Almost inevitable end point for every team that has to trade to stay competitive - just ask Southampton. Unless the top 17 are now set forever, which would be very bad, sooner or later all of the non big 6 clubs will have a bad transfer window or a couple and get relegated.
Though interesting how many bad windows you need now to be at relegation level last season for example. Probably a few for most clubs in the mid band if you're only selling one or two players per year to the big guys.
Obviously he looks dreadful as a Leicester player, but the year before he was a regular in a successful Bologna team in Serie A, so maybe it's more Leicester than him(?).
Yes, if you have a solid base the gap for the promoted sides still tends to be too big and they need a remarkable recruitment drive to get anywhere close to catching up.
The consensus in the comments hasn't aged well though. For example: "I think our FB's are as good as you can ask for out of a non-Top 6 club" about Leicester. In Feb 2023. As they were heading out of the premier league.
There's a number of (possibly) contradictory factors at play in how signings are made/perceived. There's the "costs x million, so must be good(bad)", then there's what they are currently doing (may not be a good match for their skill set, might be being made to look good by the players around them - eg Drinkwater, might be a synergy (or otherwise) thing related to the style of play - Grealish at Villa versus Shitty, might be a comfort or otherwise in the environment or pace of the league, might just be happy (or sad)).
The absolute genius of Peter Taylor was that he could look at a player and see what he could actually do, and how that could fit into what we might want them to do....then hand them over to Brian to destabilise and control them.
While I, personally, think replacing Elanga's skillset should be easier than replacing Murillo's, it's also worth noting that we already have a number of centre backs and no other wingers except CHO.
We really need 2 more wingers even before we sell one.
I get lambasted by my friends for being very negative about Forest (I normally just point to experience in reply!) , so I've been trying to "take a break" - but I'm getting pretty jumpy about our lack of signings now. We need substantial incomings if we're going to be competing in Europe as well as aiming for a top half PL finish. They don't all need to be superstars, we're just generally short of bodies (of the quality required). I wonder if the lack of clarity about our European competition is making things difficult from our cash perspective and from the potential players.
I think more of a problem is that the level of european competition that we are in is broadly a bit crap/inconsequential. Handy if you win it and go up a level of crap european competition...but not the sort of competition that merits a lot of spend on many extra bodies. We can't afford to up the quality and the number of bodies, so some careful balancing...plus nuno likes a small group. As much as anything we need some U21's who can do us a job against shamrock rovers, or whoever.
If I had to choose one of Murillo, Gibbs White or Elanga to sell, it would be Gibbs White. There are less flair options that could do his job. In some circumstances, a willingness to be a bit simpler might be the better option. If less fun to watch.
Gibbs-White is the heartbeat of this Forest side and therefore the hardest to replace. Elanga has proven himself to be an excellent signing for Forest - it was a privilege to watch him at Ipswich last season when he was largely unplayable.
However, I'd argue that fast, direct wide players who can finish are more common than those like Morgan who have something else about them. Whether you can procure one is another thing.
Out of the current crop, I'd be more disappointed to lose Morgan, Murillo and Anderson than Elanga. And I really like Elanga. As others have said, buy-low-sell-at-top-of-price-point is the only way provincial clubs survive in the Premier League.