as regards Neil...

I don't think we really expected him to get us promoted when we appointed him, given where we were in the league at the time. If we hadn't, of course, the current financial restrictions would have kicked in and we would have been looking at him bringing in the young players (which I think is why we appointed him).
Then, of course, he unexpectedly got us promoted and all the accompanying Prem money came our way. With those resources and the pressure to stay up the anticipated youth program went out of the window (let's face it, how many people on here would have been happy with us filling our team in the Prem with untested young players while we were sitting on huge piles of Premier League cash?)

Posted By: mr carra, Jul 10, 13:17:56