Why Conor Chaplin is spot on with his comments on the Barnsley board

Conor Chaplin is absolutely spot on with his remarks about the Barnsley board when it comes to their policy on buying and selling players. Chaplin was interviewed after scoring against the Tykes in the 2-2 draw at Portman Road and asked about his decision to celebrate against his former employers.

Chaplin is clearly annoyed at how the club treated him when he was sold on after only spending two years at Oakwell.

Chaplin said “Barnsley have a policy of buying and selling players and they don’t have many loyalties to players at that football club.

“The fans were amazing with me and I had a great relationship with them, but the football club in general doesn’t have loyalty and it’s just about buying and selling players.”

For a number of years now the hierarchy at Oakwell have had the short sighted mindset to buy players with a view to selling them on at a profit only a couple of years later. In fact something they have been woeful at as they often take a pittance for their better players instead of playing hard ball and getting full market value for their staff. When the Tykes made the Championship play offs the likes of Michal Helik, Callum Styles and Cauley Woodrow`s stock was at its highest yet the board decided to move those players on 12 months later when their stock was reduced significantly after relegation.

This constant turnover of playing staff is causing instability on the pitch and no wonder the club have become a yo-yo side jumping between the Championship and League One over recent years. Some of that can be down to poor managerial recruitment (which is another fault of the board) as with every new manager there comes a turnover of players.

The insistence to sell a player on only a couple of seasons after buying them is a short sighted approach. What the club needs is stability within the playing side. To give manager Michael Duff the tools to build a team who can eventually make it back into the Championship and stay there. Only by keeping a hardcore of 7-8 of the starting 11 can you do this. Sure some players will move on as not all deals work out and you should always be looking to add to the squad each year but too many players coming and going is detrimental to the stability of the side.

In 2019 when Chaplin signed for the Tykes, the club brought in another 11 players that summer of which only 3 remain (Brad Collins, Luke Thomas & Mads Andersen) although Thomas has been loaned out regularly since 2019. That leaves just 2 regular starters out of that summer transfer window.

The Summer of 2020 saw 8 players come in with various players returning from loans at other clubs yet 16 players left the club either permanently or on loan. Someone within the boardroom clearly likes playing football manager! Yet a lot of these players have barely lasted two seasons before being moved on. Herbie Kane, Michal Helik and Dominik Frieser were the standout names recruited in the summer of 2020 yet Kane has been loaned out in that time and Helik and Frieser are no longer at Oakwell. This shows the turnover of players at the club and the instability on the pitch with relegation shows these two can go hand in hand.

When you look at these statistics it is no surprise to read Chaplin`s comments about the Barnsley board.

To achieve status of being a regular Championship club, the board must stop this mass recruitment and fire sale approach and look more medium and long term, giving Duff the players he needs to do the job he was brought in to do. Barnsley need to bed these players in, give them game time and let them gel as a unit. Then after a good season or two under their belts as a settled side we should start to see the benefits on the pitch and the league table.

You cannot build a solid base on sand alone if you keep chopping and changing the personnel. It is time the board woke up to this.