I did intend these articles to be a little more frequent. After all, if other clubs do want to know why Lincoln City have been successful, the sooner the better, right?
Of course, I don’t believe football clubs will be reading this, but having seen plenty of people say ‘are Lincoln City the blueprint’, I wanted to explore what that blueprint was. One of the big points to discuss has to be player recruitment.
Last year, I had a spat on Twitter with some users for suggesting our recruitment was good. I took umbrage at the comments that for every good player we’ve signed, there are four bad, and I proved it. However, there is an interesting distinction to make between a hit and a miss in my opinion.
For instance, we’ve no doubt Jack Moylan, Ben House, Reeco Hackett, Ivan Varfolomeev and a host of others are hits, right? What about Justin Obikwu and Frankie Okoronkwo? Not misses, they played their part in this season, so in my mind, they are ones that this discussion is, partly, focused on.
Ali Smith and JJ McKiernan, misses? For us, maybe, but both have proven to be adequate (or better) League One players. They didn’t work for us, granted, but they do suggest a level of recruitment in terms of pure ability that is very good.
What is a miss? Jamie Robson? Yes, probably. Zak Bradshaw and Jay Benn? Not for me. Project players that didn’t work out, sure, but neither were they integral to the squad when they came in, nor did they have a level of hope on their shoulders. Therein lies the distinction for me: a hit or miss is defined by the final output balanced against the original expectation. Jamie Robson came in as a six-figure purchase, didn’t perform well and left for a club of lower stature, albeit for a fee that turned us a small profit.
Using that rationale, and assuming you can’t really brand a player a hit or a miss until they have gone, I’m going to suggest a hypothesis for you to debate online. The last two 100% transfer misses were Jaden Brown and Tyler Walker. I’ll leave that one with you.
Change of plan
This isn’t an article about who is and isn’t a success, but that argument strikes at the heart of the point. Our recruitment, in the main, has been exceptional for a number of years. There has been a long-term plan under Michael Skubala. I’ll defend Mark Kennedy here: we had a plan under him that seemed to suggest we were relying on youth alone. Okay, we signed Brown and Walker with experience (Ethan Hamilton and Paudie O’Connor also arrived under him, but we’ll let the narrative settle; we only signed young, untested players), but there has been a clear shift under Michael Skubala.
That’s been for two main reasons. One, I do think we have added real experience. Not players aged 23 with 150 games, but players in their 30s with a nice balance of fitness and 400+ matches. Tendayi Darikwa was the first, but James Collins, Sonny Bradley and Adam Reach all followed. All four have been, at some stage, vital in the squad’s development. It’s a minefield, by the way, balancing experience and influence, and we don’t always get it right. Sam Clucas, a good player with a solid season behind him at Shrewsbury, fitted the profile but didn’t quite land here.
Adding that experience has enabled the younger players to develop, but also placed less emphasis on them to perform in big games, meaning they have performed more. That sounds nuts, but I do believe we’ve seen more of Jack Moylan, Freddie Draper, Ivan Varfolomeev and the like because they haven’t had the same pressure that, say, Jovon Makama had when he had to carry the front line himself.
The second major reason is funds. Ethan Erhahon wasn’t a flop. He didn’t go for the figure we thought he might, but we doubled our investment on him. With the Makama funds, among others, we’ve been able to add Deji Elerewe, Josh Honohan and Ivan Varfolomeev, to name three. They’ve had different degrees of impact, but Deji has played a role in this run-in, and Ivan has turned into a real favourite. Again, not all cash buys have smashed it: Erik Ring has shown flashes, but not quite landed properly, and yet he too has had a role to play this season.
Passengers with a purpose
I did a live dog walk the other day around recruitment and coined the phrase ‘passengers with a purpose’, which I quite like. In truth, nobody has been a passenger this season. Jamie Pardington won an award for the work we don’t see, and while we haven’t watched Kamil Conteh in action yet, he’s been around the squad plenty, having an influence on the culture. However, not one signing, in my opinion, has given us a dead weight in the squad.
Oscar Thorn is still one for the future, and seeing how Rob Street has matured since arriving and not making an immediate impact, it would be unfair to rule him out right now. He’s been injured and not been a first-team squad member, but is he a passenger? No, his brief cameos earlier in the season showed promise, and my guess would be a loan next season into League One.
Kamil Conteh hasn’t played, granted, but what if McGrandles had got injured? We’d have needed that cover, so yes, he’s been a passenger, but he’s not been one without use. Just because we haven’t used him only makes him a passenger in hindsight, I suppose, and nobody has that. People chuckle about Lee Angol and James Brown in the 2018/19 season, but also moan about the lack of depth that ended up with us playing the only three strikers we had in play-off games against Exeter City. You can’t have it both ways, you either carry spares, or run the risk of being ill-prepared.
Even the loans were genius this season. Frankie Okoronkwo and Justin Obikwu were decent for us. If we had them for the second half of the season, all running with a point to prove, we’d have appreciated them more. Obikwu’s impact against Luton and Peterborough was impressive, but when he started (Bradford, I think) it wasn’t so good. That is just like Alfie Lloyd, isn’t it? Lloyd has been exceptional from the bench, but on his start didn’t have the same impact.
By changing the loans in January, whether intentional (Frankie) or not (Justin), we injected fresh attitude. The two previous loan players would know in January they weren’t going to be starting games, their initial drive to impress may have faded slightly. Out they go, and in come two more players, eager to impress. Ryan Oné has a point to prove to Sheffield United, which he has, and Alfie Lloyd had just come back from injury. Both have been part of a ridiculous run and, therefore, recency bias has cemented them as big signings. Freddie Draper’s injury also made them necessary. If Draper stayed fit, we’d likely have seen far less of those two, like with Lee Angol in 2018/19.
Slow build
Finally, a key to our success has been long-term planning. Six of the current squad played some role in Michael Skubala’s first few months as boss (Ben House, Reeco Hackett, Adam Jackson, Conor McGrandles, Freddie Draper and Jack Moylan). When you consider two of those shared the Golden Boot (thus far) this season, in a world where transfer strategy seems to purely hinge on getting in goal scorers, I think it speaks volumes. Our recruitment pre-Skubala was decent (House, Hackett, Draper and Moylan, for instance) and as head coach, Michael has improved those players and we’ve added so well.
Indeed, of the team that played the game against Doncaster as we won the title, ten were here last season. Loans, granted, are one-season features, but only Towler, Bradley, Reach, Varfolomeev and Elerewe came in over the summer. If you looked at a side like Huddersfield, for instance, 12 of the team that lost 4-1 against Mansfield Town were signed over the summer or later. The irony is that one of only three or four to have been there longer is one we sold them, Lasse Sorensen.
We’ve had continuity, and remember, the likes of Joe Hutchinson have left and come back, Marc Tracy left. We’ve had some changes behind the scenes, but there has been a focus on the long game. This squad is not rebuilt every summer, and it could be. When you think about what we lost in the summer, it’s remarkable the squad still feels continuous. Sean Roughan (Towler, Reach), Paudie O’Connor (Bradley), Erhahon (Varfolomeev) and Makama (loans) have all had to be replaced, all major players last year and, without any bitterness, not one missed. I don’t mean that as they were no good, I just mean at no point, from games one to game 44, have we said ‘I wish Ethan Erhahon were still here’. All were replaced by players who have done just as well.
Culture
Of course, the signings we’ve made are all good people; that is obvious. Under Mark Kennedy, I’m told by some fans there were ‘bad eggs’. I’m not sure I buy that, I think there was a culture of division in terms of post-match interviews, maybe calling some players out made it seem like a divided dressing room. Danny Mandroiu sang our praises when we went after Josh Honohan, so he can’t have been too bad, underlining that maybe the ‘bad egg’ scenario was more rumour and less fact.
It’s hard to gauge culture from the outside. We (as in the Stacey West) gobble up the soundbites at face value at times, players saying they’d go for coffee with each other, and you never really know. My experience over this weekend with various players is that the dressing room is solid, but then when you go 28 unbeaten it will be, and it has to be. The proof is in the outcomes, but winning games brings togetherness.
I do think there was an example of it on the pitch this weekend. We get a penalty, Rob Street on nine goals, Reeco Hackett on nine goals. Street has the ball in his hand and with zero fuss, hands it to Hackett. A small gesture, and given he’d missed one, perhaps obvious, but no arguing, no discussion, no trying to hold the ball for himself.
Contrast that with Max Sanders and Harry Boyes doing rock, paper, scissors against Shrewsbury, or Ted Bishop and Tyler Walker having a spat against Blackpool for the second penalty at 2-0 up. Little moments, big messages.
Conclusion
One of the secrets to our success is recruitment, but in the long term. We have signed some players with a view to their value rising, and ended up seeing them grow here: Ben House being the obvious one. We’ve signed to sell and sold well (Jensen, Erhahon, Sorensen) and invested the money back, not in Alfie May or Dion Charles, but in calculated purchases intended to replace and replenish, not give us a quick boost. There has been a focused drive for the right players, and at times, that’s been against fans’ wishes. Prior to this season’s big kick-off, we’d lost talent and not replaced; we felt exposed and threadbare. Remember, Bola Okewoye and Noah Simmons played in the cup early doors, which seems crazy now, given the depth of the squad.
The recruitment team have remained patient, added sensibly rather than splurged and kept a measured and structured approach to recruitment over five windows, which has resulted in us having a strong squad, losing nobody as we go up and protected in terms of wage increases so we can add quality. It’s a huge ask for them to now scale that up, but honestly, they have to be given the benefit of any doubt as the recent record has been as good as any side in League One.
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