STM

The one thing I will say, Foxedup seems so desperate to convince us that they aren't selling Maddison that I think he is very worried about losing Maddison. He might be right. He might be trying to convince himself more than us.

You could have said that about Bruno in January and Howe judged that spot on. It's hardly much of an issue. Botman will be our number 1 defender in the next few years at least. Of course some will cry like bairns when they don't get what they want.

Yeah I can see your point with valuations. I think that right now they want a "deal" and you think that if we want to be big boys we are going to have to pay the price to get the players we want? I totally agree, I just think 2 things, firstly you are 12 months early on that criticism. In 12 months we should have a big commercial operation in place, sponsorships etc, when this happens quibbling over 5 million or so will seem farcical. Right now, I think we have decided to be cute an concentrate on getting a good base of players in (which goes to your point about Burn), as well as getting those star players when their available for our price. My second point would be that even for the "top" clubs there is scope for stepping away when someone isn't at the value you have set or waiting 6 months before revisiting a target. It can look weak (see Cucarella) or it can look controlled. We are clearly trying to do the latter.

Yeah but he said team ethos. So I read that as the collective culture of our team. I don't know, but I see this heading down a slippery slope that I'm not comfortable with.

Can anyone tell me how they will line up? Formation and players?

I think he's suggesting that Cornet plays as an individual, rather than a team player. I don't think he's making assumptions on his personality but more on the type of player he is on the pitch.

I think you are being incredibly harsh on our transfer strategy. If we had signed Botman in January, he may (we can't know for sure) have cost us close to 50m on his own. Therefore if anything we have come out of it with an extra player in Burn, and a good player at that. On your previous point you said that we have an approach like Chelsea, which I believe is that you are suggesting that once we have missed out on our main target we have a scatter gun approach. Surely you don't think the Ekitike thing was preventable? He pretty much admitted he agreed to join us before PSG came in. Therefore if you accept that it was an unforseen situation, you have to cut them some slack for having to go back to the drawing board? Personally, I think they have looked at comparable players to Eikitike; young versatile forward players with great potential and found nobody who comes close in terms of valuation. Therefore they have switched tactics and are now looking at other profiles, I.e attacking players wide and central. My gut says they have decided against trying to sign an out and out striker, given our lack of links to one. This will annoy alot of people as its seen as a risk. Its only a risk this season. Not to their long term strategy. IMO they have two objectives; 1. Strengthen as much as they can and 2. Don't over pay for players based on their valuations.

The logic is that they rate Harrison higher. Whether he's worth twice as much is debatable. I'd say that he wasn't worth twice as much but then again we haven't signed either so clearly we don't agree with either valuation.

It's entirely unsurprising. I've always had Howe down as someone who prefers British based players. So long as they are as good as Maddison, I've got no issue with it However, if we want value, we will have to look abroad. For the money we have bid for Maddison, we could have signed Scamacca for example but then there's higher risk with signing players from other leagues. It's a balancing act that I'm sure they are aware of.

Ekitike was the plan IMO. That's been out of the window for a while now.

I think it's more likely that we spend 60m on two players than 50m on one. I don't think it's about a budget, just not going above a certain ceiling on one player.

I don't think for a second we only have 40m. I think we are only prepared to pay what believe a player is worth. I'm also certain the Maddison second bid was well in excess of 40m, even if it wasn't as high as 50m.

We were never going to go flying in with the third offer. We'd look incredibly desperate. We need them to know that our next bid is our final bid and that we aren't fucking about. Maddison needs to go knocking on the door.

I think this is what will happen. We won't leave the bid on the table though. We need time for a plan B. I've said 52/54m is the middle ground and I will stick by that. The Dubravka thing could be interesting too.

Yeah I agree with this.

Absolutely. I'm still convinced that a surprise target will emerge.

Even his "poor" form at Chelsea wasn't poor. They played him from the wing or the bench so often. It's a quick way to fuck with a forward players confidence. Even if he doesn't score bundles, he will offer loads of other qualities, the sort of stuff Bellamy used to give us. Again, I struggle to see how we get a deal though. It's very difficult to get a player to take a wage cut. If he does, it's to his credit.

Aye but he might do more stupid dancing. Little baldy tosser he is.

"Give me the phone, I will ring Luke and see what he thinks we should do", Dan Ashworth, never.

I wonder if we could do a permanent deal for Werner. It would arguably make more sense. If we signed him, we could off set his high wage with a large signing on bonus. Of course that would be dependent on agreeing a deal with Chelsea and given his high wages, we would want a cheaper deal. I'm sure Chelsea are desperate to get that level of wages off their books though. It would save them a ton of money.

I thought it might happen, and still do but that's coz I'm an old romantic (deluded idiot) who looks on the bright side of these things. The deal was always going to be difficult to do. I take heart from the fact we are still targeting quality players. We've signed some crackers so far. Elite players; Botman, Bruno and Trippier Good players; Burn, Targett, Pope Yes we signed Wood, who is average at this level but I doubt we will dip into that zone again.

Tell you what I'm going to breathe a huge sigh of relief when the next player signs and we can go into the last few days of the window looking for one more.

How do we make the Werner deal happen, given his wages? He'd be pretty much my ideal signing. Can play across the front 3.

It also references the Daily Star. That's like me quoting dave from the pub.

I'm 100% certain that we won't pay 60m like. 50 perhaps.