There’s a synergy in the profiles of Fulham’s last six permanent signings, across three windows. Shea Charles is 22, Gonzalo Garcia is 22, César Palacios is 21, Jonah Kusi-Asare is 18, Oscar Bobb is 22, Kevin is 22.
Aside from reading a little bit like the chorus of Taylor Swift’s hit from 2012, there has been a clear shift in what Fulham are trying to do - first under Marco Silva, and now under Álvaro Arbeloa: get younger.
Compare those incomings to the ages of the departing first team players in that period - 35-year-old Raul, three 29-year-olds in Sasa Lukić, Issa Diop and Harry Wilson, 30-year-old Adama Traore, 28-year-old Andreas Pereira - and the picture becomes clearer; this is a genuine attempt to shift the average age of the squad down into a more manageable bracket.
This is somewhat overdue. Fulham had the oldest average age in a Starting XI in the Premier League last season, with Marco Silva consistently choosing to place his trust in more experienced members of the squad. There is nothing wrong with this in principle, and Marco’s achievements speak for themselves in terms of returning Fulham to a stable Premier League unit, but it does come with some issues that threaten the health of the club from a longer term perspective.
Firstly, it is far more difficult to sell on players for a profit once they are past or towards the end of their ‘prime window’, which in football is generally considered to be from about 23-29. This is something Fulham have struggled with, and part of the reason why deals had to be accepted for Lukić and Diop this summer, because there’s not loads of value in the market for many of our players we’d be willing to sell.
Secondly, and with a hat tip to the excellent Keith Gaskin, players in this older age category tend to demand higher wages. According to Capology, the departures of Raul, Lukic, Diop, Wilson and Adama will save Fulham nearly £500k a week in wages, while the incoming signings, without the experience (and history) to demand equivalent salaries, will be far lower than that.
While this sounds a bit all “it’s not my money, whatever”, there’s context. The new SCR rules in place insist that a club’s salary expenses cannot be more than 85% of its turnover, or you fall victim to fines or transfer bans, so it is more important than ever to get these things under control.
The average age of the squad is dropping, the wage bill has been curbed, and there is a manager in place willing to put his trust in more of the youth players. This is not a guarantee of success by any means, but it does put the long-term health of the club in a better place to succeed going forward.
A lack of a pathway for youngsters has been a frustration for a while under Marco Silva. I am not here to diminish the great man’s achievements, or pour any water on one of the greatest managers in the club’s modern history, but I recall being very frustrated about the departure of Callum Osmand to Celtic because he didn’t see a route to first team football last summer.
If you’ll cast your mind back, in the close of the season prior to Osmand’s departure, Fulham had suffered the loss of Rodrigo Muniz to injury, and Raul was being asked to plough himself into the ground again. Marco made the decision to bring Carlos Vinicius back into the squad, despite the Brazilian effectively putting out cones for the entire season to that point, and with his contract expiring in the summer.
While this was relatively amusing in the stands, with Vinicius Sr. being received warmly by the Fulham faithful, was that not an opportunity to see how Osmand might get along with the senior squad, and to test him out with a couple of minutes in the Premier League?
Osmand’s time at Celtic has been inhibited by a major hamstring injury, but he’s scored twice and assisted once in the 125 minutes of football he has played, including an assist and a goal to seal the league title against Hearts. He might have been worth a shot - especially given that he scored 51 goals in 85 games for our youth sides.
Either way, and in the words of Bob Dylan, the times are a-changing, and Fulham are into a brave new world of bringing in players who have potential, rather than experience. Perhaps in this shake up we will also see the likes of Macauley Zepa given first team opportunities under Arbeloa, after the club batted off interest from Bournemouth and Forest last summer and assumedly made assurances of a route to top-tier football at the Cottage.
As our noisy neighbours down the Fulham Road have shown us, there is a balance that needs to be struck between youth and experience.
Stockpiling talented youngsters with no plan, rhyme or reason is clearly not an effective route to success, as their pivot this summer illustrates; but Fulham needed to shift the balances in a direction that was more sustainable, and the signs in that regard look positive - for the time being.
We shall have a very talented young squad, but ultimately relagated. You cannot win battles with kids.
This policy only works by retaining any belief and trust in the manager in the event of relaxation to lead us back to the PL.