Stuy_O

Age and his current earnings was always gonna make this one tricky, but you'd have thought we'd have valued slightly higher than that.

Quite the opposite. It's the equivalent of some horror looking in your direction at 3am and all you'll agree to is not spitting in their face. Aye true, I was going more for the idea if we reluctantly signed him and for nothing. It's the age thing again, we consider 5mil far to expensive for someone Ashley doesnt envisage selling.

He was always one for if the other options were looking unlikely. 2mil is insulting though if true.

2million ffs. Nufc on the pull and at half 3 in the morning saying to some horror 'suppose you'll do'

Think they'll compromise. We're no doubt interested but his wages are very tricky to get around. I can maybe see a deadline day last ditch move if we're still struggling to get Remy or Gomis.

He'll end up at Fulham.

Since the Keegan affair Ashley's desire to invest in this club has depleted, and it's at an all time low at this moment. The impression I get is that if he can avoid spending any money at all on the team, he will. There is this story about how this summer's spending was fast forwarded to January. I'm suspicious that if we'd had a successful season last term that we'd have seen those players brought in. That investment was to save his skin from relegation, simple, and even then you get the impression Pardew almost had to beg him to cough up.

We are debt free to Banks unlike all the other clubs, we owe fatty the money.

Debt in football is acceptable if you're earning bucket loads of revenue to pay it back in doses. Man U, Chelsea are in heaps of it but the banks are quite happy to let them get on with it as they know the money is coming back and with interest. We are debt free but that's basically it, our revenue is bleak. The money is there, it's just all Ashleys.

Ashley should have just sacked him if he felt so strongly. Folk do have short memories, Joey Barton was all over the place for us when he got sent down.

Yeh I actually don't mind Barton and we all know Ashley's flaws but he's going on like he was the victim in all that saga. Joey needs to remember that apart from our first season back up he was mainly useless for us and was nothing but bad press. I did enjoy his attitude when we were promoted mind but it's a pity he never portrayed that throughout his Newcastle career.

At the start of that interview he claims he wasn't paid in jail then about 2 minutes later he says they had to sack him or keep him on the money he was on. So he was paid?

Off at HT and sort it out for City. Made of glass that kid.

Benny hobbling.

3 players, who by all accounts are available, and we are making an utter balls up of all 3 (if we're actually doing anything at all)

This would mean we had a Plan A and B. Let's be realistic here.

It's a combination. If you give a limited manager limited recourses then you're asking for it. When Pardew was asked about what Ashley said to him about the season prospects at the beginning of the last term, he said 'mike said do it all again but with less money'. Quite staggering really.

Spot on. Our amazing policy nearly got us relegated ffs. The season before that was a bunch of opportunity buys for available players. And the squad is nowhere near strong enough. A few injuries decimates it.

Bent's not ideal but he's better than no one. Cisse could get crocked and we've got Shola on his own.

Etap I reckon

Kinnear has slowed down what was an already painfully slow process.

So he's not up here, and we are heading for more dialogue. Brilliant.

For 80,000k a week and his club getting offered 35million? I see your point but it wasnt really that unbelievable imo.

Maybe I am being naive, but I really don't get why these "smaller" transfers take so long. I can fully understand the huge transfers turning into a saga as there is so much to think about but the ones for Gomis and Remy take so long. We are led to believe that we scout our players well and that these targets have been on the agenda for a while. So I don't understand that a few weeks after the season has ended talk do not begin then. Surely this would benefit the buying and selling club as well as the players. Obviously negotiations can be niggly at times but it's not as if this is the unions sorting out strikes etc. So frustrating. Maybe I am missing something I do not know. Just sign someone FFS... Easy to fathom really. We have a lazy attitude to player recruitment, almost as if it's a chore. Can anyone really see Ashley hell bent on getting anyone in a soon as possible? Quite a few of our fans still seem to think that Joe Kinnear is actually a Director of Football. That's not why he was brought here.

QPR lost all their player power as soon as they went down. The clauses that will have been triggered in players contracts will leave them pretty helpless imo.