It was the common narrative to congratulate the resilience of West Brom and Everton this summer, but there was unquestionably not enough of a reality check from the collective media when they analysed their summer decision making.

Roberto Martinez and Bill Kenwright presided over the transfer saga of the summer as their defied the odds to keep John Stones at Everton, whilst the board at West Brom were equally stubborn in their efforts to retain Saido Berahino from the daring advances of a desperate Tottenham. This, if you’ve looked anywhere on the internet, is congratulated as a brilliant victory for the mid-table and a welcome two fingers up at the money throwing big boys; unfortunately, its not even halfway to being that simple.

The Baggies are not going to be pulling up any trees this year, whatever Pulis may think, and the potential revenue they could have gained from the sale of Berahino may have made a significant difference to their squad. At best, West Brom will comfortably avoid relegation and be set for the riches of the Premier League for another year to come. With the money that was on the table, surely West Brom could’ve added depth and quality across the squad and moved on a player who had upset the fans at the Hawthorns.

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Once a player has asked to leave the club, it almost always seems slightly foolhardy to force them to stay, however much you may want to. Saido Berahino is currently a talented individual, but lets not get carried away about his talent or what excellent things he could do for West Brom. The West Brom man is on the cusp of the England squad (by no means a regular) and is currently a very big fish in a small pond, the money that was on offer would have been massive for West Brom.

Everton were in a similar situation with Stones. The Toffees should’ve been licking their collective lips at a record deal for the centre-back, who I believe has the potential to be one of the very best, but the offers that Chelsea made could’ve seen Martinez add four or five quality players to his line-up. Yes, it would have left Everton extremely short at the back, but if they had accepted an offer with over a week to go in the window, there would have been plenty of time to reinforce a squad enough to challenge for Europe.

It is likely, in both cases, that they will never receive offers quite as lucrative as they reportedly did this summer and it could well come back to haunt them. Once both are tried to force a way out, the best thing either board could have done would be to maximise the fee they receive up front and move the deal on as quickly as possible. Unfortunately, this was not the option either club took and they are now left in a situation that they may well face repeatedly.

The retention of either player will not change the course of the season, particularly a centre back, whereas a reinvestment across the squad could’ve changed the fortunes of either manager. It would have been easy to speak separately of these transfer ‘sagas’, but the parallels are clear to see.

The fans, if social media is anything to go by, are ecstatic that their club has held off such significant offers, but there must be some who are worried that they turned down offers that were too good to be true.

The stubbornness shown by both Everton and West Brom was not the pragmatic route that they may have though it was, they will have to hope they have not lost out longer-term because of such an error.

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