What this summer, and the previous few summers, show me is that Randy needs to seek further investment in the club if we are ever to achieve anything.
Our best players join in a blaze of optimism, soon realise that we are going nowhere fast and use the club as a stepping stone on to bigger things.
We can't compete with the likes of City, but we do need to have some kind of ambition and direction at the club if we are to attract and retain decent players.
That direction and ambition seems to have vanished over the past couple of seasons. Now the board seem to be content just bumping along. We seem a bit clueless and rudderless at the moment. The farcical managerial search and appointment epitomises to me where we are as a club just now. IMO it's become obvious in recent month that the people running the club simply don't know enough about football.
Players like Downing and Young will continue to come and go unless the board have a plan to compete. Bent will be off next summer, wait and see.