BottledDog

Struggled to think where you'd could actually use them as functioning gates, so it's as good a place as any. Just think of it as an artistic addition to the ground, and as such I think they'll look pretty good. Er... Nah.

Nice to see he thinks we're a bigger club than Fulham. /pardew

I guess they'll just point to their CL spot and say there can't be that much wrong. I'd be delighted if you could tell my arsenal supporting friend that. His face would be priceless. Obviously they are used to winning things but when you consider that they aren't in the same spending league as the three clubs above them then 4th spot is not a bad achievement if looked at through neutral eyes. Yup, I wouldn't complain. But still, they are on a bit of a trophy drought, and they've had a pretty healthy spend in the past (facilitated by the selling off of their best players to be fair). That should increase now they have pretty much cleared their stadium debt and are pulling in massive money. Hell, even their ticket sales are probably four times that of SJP on a match day.

I guess they'll just point to their CL spot and say there can't be that much wrong. I'd be delighted if you could tell my arsenal supporting friend that. His face would be priceless.

Basically don't spend any money on players? Doesn't our gross spending put us 6th in that table? Above Chelsea.

Yes, but we have over £100m in debt and up until a couple of years ago were losing £30m+ a year. That's a fact isn't it? So either we need affordable debt sources or Ashley needs to use his own money. Or the club could spend its own money instead of being used to repay the debt. You said yesterday it was unacceptable for him to be withdrawing his debt, now you're saying it's fine. Going down your route of borrowing as a display of ambition, we'd be spending similar amounts just paying interest on bank loans. If we don't get in another striker then it means fuck all, but at least this way our debt is shrinking.

Exactly, don't understand all this Pardew hates Europe? He gave it his best shot, never neglected the cup and fielded weakened teams no matter the opposition. Fact of the matter is, that we generally played pretty much our strongest side in Europe and it did bare an impact on our league form and history tells us we weren't the only ones to suffer from it. Be very interesting to see how Laudrup approaches it. Do i want to be in Europe again next season? Course i do. Does Pardew? Course he does. Because he said "thank god we're not in. Europe"? He was deadly serious when he said that. A straighter face you never did see.

Decent. Gave me a better understanding of FFP at least.

Plenty of clubs that finished above us have invested significantly. If they needed to, why don't we? Because the policy now is to only spend what we generate? Does that make it acceptable, because it's our policy? It is what it is. We are unlikely to see Ashley ploughing extra money in to facilitate a signing so we don't have much choice, but if that meant we had no money and couldn't compete then of course it wouldn't be acceptable for us as supporters. But that's by the by, we should be generating money, and we do have a budget. What it may mean though is that we have to use what money we have fairly carefully and might struggle to increase an offer for Gomis without affecting our chances of getting the right left winger in. This is possibly why Kinnear made the point that they needed to get the striker situation sorted before moving on to other areas. If we come out of this window with just Monsieur Remy mind, the whole fkn lot of them need pelting with shit. IF?! Yeah, if. I don't see it myself as it seems pretty reasonable to suggest that we have a fair to middling chunk of money allocated for this window. We're just having a 'mare trying to get the players we want for the prices we feel comfortable with. Sodding tiresome, but not only limited to ourselves.

Plenty of clubs that finished above us have invested significantly. If they needed to, why don't we? Because the policy now is to only spend what we generate? Does that make it acceptable, because it's our policy? It is what it is. We are unlikely to see Ashley ploughing extra money in to facilitate a signing so we don't have much choice, but if that meant we had no money and couldn't compete then of course it wouldn't be acceptable for us as supporters. But that's by the by, we should be generating money, and we do have a budget. What it may mean though is that we have to use what money we have fairly carefully and might struggle to increase an offer for Gomis without affecting our chances of getting the right left winger in. This is possibly why Kinnear made the point that they needed to get the striker situation sorted before moving on to other areas. If we come out of this window with just Monsieur Remy mind, the whole fkn lot of them need pelting with shit.

Plenty of clubs that finished above us have invested significantly. If they needed to, why don't we? Because the policy now is to only spend what we generate?

Cheers for both those replies. At the end of the day I think it comes down to how much money we made last season as to what we have to spend as Ashley has reiterated that he'd not be sticking any more in, and I can't imagine we'll be taking out loans in order to add in next years TV money into this windows budget. Still I'd like to think we'll have maybe £15m allocated and that should get us the 2 more we need; though it does rather mean we can't be too soft and just throw another million at Gomis. If Loic has already taken £2m then that would only leave, what,say £4m for a decent attacking winger which won't get us anywhere near someone like Tom Ince. Fuck, hope the rumoured £20m is true.

:lol: Loic's losing us £2m a season plus wages. Get rid!

We've been through it a million times before but it is clearly still is a bit of a head fuck. Does giving a non asset (like Wullie says Carroll was) a new long term contract make any difference? Is he right that despite what the club accounts have shown, we are in fact, rolling in wonga?

Quite.

And we've bid £15m on PEA like. They seem equally shite at getting players 'over the line'.

Looking forward to my fantasy team getting off to a good start (Navas and Fernandinho) Navas will get James Milner'd. Very risky! I've steered clear of Man City players as it seems impossible to predict who will be played. I'll be surprised if Navas isn't a regular starter for them like. Prepare to be surprised then. Milner started ahead of him in the majority of pre-season games, despite the fact Navas joined them very early on. The constant rotating with Man City strikers and wingers will be a nightmare with City this season. Definitely nowt to do with giving Navas a break after playing in the Confeds of course. Alright, we'll see soon enough. That Pellegrini looks like he's got a whole lot of tinkerman in him. You just watch. I agree. With that much talent in the squad it must be hard to determine your best team/player selection! That could go against them in the first few games. Or give their players the edge as some of them determinedly look to start regularly... Still think we'll boff 'em mind.

They play in the same league, so ...er ...aye.

They haven't even bid though. In fairness none of us know what goes on behind the scenes ...

Doesn't half piss me off. Pardew has at least come out and said he would love to win the FA Cup this year, then fkn spoils it by saying it might take a bit of luck.

And how does that relate to the January 2014 transfer window? Don't think it does, it's a pretty shit article. It's clear he's talking about the 2013 January transfer window imo. Yup. This bit is bunkum '...admits to already eyeing the January 2014 transfer window'. It makes it sound like he's given up on this window already, but there's nowt to actually back that up.

And how does that relate to the January 2014 transfer window?

Is he talking about getting players in next January, or about seeing the benefit of last Januarys signings in the new season? Bit cheeky by .com, IMO Yeah, was trying to find the relevant bit as well. Hopefully they've just missed some of the interview out, otherwise their headline is a load of old bollocks.

Lets do 'em.

Aye, an then when we offer to pay that, he'll come back saying we need to pay a £600,000 handling and packing fee. ... and shipping, and shipping insurance...