McCormick

Me too; him and one of Kalimuendo or Sekou Mara. Would be a pretty solid window if so.

He’s always been strangely reviled by our fan base tbh. I get that he’s often gone missing in games and has, at times, seemed pretty averse to tracking back but I’ve seen worse players get less criticism. The guy was really good under Rafa and unplayable in the championship but hasn’t seemed to have retained any goodwill from those times. I have a theory it’s partly due to his appearance, which is a bit shan.

Your Swindon lot are little slugs… etc. edit: Ah, fuck me.

And people say you’re just a pair of tits

I sincerely hope that, in typical PIF fashion, these lot haven’t underestimated the amount of capital required to challenge the top end of the table. In my experience they tend to (mostly) overpromise and underdeliver. The Neom project is currently an absolute shambles, they’ve just fired a lot of top execs in the Roshn project and their housing project near the airport and in northern industrial ports of Jeddah are massively underfunded and have missed their deadlines (I’m coming under a lot of heat for this specifically but their targets and set budget are massively at odds).

Lascelles has shown- at least in a couple of games near the end of the season- that he isn’t a complete liability, I suppose. Howe seems to be focused on team unity and morale which was certainly a massive contributing factor to our amazing late-season form last year. Would be pretty silly to throw that to the wayside so soon imo. I imagine (or would hope) that he’d be a bit more ruthless as expectations rise; carrying players for the sake of morale at the expense of ability only gets you so far.

Honestly, I don’t see it (but hopefully I’m wrong). I reckon we’ll maximize our remaining resources by getting 2x priority positions sorted (rw and st).

If only.

I thought I read it would be available in the uk and KSA, is that right? Want to get home early to watch this.

Shock and awe as what everyone’s been saying about having a reasonably ‘modest’ budget is seemingly true. This is why they said this at the beginning of the window so that people like Bompeter, wouldn’t get unreasonable expectations and throw their toys out of the pram when we didn’t spend 150 million plus. I’m sure we’ll do what we need to do to improve the squad but we’ll do it within our set financial parameters.

I think the stats point to Burn being the better defender though; significantly more progressive passes and aerial duels won iirc. In saying this, I do reckon Howe will go for the right-footer on the right side, which makes sense.

I’m still fairly convinced we’ll “only” spend another 50-60 million.

“ we should be all over that”. I kid, but really we should.

I think that’s the idea if you’re playing 2 up top (having wingers to provide the delivery while your strikers crowd the box). With just one up front, you need that extra fret that inside forwards provide. Your width and delivery from wide areas will come from your full-backs.

He’s left-footed but decent with both feet. I doubt he’d have any issue playing RW, might even be more suited to cutting in.

Yeah that’s a very balanced front 3, on paper. Needs to sort out his consistency but the lad can really strike a ball (which is something Maxi could really do with improving). Don’t see it though, unfortunately; Leeds will only sell for silly money.

Already donning the famous black and white stripes here.

Wow what write-up. I’m in.

Based off of last season’s form I’d go Dennis as well; seems like he just glides across the pitch megging players left and right. For a rumoured 20m, that’d great business imo. Honestly though if we can’t land our top targets, any of those 3 would greatly improve us (and without breaking the bank).

Jacobs saying we’re considering Dennis and that apparently Howe prefers him to Cornet . Interesting if true. Out of Dennis, Sarr and Cornet who would you prefer?

Christ.

I’d take Traore on the cheap if it meant freeing up the funds for a big ticket signing like Isak; think he’s more effective than any of our current rw options. That being said, I think we’d be aiming a little higher.

Daryll.

Sure, I get that. Suppose it’s up to how much you think the roughly 10m spent on them actually contributed to our success that season and whether or not you think 1 or 2 “quality” additions would have contributed more (2 of our most influential buys were Gayle for 12ish and Hayden for 5m). I guess it’s pointless speculation as we can’t know the answer to that question. If you subscribe to the ends always justifying the means then fair enough. Personally didn’t like that approach at the time and think it’s reasonably short-sighted; my point is about preferring to buy players who improve the first team or young back-ups that you can develop. Anyway, apologies, I’ll stop being a bore now!

Daryll