Stoke City have made a busy start to an important summer, with three new signings already in the building ahead of the first day of pre-season training.
Viktor Johansson, Ben Gibson and Eric Bocat will meet their new teammates at Clayton Wood on Monday but Steven Schumacher has been clear that he still wants to strengthen his squad further, with six weeks to go until the season starts and two months left of the transfer window.
There is a lot of work still to do behind the scenes and on the training pitch to gear Stoke up for the head coach’s first full season in charge, as well as sporting director Jon Walters and head of recruitment Lee Darnbrough’s first chance to shape the squad.
There have been three big items on the to-do list as Stoke try to break the cycle of bottom placed finishes in the Championship and haul themselves on an upwards curve.
Leading man and men to help him
There is no getting around it, Stoke’s leading scorer last season only got six goals. That was Andre Vidigal, who probably won’t be penned in by most fans if they drew up their starting XI for the new term right now. In the season previously, top scorer was Tyrese Campbell with just nine.
Jacob Brown got 13 in 2021/22 but only two others – Lewis Baker (8) and Nick Powell (6) – got past five. Powell got 12 in 2020/21 but only two others – Steven Fletcher (9) and Tyrese Campbell (6) – got past five.
It is clear that Stoke would be helped a great deal if they could hang their hat on a striker to score more than anyone has managed yet since relegation in 2018 – and looking at the number of chances Stoke started to create in the box towards the end of last season, agents should be pushing their clients in Schumacher’s direction – but they also need a few other players to chip in more substantially.
They scored just 49 times last term, 21 fewer than the lowest scorers in the play-off places and at least 30 behind the rest up of the teams up there.
When Schumacher won the League One title with Plymouth Argyle in 2023 he had six players who scored more than five goals and Ryan Hardie and Niall Ennis both reached double figures.
Of the Championship top six in 2023/24, Norwich had seven players who scored more than five and three in double figures; West Brom had six players with five or more, as did Southampton, who had Adam Armstrong get 24. Leeds had six 5+ scorers, so did Ipswich and Leicester had seven.
There will be hope and expectation that Million Manhoef, who scored four in nine starts and five sub appearances, can regularly contribute and it is the next challenge in Bae Junho’s development that he ups his game-changing moments from two goals and five assists.
There will be pressure to get more from midfield – Wouter Burger (3), Lewis Baker, Daniel Johnson and Jordan Thompson (2), Josh Laurent (1) – and defence – Michael Rose and Ben Wilmot (1) – and replace what has been lost with Ki-Jana Hoever (4) and even Luke Cundle (2).
But the bottom line is that Schumacher must be able to look at his squad at 11pm on deadline day and be confident to say: “There’s goals in there.”
Three long-term issues addressed
Try to draw up a consensus among Stoke supporters about what has been lacking over the last few years and there is a good bet that, as well as a center-forward who scores goals, the list would include a number one of their own, a leader at center-half and a left-back.
That is three major issues that Jon Walters and his recruitment team have been able to address before the start of pre-season. No mean feat considering Stoke haven’t signed a senior goalkeeper to throw the gloves to straight away since bringing in Thomas Sorensen in 2008, haven’t paid a transfer fee for a senior left-back since bringing in Erik Pieters in 2013 and have struggled to find a left-sided centre-back, never mind one who has just been in a play-off campaign.
There are no guarantees in the transfer market and there is always a chance that everyone could be disappointed as well as pleasantly surprised. But the fact that Stoke had these three items at the top of their agenda when the season ended is a sign that they had a plan and, after the challenges of last summer, that is very encouraging.
Contract thinking and moving people on
There will be some players who will be looking around the changing room on Monday morning and wondering just how much they are going to be part of things going forward.
There will be only five players who played more than 2,070 minutes for Stoke in 2023/24 – half the minutes of the season – and 16 who didn’t.
There will be some, from Sol Sidibe to Enda Stevens, who will be confident they can seriously increase their own count over the next few months. There will be others who might wonder if they will need to make a move to get playing regularly – and there will be some in that group who Stoke are probably looking at and agreeing.
If Schumacher and Walters want to maintain a squad of about 22 senior players, they will need to shift some out if they want to bring any more in.
It is an important time with decisions on the horizon too for players who will be out of contract next summer: Josh Laurent, Lewis Baker, Lynden Gooch, Jordan Thompson, Daniel Johnson and Michael Rose in particular, considering that Stevens, Jack Bonham and Frank Fielding have only recently extended their terms until 2025 and are stages of their career when they can go season by season. Thompson’s 12-month extension was triggered by the club.
Stoke have had a problem with collecting players at times over recent years.
“The biggest problem for any coach is the players not on the pitch,” said Walters recently. “Everyone that’s playing is happy and you have to get around everyone who’s not. That’s quite difficult when you’ve got so many – and it blocks the academy pathway too.”
There might be a need to be ruthless while still making sure they do not leave themselves too short when it comes to covering injuries, suspensions and the blood and thunder of a long Championship season.
