Stottie

Gayle gets into good positions but I think the recent misses show that he's not very good with his head. I watched the highlight reel recently and there weren't many headers among his Championship goals either.

Obviously not talking from experience of putting money in, never mind 90m of it.

Good signing. He looks useful to me. It applies to our current young wingers too, but they need someone in the middle to give it too, if they aren't going to end up overplaying it or running into trouble. We're far too stingy for it to be us, but it looks like Michy will go out on loan now that Dzeko has arrived. He's the Chelsea player a team in our situation should be loaning. I hope he doesn't go to a fellow PL struggler.

Suarez, Van Persie, Van Nistlerooy, Kuyt and many more. I think it's just more of a lottery than normal really. I think if you watch them as players rather than their league, you'll probably get a better idea. I think the only player who looked brilliant before arriving and then wasn't, was probably Kezman. Oh, plenty more have (Alves, Ruiz, etc), but many more players than the ones you mentioned from Eredivisie have also looked brilliant in the PL (Robben, Hasselbaink, VdV, Bergkamp, etc.) It’s just a strange notion that transfers from Eredivisie clubs are somehow different from any other player transfer from one club to another. Plenty of players have moved clubs within England and even the PL and failed. It’s almost like getting a new player in is always a bit of a risk. Thing is, the players who have done well in the PL usually have had one or more stand out attributes like speed, physicality or exceptional technique. Players like Kezman, De Jong, Janssen etc, may have good movement and play intelligently which seems to be working great in the Dutch league, but they are neither strong, fast or have particularly good technique where you need something to stand out in England. Only exception I can think of is Kuyt which, as we here know all too well, will always be an enigma. I've linked it before, but here is some analysis of how strikers at promoted clubs fare in the Premier League. They're not adapting to "English football" or new teams and systems obviously, but are adapting to bigger and faster opponents. It suggests target men fare best. Bringing this back to Dutch football, but successes like Suarez, Van Nistelrooy, and Pelle were all very strong. Janssen, Kezman, etc. look for space to exploit, and you need world class movement (Van Persie) to create it in the PL. https://experimental361.com/2017/07/15/how-do-goalscorers-fare-after-their-team-is-promoted/ I don't know how strong Jorgensen is, or how fast, but the less fast he is, the more how strong he is matters.

25-30M with a sell on clause is about the most you should pay for someone in the Championship. Sessegnon will be up against much faster players in the PL.

I'd sell him to anyone if the money went on a player high up Rafa's list. It'll only strengthen a rival in relative terms if we don't spend the money.

3 goals in 8 games' of minutes in the CL for Copenhagen and Feyenoord, two minnows who lose most of their matches. Rafa signed Crouch at Liverpool, so he's must like the "good feet for a big man" type. Transfermarkt says Leverkusen mostly played this fella as "LW", so presumably he's all right on the ball. 1 in 2 as a CF.

Sorry to repeat myself, but I trust the press comments about PCP paying a fair price are accounting for the reports that Ashley has asset stripped a 60M chunk of land from the club. The way this has played out, I suspect Ashley will sell if PCP come back with 25M more after this nonsense PR war in the press. He simply wants to be seen having the last laugh. He wants his lackeys to be able to spin it so that he's strong-armed more money out of them. It was him who took the negotiations public.

Gameiro is like Sturridge though, with game time he could play his way into a last chance at the WC. If he goes to Spurs, can we have Llorente?

Why aren't the press mentioning this when they talk about Ashley, how much he has spent, and the price he wants to sell at? PCP are being criticized for being 50M short of the press version of his price, but his price also includes him keeping 60M of land. Its also land that the club will need if stadium expansion in the current site, something central to what the club is, is ever to go ahead.

Other bids from people who've not done due diligence? Aye, righto. Just asking, but does inventing rival bids during a takeover amount to fraud?

Ritchie's been disappointing, Atsu is hit and miss, but Murphy looks like he's getting there. A young player worth persevering with.

He goes on Sky TV and openly says someone can buy this multimillion pound business in installments, like a carpet at DFS, and then turns his nose up when someone takes him up on it.

The second bid is 300M with an easily avoided relegation clause (look at all the shit teams in the league and the easily upgradable positions in our team), plus a pie in the sky 50M for CL. Had Ashley's people engaged PCP properly, you would think they could push for 25M without simply ignoring the bid. It's less than 10% extra. Ashley said he would sell to someone paying in installments, so that is not a factor.

Total cost of Alexis Sanchez 180M according to the Telegraph. Just so they can put Martial or Rashford on the bench. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2018/01/17/alexis-sanchez-agrees-four-year-manchester-united-contract-arsenal/

101 games at exactly 1 point a game suggests Lambert kept Villa up with terminal relegation form. He was merely saved by the existence of three worse teams. Just like this man.

For Villa in PL P101 W25 D26 L50 F98 A164 Pts 101 1.00 Pts/game Since Villa, for Blackburn/Wolves in Championship P30 W10 D8 L12 F31 A31 Pts 38 1.27 Pts/game P30 W12 D5 L13 F35 A37 Pts 41 1.37 Pts/game He may do okay, but his record does not point to it.

Five Thirty Eight now have seven teams finishing on 38 points or fewer. 36 points and second worse goal difference will save you. I would normally think that was low, but with so many poor teams this year, there may be fewer "opposition on the beach" points to be had in April and May. They're usually a gimme with mid table opposition. A classic example would be Carver's last game against Fat Sam's West Ham.

Just saying but there is probably 50M in Lascelles and Merino that I hope Amanda's people are accounting for in their valuation. I bet Southampton's valuation didn't count on them getting 75M for a player in the near future.

Re: his goal scoring, does he ever get in the box? Does he ever take shots from positions like the Dummett one? Nice, if not difficult, ball over the top for Perez, but otherwise he was poor. The checking back all the time is frustrating and kills attacks.

My comment was before the game, and he certainly can't blame the service yesterday. fwiw, most of those six yard goals were with his feet. I don't think he's ever beaten an in-position keeper with a shot from outside the box, so the other chance was not one he was likely to take. This wouldn't matter so much if he did better closer in, but the headers were woeful. Ayew's was straight at Darlow, but had enough power to get a second chance. It sounds like Rafa would have happily traded up on Gayle in the summer but the transfer people were too stingy and inept to do it. He can even do wheeler dealing to make the most of what little resources we have.

Darlow won the challenge, which I think he was favourite to win, but like their goal, simply pushed it back into the danger area. I think he does it too often to call it unlucky.

Poor second half. Darlow nearly gave the point away at the end there. Other than that, lacking quality across the board. We started the season well partly thanks to good set pieces, but they've totally gone to pot.

That free kick was SHITE

Note that when he gets nutmegged by a shot that goes in, Mowson suddenly becomes "the defender".