The winter transfer window simply came and went on Tyneside, as despite speculation that we would bring in fresh blood and guard against our injury issue, no one arrived through the door.
Though we have been bolstered by the recent returns of Dan Burn and Will Osula to the first team squad, we are still criminally short depth-wise across the squad, in particular in the defence, with Tino Livramento, Fabian Schar and Emil Krafth all out.
This morning, Howe tried to defend and explain the reserved approach taken by the club this window, despite the risks that inactivity will pose to our chances in each of the four major competitions.
Sadly, it looks like PSR was (somehow) a factor once again, also hinting that the right players were not there for us to sign in a notoriously tricky January window.
> _“Is it a risk? Erm…yes. I need to choose my words carefully here…we were left with no other option really. Every decision we make has a long term implication. There was no guarantee even signing someone with the funds we had would even help us short term._
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> _“It is what it is. We have been used to working in these conditions for a while…we have only been active in one of the last 4 or 5 windows._
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> _“We also had a very limited amount of money to use in this window. We have a need in the short term defensively, but those options weren’t there for us so we can’t sign players that don’t exist.”_
Howe then admitted that, not only were the right players not available, but it was decided that the summer will be a more suitable window to recruit, especially from a quality and value for money perspective as we continue to wrestle with PSR.
> _“Financially, it wasn’t possible. We are under financial restrictions. We have to be smart and decided to wait until the summer._
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> _“The decision is that the summer window is a lot easier to recruit. There are more players available and better value for money._
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> _“There were players we were looking at for the future, younger players we could develop. Ultimately, it didn’t happen. I didn’t think there was a player coming in that could affect us”_
Howe has backed the quality and character of his current available players to pull through, even if there is a current imbalance at the back due to defensive injuries.
> _“The squad is okay. I think if it was a fully fit squad it would be really strong in all areas, of course it’s not so we need to get our injured players back fit._
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> _“Until we do I think there will be a slight imbalance and we’re certainly stretched defensively, but yeah of course I’m very happy with the squad when it’s got a clean bill of health.”_