oldtype

In six months to a year the entire market landscape will have changed. Strikers who we haven't even thought about now will be touted as the next big thing with price tags of 50-80 million pounds attached to them. That's the argument for replacing Isak later rather than now.

I could scarcely imagine a player less suited for Eddie Howe football than Lee.

He's gotten to the top of the mountain as a squad player. He hasn't gotten there as the No. 1 guy yet and you'd imagine an ambitious 24 year old would care about that.

Closes down like a madman too, so will fit our style. There's a reason we've been looking at him for a while.

I think he's good enough to take Longstaff's role right now and if he makes some appearances in big games and looks good his value will explode (not that I would want to sell him, but it's a good option to have). Really don't like the idea of loaning him out when he could be a full-time rotation player in our squad, but I suppose Eddie would know better than I do.

Samu needs another year before I'd be wiling to bet big money on him and at that point he'll probably be too big for us

I think Ramos is by far the least uninspiring of all the remaining “Isak Replacements” that have been floated by the media.

Can we not convince them to take Isak too? Ramos and 80m. Sold!

What on earth is “he only wants to leave” little shit just couldn’t bring himself to type “only wants Newcastle”

If we can sell any players on the extreme periphery of the squad like Targett or Willock we may sign a replacement. But yeah, other than that I think it’s just one or two strikers (probably one).

Honestly I’d not be anywhere near as intensely angry at Liverpool and Isak if it were not for those stupid Romano tweets they’re actively counterproductive for everyone.

Not that this would actually happen, but a repeat of the Jose Enrique situation would be absolutely delightful. He forced a move there saying that he needed to go to a Top 5 team. We finished fifth that season. They finished eighth.

Miley needs playing time. If we buy anyone else we would need to loan him out, which defeats the purpose of buying more depth.

I don't much care to justify how Wissa has conducted himself. There's not much difference between him and Isak IMO. (If any kind of distinction is to be drawn, I would note that this is Wissa's last chance to play CL football, while Isak still has basically his entire prime in front of him). That said, we need a striker, so I don't care.

Okay can we have stupid Wissa now. Having one fit senior striker will fully take all remaining anxiety out of this transfer window.

To be fair, I assume he's taking a helicopter not a jet, but yes it's kind of ridiculous.

As far as the decision to act out itself goes, I agree. But it’s not Isak’s job to be dictating the specifics of the media strategy and that strategy has been terrible.

And while I normally hate the whole “it’s the agent not the player angle” at this point I can’t help but think that he’s receiving bad advice. Even if you’re hell bent on getting out of dodge this summer, there are smarter, more nuanced ways to do this. Going on strike? Fine. Threaten it behind the scenes. You absolutely don’t need the gleeful “HERE WE GO Alex Isak on strike!” Tweet from Romano. All you’re doing is harming your public image.

If you’re a superstar already you probably don’t need an agent taking a cut of your deals. Clubs will offer you close to whatever you want anyway. You can hire someone to coordinate all the PA stuff without asking for a percentage of your earnings (honestly more star players should do this). But when you’re young and just breaking into the professional scene a well connected agent is huge in terms of finding the right club for you, maximizing your earnings, putting the right support people around you, and building your public image for marketing purposes. And if you feel like your agent has done a good job for you at that stage, there’s a great deal of personal loyalty and friendship built up so it’s hard to cut ties even when you don’t actually need them anymore.

We would have to select him and he would have to refuse to play for a fine to occur. Eddie may choose to get around the situation for a while by just not selecting him. At the end of the day we won’t know what will actually happen until the window shuts. There’s a reason no player (as far as I know) has actually refused to play a significant amount of games that matter. Can’t throw away an entire season of your prime like that.

We have enough midfielders now IMO. Willock is rarely fit but as sixth choice rarely is exactly as often as we'll need him. (and you would hope that the reduced playing time results in less injuries as well). There's also a bunch of folks who can play at CM as emergency cover if needed. I wouldn't want to stifle MIley's development by bringing in too much competition. He should hopefully be playing this season about as much as Longstaff played last season. If that's not going to be possible he should go out on loan.

Af this point I could see the price coming down enough that we go for him instead of Wissa. Chelsea have enough money that they don’t really need to haggle that hard and clearly they just want him out of the building.

I'm sure we're aware that he exists and is good at football, the question is more whether the recruiting team has done the sort of extensive, months-long vetting of him we appear to require for all of our big-money signings. That may or may not have happened.

100%. This happens all the time.

Not too proud to admit that while I know nothing about what kind of person Craig Hope is, I just absolutely cannot stand his face.