovern and the pure panic buy that was Wildschut. We are still the proud owners of three of them, as we are in the case of Jarvis wherein due diligence was completely unexercised.
Persisting with Russell Martin, Seb Bassong and John Ruddy was another cause of our all-too-predictable demise.
In other words we had the chance to establish ourselves in the PL but blew it big style. It wasn’t just a case of how little we spent, but more what we chose to spend it on. The repayment of the Directors’ loans does not grate with me, believe it or not. Better for Delia to have her money back than Neil to have wasted it.
Add the infamous Times interview and the Moxey appointment. Phew!
We’ve painted ourselves into the corner we currently occupy, simple as. We won’t have a Maddison to offload every season and that’s for sure. Delia can’t afford to bail us out and refuses to even consider selling so we’re stuck with what we’ve got and must get on with it, oh joy.
The remaining high earners continue to cripple the new model, so to the many people suggesting another transitory season: I think you’re right.
As for David McNally (who I met a few times and found a thoroughly decent guy) we will never know. Most of us have heard a few bits and pieces – I know I have – but they can’t appear on MFW:-)
Good morning Martin. I knew nothing about this development last night, but I’m intrigued and energised by the re emergence of Mr. McNally.
It would seem there are some serious chickens scratching around, just desperate to come home to roost.
The directors were all perfectly entitled to pull their remaining money out of the club upon relegation. However, an act of “support” it most certainly was not.
I reckon there would be a great deal of support for David McNally were he to feel the need to get his side of the story off his chest.
The loss of Bowkett and McNally and the installation of smith and balls was a bigger loss to the club than the impending fire sale of James Madison. Ever since that sad day the club has been in a tailspin.
Power to your arm David,
We won’t have a Maddison to sell every year, of course. But nor will we have a financial hole from disappearing parachute payments. This summer is the last time we’ll have to make/save £20m to stay on the same spot.
It does make we wonder if DM was so wonderful why he is no longer in football. As to saving the club in our hour of need I see Mr Bowkett is still a regular welcome visitor at Carrow Road
Yes indeed JG – the contribution Alan Bowkett made at that time is often overlooked.
I’ve heard his actions described as skippering a ship of fools into a safe haven. That came from somebody far more poetic than myself, obviously.
It should also be remembered that the timing of his resignation was significant. I’m glad to know he still goes to matches. I wouldn’t know from my perch in the Upper Barclay:-)
With the owners having stated previously that they didn’t mind being a yoyo club till it could sustain a proper stint in the Premiership it is no wonder that as soon as the promotion was won and the funds came in that they repaid themselves.
Is it as simple as they couldn’t see a long period in the Premiership or that they weren’t will to stage the repayments of their loans over a couple of seasons.
If it is the second then it was shortsightedness on there part.
If it’s the first then surely they could tried harder to get the right players in.
McNally might have his distracters in what he help to achieve at city with the help of other to turn the club round but it seems city lost both of the main people from the board at the same time.
Were we seeing the fall out once the chairman left and Ed Balls came in then McNally left and we get Moxley, did the first 2 scare the board with their demands on how to progress the club while the replacements nodded in agreement, Moxley’s departure awas sudden and shortly after an AGM did he actually up set the board with his comments or did he doing to get a reaction from them, if he did it was possibly the one he wanted sacked and a handsome payoff to boot.
Mcnally might have not been everyones cup of tea but for a short time he help to give city fans a good ride 3 promotions and 2 relegations and a couple of years in the Premiership, I have wondered what if as relegation was a certainty we had kept Houghton instead of changing to Adams and then O’neill possibly promotion and just a chance he could have done for city what he has done for Brighton but we will never know the board either keeps a manager to long or doesn’t give him time enought or the money to get in the players he wants.
I’d rather talk about Buendía. It’s a strange one. In terms of his recent experience, I’d have to admit that I don’t know much about the Segunda Division; he wasn’t considered up to it for the Primera, but then if he had been, we wouldn’t have been able to sign him.
The odd thing is that it’s a position that we look ok in. If you ask most fans they’d say that up front and (probably) in the full-back positions are where we need to strengthen. £1.5m is more than most of the new signings cost last summer, when there was a bit more cash floating around, presumably.
We’ve heard it before, but it would seem as if the scouting network have been keen to get the man’s signature for quite a while. Without having much else to go on, I’m curious to see why.
McNally hasn’t exactly thrown a stun grenade in the boardroom, but is starting to play like a mischievous schoolboy who wants to be heard. And we will hear again, I am sure.
My view of him is that when he came at Carrow Road, he was very much a professional amongst amateurs – of which he was very, very aware – and other than the much missed Bowkett, I’ve never really had time for any of the other board members in the last ten years.
McNally always tended to side in with Delia & Michael, simply because – then as now – there is no point voting against them as they are the majority shareholders and what they say goes, so he was given a free hand of sorts, which ultimately proved his undoing.
While he is absolutely right to say last year was embarrassing ( I have heard much worse), where I think he goes wrong is that he makes no mention of his mistakes and the part he plays in this current malaise, I think if he did that, he would be treated a little more kindly.
Ultimately he did more good than bad, and he was a promotion man (unlike the current majority shareholders, who took their loans back because they knew it would be their last chance) who was ambitious and was generally well liked by the staff at Carrow Road, who he knew almost all on first name terms.
For better or worse, we will not see his like in the NCFC boardroom again.