Dan Gleebals

Training alongside Isak and Wilson (occassionally) and the input from Howe and team, he could develop into something pretty good IMO. At that money, we don't have much to lose and you would think this is very much a player they like based on data and upside potential.

We now know that Howe takes his time to bed all players in and to be fair, it is clearly the right approach. Chucking Hall into an injury ravaged team who were under the cosh last season might have gone the other way. Not ready, not fit enough, has a couple of stinkers and then he is under massive pressure.

I have nothing against Longstaff, but I really hope so. Willock offers so much more, decent touch, killer passes, drives the ball well and generally is way more unpredictable that Longstaff, which makes him harder to play against. Thknk it will be Willock, Bruno and Joelinton for the first game.

Taking a longer term view, I wonder if we have one eye on next summer already. With so many players contracts expiring, it could be a very expensive window to get that many replacements. You would have thought the likes of Wilson and Tripps will run their contacts down / not be offered a new contract. Schar, Longstaff and Burn will probably get extended. No idea for Lascelles and Kraft but can see both going. They are all first team players (or subs), so to replace that many will require big money. I wonder if we will go with what we have got for this season, and hope injuries are not as bad. Maybe go for one or two players, but not in the Tonali/Isak price range. Then look at things for next summer based on where we finish up and buy based on that.

Of course that will be the outgoing message.

I doubt them finding a replacement first would in anyway be conditional on us getting him, even less do for a low ball fee. Might speed things up I guess as this name just does not want to go away.

Not sure on their net spend, but nothing on that Villa list really excites me for that amount of outlay. They are certainly not messing about. Cannot really see how that lot massively improves them considering who has gone.

😂

Boring yes, but very confident we will get the players we need. Mitchell will be well on it now following all the internal discussions that would have been needed. He has only just got here. Club has been very good at doing its business quietly, so I expect something to happen pretty soon, and ideally before they head of to Japan!

So you are saying spurs are worth £2.5b?

Agree but we could really do with getting Willock, Wilson, Miley, Tino and the rest of the squad injury free (apart from the long termers) going into the season. Even with less games, we need a full bench to really allow us to go all out this season.

Great player for sure. But given our formation, how do you keep him and Isak playing/happy. Nice problem to have.

The noise when he comes on as a sub against spurs and slams a 30 yarder in.

If this guy is as good as people are making out, and can sort our mdeical/recovery team out and significantly reduce injuries, I can see no reason why Howe would have a problem with that. The more players he has in peak condition on the bench, the better. What manager would not dream of that? Sure, there might be some friction, and I guess some of that could come from the highly demanding training Howe adopts. He might make recommendations to to change that slightly, but with science backing it up I am sure

He is top dog, such a brilliant personality to have around. Hopefully a great pre-season and injury free season and he will be massive for us this season.

We have a very competent board in place now, and key leaders in all the necessary positions. They are not football people, but investors, who despite their lack of football experience, have done a spectacular job in rebuilding the club. That would have at a cost, in terms of their ability focus on other things. The value of the club has probably doubled, and if not at least gone up by 50% so their stake has increased in value considerably, so they will see a healthy return. All the best to them. They will no doubt be fans for life, and continue to support the club. They will always be very welcome. As others have said, hope the other key investors have taken the shares and not others. Time for the big guys and execs in place to take the full leadership roles.

I think things might go a little quiet for a couple of weeks. Sure they will be having a review and meetings to compare notes. He might have other players on his radar that we don't, so think they will take some time. That's said, think they will move quick if Olise or someone similar could happen.

I think so to, they constrantly talked about compliance from day 1. Alternative view might be that they wanted to show breakeven or even a profit so we can spend this summer. We have lost a few wages too at the end of last season, so going into the new financial year, it would not suprise me if we ended the year (and 3 year period) in pretty good shape. Either way. Its had to question or doubt the board, they have been spot on so far. Oh, and great appointment !!

Happy to keep Murphy as backup. He is realtively low wages and despite not being an outstanding player, he works hard and has a great attitude. That said, if a reasonable offer came in, I would let him go. However, I'm sure Howe does not want too many first teamers to go in one window, so assuming Almiron goes, which makes more sense, I think he will stay.

I think 60K a week is probably enough to do that, but I get what you are saying.

100% - which makes it even more ridiculous, the whole thing.

Ffp written all over this. Wonder if we need to sell Minteh if true. Or maybe we will anyway. We would have made over £50m if prices are to be believed which equals big spending.

Price goes up to £200M at 00:01.

Ashley vibes this signing, no thanks.

Trafford is almost certainly better than Dubravka, so we are in a better position if Pope is out. Trafford is young. He could go on to be a brilliant keeper, he may not. But as a backup with potential, I think this makes sense. Otherwise, we are looking at least £30M+ for a better ball playing keeper. We were/are a much better with Pope in the team, despite his distribution. Personally I would rather focus on getting the RW sorted this summer, and another CB in, and then have another look at the situation at the end of the season.