Stottie

FFP, they can't afford to keep him basically. Owner has been going through a very nasty divorce apparently. He couldn't pay her off with the James Rodriguez money?! Wow, that's got to hurt.

Why do Monaco want rid of him? He's only been there a year.

200m if you add in Felliani and Zaha from the previous summer. The Glazers may be taking money out of the club, but they're clearly not bleeding it dry.

Great player but its hard to see where he fits alongside Rooney, RVP, and Mata. Mata out, Januzaj and di Maria in and forget about wing backs might be one way. I bet loads of planks on Red Cafe etc. think they should just drop Rooney. Ozil arrived with a similar pedigree and hasn't set the league alight, so di Maria might take some time to settle. He's coming into an unbalanced team for a league record fee and the pressure to produce, most probably in a formation thats new to him, will be very big.

I think Fergie shunted him wide in 2012-13, the season they got RVP and pretty much walked the league. Prior to 2012-13, Man U had got goals and assists a plenty from Nani, Valencia and Young, but most of it seemed to dry up and lot of their width that season came Citeh style from Rafael and Evra. They also bought Kagawa before that season, so there was some kind of shift in philosophy toward more of a play-it-through-the-middle style. Welbeck's a good player, and he needs a move. 12-15M doesn't seem that mad, but he doesn't seem to have enough of a spark about him to be successful under Pardew. We need someone more capable of doing it on his own.

Micah Richards could be a new target for the floated set penis!

Looked pretty good. Set pieces were way better than normal. Colback was great. Dummett, Perez both came very close and Sissoko should have scored. Riviere needs more support and to be more patient.

Considering Joe Hart's had nothing to do, that wasn't too bad. Riviere's alone and is trying too hard. There was one break we had with Anita and he completely stopped after giving it to Cabella about 40 yards from their goal. It looked like he must have had orders. We've had a lot of the ball though and are not being overrun in midfield against a very strong team. Undone by a moment of class from class players, as much as anything.

Lose by more than one and we're bottom. Looks inevitable from the lineups.

I reckon Januzaj offers more than Mata if you're playing RVP and Rooney. Get di Maria and stick him on the other side!

It was him that Andy Carroll headed the ball over wasn't it in that win at Arsenal.

That looked like our defending!

Maybe a good move to play Routledge rather than Gomis as some of the predictions went. Are Man U playing 3 at the back and if so, who's the third center back? Whatever they are doing, it looks well worth Swansea having a go.

On the subject of Stoke of that vintage, the Demba hat-trick against them was well sweet.

They even made their pitch narrower so he could hoy it closer to the goal. They had to use a wider pitch for their Europa league games because UEFA had rules that the Premier League didn't have at the time.

Good to see them reinvesting wisely What a waste of money. Apparently they've accepted a 3M bid from Palace for Jack Cork too. Only a year left on his deal, hence the price. Great deal for Palace. Southampton looking like things could go very pair shaped.

Great video Sewelly!

Not that we'll buy him, but presumably the going rate for Chicharito will only be a few million more. That would be much better value.

Or acknowledging the fact he had some very good games for us when we finished 3rd, 5th and 7th. Not to mention scoring 2 important goals in 1-0 wins to get us into Europe. Imagine a CB doing that for us now. Yeah, for quite a while it was a case of him looking like a strong and quite capable defender who'd be pretty good if he'd just cut out the mistakes. He would have good games against the likes of Henry. He never grew out of making mistakes though. They only got worse, and to state the obvious, the closer you are to your own goal, the bigger the liability of any cockup you make.

If you presume Laurent Robert was playing at his best, there's two goals straight away from absolutely nothing!

Good to see some ambition from Everton and good luck to them. They're certainly showing us up. Looking at the Southampton prices, you'd have to think they could get a mint for some of their players. Lukaku played 500 more minutes than Remy last season, over 20% longer, so Remy for the price the CL clubs can get him for is a bargain and a half.

Stoke's people seemed to think Demba Ba's knee would explode but its still going strong. We should make a bid!

With Shaw in particular, the English player premium is there for everyone to see. Lovren and Schneiderlin aren't English though, and their valuations are also very high. Lovren looks like he'll go for more than Cabaye. I rate Ricky Lambert though and he's a great striker for 5M. I think he's a much better footballer than he's given credit for. Maybe his price should have had a premium too!

P18 W3 D7 L8 16pts That's Southampton vs. the top half of the table last year. Four of the points are off us in tenth place. Versus the top four it was P8 W1 D2 L5 with only six goals scored. They had a great season and played some nice stuff for sure, but those valuations of their players are way out there. Their manager too will have to up his game at Spurs.

LVG certainly seems to have the media on his side, but we'll see how things go when the season starts. They look a couple of players short at the moment. Given that players of the calibre of Fabregas and Alexis Sanchez have come to the Premiership, their transfer activity has not been impressive. Their commercial revenue should mean they can afford anyone's wages.