Summer Silly Season Transfer Thread 2025

[iansthailand]

I have just been told if we buy players over 27 we get extra green shield stamps into perspective perieria we paid 10 mil plus sell on fee at 29 we will struggle to get 15 plus, mr chairman silva and your son should be selling burgers not near doing transfer deals,the only sad thing is you can't make money out of a 27 /28 year old.No old peoples homes can't be turned into under 18s academy s.palace and Brentford are making us look like fools get real before we get relegated.

Mick, as you know I appreciate a lot of what you say but really?

Do you want us fielding eleven year olds or something?

We bought older players so we could stabilise and become a secure PL side. That has been achieved, we have the full 105 million for PSR so, lets wait and see if we go for a younger type of player. 'Patience is a virtue, find it if you can, often in a women, rarely in a FoFer.

[Bal_13]

I have just been told if we buy players over 27 we get extra green shield stamps into perspective perieria we paid 10 mil plus sell on fee at 29 we will struggle to get 15 plus, mr chairman silva and your son should be selling burgers not near doing transfer deals,the only sad thing is you can't make money out of a 27 /28 year old.No old peoples homes can't be turned into under 18s academy s.palace and Brentford are making us look like fools get real before we get relegated.

Mick, as you know I appreciate a lot of what you say but really?

Do you want us fielding eleven year olds or something?

We bought older players so we could stabilise and become a secure PL side. That has been achieved, we have the full 105 million for PSR so, lets wait and see if we go for a younger type of player. 'Patience is a virtue, find it if you can, often in a women, rarely in a FoFer.

As a counter, I'd also point out that when we have signed younger players over the last few years it's not exactly been met with positive support.

We signed Robinson at 23 and for the first 2-3 years there was plenty of moaning about his final ball / technical abilities

We signed Rodrigo Muniz at 21 and most had written him off by the time he had his loan at Middlesbrough but even last year there were plenty of posts about how he's not good enough before his hot streak from Feb

Both players are now spoken about in glowing terms but I don't seem to remember anyone lionising them initially

And that's before we get to ESR signed at 24... who apparently is a flop

Feels like a lot of this forum speak about signing youth and how we have to do that but often when we have they're met with just as much criticism and caveats as the older players.

When we sign the next 18-24 year old I suspect there will be huge excitement followed by the usual criticism and Fulhamish proclamations that we missed out on CHO / Cherki / some other young player doing well etc. and our scouting is useless, followed by the next round of calls that we buy poorly

[Tabby]

Bassey is the only example we have of a player that we got fairly young (and that has increased in value) since promotion. Other than him the only under 25s we've signed is ESR and Sess last season, so it is improving I guess.

[SuffolkWhite]

I agree with Bal_13.

Football fans are fickle imo and we all moan at some point.

The team is an established Prem team now, and we are in a position to lower the age with new players. Hopefully that happens but it does have to be a balance.

[Bal_13]

Bassey is the only example we have of a player that we got fairly young (and that has increased in value) since promotion. Other than him the only under 25s we've signed is ESR and Sess last season, so it is improving I guess.

Funnily enough I nearly called out Bassey in my last post as the exception to the rule.

I'd again point to the examples of Robinson / Muniz who yes were signed pre our recent prem stint but who have weathered criticism to become highly rated. Let's not write off ESR yet. And Sess has been a relative success, but before Feb I'm not sure I read any posts hailing his re-signing as genius - I think he has a lot of potential still.

My point is that often I read here we need to sign youth but rarely have the same voices actually accommodated the progression youth needs to go through when we deal with young players in our squad.

Unless ofc it's someone from the academy who is purely potential and without any regular exposure like King who we're apparently wasting and who will leave us because we've not given him more minutes...

For a set of fans bemoaning short termism in our transfer policy over the last few years we sure do seem to take a short-term view of any young player's output - or a short-term view of any youth prospect's handling

[Angus Telford]

We have the oldest team in the league, and besides the newly-promoted clubs, the lowest value. It's hardly a spurious complaint from Mick.

[Tabby]

I'd again point to the examples of Robinson / Muniz who yes were signed pre our recent prem stint but who have weathered criticism to become highly rated. Let's not write off ESR yet. And Sess has been a relative success, but before Feb I'm not sure I read any posts hailing his re-signing as genius - I think he has a lot of potential still.

My point is that often I read here we need to sign youth but rarely have the same voices actually accommodated the progression youth needs to go through when we deal with young players in our squad.

A lot of football fans are fickle, what a huge revelation. We better sign some 30 year olds to be disappointed by instead

Unless ofc it's someone from the academy who is purely potential and without any regular exposure like King who we're apparently wasting and who will leave us because we've not given him more minutes...

For a set of fans bemoaning short termism in our transfer policy over the last few years we sure do seem to take a short-term view of any young player's output - or a short-term view of any youth prospect's handling

Yeah, wanting to get more out of our academy instead of having them leave for peanuts is the height of short term thinking.

Do you have any point other than grandstanding? Should we sign younger players or continue with a policy of older players?

[Deeping_white]

https://twitter.com/fulhamtransfer/status/1932721661712679192

[Jim©]

Bassey is the only example we have of a player that we got fairly young (and that has increased in value) since promotion. Other than him the only under 25s we've signed is ESR and Sess last season, so it is improving I guess.

And Cuenca. Stansfield was a good example of someone young increasing in value!
We've grown the value of most of the players we've bought over the last couple of years- Lukic, Periera, Traore, even Iwobi worth more supposedly.

[steed the legend]

As usual we are letting our best youth players go. Callum Osman is going for a pittance to Celtic, and we left another talent Kristian Sekularac go to a Hungarian club earlier this year.  No doubt the likes of Ridgeon and Dair will leave next year.
We never seem to value our young talent.

[alfie]

As usual we are letting our best youth players go. Callum Osman is going for a pittance to Celtic, and we left another talent Kristian Sekularac go to a Hungarian club earlier this year.  No doubt the likes of Ridgeon and Dair will leave next year.
We never seem to value our young talent.

Surely it's possible the agents putting stuff in players head, "stay with Fulham and work your way up, or sign for Celtic and play champions league".
I do find it frustrating that we immediately put any blame on Fulham without knowing full facts.
I'm not saying this is what happens, it's just another view of what might be.

[Angus Telford]

Bassey is the only example we have of a player that we got fairly young (and that has increased in value) since promotion. Other than him the only under 25s we've signed is ESR and Sess last season, so it is improving I guess.

And Cuenca. Stansfield was a good example of someone young increasing in value!
We've grown the value of most of the players we've bought over the last couple of years- Lukic, Periera, Traore, even Iwobi worth more supposedly.

Difference is most teams have 8-10 players aged 17-23 in and around their first team, maybe 30% of the squad, whereas our "young" players are 25 year old Sessegnon and Cuenca.

Have to agree to disagree on Perreira, Traore and Iwobi. Dont think any of them would go for more than we paid (in Traore's case factoring in wages and sign-on fee). And certainly across the squad with the likes of Anderson and Berge we aren't generally getting our money back.

Robinson, Bassey (as noted above) and Muniz are probably the only players showing any real upside, quelle surprise the tiny minority that we actually brought in at a genuinely low age.

[JimmyConway]

Bassey is the only example we have of a player that we got fairly young (and that has increased in value) since promotion. Other than him the only under 25s we've signed is ESR and Sess last season, so it is improving I guess.

And Cuenca. Stansfield was a good example of someone young increasing in value!
We've grown the value of most of the players we've bought over the last couple of years- Lukic, Periera, Traore, even Iwobi worth more supposedly.

Difference is most teams have 8-10 players aged 17-23 in and around their first team, maybe 30% of the squad, whereas our "young" players are 25 year old Sessegnon and Cuenca.

Have to agree to disagree on Perreira, Traore and Iwobi. Dont think any of them would go for more than we paid (in Traore's case factoring in wages and sign-on fee). And certainly across the squad with the likes of Anderson and Berge we aren't generally getting our money back.

Robinson, Bassey (as noted above) and Muniz are probably the only players showing any real upside, quelle surprise the tiny minority that we actually brought in at a genuinely low age.

Tend to agree the three you mention are our current prize assets along with possibly Wilson in his current form.

[Jim©]

Robinson, Bassey (as noted above) and Muniz are probably the only players showing any real upside, quelle surprise the tiny minority that we actually brought in at a genuinely low age.

Tend to agree the three you mention are our current prize assets along with possibly Wilson in his current form.

I think the point made that age = upside is incorrect. Mitro and Palhinha, the two biggest sales in our history were not of that profile.

[KJS]

As usual we are letting our best youth players go. Callum Osman is going for a pittance to Celtic, and we left another talent Kristian Sekularac go to a Hungarian club earlier this year.  No doubt the likes of Ridgeon and Dair will leave next year.
We never seem to value our young talent.

If these young players turn down their contract offers then there is honestly Nothing the club can do about it, we offer the contract we believe is what the further investment of the player is worth and if they don't think it is then they can leave🙄

[Angus Telford]

Robinson, Bassey (as noted above) and Muniz are probably the only players showing any real upside, quelle surprise the tiny minority that we actually brought in at a genuinely low age.

Tend to agree the three you mention are our current prize assets along with possibly Wilson in his current form.

I think the point made that age = upside is incorrect. Mitro and Palhinha, the two biggest sales in our history were not of that profile.

We signed Mitrovic age 23.

Palhinha was indeed an outlier but a freak in that respect.

[hopper]

I also want to bring the average age of the team down, but think the talk of age gets completely out of hand. People can look at that too much and create artificial dates at which a player for one reason or another will no longer be good or be too slow.

Age is linear but the relative performances people are capable of at it are non-linear so it shouldn't be simplified.

The Premier League is insanely competitive with teams spending so much each season and with many good managers. A club like ours is obviously wanting to minimise any margin for error, hence preferring slightly more experienced players. I don't see any problem with that.

I agree though that it is also imperative to have a few younger players in the squad as it helps create a balanced squad, and gives opportunities in the future to potentially make a profit.

You can go too far with getting in too many signings based on potential as Leeds spending spree a few seasons ago on inexperience showed. Few of those signings performed well in the short term and not many look like current stars now either.

I don't mean this to grandstand but just to say I will judge the players based on what they do on the pitch and don't believe we should be obsessing on their age profile.

[Bal_13]

I'd again point to the examples of Robinson / Muniz who yes were signed pre our recent prem stint but who have weathered criticism to become highly rated. Let's not write off ESR yet. And Sess has been a relative success, but before Feb I'm not sure I read any posts hailing his re-signing as genius - I think he has a lot of potential still.

My point is that often I read here we need to sign youth but rarely have the same voices actually accommodated the progression youth needs to go through when we deal with young players in our squad.

A lot of football fans are fickle, what a huge revelation. We better sign some 30 year olds to be disappointed by instead

Unless ofc it's someone from the academy who is purely potential and without any regular exposure like King who we're apparently wasting and who will leave us because we've not given him more minutes...

For a set of fans bemoaning short termism in our transfer policy over the last few years we sure do seem to take a short-term view of any young player's output - or a short-term view of any youth prospect's handling

Yeah, wanting to get more out of our academy instead of having them leave for peanuts is the height of short term thinking.

Do you have any point other than grandstanding? Should we sign younger players or continue with a policy of older players?

The intention of the post wasn't to be grandstanding. It just seems fans are so quick to bemoan our transfer policy when the reality is our club is in the best shape competitively that it's been in for over a decade.

Last time we went in wholesale on our academy players and youth signings from memory was the 2014-15 season (Roberts, Woodrow, Christensen, Hyndman, Dembele, Bettineli) and that nearly ended in relegation...from the championship (also how have most of those careers shaped up?).

Perhaps the fact we're more judicious with which academy players play for the first team (Elliot, Carvalho, Sess, now King) means we're actually letting the cream of the academy rise to the top and letting those not good enough move on? And equally the young players we've signed more recently as Angus pointed out have done well... which hasn't always been the case.

This isn't to say I disagree with the argument our squad is one of the oldest in the prem - it's a fact. I've posted elsewhere that I agree we should be signing a younger profile of player this summer.

But equally the characterisation of the club as wasting the academy / being unable to sign young players just doesn't sit well with me. Yes we can get more youth in, but it's not like we've exclusively signed 30 year olds for the last 3-5 years either.

[Angus Telford]

the reality is our club is in the best shape competitively that it's been in for over a decade.

You make some good points and i mostly sympathise but I'd query this. In the last MAF season we finished 12th, and went into the next season as 5th/6th favourites for relegation. Almost identical to our current position on those metrics. And no one with hindsight would say we were in great shape competitively, largely because, like now, we had the oldest side in the division. Don't get me wrong it was worse then than now (average age 29.9 vs 27.9 now) but we've learned the hard way it's a creeping risk that we ignore at our peril.

[Ffc10_]

Muniz to Leeds £50 million on a few different sites, can't see Leeds spending a third of budget on him though when they need at least 7 new first team players