Cardiff Devils Confirmed Signings & Departures 2026/27
I am not privy to that sort of information I’m sorry.
However, I wonder whether all those sitting in row K will get a Club supplied 'see-thru plastic poncho' like you get given at Sea World!!
Actually, now I think about it why not put the new logo on the front and sell them from the Club shop!!!
Double bubble, I should be in marketing!! lol
However, I wonder whether all those sitting in row K will get a Club supplied 'see-thru plastic poncho' like you get given at Sea World!!
Actually, now I think about it why not put the new logo on the front and sell them from the Club shop!!!
Double bubble, I should be in marketing!! lol
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As the squad is finalised with the single signing Devils have just advertised is coming (Riley Brandt - sticking my neck out here), I’m sure there’ll be more comments on ticket price increases, and not just among Devils fans either - a brief comment on the 3-on-3 podcast last week joked Devils have spent their extra budget on paint.
It seemed and still seems that numerous fans expected more new signings (although Todd did state the increase was needed to keep the team competitive rather than promising lots of new players - its us fans that correlated price increases with new players). It is now vastly more expensive to retain large parts of the same squad year in year out.
What screams out to me is that for the first time that I can remember it very much looks like Devils have been able to choose which players to retain without losing them to other teams for more money. I don’t think we’ve lost a single player this off season to higher paying rivals and I think every departure has been the club having that tough exit interview with the departing player telling them there is no spot on next year’s roster for them.
So the increased budget has been vital to allow Thommo to keep all the players he wanted to keep and to add a few top-end players to complement the big core.
Nottingham have only retained 6 of last year’s squad so far. With their successes over the past two season surely they can’t have chosen to get rid of that many? Let’s say they were maxing out their player budget last year and a number of the successful squad wanted more money to stay, they might not have been able to afford to keep them all. Pure speculation from me but it’s not an unrealistic situation. The same might be case with other teams and there has, for example, been quite an exodus of Elite League players to the higher paying teams in France this summer too.
I remember Thommo saying in his Christmas podcast interview that last season he had to change the systems he wanted to implement to accommodate some players that couldn’t play the way he wanted them to. Maybe he’s been able to keep those who can play his preferred system and added to them with the budget he has got.
And why would we want to make big changes after last year? We were very good, not quite good enough but nothing in my opinion a few tweaks couldn’t have fixed.
As I mentioned way back in the late winter, much of the ticket price increase would go on having to pay last seasons squad more with changes to the law on minimum import salary rules, as well as big increases in transport, fuel, airfares, accommodations, equipment, utilities, etc. I don’t think it should be surprising to not have loads of new players for these reasons but also as settled successful core groups should, on paper at least, be more likely to kick on and keep achieving.
As of now with teams not yet having completed rosters, the percentage of new players out of the squads so far for each teams is:
Fife 89%
Dundee 85%
Nottingham 63%
Sheffield 44%
Coventry 43%
Glasgow 43%
Guildford 41%
Belfast 40%
Manchester 27%
Cardiff 19%
How quickly will the rebuilt squads of Sheffield, Nottingham, Glasgow and Belfast gel?
If our last signing is Riley Brandt (as I expect it to be) we will have retained 18 out of our 22 players (18%) one of the lowest roster turnovers I can find in recent history across the league.
To me a lack of new players doesn’t suggest a lack of ambition at all - quite the opposite as with a successful team keeping every one of the players you deem to be the best, and the best to do the job you want to be done, and only upgrading the areas you see as weaker screams of high ambition for success.
The Devils of the last 2 months of last season with added Caron, Welsh and Mieho would be a very very tough team to beat and I think it’ll be tough for the rebuilt Belfast, Sheffield, Glasgow, Guildford and Nottingham to be up and running straight away so which of the teams will flatter to deceive?
Nothing is guaranteed. That’s why sport is great.
It seemed and still seems that numerous fans expected more new signings (although Todd did state the increase was needed to keep the team competitive rather than promising lots of new players - its us fans that correlated price increases with new players). It is now vastly more expensive to retain large parts of the same squad year in year out.
What screams out to me is that for the first time that I can remember it very much looks like Devils have been able to choose which players to retain without losing them to other teams for more money. I don’t think we’ve lost a single player this off season to higher paying rivals and I think every departure has been the club having that tough exit interview with the departing player telling them there is no spot on next year’s roster for them.
So the increased budget has been vital to allow Thommo to keep all the players he wanted to keep and to add a few top-end players to complement the big core.
Nottingham have only retained 6 of last year’s squad so far. With their successes over the past two season surely they can’t have chosen to get rid of that many? Let’s say they were maxing out their player budget last year and a number of the successful squad wanted more money to stay, they might not have been able to afford to keep them all. Pure speculation from me but it’s not an unrealistic situation. The same might be case with other teams and there has, for example, been quite an exodus of Elite League players to the higher paying teams in France this summer too.
I remember Thommo saying in his Christmas podcast interview that last season he had to change the systems he wanted to implement to accommodate some players that couldn’t play the way he wanted them to. Maybe he’s been able to keep those who can play his preferred system and added to them with the budget he has got.
And why would we want to make big changes after last year? We were very good, not quite good enough but nothing in my opinion a few tweaks couldn’t have fixed.
As I mentioned way back in the late winter, much of the ticket price increase would go on having to pay last seasons squad more with changes to the law on minimum import salary rules, as well as big increases in transport, fuel, airfares, accommodations, equipment, utilities, etc. I don’t think it should be surprising to not have loads of new players for these reasons but also as settled successful core groups should, on paper at least, be more likely to kick on and keep achieving.
As of now with teams not yet having completed rosters, the percentage of new players out of the squads so far for each teams is:
Fife 89%
Dundee 85%
Nottingham 63%
Sheffield 44%
Coventry 43%
Glasgow 43%
Guildford 41%
Belfast 40%
Manchester 27%
Cardiff 19%
How quickly will the rebuilt squads of Sheffield, Nottingham, Glasgow and Belfast gel?
If our last signing is Riley Brandt (as I expect it to be) we will have retained 18 out of our 22 players (18%) one of the lowest roster turnovers I can find in recent history across the league.
To me a lack of new players doesn’t suggest a lack of ambition at all - quite the opposite as with a successful team keeping every one of the players you deem to be the best, and the best to do the job you want to be done, and only upgrading the areas you see as weaker screams of high ambition for success.
The Devils of the last 2 months of last season with added Caron, Welsh and Mieho would be a very very tough team to beat and I think it’ll be tough for the rebuilt Belfast, Sheffield, Glasgow, Guildford and Nottingham to be up and running straight away so which of the teams will flatter to deceive?
Nothing is guaranteed. That’s why sport is great.
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Think most of it is going into a pot for accommodation for players and families which as we know has risen, utility bills, ice plant, hotels and flights will go up in price re., belfast and Scotland trips, bar prices and food price rise a norm every season , oh and a new one a facility fee added to booking fee for match tkts , dont think a lot will be going into better players tbh ..just saying