Sunderland shaking things up for season 34

[freeriderau]

The weeks in between seasons 33 and 34 in TDE have seen a whirlwind of transfer dealings, as across the league everyone's young players graduate to the senior teams and compete for increased squad standing and long term contracts whilst trying to fight off the threat of being sold to the TransferGPT automated market. Some lucky few players have crystallised their off-seasons gains such that they are now highly sought after by top flight clubs, with sums of 250m and 350m being thrown around like it's a tenner for fuel.

None of the Sunderland players hae attracted those sorts of bids (you'd probably have heard about it by now). But ten youth players were making their step up to the big boy grade this offseason and the club were forced into deciding who can stay and who should go. Additionally, in an absolute gift bonanza from the league, all clubs were granted a fresh intake of 4 youth players, the majority of whom are close to nailed on starters in the Championship. The sorts of players Sunderland are promoting this season are of better quality and potential than the sorts of contracted players they were ultimately relegated from the Prem with at the end of season 32, so after suffering through limited resources the development strategy is paying dividends.

First, the youth contracts:

S_Bio received the 'prodigy' contract of 1.5 main skills and three secndaries, taking him up to be comfortably Sunderland's best midfielder after a strong season on loan at the Norwich U21's.

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S_Bio         19 ENG  1 13 22  8 21 300 745 722 763

Next, Dixon and Fapetu received the two remaining standard contracts to take them up to 21 main skill with reasonable secondaries. The promotion of these three players alone is already an improvement on last season's squad which enjoyed a wonderful second half resurgence after a fairly indifferent start.

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J_Dixon       19 ENG  1 21 13  5 38 300 716 553 397 
F_Fapetu      19 ENG  1 13 21  5 29 300 322 149 225

Fapetu's promotion allowed T_Samba to leave on loan to Nottingham Forest's U21 team where he will receive consistent game time and develop further as a player ahead of season 35.

Whilst Samba played senior football last season, often ahead of experienced campaigners like H_Barnes, Craig has seen enough in early training to commit the player to dipping back into youth football. Likewise, season 33 regular feature McDonnell has jetted off down under to the Harbour City, committing to a season long loan playing in the A-League for Sydney FC. This is made more tolerable for me as a Melbourne Victory fan, knowing that Sunderland got 17.1M for the loan too! It's hoped both players will come back and will provide the good kind of selection headache developing young players is famous for and the A-League running over summer will act as a crucible to either refine McDonnell into a star or

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T_Samba+      18 ENG  1 11 21  5 38 300 848 107 769
J_McDonnell   21 ENG  1 14 20  8 24 300 104 979 383

Part of why the club felt confident in doing this, is due to the high quality of the youth intake that has come through - in fact there is an incredible crop of talent coming through across the entire league this season which is exciting to see. Whittaker and Geragusyan will join the senior team as they've got the skills to contribute from the jump, whilst Neild and Robertson are high growth potential players needing at least a consistent season of PDL football. 50 million was spent on securing this crop of players, such a bargain! A 150M bid for Geragusyan has already been rejected.

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F_Robertson*  16 ENG 22  1  1  1 22 300 300 300 300
J_Neild*      17 ENG  1 19 10  1 27 300 300 300 300 
J_Whittaker*  18 ENG  1 11 21 11 28 300 300 300 300
F_Geragusyan* 18 ARM  1  1 13 24 17 300 300 300 300

The promotions to the senior team and subsequent sales to TransferGPT have left the club's youth midfield short so quickly leveraged our being known for our reliability in playing and coaching young players wanting the opportunity. Desmond Kumih-Barimah seems like a pretty good get based on his FM26 profile so here's hoping he turns out alright - or at least can be TransferGPT'd off in a few seasons time to keep this whole cycle rolling. I believe it's called 'regenerative agriculture'?

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F_Billings+   17 ENG  1  8 20  8 25 300 233 175 180
J_Tremain+    17 ENG  1 10 19  6 15 300 400 400 600 
D_K-Barimah   17 USA  1 10 18  5 30 300 400 800 300 - 35M from Bristol City

So far other than the youth intake and Kumih-Barimah the club has not had to spend a single cent on improving the squad and we've gained a future keeper, a key defender, a good midfielder and a striker ready to smash in a few goals in the Championship already! We might ignore that nearly any signing improves Sunderland at the moment. Well, nearly... we've ended up shipping out six players in total to the ATM raising a whopping 359m! Mora, Minchev, Hwang, Billings (more on him later), Landers and Henry all departing for a giant cash injection.

With money to spend we can now wheel and deal a bit, and wheel and deal we have... stay tuned for the next instalment of bragging-about-my-new-signings!

[freeriderau]

So now we turn to a little bit of the story of the wheeling and dealing Sunderland have been able to get themselves mixed up in to put some of that money to work. The first signing was Nunez from Nottingham Forest for a sum of 135M, giving the club a 25 rated striker (just) and meaning the midfield has someone to put the ball in front of.

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D_Nunez       27 URU  1  5 11 25 26 300 977 688   4

This meant that faithful servant Evanilson, who toiled bravely last season alongside Nketiah and Bellingham, was deemed surplus to requirements and left the club to join Hull City for a fee of 112M. His experience across the two top divisions will stand the Tigers in good stead as they look to hit the ground running on their return to TDE.

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Evanilson     27 BRA  1  7 12 23 34 300 423  94 900

Next capture was Victor Kristiansen in a 100M deal from Liverpool, expanding the depth and talent in the defensive ranks after the sales of Henry and Minchev to the ATM. Being so close to 21-13, I feel this was a good bit of business relative to other prices in the market and looking forward to seeing him and the rest of the defensive unit continue their growth this season. Where Sunderland are at now, close to 22 is as good as 22 as I keep trying to build them back up for a run at the Premiership.

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V_Kristiansen 23 DEN  1 21 12  3 25 300 835 941 818

Last season, Sunderland only really had one 21r midfielder in the mix and a pretty small group of mids, we were lucky not to get hit too hard by injuries although a few suspensions did make things difficult. Mids seem the hardest position to acquire in this league and I wanted one with decent secondaries too; not for lack of trying but missed the boat on Manafa very early (BHN posted whilst I was asleep) and then just outmuscled financially when the 22r's did come up. We were presented this opportunity from Ipswich and negotiated a deal that saw us get what we wanted.

Triple rated mids have gone for an average of 180m this off-season, I'm unsure about the overall weight of what we paid to secure Semenyo but got a good deal on Kristiansen so if I have stooged myself it's all good. And I got the 22r mid I've been wanting for ages!

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A_Semenyo     26 GHA  1  9 22 13 26 300 884 434 230
swapped for
M_Cucurella   27 SPA  1 22 12  4 29 273 137 668 663 + 60m

Can't do a transfer review without mentioning old mate H_Barnes. Been trying to offload him all off-season, reducing the price, touting him to half the league - no bites. Initially had a deal on the table from Hull which was worth about 80m but I balked and wanted more and then the other Ryan had moved on. So when he did come back and offer me Fleming as an exchange - a player I can send to the ATM - I decided to take the income and call it a day knowing I'd probably not be able to liquidate Barnes any other way at this point.

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H_Barnes      28 ENG  1  7 21 12 23 300 583 523 775
swapped for
T_S-Fleming   20 JAM  1  7 20 11 35 300 200 800 200 - who then went to the ATM

In the end I am happily left with a squad of near 22r defenders with reasonable seconds and one near 22r with average seconds, the possibility of a starting midfield of triple rated 21's, and close enough to a pair of 25r strikers with a 18 year old superstar lurking in the wings and a 14TK DM out on world loan.

I think that's actually a better squad than what I took over and nearly kept up in the Prem in season 32 - I think things are looking good but it's just taken that season and a half to get through to the next youth contracts window to then be able to have excess players and funds to sell to ATM and for there to be some player liquidity in the market too.

I'm looking forward to the auction reveal - both because I hope I get a player but also so that it might then free up some more players to move around. In terms of what we still need, I'd happily upgrade defenders if we can jump up half a skill here or there or get some better secondaries in but there's no one I've looked at yet where I could convince myself to make a bid right now. I suspect everyone's in the same spot just waiting for the auction reveal (which I've learnt is now locked behind EOS awards voting boooooo! I didn't know who to put for the manager of the year other than myself...)

[freeriderau]

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J_Garner      25 ENG  1 12 23 10 28 300 500 100 500

Sunderland are pleased to announce the signing of James Garner for a total fee of 175M. The capture of the central midfielder adds further class and polish to a rejuvenated midfield that has gained something like 8 mains and 10+ seconds compared to the squad at the end of season 33.

Garner will report to pre-season training whilst the recruitment team continue delicate negotiations around continuing to improve the senior side in a push to reach playoffs - or even better, given how well the side played at the end of last season coming from adrift in the division to an outside chance of playoffs.

[freeriderau]

In further transfer news, Sunderland have acquired two 'veterans' (realistically just early 30's players) in recent days.

The ageism against anyone 29 and up in TDE is strong, despite players only aging up every second season and ability point derates not occurring until age 32 anyway. It seems that the progressive percentage deductions on ATM sale fees for older players weighs heavily on prospective buyers minds - perhaps overlooking that the ESMS engine only cares about four of the players stats (eight if you want to be specific and include Ag, Fit, Inj, and Sus).

The first is versatile forward and 57 times Belgian international Leandro Trossard. He joins for a fee of 150m, nominally from Tottenham Hotspur but has moved around multiple clubs this off season including briefly at Ipswich Town. Reaction amongst the fans is mixed, feeling that the club might have overpaid for an 'older' player - but Craig is convinced Leandro will be a key part of unlocking the 'score enough goals' part of the Championship promotion puzzle.

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L_Trossard    31 BEL  1  6 11 25 24 300 678 998 118

The second is Paraguayan defender Omar Alderete - who has made his TDE home at Sunderland much like in real life. Sunderland are stoked to have captured him, as a Premiership quality player who with captain abs would be close to one of the elite main skill defenders in the game. He joins the club alongside Mbamba in a 2v2 deal with Bournemouth which saw J_Garner - who barely had time to hang his things up in his locker - join T_Adarabioyo at Dean Court.

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O_Alderete    30 PAR  1 23 11  5 31 300 479 728 390
N_Mbamba      21 BEL  1 12 22 11 25 300 392 617 352

for

J_Garner      25 ENG  1 12 23 10 28 300 500 100 500
T_Adarabioyo  27 ENG  1 22  8  4 29 300 823 737 524

In true ESMS fashion, Alderete may want to consider leaving his things in the box they came in, because he is already being touted to other clubs who also see the value and beauty of having experienced high main skill players in their squad to be good at the main job they are paid to do. But the aforementioned sticking points about perceived value has made serious negotiations difficult, with the key difficulty being in what is offered would just result in Sunderland having traded away their auction signing to go back to the same existing 21.800r defender structure already here.

It might just be that the best thing Craig can do is to work on 'extracting' value from Alderete the same way he did with Adarabioyo - by pointing him towards the opponent and letting him rip (in the most sporting of ways, of course). The second best thing might be to spam other managers with offers and see if a volume marketing strategy works. The art of the deal... ?

[freeriderau]

One of the most closely tracked young defenders in the game in the Argentinean defender V_Blanco has completed a big money move away from the Stadium of Light.

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V_Blanco      21 ARG  1 21 14  2 26 300 860 666 761

Leicester City, Crystal Palace, Chelsea and Everton had all closely tracked the player this off-season, and Sunderland have jealously guarded the 21 year old's transfer future, rebuffing large cash bids routinely. He was seen by the football department as a build around player who has Premiership experience and has continued to grow and develop season on season, being just 140 tackling abs off 22 rated with elite passing seconds also.

But it was surprisingly none of these big four transfer kings who secured Blanco's signature... in a plot twist Sunderland initiated a transfer to bring L_Thomas to the club in exchange for Blanco and a large amount of cash which was eventually negotiated out at 80m.

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L_Thomas      24 ENG  1 22 14  1 27 300 678 208  95

One of the four clubs expressed disappointment that they were not offered a 'first option' on Blanco to match or exceed the offer and insiders suggest there may have been a rupture in an otherwise excellent working relationship between Sunderland, their manager and the unnamed Premiership club.

On one hand football is a game of relationships and negotiations, West Wing style. On the other it's a ruthless business that discards hundreds of young footballers annually, putting profit ahead of people routinely (hydration breaks anyone?). Sunderland will be hoping their manager can repair some of that rupture in relationship and also reputation as the Black Cats look for their redemption arc in season 34.

[freeriderau]

Following on from the partnership between Norwich and Sunderland in season 33 which saw S_Bio be able to go on loan and play a major role in Norwich U21's trophy winning season, Nock and Craig have seen fit to continue the loan swap arrangement in a strong show of faith from the Premiership club in spite of the recent Blanco debacle.

This time the player going on loan to Norwich is none other than Armenian international Finn Geragusyan - who pundits tipped to be the starting partner for Nunez or Nketiah this season such has been his strong pre-season form. The 18 year old received his first senior cap for Havakakan in March 2026, coming off the bench against Belarus in a match which his side ultimately lost - but coming ahead of him making any senior club appearances, showing how highly rated this young man is. He will join a side of proven winners at Norwich where he should play most minutes, getting refined in the crucible of the Premier League 2.

With a season of first team minutes abs plus re-rates abs plus a potential abs pack boost, he could be near about 26r on return to the Stadium of Light. Other clubs have noticed this too - of course; nothing gets missed in the modern world of video scouting and the immense resources clubs have at their disposal. But it seems the Black Cats have committed to this young player at least for season 34 in sending the player onwards to Norwich and if promotion can be secured, Finn would return to Sunderland to lead their line in the Premiership.

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F_Geragusyan* 18 ARM  1  1 13 24 17 300 300 300 300

In exchange, Sunderland receive Rio Smith-Roach on loan. The 16 year old, born in 2010 (doesn't that make you feel terribly old?) could easily surpass the heights that Finn is expected to reach and end up leading Norwich and England for decades to come. Norwich will be carefully monitoring the progress of the 16 year old whilst up North, given that he has come through from the Canaries' under 13's to his current scholarship deal at Carrow Road. He will partner a similar looking now 17 year old T_Lamb as we look to go a little better this season and maybe jag a playoffs spot.

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R_S-Roach*   16 ENG  1  1 10 22 23 300 300 300 300