The current Division two is nothing like the one that we won with Dicky Dosh. Then it was made up of a lot of struggling clubs with no funds, and we probably had one of the bigger budgets.
Now there is a lot of money being spent by our fellow Division 2 Clubs, with many having much higher budgets than us. I would suggest the following clubs have much bigger budgets, and ambition than we have. Wrexham, Gillingham, Mansfield, Stockport, Notts County, MK Dons, Swindon, Salford, Bradford and Doncaster.
On this basis a top ten finish for us would represent an achievement
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I agree.
However, Fulham had a big budget under Keegan and we still gave them a run for their money.
Blood some youth, play attacking football and have a positive match day experience (lots of factors go into this) and we can still make positive progress.
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I don’t think “ambition” really comes into it. All of those clubs have bigger budgets by virtue either of rich owners willing to throw money at a potentially unsustainable level and/or by virtue of the crowds they get.
I agree with the main point though…top 10 is a good performance.
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Might as well wrap the football club up if scraping top 10 in L2 is the best we can ever hope for
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Well done on missing the point.
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Accrington, Morecambe, Stevenage and to a lesser extent Northampton and Burton show it can be done, but my God its tough
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When asked if the budget will still be top 10 this season, Pomlett said: "It is. There are funds available and we have a competitive budget for this year.
"But the team that got promoted in the play-offs (Morecambe) didn’t and yet they got promoted.
"It’s about the whole infrastructure, the quality of the management team, the recruitment process – a whole myriad of things, one of which is the playing budget.
"The playing budget will be fine, we cannot use that as an excuse for failure.
"We just spent a considerable sum of money at the training ground because we have a drainage problem there, that’s of significant value.
"That’s part of the whole playing budget at the football club, it’s just not going into a player’s bank, but it’s helping them be successful.
“It’s not just about the playing budget, we get fixated by that. It’s just one of the elements.”
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There’s numerous examples yep. We don’t even know what our budget is either. Didn’t Pomlett say it was around top 7 last season?
Using your budget wisely can often trump spend spend spend but unfortunately I don’t think Sadler is the man.
Also. id say the many of the other teams Barrow, Grimsby, Morecambe. They are very well managed.
It is very different to most seasons in L2 where one or two clubs couldn’t even pay their players.
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Exactly. Which also makes signing players good enough to get out of this league difficult.
Those will be after the same kind of players and a club isn’t going to accept a bid from them and accept a bid off us half the size just because we’re little old Walsall with not as much money.
Also means wage demands for those players will be inflated. Hopefully calms down next season a little if a few of those clubs go up.
I would be astounded if our budget was anywhere near the ten clubs mentioned despite Pomletts claims
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You may be right about Sadler and I understand that opposition managers are hardly likely to say that he’s useless; however, the Grimsby manager had him as his skipper at Shrewsbury and he was one of Clarke’s signings to organise a defence.
I recognise that the defence has been an issue but there have been individual errors (Foulkes has poorly cleared leading to two goals) that cannot be attributed to the coach.
I just hope Waddock is not another Neil McDonald because an experienced number two is crucial to a team’s success (think about the clamour for O’Kelly).
I really hope it works out for him at Walsall; however, if it doesn’t, I fully expect a club to hire Sadler quite quickly in some kind of coaching capacity (a bit like Whitney who is a strength and conditioning coach at the Villa currently, I believe).
A good cup run would really help. Remember when Walsall lost to Mourinho’s Chelsea? That performance was a real springboard and youngsters like Rico really brought back the excitement.
Get Priestley fit and things will start to look more slick, I hope.
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Not sure what your point is. I believe a large part of the playing budget for when those quotes were relevant went on Wilkinson and Labadie. Bit unfair to ignore our terrible injuries.
I agree @Andy_Petterson. Both were marquee signings.
Ironically, Wilko and DJ were brilliant at Orient.
Ash Taylor came from Aberdeen with a good reputation.
Labadie was captain of a playoff finalist who absolutely bossed midfield (and scored against us) against most league two sides (when he wasn’t suspended).
Add George Miller to the mix and that’s the best part of £10k a week (combined) on 4 key players. Only one came anywhere close to representing value for money…
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That budgets are just one element of a successful team and you don’t need to have a top 10 budget to get out of this league, unless we are getting our excuses in early 
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To be fair neither of those players was good enough for the money they were reportedly being paid. Wilkinson had it in him but nowhere near often enough.
That is part of the problem, if you spend relatively big wages on a player then they need to have a big impact. Can’t do much about those injuries of course, they happen.
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Its not the only factor, but it would be foolish to pretend budget doesnt matter if objectively assessing where we should finish this season.
Can’t quite see where anyone is saying that?
My interpretation of you saying this is that a team does not need a top 10 budget to be top 7
I do agree with that.
But then I dont agree with getting angry if a team without top 10 budget isnt top 7 which seems to be the flavour of a number of posts on this site at the moment.
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Budget is a factor but the manager is the most key for me - I didn’t want Saddler and only time will tell if he’s the right man
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