They must have assessed the situation regarding Walters and reflected on the fact that he was 33, had only scored 4 goals for them last season and the fee was a sum up to £3 Mill so they concluded it was a good deal all round.
Furthermore perhaps he hadn't performed as well as they would have liked in the games he did play.

At Burnley this season he has only made a handful of appearances and hasn't scored - not sure if he has been plagued with injuries.

They could of done with those 4 goals this season and his passion! They got £3m for him, but are now to languish in the Championship for years losing £100ms of revenue.
Not a good decision by a Chairman.

As mileend said a lot of it is down to luck. Stoke got rid of Walters and perhaps suffered because of it and we got rid of Murray but managed to get away with it.

If one was a bad decision by the chairman then the other must also be although I'm sure you'll find a reason why it was different

Stoke appointed Hughes to replace Pulis after Hughes had a disappointing time at QPR.

In Pulis' last season, Stoke finished 13th but then Hughes engineered 9th place finishes in each of his first 3 seasons in charge so this was very creditable for a club of Stoke's stature. It has only been in the last 2 seasons when Stoke's fortunes have dipped under Hughes, finishing 13th last season and when he was sacked this season they were 20th.

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I hope, and I mean I seriously hope, that Steve Parish really will learn from his mistakes of this season, and every season so far in this league.

I hope more than anything that we will conduct our business in the upcoming transfer window in a shrewd, smart, and where possible in a fair way that doesn't leave bad tastes in players/other club's hierarchies mouths.

I pray that we will sign most, if not all of the players that we need before the final 1 hour of the transfer window. Though with the earlier window at least we will benefit from that either way.

I dearly wish that we will back our manager, reward him adequately for the excellent finishing position we will attain, and dont make a fool out of him once again. RH said many, many times that we needed to sign a goalie in January and we fouled it up, making him look a mug. I really hope we dont do that again.

I hope come the first game of next season that RH is still our manager and hasnt decided with 3 days left until the first game that he needs to resign or retire from the game completely, out of the blue as far as the fans can see.

I hope that we dont play silly games on one of our main targets, like we did on Sakho. Using the press to plant stories about not being able to afford the player, and generally playing silly buggers up until the last minute.

I hope we dont repeat any of these dimwitted approaches, that have been the hallmark of how we have operated lately.

Not that fussed on Stoke but Hughes had been there long enough to have a fair degree of influence on transfers.

He, Cartwright and Scholes probably shoulder an equal amount.

Arnoutavic is a talisman but looks capable of behaving like a kn0b.