Task 1 Main Page & Boardroom meeting page

Winners of Task 1 - TEAM Bam
Fired - Tino

Mr Nando, my team and I would like to clarify a couple of things.

1. Will wages be factored in?
2. What is the timeframe to achieve the target?
3. Will we be able to sign free agents in the summer or will we have to go by TM Values?

Will our wage bill total over the next 18 months come off of our £250m budget?

Hi Nando,
On behalf of my team, I would like to ask the following questions.

1. Are wages to be included within the £250m
2. How is the task to be judged - most likely to make top 4?
3. Do we take existing injuries into account - ie Coleman's current record
4. Is it strictly transfermarkt fees? So if a player's 'real' value is vastly different to his price on transfermarkt, does the value remain?
5. Can we loan players in?

Nando

I assume if new players wages are to be included within the 250m budget, the wages saved on players we sell can be added to the budget?

I also assume it is only 18 months worth of wages we should be including for new signings for our budget? Assuming 18m due to your answer to our 3rd question earlier

Nando

Do we have a minimum/maximum squad size we have to keep to?

Just a quick one. Are we buying players at TM Value? Or realistic values?

Team B have submitted their proposal

Don't we submit them here?

I've PM'd Nando, but happy to put it here if that's what you're meant to do

Plan to get Everton competing for the Top 4 next season

With Sam Allardyce remaining manager throughout the duration of this project, we felt we had to take into account the style of footballer often (unfairly) associated with Sam's style of play. We also had to recognise that mass squad building in the middle of the season would cause too much unrest among the squad, as this is not a fantasy game we felt we had to build slowly and separate our buying and selling between this January transfer window and the summer months.

We started by sorting out the defence. Everton's issues have been caused by not having a solid enough base, and to address this we agreed as a team to sell the following four players in January.

Leighton Baines - £9m TM Value - £70k p/w (£5.46m over 18 months) = £14.46m
Ashley Williams - £6.3m TM Value - £75k p/w (£5.85m over 18 months) = £12.15m
Phil Jagielka - £1.8m TM Value - £50k p/w (£3.9m over 18 months) = £5.7m
Oumar Niasse - £7.2m TM Value - £55k p/w (£4.29m over 18 months) = £11.49m
Total raised = £43.8m

Initial budget of £250m + the money raised from these four departures = £293.8m

Budget wise, players bought and sold in January would have their wages calculated over 18 months, and players bought and sold in the summer would have their wages calculated over 12 months, to keep it realistic and also to stretch the budget until the end of next season.

As a team we named five signings to make (in addition to the obvious additions of Theo Walcott and Cenk Tosun) that would improve our defence, and as well as settle in for next season, they would assist us in pushing for 7th place in the Premier League this season, our thought process being that if we get into the Europa League next season it would make it likelier we could sign the players we wanted to in the summer and also keep hold of the players we had signed in January. 7th place will guarantee us a Europa League spot as one of the sides already in the Top 6 will win the League Cup.

The five signings are;

1. Juan Bernat. A no brainer for us, as there are real life links to Bernat leaving Bayern and possibly moving to Everton, it made sense for us to get him in, not only would be playing first team football in a World Cup year but he would also improve his wages in the process (currently on €65k per week). Bernat only has 18 months left on his contract so Bayern wouldn't command a monster fee either. No fees suggested, but with a TM value of £10.8m and wages of €65k per week, our bid of £15m and £100k per week we feel would entice both player and club. Over 18 months, the total outlay would be £22.8m. Remaining budget £271m.

2. Kamil Glik. We feel that with Monaco being out of Europe and out of the Champions League places in Ligue 1, that Glik would accept the opportunity to join our growing club. Aged 29, Glik would bring experience to our back line without being too old like the current crop of defenders are. Glik has a contract until 2020 so we would need to make it worth Monaco's while, but I feel a bid of £30m would be fair with wages of £120k per week enticing the Polish born defender to Merseyside. Total outlay would be close to £40m. Remaining budget £231m.

3. Alfie Mawson. With Jagielka and Williams leaving, we feel we need to bring in another centre back. Alfie Mawson has been doing good things with Swansea despite their lowly position in the Premier League. Much like Ashley Williams before him, Mawson would be able to leave Swansea to join a bigger side, offering chances of playing in Europe and also improving his salary. Swansea wouldn't be keen to sell, but money talks, and a bid of £25m would be too much for Swansea to turn down. Mawson is only on £25k per week so a £75k per week Everton contract trebling his money would definitely appeal to him. Total outlay £31m. Remaining budget £200m.

4. Stefano Sturaro. With Everton needing more in midfield, as well as the unfortunately timed injury to James McCarthy, we feel that Sturaro would be the ideal signing. He's been a great utility player for Juventus, but with appearances limited, we feel we can offer Sturaro a deal that not only gives him the first team football he desires, but a new challenge and a contract that would reward him handsomely. His latest contract worked out at €48k per week and lasts until 2021. Despite real life reports a couple of weeks ago where Juventus stated he wasn't for sale, new stories have emerged of Cagliari and Genoa attempting to sign him to give him the gametime he craves. We would offer Juventus almost double the £12.8m Southampton offered last summer, £25m. And we would offer the player double his money and a bit more, at £100k per week. The total outlay would be £33m, leaving our remaining budget at £167m.

5. David Neres. Neres would be a signing for next season, but with the added benefit of 6 months to get used to the Premier League before he is expected to deliver performances. Neres would give us the pace and trickery we need out wide and be a great asset to the side in the future. Neres only joined Ajax 12 months ago for £10.8m, so Ajax would have to be handsomely compensated. Reports are that Neres is not on more than £10k per week, so we feel an offer of £50k per week and (presuming we meet our target for the 2nd half of this season) playing in the same Europa League as Ajax, would be enough to bring Neres to Everton. We would offer £25m to Ajax, with a total of £29m going out, and our budget down to £138m.

One final piece of business is to bring in additional coaching. We felt Mike Phelan would be a great addition, he's been out of work but is proven as a top coach. We feel he is a perfect fit under Big Sam and frankly improves on the current coaching regime of Sammy Lee. We estimate his wages to be circa £1m per year, the higher price to reflect Mike's desire to be a manager, at least he'd be close to manager money.

Remaining budget end of January: £137m.

---------------------

Phase two. Now, we know the aim for the second half of the season was to qualify for the Europa League, but whether or not we achieved that wasn't going to change our summer transfer plans.

As a team, we decided we would sell the following players;

(We've included James McCarthy in this, we feel with his leg break it would be harsh to sell him in January, however he was going to be offloaded pre-injury so hopefully it's not too frowned upon to let him go in the summer.)

Maarten Stekelenburg - £900k TM Value - £25k p/w (£1.3m over 12 months) = £2.2m
Cuco Martina - £1.8m TM Value - €53k p/w rounded down to £45k p/w (£2.34m over 12 months) = £4.14m
James McCarthy - £10.8m TM Value - £50k p/w (£2.6m over 12 months) = £13.4m
Ramiro Funes Mori - £10.8m TM Value - £40k p/w (£2.08m over 12 months) = £12.88m
Total raised = £32.62m (rounded down to £32.5m)

And our incoming signings in the summer would be, beginning with our increased budget of £169.5m, are;

1. Hirving Lozano. Lozano is tearing it up at PSV but we feel the lure of the Premier League is stronger than ever, and with PSV a known selling club, we feel we can strike a deal. We would meet Lozano's £30m release clause, and quadruple his current €20k per week with a £75k per week contract. Total outgoings over 12 months = £34m, remaining budget £135.5m.

2. Jordan Lukaku. Lukaku has been making a great impression at Lazio, and we would like him to bolster our squad and challenge Juan Bernat for the LB/LWB role. One benefit is that his brother lives in the same north west of England and with the right wages, we feel that this would be a deal Jordan would be keen to complete. Not to mention it's his brothers old club. Transfer fee would be in the region of £15m, with wages of £75k per week a vast improvement and enticement. Total outgoings £19m, remaining budget £116.5m.

3. Sime Vrsaljko on a season long loan. Ideally we wouldn't use loan signings as we feel it hinders the long term project, however in Sime's case we had to make an exception. Vrsaljko is a phenomenal talent, however he is still out of favour at Atletico with Juanfran being a prominent figure. We would offer Vrsaljko first team football, in a very competitive league, and cover his wages while Atletico squeeze another season out of Juanfran, preparing Vrsaljko to go back to Atletico for the 2019/2020 season absolutely primed to take over the RB position. Outgoings would be modest, £2m to cover Vrsaljko's contract for the season. Remaining budget  £114.5m.

4. Harry Maguire. Maguire moved to Leicester for £17m last year, we feel Leicester would be open to accepting a bid of £36.5m which would adequately compensate them and allow Maguire to join the Everton ranks. We also feel almost doubling Maguire's £80k per week to £150k per week would convince him we are a club going forwards. Total outgoings, £44.5m, remaining budget £70m.

5. Matthew Ryan. The Aussie born shot stopper has been great at Brighton this season, but as a former Liverpool player he does have links to the area, and we feel we can offer Ryan a deal that would entice him to join Everton and challenge Pickford for the #1 shirt. We would offer £14.3m to more than double Brighton's initial outlay, and we know Ryan is on AUS$60k per week, which works out to roughly £35k per week. We'd double that to £70k. Total outgoings £18m, remaining budget £52m.

6. Olivier Giroud. Giroud isn't going to play much for Arsenal with the impending arrival of Aubameyang. We would offer Arsenal a £20m fee but it's the wages that Arsenal would be keen to save. Giroud is currently on £100k per week, but to convince Giroud (and Mrs Giroud) to join us, we would offer double that, to make Giroud our highest paid player at £200k per week. Silly money but such is the football world at the moment. Total outgoings, just over £10m in wages so £30m, leaving £22m remaining in our pocket.

We believe that these signings, alongside the signings made in January, would propel us into Top 4 challengers, and without expecting too much from Sam Allardyce's usual format, as these players would buy into what we feel we can achieve as a club. Our remaining budget of £22m would be exclusively put into our Youth Academy, to improve the facilities and coaching, which would hopefully lead to more youth team gems emerging in the future. Also, with Wayne Rooney still at the club and playing less and less, we would offer Wayne an Academy coaching role, where his influence over the next generation of Everton players could be invaluable.

We feel our best XI at the start of the 2018/19 season would be;


With backup of;

Thank you for reading.

Team B – Bam (PM), Miky, Nads, Trebs

As PM, I decided to split the tasks between our team as follows

Miky – Decide on who we would be selling from the existing squad, then work on the backroom/youth plan for the future
Nads – Once the budget was decided, focus on 1st team improvements to the positions identified, which were ultimately CB, LB, CM, Winger and Striker
Trebs – Focus on finding undervalued gems to add quality depth – GK, CB, CM, AM
Bam - oversee all 3 areas adding input wherever possible, pulled together financials linked to below, ensure we stuck to the agreed framework and timeline

Starting with a budget of £250m, we looked at our squad and decided over the rest of the January window and summer, we would look to sell the following players from our squad

LINK TO SALES - https://ibb.co/kCO9tb

Our sales are based on the players we think attract maximum value, have the highest wages and offer the least in terms of the direction we think the club should be going in, either past their best or never likely to get to the level that we require to achieve a top 4 finish.

This would give us an additional £117.6m over the course of the next 6 months to add to our budget, totalling £367.6m to improve our squad.

We then looked at how we would accelerate the development of the club, and looked to go big in January to bring in players that a team like Everton wouldn’t typically be associated with, but may potentially be available.

1. Stefan De Vrij - £22m fee, offering £80k per week on a 4 year contract and a £5m signing on fee – total cost to us £43.6m

Stefan is one of the best defenders in Serie A, but has just 6 months left on his contract and has not yet renewed. We make the bid to offer Lazio a chance at getting a fee for a great defender, and Stefan gets a substantial pay rise and the chance to be the defensive lynchpin of our project, as well as a £5m signing on fee as a sweetener

2. Layvin Kurzawa - £20m fee, offering £80k per week on a 4 year contract – total cost to us £36.6m

Layvin is currently on €75k(http://www.totalsportek.com/money/psg-salaries/ ), we are offering an uplift of £15k per week to a player who has been rumoured to be unsettled and is being rotated with Berchiche. PSG also need to balance the books for FFP, and L’Equipe reported they would be willing to let him go for c. €25m

If Kurzawa/PSG aren’t willing to make the deal, we would offer the same terms for Jonas Hector as a backup option

3. Oriol Romeu - £15m, offering £60k per week on a 3 year contract – total cost to us £24.4m

Oriol would come in and be a starter sitting alongside Gueye and giving us real steel in the middle of the park. We offer him the chance to play for a club looking to push towards the top 4 rather than a relegation battle

In the Summer transfer window we’d look to really push the club on. Our full list of signings is as follows, spending a total of £175m in transfer fees over the two windows, and committing to £138m in salary costs over a 4 season period.

LINK TO SIGNINGS - https://ibb.co/ch1rOb

We would look to use the success we have from Jan – end of season with De Vrij, Kurzawa and Romeu on board as a recruitment base to build on, looking to sign proven talent in the likes of Horn, Shawcross and Brozovic, and great potential in the likes of Lozano, Silva and Maddison.

We think we can attract these players, and would pitch to the likes of Lozano the possibility of showcasing his talents in a leading English side, and the possibility of Champions League football within 18 months. We would agree to not stand in his way if his dream Barcelona move materialises based on his performances.

We’d pitch the potential for immediate top 4 success based on a starting squad of

--------------------------------Pickford--------------------------------

Coleman---------Keane------------------De Vrij-----------Kurzawa

---------------------Gueye---------------Brozovic--------------------

-Bolasie----------------------Sigurdsson------------------Lozano--

----------------------------------Silva-----------------------------------

Subs – Horn, Holgate, Shawcross, Davies, Romeu, Walcott, Maddison, Tosun
Squad players – Stekelenburg, Jagielka, Kenny, Martina, Klaasen, Vlasic, Lookman, Rooney, Calvert Lewin, Ramirez

Playing the Big Sam way, with physical power and robustness throughout the side with a little bit of stardust from the likes of Bolasie, Lozano and Silva to really add quality.

We keep £35m of our budget to cover any long term injuries that may occur in key positions.

£15m of our budget would go on improving facilities at the training ground, given we are likely to spend the majority of our capital budget on the new stadium, we want to continue to refresh our training facilities and youth system

We’d like to use some of our budget to bring in Frank De Boer into a coaching role, giving him exposure under an experienced Premier League manager but offering us the ability to coach a more attacking gameplan. We’d offer him £500k per season as a coach, with an agreement that he is free to leave should an attractive manager’s position come up after the 1st season. We'd be looking at Frank as an option to be the successor to Big Sam in 18 months time

Our overall budget position at the end of the Summer transfer window would be per the below, leaving us in a strong financial position to continue to build and react to the availability of any major talents

Budget £250.00m

Sales £117.6m
Signings -£317.8m
Youth -£15.0m)

Balance £34.8m

I assume we shouldn't be commenting on the other team's submission ..

I think we can afterwards.

Afternoon.

Questioning will begin in 10 mins

Cool. I'm here until 1pm then I have to go back to work.

Afternoon Lord Nando,

I will be around, but in and out..

Same here. I've got a little time now

I must say though Nando. You look terrific. Have you lost weight?

Fernando wrote:Afternoon.

Questioning will begin in 10 mins

Has your watch stopped?

I'm around most of the afternoon, just heading to lunch now

Questions For Marky

- Who did what in your side
- Who picked out Bernat/Vrsaljko
- Do you think these signings would get you top 4
- Who was the weak link in your side
- Do you think just 1 forward in was the to go for a side lacking goals


Questions for Bam
- Why Frank De Boer as a coach
- Do you think these signings would get you top 4
- Who was the weak link in your side
- Do you think just 1 forward in was the to go for a side lacking goals

Questions for both
Who was the mvp of your group
Why did neither of you approach lord afro as an Everton fan...

Are these for Bam only or can I answer?

only the weak link/mvp question others are allowed to answer

- Who did what in your side
I did all of the presentation myself, when it dawned on me that nobody else was going to assist. I tried assigning roles but there wasn't enough input from my team. Fluxy and Olly contributed to signings, Hero to wages, Tino popped in to say hi every now and then.

- Who picked out Bernat/Vrsaljko
I personally chose Bernat but we agreed as a group. Vrsaljko was Fluxy's idea, I chose to make it a loan rather than permanent as I didn't feel Atletico would sell.

- Do you think these signings would get you top 4
Yes, we've strengthened the squad and the first XI, while trying to maintain a sense of identity common with a Big Sam side.

- Who was the weak link in your side
By default of him doing nothing, Tino.

- Do you think just 1 forward in was the to go for a side lacking goals
We had to go with what Sam Allardyce would do, and as he plays formations with one striker it seemed pretty cut and dry.

Who was the mvp of your group?
I guess me, but I stood up as team captain, I didn't mind having to do it, but it would have been nice to share the workload fairer.

Why did neither of you approach lord afro as an Everton fan...
Nothing wrong with thinking outside the box, but we took it as though we had to go with the opinions of our team and nobody else.

- Why Frank De Boer as a coach
Not my call, but I do think he's an interesting option. I did suggest looking for someone big Sam had worked with before or somebody that is associated with Everton.

- Do you think these signings would get you top 4
I think it would put us on a par with the other big 6 sides.

- Do you think just 1 forward in was the to go for a side lacking goals
No, it's three forwards in because Tosun and Walcott are now in the side. They haven't done anything yet and we need to give them an opportunity.

Why did neither of you approach lord afro as an Everton fan...
In the previous iteration of the apprentice, I named the team Integrity. I think it's important to keep that.

Fernando wrote:only the weak link/mvp question others are allowed to answer

Won't tell you again Trebs

That's a little ambiguous - sorry. I took it to mean the weak link/mvp can be answered by Bam and other questions could be answered by the rest of the team.

- Why Frank De Boer as a coach

He clearly has potential as a coach/manager, and ambition to work in the big leagues. His reputation (in England at least) has taken a real hit due to the Palace situation. We think he'd bring a continental style of play which may be able to take us to another level with the players we're targeting, perhaps that Allardyce's play style wouldn't necessarily be the best fit with.

The issue for De Boer at Palace was that the players didn't fit the system he was trying to play, and weren't quite good enough on the ball. We think that bringing in players like De Vrij, Brezovic, Lozano and Silva added to the likes of Sigurdsson should enable that play style to develop a bit more.

Having Allardyce as the man in charge gives us a manager with the strength of personality to be able to overrule De Boer where necessary, while we think De Boer would benefit from learning from a man as experienced as Sam, potentially giving him what he needs to be a successful manager in England in future

- Do you think these signings would get you top 4

I think it will bring us very close, I'd say that City/Utd are out of reach, Liverpool/Chelsea have to be favourites for the next 2 places. I think this puts us in line with Spurs and Arsenal, with the quality to beat anyone on our day but maybe not quite the outright star power of the top 4 - I think we would be relying on a Chelsea/Liverpool car crash season but we would definitely challenge

- Who was the weak link in your side

Assuming you mean team member, I found this very difficult as the whole team contributed. I will have to pick Miky - I felt I had to step in more on his allocated tasks, as I added a fair few sales to what he came up with, and he didn't have much to add on the backroom side of things. I would say that he contributed good opinions for signings, just could have done more on his allocated tasks

- Do you think just 1 forward in was the to go for a side lacking goals

Yes, I think we have a fair few forwards on the books already - Rooney, Tosun, Calvert Lewin, Ramirez (3 of whom can't be sold), and adding more than 1 forward would imbalance the squad and would not have been the best use of our budget.

We think we've added goals to the team in Lozano, and would back Sigurdsson, Bolasie, Maddison and Walcott to contribute goals too

Who was the mvp of your group

I would personally pick myself - I created the sheets showing what we could possibly add to our budget, I think I had good input in each of the tasks allocated and I think I made sure the team kept on track and delivered when they were expected to

Other than me I would say Trebs - he offered good input throughout, and we couldn't find much fault with what he suggested for depth improvements

Why did neither of you approach lord afro as an Everton fan...

I assumed we were to only use the resources within our team

Anymore responses before i go to deliberate my musings.

The Following Is an Announcement

The Winners of this task are Team Bam as feels more realistic & well other people helped

Tino as you did nothing you are FIIIIIIIIIIIIIRED

Lord Odnan x

Task 2 will go up after Lunch x

We at Team Galactico's would like to clarify one thing.

When signing a new player, are we paying them for 18 months or for the full length of the contract aka 4 years? We budgeted our signings on the basis that we will be paying the full length of the contract while the other team has not.

Well done team

Would welcome feedback from all on our approach, and from my team on what I did well/could do better

Also I think Bernat, and Vrsaljko on loan, are more realistic than Frank De Boer being assistant manager

Why have we been marked down for not having as many teammates involved? Surely you should just look at the individual presentations?

Marky wrote:Also I think Bernat, and Vrsaljko on loan, are more realistic than Frank De Boer being assistant manager

Why have we been marked down for not having as many teammates involved? Surely you should just look at the individual presentations?

I was going to say, I don't think the Apprentice has ever been decided by the virtue of the number of people actually doing something.. 

Bam coordinated everything well.
Trebs found some decent squad players.
Miky had the hardest job imo but did ok.

Well you're lucky it wasn't a factor Marky, a good PM keeps everyone engaged and involved

BamBam wrote:Well you're lucky it wasn't a factor Marky, a good PM keeps everyone engaged and involved

I never had them engaged and involved to begin with

De Boer is a perfectly plausible assistant, no one in England is touching him with a barge pole for a manager's job atm

Shall we mix the teams up for the next task?

Mike Phelan was a better choice IMO.

Also I think giving Wayne Rooney an academy coaching role deserved more credit.

I see marky bought 2 left backs. We didn't even buy a back up for Kurzawa

We used our budget properly, that's why we didn't buy a backup

Marky wrote:Mike Phelan was a better choice IMO.

Also I think giving Wayne Rooney an academy coaching role deserved more credit.

Possibly, but having two dinosaurs in charge wouldn't go brilliantly

I'm shocked we didn't get slaughtered for targeting De Vrij, Kurzawa, Lozano and Silva

BamBam wrote:We used our budget properly, that's why we didn't buy a backup

True.

I want Afro's thoughts on these plans, objective Everton fan

Yeah good idea.

I just want to know if marky's team budgeted right or not. If they didn't they should all be fired imho

nadeem2099 wrote:I just want to know if marky's team budgeted right or not. If they didn't they should all be fired imho

But if we did then you're all fired instead

No, we're just tight