Just watched the transfer deadline episode.
It reminded me of that time following Argyle. Sunderland were linked with Ladapo and they bid something like £400,000 for him. We had debates on here about it and were divided on his worth. Sunderland seemed to accept our 'no' and move on to working out a deal for Will Grigg.
Ladapo eventually moves for £600,000 and is currently the joint 5th top scorer in League One. His many appearances off the bench make his 'minutes per goal' column very competitive. Meanwhile Grigg is now a League One bench player with 5 goals in 38 appearances.
Stuart James went with his gut feeling thinking Grigg might score a hat trick in the playoff final. Everyone around him, his advisors, his own football manager, told him not to bother bidding high for Grigg, he wasn't worth it. It is very interesting seeing the pressure on him building as his plans based on Josh Maja folds and crashes. But ultimately, a man with no football experience or judgement made the call on pouring £2 million pounds down the drain (if you were to accept that Grigg is worth £1 million). Also based on only receiving €1.5m for Maja, who he could have kept for the season.
The chairman went on the fans podcast and said that Grigg was Jack Ross's number one transfer target. It certainly didn't seem like it. He told James not to bid more than £1.25m and James ended up settling at £3m with add ons. His advisor was groaning in pain at overhearing him do it.
If Grigg scored the 10 goals in 16 games he planned to it might have worked out as good value, but talk about a transfer fee putting pressure on a new signing.
With the benefit of hindsight it was a financial and footballing catastrophe. I wonder with coronavirus how Sunderland's finances are looking now?