, Bradford City are ready for the Championship – and it’s thanks to Edin Rahic

Bradford City are ready for the Championship – and it’s thanks to Edin Rahic

I’m a Bradford City fan. When Edin Rahic and Stefan Rupp took over at Valley Parade I was full of optimism, I was excited and it was time for a brand new era.

12 months followed and I saw Bradford City reach a League One play-off final, defying all expectations under the guidance of club legend Stuart McCall after a mightily impressive season.

24 months later, I saw us collapse from being automatic promotion contenders in the following season, to finishing in mid-table.

At the end of last season we felt dejected, disappointed, we had no manager, we’d seen our club legend Stuart McCall leave, Simon Grayson came and was simply uninspiring and furthermore, we had arguably the worst transfer window I’ve seen – when rather than strengthening, we simply fell away from our rivals.

The mood today, as I write this before our first game of the season is entirely different.

This summer started full of negativity, fans expected a relegation battle, or at least for us to struggle. Furthermore, we took around a month to appoint a new manager and after being linked with a whole host of exciting names, we simply promoted Michael Collins into his first ever job in senior football management, from being an Under-18’s coach with the club.

Fans were simply angry, unimpressed, wound up and thought more negativity was to follow.

Edin Rahic has proved his doubters wrong, he’s learned his lessons and he deserves immense credit for what he’s done this summer.

Of course, the season hasn’t begun yet and we have an unproven manager, but the quality of recruitment this summer has been absolutely exceptional and both Edin Rahic and Greg Abbott deserve a remarkable amount of credit for what they’ve done.

Bradford City have made some huge calls this summer, fans favourite, goalkeeper Colin Doyle left the club, German recruits Rouven Sattelmaier and Lukas Raeder were let go – mainly because they were sub standard, and the club accepted it, rather than trying to prove a point.

Bradford City have brought 15 new players into the club, they’ve sent a couple out on loan and also some of these players they’ve bought are ones for the future.

Importantly though, the ready made first team players they’ve brought in have been of serious quality and are incredibly strong signings. The signings of Jack Payne and Sean Scannell are serious statements of intent, with both players each boasting real Championship quality. Also, the likes of Hope Akpan, Richard O’Donnell, Josh Wright, Kelvin Mellor and Sherwin Seedorf all scream real quality and suggest that the Bantams will be up there come the end of this season.

The most impressive part of how Bradford City have handled this transfer window was the fact they sold their key asset, Charlie Wyke to Sunderland, but then announced the signing of prolific striker Eoin Doyle very quickly after letting Charlie Wyke go.

Bradford City have learned how to handle transfer windows, they’ve begun to attract real quality and also, Edin Rahic and Stefan Rupp’s model of buying young players, mixing them with experience and then selling them on for profit has already worked. The club could be looking at a £750k profit for Wyke and have used that money to immediately invest in a proven goal scorer to replace the striker – showing how business well and truly should be done.

Bradford City fans gave Edin Rahic an horrendously hard time in January, and at the time unhappiness was somewhat warranted as the club somewhat self-imploded and failed to remedy any spiralling of destruction.

Now, it’s the time to credit the club’s Chairman as to how quickly he’s turned things around, the fact that his philosophy is up and running and also the club has had one of the best transfer windows in its recent history.

Let’s call it an even playing field now, and say that now is the time for thinking forwards and positively, rather than negatively and in the past.

This could be a huge season for the Bantams, and now it’s time everybody acts as one and shows a team spirit and focuses on the positives, rather than trying to unpick negatives and think about the past.

Onwards, and upwards.

@jake_verity

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