£90m spent, 60 transfers and why Mark Robins isn’t only answer to huge Stoke City issue
Stoke City are in the process of another major appointment ahead of a huge summer transfer window
Stoke City have made a massive appointment already this year by bringing in Mark Robins but the manager is just one big part of the puzzle that the club has to get right.
The departure of Lee Darnbrough as head of recruitment just one week after the end of the January transfer window meant easy conclusions could be drawn about the reasons behind the decision.
It was always going to be a difficult month for Stoke because of Financial Fair Play constraints plus losing top scorer Tom Cannon but it was still on the disappointing side of the spectrum. In the end they made two loan signings – Ali Al-Hamadi and Josh Wilson-Esbrand, who had worked previously with Robins at Coventry. Lewis Baker, Nathan Lowe and Ryan Mmaee returned from loans away as well.
Robins was always adamant that it was better to work with what he had, and particularly with Stoke’s own players, rather than make a signing for the sake of it that wasn’t going to improve the starting XI. Better to give game time to Lowe in the Championship, for example, than borrow a kid to develop from a Premier League team.
Bristol City weren’t keen to sell Mark Sykes at a price Stoke were willing to pay and Stoke pulled out of a move for Hibs winger Elie Youan, who they had sniffed around 12 months previously. There was potential for a sixth loan but the cons outweighed the pros. For whatever reason, Stoke couldn’t find the right, affordable player.
Darnbrough had only been at Stoke for eight months but now he’s gone. A specialist recruitment agency is expected to be tasked with finding the right person to come in and report to Jon Walters and John Coates, building a better squad for Robins, who spoke on Friday about the importance of everyone being aligned.
