brummie

£26m

If Why not? If Bent carries on delivering 1 goal in every 2 games, he is worth every single penny. Bent was bought by Spurs for 16.5m three years ago, and since leaving them his scoring record has been superb. He's only 26, so I don't really see how anyone can clearly say "he's not worth it". It's also fair enough when people say "yeah by VdV only cost 8m" but that negates the fact that VdV was an absolute steal.

Oliver Holt has been cringeworthy in his licking of MON's ringpiece the last few months.

Whats gone wrong with Warnock? For over a year now, he's been awful. Very unhappy at the moment, by all accounts. Glen Johnson and Warnock as your full backs, though, there's an awful lot of positional fuck ups waiting to happen there.

Rumours about Stephen Warnock going to Liverpool on loan (I'll carry the fucker there) and someone called Taiwo joining us. I had to google him. I've no idea whatsoever about football beyond these shores. Much like a former manager of ours.

What did he say? 'It was never gonna happen' in relation to the deal itself, to which he added: 'I think they just wanted some publicity'. I saw that. Just when i thought a good day couldn't get any better.

Pleased as I am with the signing, it is extra nice to fuck off Potato Head over it, too. http://www.nufcblog.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/Steve_Bruce.jpg http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Football/Pix/pictures/2010/10/29/1288379247640/Steve-Bruce-007.jpg http://www.blogonthetyne.co.uk/images/bruce.jpg

A couple of things surprise me One is that Sunderland were prepared to sell him at all. Even to think about it. Another is that the first whiff of this came out on Sunday night, and less than 48 hours later, he's signed. Clearly, we'd been working on it a while, we did a very good job of keeping it quiet.

Those statements fron Bruce and from Quinn. If i were a betting man, and if the odds hadn't already tumbled, I'd be having a few nicker on him not being there much longer.

How long delay? Hours, or is it happening 2moro? The press are all there now.

Press conference delayed. Doug's on his way down there to claim the credit, by all accounts.

Reading that RTG site, I have never seen a forum where every poster seemingly has to start a new thread to make his point.

In fairness, nothing, nothing at all heard of this until Sunday night, less than 48 hours later, signed and moved, a massive deal like this. You happy with this Brummie? Yes. Desperately need goals, have spent 18m on a striker who consistently provides goals. Can't really complain about that.

In fairness, nothing, nothing at all heard of this until Sunday night, less than 48 hours later, signed and moved, a massive deal like this.

Great manager, really top notch and i think Liverpool should go for him. Got slaughtered by the knucledraggers down here for being "too negative" Mind you, he's Rinus Michels compared to McLeish

Press conference at VP at 4, by all accounts.

I've already hoyed some abuse the way of the twat who wrote that. Unfortunately, that's the sort of nonsense that gets all football suporters a bad name.

No, that is emphatically not what I am saying. What I am saying is that all clubs have to do some wheeling and dealing and manage their club on a budget - for transfers AND for wages, and that is precisely what Lerner asked MON to do. I can not believe that - other than Mancini - there is another manager in the top flight who does not have to do that. You're right, MON did well for us for a while - although i don't really see the relevance of your comment re your relegation, the fact you went down was nothing to do with us - but the fact is - and this is what gets lost - he *left* us, he wasn't sacked, he wasn't hounded out, he left us of his own volition. To read people in the broadsheet press - not all, but most of them - like Barclay, Winter and Hayward - you would think he was sacked. He was not. He was asked to work on the wage bill, he said he would, he then didn't do anything about it, and decided five days before the start of the season that he wanted out. For the last x months, the press have been telling everyone this is because Lerner pulled the transfer plug, which the club have consistently denied, and are now proving. The fact that MON decided he wasn't prepared to do something with getting the wages balance right is up to him, but it sticks in my craw to hear it suggested that, actually, it was the club's fault rather than his. I suspect that, now that we have spent a lot of money - and don't forget, we spent 6 or 7m on Makoun last week and will almost certainly buy Adam this week - will not be sufficient proof for MON's media friends that, actually, the financial umbilical chord has not be cut and that they'll move on to "why didn\t they support MON like that? what idiots!" when, actually, we DID support him like that, massively. The club genuinely can not win.

That's not true. Lerner told MON to do something about the wage bill, not that he couldn't spend, as we had big earners, quite literally never getting used, not even making the bench. Sidwell and Davies goign will cover Bent's wages, I imagine, more than, in fact. I know for a fact that if MON had been given 18m to spend, he'd have spent it on Robbie Keane or Kevin Doyle, plus McGeady to add to our wingers collection. Yes but your logic defeats itself frankly - do you honestly think that players who cost a big fee are going to accept lower wages than they could get at another club ? You are virtually saying that Lerner is trying to be like Ashley over wages , yet still pay big fees for top players...just won't happen until all clubs do it. No, that's not what I am saying. I am saying that Lerner pointed out the players on big contracts and big money who weren't getting used - that's the key part, not getting used. Lerner's argument was that he doesn't mind paying out the money, but ideally we'd make sure the big money went to the right players - this is almost word for word what his right hand man said on our forums. Last season we had Shorey, Sidwell, Davies, Beye, NRC not even getting onto the bench most weeks. I'm guessing their combined wage bill per week was 200k. Lerner's approach was that he'd pay the big wages to the big name, but it is hard to make any remotely convincing business case for not moving on any of the above.

I have some Villa supporting mates who don't shed any tears over his departure, and I imagine anecdotes like that are why. But you won't read anything like that in the papers or on football websites, it's all about the miracles he performed and the evil Yank who cut off the cash-flow. Don't get me wrong, he did an awful lot of good for us, but he's a walking disaster in the transfer market. He also has a tendency (shown before us) of leaving clubs in a right mess transfers / wages wise. I genuinely think his main transfer failings are all linked back to the fact that he's just too half soaked or lazy to scout players abroad. We had no scouting network under MON - literally none. A head scout, Ian Storey-Moore, then nobody else. How is that acceptable in the modern game?

Do you ever feel like you're repeating yourself? It must get frustrating saying the same thing over and over - it seems the media myth of the Lerner/O'Neill split is as hard to dispel as the one about Toon fans going on about being the best fans in the world... Something I just heard August 2009 - Villa desperately in need of a striker and have been for two years. MON spends 17m on Warnock, Collins and Dunne, 3 defenders ......... to replace the three defenders - Shorey, Davies and Knight - he himself had spent 17m on the two seasons before. Oh, and he'd also spent 8m on another CB, Cuellar, the year before, too. This while Darren Bent was joining Sunderland for 10m.

That's not true. Lerner told MON to do something about the wage bill, not that he couldn't spend, as we had big earners, quite literally never getting used, not even making the bench. Sidwell and Davies goign will cover Bent's wages, I imagine, more than, in fact. I know for a fact that if MON had been given 18m to spend, he'd have spent it on Robbie Keane or Kevin Doyle, plus McGeady to add to our wingers collection.

Very much so going forward, slightly frightening defensively at times. Early doors yet, but he's a much better bet there than Warnock If Dalglish takes him back to Liverpool, he's spent his ten years out of football mainlining heroin.

It's our old badge for starters. Couldn't they find the one Randy designed with MS Paint?

Football has a habit of throwing up these things. As it will if we get relegated after events at VP when you did.