TRon

Marveaux's starting according to the Chron so Jonas or Obertan will be out more than likely.

What else can he do? Sign the cheque to get the deal done? Puts more pressure on the board Del boy will not like that! The fact that he's publicly saying he still wants and expects us to sign a striker IS to put pressure on the board. People keep slagging him off for talking about it but I'm sure Llambias would prefer him just to shut up.

Makes the win feel even sweeter knowing that pond life went home devastated If you see the vid of them getting to St James and our fans effort, there's really no comparison, their players looked petrified Aye ours clearly couldn't give a shit in comparison.

Makes the win feel even sweeter knowing that pond life went home devastated

Rested for Scunthorpe back for Fulham dingo. Good. It will give us a chance to field a side with a bit more width hopefully.

What else can he do? Sign the cheque to get the deal done?

Historically top class championship striker hardly achieve success in the Premiership, compared to top class championship central defenders. Shane Long was shite before last season, and he had had experience in the Premiership already. It is easy with hindsight to say we should have bought shane long, but before the season starts he just did not seem a good bet. Credits to Roy Hodgson for having wonderful foresight, but I think he was luck more than anything else. I don't think it was luck. I saw the videos of Long and it was clear he was great at running with the ball. I'll bet he ends up with more goals than Shola who is starting as our no 1 striker at this point.

What? They really are the tightest bastards in the world if they need persuading to pay an extra £500,000 on top of what we got for Enrique for an international left back. FFS. It depends on the quality of the left back. For that price he should have everything basically, I'm not liking this talk that he's not the quickest. I'm pretty certain we will end up with Bridge as it stands unless Pieters price drops dramatically.

I think we've made a decent offer there if it's true. Maybe we need a title change as it's clear we aren't set to meet their asking price.

Or we could be using the Cissokho link to drive down the price/wages of the Pieters deal. WE could still end up with Wayne Bridge on a short term loan deal depending on what happens on deadline day by the looks of it.

There better be. There's absolutely no excuse for being in-profit and having Ameobi as 2nd choice 'proper striker' come September 1st. We've made like £39m profit since January from transfers. You wouldn't f***ing know it. From transfers possibly, but we've no idea what actual profit has been made overall. By the look of our possible bids I would say we are looking at around £15m profit that we can put into the pot for the remaining transfers. That's great if you like buying penny shares and think it's a wheeze if you hit the jackpot. There's also an alternative method of investing in decent potential and backing it to produce a return.

So from that video, Lovenkrands has a massive schlong ... and he's the only one! That and Raylor actually laughing ...video must be fake.. Can't believe that with all the black players we've got in our squad Lovenkrands is still the longest..my bet was on Ranger for some reason, only a guy with a massive cock will have his attitude Lovenkrands probably spends the longest time in the shower. Typical Soccer AM double entendre tbh.

That formation is how it should pan out but in reality what I've seen of the formations we've seen so far look more like this ------------------------------- Krul ------------------------------- Simpson -------- Taylor ---------- Coloccini ------- RTaylor? ------------------------------ Tiote ------------------------------- ------------------ Barton ----------- Cabaye ------------------- Obertan ------------------------------------------------ ---------------------------------------------------------------------Jonas --------Shola ---------------------------------

Actually now I recall the talk of Barnetta signing was when Barton started playing up and he was put on a free transfer. Then he dug his heels in and we put that on ice probably because we didn't want to pay two players big wages for one position.

It would be a no brainer if you were only looking at the player's ability but I'll bet Cissokho will want at least 10k a week more than Pieters as well as the fee being higher. If that doesn't get the hierarchy running scared I don't know what will. Sorry if it was a bit unclear, what I meant was that if all the monetary factors (wages, fees etc.) were held constant and we were looking at ability alone, then Cissokho should definitely be the one to pursue. We're talking about a player who was linked to Barcelona not too long ago and one that I thought would be 'too good' to want to sign for us. If he wants to join us and is willing to accept a sensible wage (even if it would be higher than what Pieters would accept), then we should be busting a gut to get him through the door. 8 million euros for him would be a steal. That would be how most sensible folk would view it but you only have to look at us knocking back the Barnetta deal and signing Obertan instead to see how our pea brained minds work. That isn't a slight on Obertan btw, but it seems Mike Ashley would fit his own profile as the ideal customer at Sports Direct outlets.

Sounds like if one falls into our lap at a surprisingly low price we'll take it otherwise Carry On up the Khyber.

I think Barton is the one who is a bit different, the rest look to be pace merchants who like to run at players and cause havoc with their skill, Barton is the slower one who relies more on his delivery and intelligent play. Yep, couldn't disagree more with Tron. It's a diverse midfield trio, him, Tiote and Cabaye. There's so much going for it - would be desperately disappointed to see it broken up after only just getting it. I mean for God's sake, our fucking centre midfield since Bobby left. Absolute shite, every single year without fail, until Cheick came along. He was the first part of the jigsaw, now with Cabaye in there (who, already i can tell, will cover more yards then 90% of midfielders in the league) and Barton's intelligence on the ball... i can see it developing into a super little engine room. Really can't be underestimated, the centre of midfield. We should know it better than most, having put up with shite like Jenas, Faye, Parker, Butt, Smith since Speed left. Emre had potential. Was a decent CM amongst all the dross. Him and Parker could have worked if bloody Roeder didn't try and make Parker our 'Gerrard'. That's a case in point. In theory Parker, Butt ( ) and Emre were all good central midfielders but as a combination they were woeful. I'm getting a similar vibe with Barton, Tiote and Cabaye though I appreciate it's early days yet.

It would be a no brainer if you were only looking at the player's ability but I'll bet Cissokho will want at least 10k a week more than Pieters as well as the fee being higher. If that doesn't get the hierarchy running scared I don't know what will.

I think Barton is the one who is a bit different, the rest look to be pace merchants who like to run at players and cause havoc with their skill, Barton is the slower one who relies more on his delivery and intelligent play. I thought that as well in theory, but in practice Tiote, Barton and Cabaye seem to be all lying quite deep and very central so we are missing both width and connection to the strikers. It hasn't looked right to me on the basis of the first two games in any case.

I think he'd consider it if he gets a good contract. West Ham will likely only be in that division for one season.

Well at least he's at another club now. It was ten times worse when he was our captain handing out Liverpool brochures to Carroll.

I wouldn't really object to him leaving. I think we have too many midfielders in the centre circle who are similar and not enough width. It's only worth him leaving if we get someone like Barnetta in though and that's not happening in a month of Sundays now.

Sounds like they might let him go if they can get in a replacement before Aug 31.

No excuse on this one, the clubs needs a striker just as much as a left back, goals are the cornerstone of success on the pitch and barring Ba none of our strikers are clinical or good enough to consistently aid the creation of goals through indirect play. Best is still an unknown quantity in my opinion but definitely has the potential, I wouldn't want to have to rely on that potential. We need proven strikers. Full stop. I think one of the reasons we are being so hesitant is that for £7-8m you don't buy proven strikers, there's no guarantee this Maiga will get goals in the premier. But then if that's all you are prepared to spend then you have to take an educated punt. If you do your homework it can pay off big. I'm sure WBA are more than happy with the daft fee they spent on Shane Long right now.

This is not an option. It would be unforgivable to go a full year without adequately replacing a striker we received £35 million for. Especially when the only striker to have been brought in can't get into the team ahead of Shola.