Quote Originally Posted by freemuzzy View Post
The problem is those out of contract are largely those who’ve been playing. The likes of Mitchell, Taylor, Vincent and Knight who for whatever reason have been nowhere near the team in recent months all have another year.

So there doesn’t look a lot of room for manoeuvre. Personally I’d keep the likes of DKE and Chicksen as solid squad players and good characters who (presumably) won’t be among the top earners. Brindley I’d expect to get a move to the Football League. Wootton’s obviously gone - just hope he goes somewhere he’ll play regularly. Lacey probably depends on earnings given his injury record, but he was (again) excellent last night.

Big decision is on Rodrigues and Roberts, both have a year left but would say it’s very unlikely currently that either signs a new deal beyond that. So if the owners want to enforce the model and get any ROI for them then you’d think they could go (particularly Ruben), but surely we need to keep them as replacing Wootton will be hard enough, let alone either/both of those too.
If the aim is to develop and sell players for a profit, and then reinvest that in the next young talent, Rodrigues and Roberts should be sold this summer. Either that or offer them new contracts so they don't leave for free in 2023, like Wootton will do this month. If they move for free next year, the model will start to look like a failure.