Teasy

He's played 95 times over the last 3 and a half seasons, no idea if he's currently a first team regular though.

We hold all the cards if we aren't planning on buying any more players. If we want to buy say M'bia or Donadel for example, we'll probably need the sale to go through before too long. That's if we need the money from Given to buy the likes of Donadel.

Why would Donadel's wages be huge? Saviola's on something like £60,000 I think so I agree if he's not willing to take a cut I wouldn't bother, simply because he's unproven in the league and hasn't played consistently for years. But I can't see a relatively young player for Fiorentina being on large wages.

I think even just letting Owen, Viduka, Cacapa and Geremi go would go a long way to recovering our financial position. Saves us about £15 million a year, of course they need to be replaced. But I see no reason why that can't be achieved on half those wages. I think we might even be able to sell Smith if we're willing to let him go for a small fee.

We don't need to sell all our established stars and buy youngsters, we just need to stop giving numerous players silly money, especially players who are useless to us. Some people seem to have gotten the idea we're just poor or something "we can't afford big players, we have to be a selling club bringing through cheap youngsters". Have people forgotten we've got the fourth highest wage bill in the league? Its twice what the majority of Premiership clubs pay out. We're still a financially very strong club as far as the money we bring in, with a massive revenue in comparison to most Premiership clubs. All we need to do is get rid of the wasters like Smith, Duff, Geremi ect and other players on silly wages like Owen and try to stick within about £45-50 million total for wages (still far more then 70% of Premiership clubs could afford). Why would we need to become a selling club when we have probably the 5 or 6th highest revenue in the league? Also how is the likes of N'Zogbia and Given a problem for our wage bill? N'Zogbia's on a moderate wage compared to most and Given's wage is both appropriate and affordable (around £45 to £50,000 isn't it?). Cacapa Owen Duff Smith Geremi Viduka Six players that cost us in the region of £20 million a season, that's almost as much as a lot of Premiership clubs spend on there entire squad! Yet how many of them are even useful to us in any way, about four of them, and even then only one of them would actually be difficult to replace. The rest could be replaced by average players on low wages and still be a improvement (not that I'm advocating that of course).

Well I agree of course, but to be fair despite Ashley not spending any of his own money on transfers we haven't been in profit on transfers since he's been here. When has transfer money ever gone in his pocket?

If we didn't step up our transfer activity after selling Given I'd be both surprised and extremely pissed off.

In all honesty if £14 million was on the table I'd be disappointed if it didn't go through. IMO we need that money spent in other area's and I'm totally confident in Harper's ability.

Unless we get the new defensive midfielder as well.

Harper's played bench boy all his life, nothing has changed. According to reports he did want to go though didn't he?, certainly could have been bollocks but to be honest at 33 I'd be surprised if he hadn't finally decided he needs first team Football.

Toon's Taylor I wasn't referring to Newcastle's intentions, I was referring to Harpers.

Harper signing a new contract does suggest its a done deal.

No but its pretty certain he will.

You're confusing bigger club with better team or being more attractive/in a better position at the moment. West Brom could get a crazy billionaire owner tomorrow and spend £50 million but that wouldn't make them a bigger club immediately..

I would say that he should. I'm not terribly happy about the manner in which he's leaving, but 10 years at the club deserves a testimonial. He's been a great player for us on and off the pitch. Definitely deserves one but can't remember a testimonial for a player who has moved on to a "bigger" club, rather than downward as would more usually be the case for aging players. Given all his charity work as well would be sure he wouldn't want to keep any of the money for himself. Glad you put that in quotation marks Can't think of any way in which they're a bigger club, owner with bigger pockets yes. the bigger pockets thing is making them into a bigger club. It might make them into a bigger club in the future if they turn the spending into actually winning matches and trophies, but certainly hasn't yet. We're a bigger club in every way apart from owners.

I'd say when we have no right back we are a bit suspect in defence, but nowhere near all over the place. With our first choice defence we look quite solid at the back. Though it could be argued that when they say "defensively" they mean how the team defends as a whole.

I would say that he should. I'm not terribly happy about the manner in which he's leaving, but 10 years at the club deserves a testimonial. He's been a great player for us on and off the pitch. Definitely deserves one but can't remember a testimonial for a player who has moved on to a "bigger" club, rather than downward as would more usually be the case for aging players. Given all his charity work as well would be sure he wouldn't want to keep any of the money for himself. Glad you put that in quotation marks Can't think of any way in which they're a bigger club, owner with bigger pockets yes.

More like: FA: "Are you aware of the rules you have broken?" Joe: "You're a cunt!!"

As much as I appreciate Shay's time here, no he absolutely can't be given a testimonial.

Why is Chris Mort so much of a better person then you?

Its ok he's actually played over 20 games a season for his previous club unlike the little midget

£3.8 million then, so its not £5 million yet he still managed to pull off this Machiavellian smokescreen!, Kinnears even more clever then I thought!!!

I'd agree most of them seem quite unconnected though. As in "I've heard we wanted him, we got him, smokescreen!". It just seems strange that Kinnear mentioned the £5 million bid for Mbia and then kept talking about a £5 million bid for a midfielder yet never told anyone that he meant another midfielder for £5 million, there's definitely more logic to it then most smokescreen theories, even if it might be bollocks.

or more likely either of........... a) they wanted more than we could offer b) they wanted more than we thought he was worth c) he didn't want to move here. I don't know like, didn't people say at the time that Everton had offered £8 million the season before and it seemed silly to even bother offerin £5 million? Now the offer starts to make sense £5mill may just have been an opening bid and the smokescreen arguement in transfers always seems silly, Well it was tongue in cheek, but I'd like to believe it, its a much more interesting scenario then wasting time and effort by offering half what a club want for a player, whatever the reality

Ditto. I won't know who to praise though, as usual. I'll praise the people I hate least Vetere? Sounds good, lets do that, with just a little bit left over for Kinnear.