KaKa

Woah ... so the people upset about the Minteh sale, don't understand the circumstances?

Yeah, maybe. Although it seems even worse on the bigger platforms.

I think one of the unfortunate hang overs from the Ashley era is this fear that players we are after aren't up to scratch, unless they are very well known names. Along with the fear that we won't be able to replace any good player that leaves, or is getting older and that we will eventually need to move on from. Really hope the fan base can eventually overcome this.

We signed Fabian Schar at 26 years old for less than £5 million. He had never played at a big club and had never even had anyone spend up to £5 million on him. Round about the same time or a year later Man United spent £80 million on Maguire. Man City were after him too and he was being hyped in the media. The amount spent doesn't indicate how good a player is, neither does all the noise around them either. If the scouts do a good job we can definitely find someone to eventually take over from Schar. After all if we're talking strictly pedigree at the same age, pretty much every young defender we've been linked with is ahead of Schar was at the same age. Spending big money often gives a false sense of assuredness on transfers that doesn't necessarily pan out. I think the defenders we're looking at are plenty good enough, and are being underestimated a fair bit.

Ultimately if they need to raise funds though, and the offers coming through are lower than their perceived value, then ultimately, something usually has to give. Guess we'll find out soon enough. That's if we are even in for him.

Any further info to share on what stood out that you don't like? Haven't seen much of him myself, but like his profile.

Typically agents like to have their players names out there as any move means money for them. Really odd to see them come out against a move in this manner. Usually means negotiations for their cut/fee haven't gone great.

And why has no one else snapped up this magnificent defender yet, if you don't mind me asking?

It was part of the reason we brought in Pope as a sweeper keeper that is really good coming out and sits higher up the pitch as a starting point to protect against balls in behind. They tend to favour big powerful centre backs that are aggressive, to push up and support our pressing. It's really just out wide we have got exploited with speed from faster wingers taking on Dan Burn, but with the options we have now, he won't need to ever be used there anymore, hopefully.

And so based on this Botman should have only been £15-20m because of his recovery pace? Or perhaps even cheaper since he is even slower?

If the third striker is going to be really young and fairly inexperienced like that Osula kid linked yesterday, then I like this link even more, as he can also play upfront.

Think Brentford left things too late last year. Also, circumstances change year on year. They may well need the money to rebuild and are now ready to let him go, as they may have no other assets, and maybe not as many clubs are interested as last time. All sorts could come into play.

It's a smart strategy that has worked really well for us, and hope it continues. Buying the guys getting hyped all over the media usually means a ton of competition for them, large fees and large salaries. We need to continue being smart in the market. Once again we are in that £35 million range for a player, that has been really good for us, and it is really not that expensive nowadays.

Don't do ASM like that man.

Looks to have some nice tools to work with. Just so inexperienced though in getting goals outside of the under 21s it seems.

Sounds like he's one with potential, but doesn't seem to have shown much yet in goals. Was hoping the third striker would have more of a record of scoring goals, even if it was at a lower level. For this kind of money, was hoping we could find someone scoring goals already in somewhere like Belgium or Austria at a similar age. Don't think the 3rd striker we carry should be this inexperienced.

Just under 3 weeks now. Then the football starts.

You've definitely been on the wind up all summer. Don't worry. We'll speak again once the season kicks off!

There is no flip flopping. My opinion hasn't changed though. I don't know why this is so difficult to understand. Kelly is not going to start the season if he is yet to even start getting any matches under his belt. We are just over two weeks away. Our issue last season tended to be at the defensive end. And so my expectation had Kelly come in and been involved fully from the outset, was that he would have gotten the spot, because he is the better defender. And so yes, I would have been surprised if Hall got in ahead of him. Kelly appears to be a fair bit behind fitness wise, if he isn't even in the match day squad to come in for some minutes. And so it's fairly obvious Hall has a clear advantage right now. I don't know why this is so hard to grasp.

Um ... not really. You just have to read things properly to fully understand.

Don't think Lewis has ever made it through a pre season fully fit since Howe joined. Will be interesting to see if he can just manage that alone first. If he can do that then who knows what will happen. We're pretty low on numbers at the minute and so he may end up being kept around.

Yeah ... but Kelly's fitness is far behind still. Thought that would be obvious from what I said in my post this morning. All being equal I think Kelly would have claimed the spot personally. Don't think Hall is the defender he is yet, and Howe is likely to prioritise that.

He'll definitely start the season, as he's playing pre season games and doing well. And so he has every advantage of nailing down that spot. Kelly not playing games yet and being brought along slowly knocks him out of contention to start the season IMO.