Rich

Too early for this shit. /Mike

I'm just worried about PSG again, personally. If they keep their beaks out then I'm very hopeful. Parisian journo on Twitter:

Prefer those types of games mid-late season personally. Doesn't feel as "important" when it's early doors, based on what I remember of the games we have had against them early on in seasons gone by. Shit, cold weather. Baying crowd. Both teams firmly on their way through the season - classic derby stuff. October/January was perfect.

Don't really understand this one at all. He fits perfectly into the mould of Williamson/Simpson/Gosling/Guthrie, who I'd be happy with as backup players in their favoured positions. More than likely on fairly modest wages and not anywhere near the front of the queue for those who should be "up for sale". Surely there would be some takers for the likes of Lovenkrands ahead of him? Although I realise the money we'd get wouldn't match up. More incoming moves in the pipeline than those we've been made aware of? Or just a definite switch to a lone striker formation?

You proper love predicting. Yeah, its that brief moment you get where you feel really powerful, as if you do have some sort of knowledge of guessing the future. Until nowt happens, or you get lucky with one or two. If any of them right, I will wear thin that smug smiley. WEAR IT THIN! I see the appeal.

You proper love predicting.

http://www.dailymotion.com/#/video/xeoi3k_my-lovely-horse_fun

Seen him play much or just had him on FM? He is unbeatable on there, I'll give you that.

Again, awful avatar, but why do you say this? This guy is probably valued more than £1m but we've taken advantage of the release clause in his contract. If we bought him for £3m or so, I reckon people would expect him to be able to develop into a relatively good LB, given his young age and lack of experience. What the fuck? I was talking about Simpson you gimboid.

Got proper cheapies over this like, get in.

Actually, will remove that bit of arse from the fence... it is absolutely non-existent.

"Fantastic player" though? Really? Perfectly happy with him as backup and he's proven capable enough as first choice, but potential to be fantastic is basically non-existent.

Why Simpson? Hopefully he'll turn out to be a fantastic player. Nar.

Aye, fair enough. Just see things differently I suppose.

Other than Quinn come out and categorically denied we were after him then yes you are correct. That'll do, pig. That'll do.

Nice that a player who could have gone to Sunderland has chosen to come here instead. Order has been restored, despite how the league table turned out.

This. Can only hope our dreadful medical team don't destroy him. You had a medical for NUFC like? Yeah, passed it with a broken foot. Haw haw, you negative bastard.

This. Can only hope our dreadful medical team don't destroy him. You had a medical for NUFC like?

Oh dear.

Penetrates. Anally.

They've got money to burn though, so they might as well I suppose. Like Disco alluded to, it's main use will really be for targeting up-and-coming players as they know that the day will come when they need to start being self-sustained. It's more about just building up the overall knowledge base of world football, I think, and bringing it in-house so they don't need to rely on any external companies for stuff. What they are doing could potentially change the way the whole scouting/analysis side of things works the world over if it proves to be a successful model. It's never really been done before anywhere else. Obviously it'll take other clubs (even clubs our size) a while to catch-up.

They haven't. Their scouting/support staff is quite possibly the best in the world these days. They've invested a fortune into sports science/analysis/scouting. It's all digital now, I believe, even down to the scouting, and they have their own servers and everything where stuff is kept (footage of games at all their levels/footage of targets). They are certainly the most advanced in England now, or at least on a par with Man Utd (who are a lot more old school/cloak and dagger about their set-up) in terms of the pure number of support staff they employ. A lot of clubs still do the basic pen/paper scouting, where they'll go and watch and make notes during the game and it'll get passed to the manager and then binned if the move doesn't come off. I think City's do everything on software programs and feed it into a central database of information. They're pretty revolutionary on that front.

He's definitely got more of a public profile/reputation than any other scout I've seen here and any I've noticed elsewhere (although naturally I don't really read the other local rags from around the country). We do seem very heavily-reliant upon him, but he must know his stuff when it comes to judging a player. He was literally Man City's only full-time (only employed, actually, although I'm sure they would have had people helping out) scout before the big takeover happened, as mental as that seems, even through the Shinawatra time of Elano/Geovanni and others. Not quite sure why they got rid/he decided to go considering the finance that department now has.

He has to be on the wind-up, man. Not even a Spurs fan could be such a conceited arsehole all of the time without it being intentional. He's good if he is, because it grinds my gears every time.

Or it was just an error on my part and it's you implying/deducing that...