Dr Jinx

Funny, I remember mentioning that shit about sports direct to people at the time who sort of shrugged their shoulders and said it wouldn’t stop them shopping there.

The only difference with this one is the KSA virtue signalling that the journos love to be part of for obvious reasons.

It won’t go much further than that as deep down, nobody really cares about those workers, they’re just being used for a parallel cause.

30 minutes ago, 1964 said:

According to the Bournemouth fans, the other way round.  He's a good CB that can also play LB

So he’s an upgraded replacement for Dummett 😂

So he’s Dummets replacement? Certainly an upgrade if a risky one at that.

Is he purely a left back or can he play CB?

Chelsea is still a massive gamble, if they don’t make top 4 regularly there’s only so long that charade can be kept up for.

At least we’re using Romano for our benefit in this case.

He’s basically Game of Thrones’ Varys of the football world.

1 minute ago, LRD said:

 

Hart retired at the end of last season.

I did not know this 🙂 know he’s been around ages but he didn’t seem over the hill.

He’s really fucked his career up. Reputation is in the bin.

Why would he move to a shitty league to play 2nd choice to Joe Hart?

I have a feeling (or maybe a hope) that this “bid” is just a ruse to get Valencia to accept the offer for Marmaduke

He absolutely looks a talent and a bit of a maverick.. which is why I don’t think Eddie Howe would keep him in the squad. He’d much rather sign British which is why I think Bowen may be a goer.

But looking at his clips I can definitely see the comparisons he’s been getting to elite players.

Funds from Minteh and Almiron could well fund a move for Bowen?

There’s no reason we couldn’t ask for 25m for Miggy.. we signed him for 21? Inflation n all that.

I think we’re on the cusp of the PSR limit for last season which runs until end of June.

From July is a different prospect. I don’t think we need to sell to buy but getting rid of some deadwood is a given. We need to make space in the squad.

Now Minteh is a total gamble. He could be a 40 million pound flop or he could be cheap as chips for that sort of fee. Plenty of very skilfull players who don’t have that sort of power and pace who tread water in the PL.. also plenty of players who have pace and power but no skill and no brain who equally stagnate.

We could be onto something rare who just clicks in every way and becomes an absolute nuisance to opposing teams.

IF we are on the cusp of the limit but still ok.. that 5m is already accounted for. The lad could be worth 80-100m the following season. I say fuck them, let the boy play. Let him impress and don’t ever enrich the likes of Liverpool with talent again, unless we know 100% that he’s a dud.

Sell the training ground and lease it back for £1 a year on a long term contract.

It’s open season now for taking the absolute piss. Fuck the lot of them 

FFP is bullshit anyway, it’s supposed to prevent clubs from going into administration but it fails on that front. It still happens. And penalties for that happening were always in place anyway, now the clubs just get the points deductions ahead of schedule, sealing their fate as it were.

If a club has the money, let them spend it. Is it fair? Nope. But the PL as an entity with massive tv deals brought this into the game.

Once upon a time clubs outside the very top 2/3, were happy if they could lure some aging Italians to the league for their swansong, now nearly every PL club right down to the bottom can rival most of Europe’s clubs for new signings.

It’s in the interest of the PL to allow clubs to go for players like Mbappe if they can afford it. More eyes on the games = more revenue. Everyone benefits from the trickle down.

In the case of our PSR balance.. I don’t think it’s a huge sum. Something that selling say, Matt Targett could probably cover.

6 minutes ago, Kid Icarus said:

Sorry, it's a bit late for work talk like.

No I understood your line of thinking.

I think the days of stellar websites are done to be honest. Web development has settled down into a very boring one size fits all stylee.

The only thing I’ll ever go to the site for is either tickets, membership or pre match press conferences. If I find myself on the site it’s usually via clicking a link on here or twitter. And that’s probably far more organic than most sites.

The last time I saw a web designer go wild with a free reign was this.

https://alfredservice.com/
 

View the desktop version… 🙂

Start of July is when most clubs will be spending. It would be wonderful if we had everything lined up and executed at speed.. sort of like the end of Godfather 1.

We can sell before obviously but the only clubs not hamstrung by FFP are Saudi so we need to be far more aggressive in using that market. Our guys need to want to go there too though which is the main thing. We can’t force Miggy or any other player to go anywhere.

Minteh probably has more sale potential after his season on loan but again, maybe Howe wants a good look at him before committing to any other right sided forward. He might just be a revelation.

8 hours ago, gjohnson said:

Got to remember in the mid 90s we weren't far behind Man U commercially. A couple of bad board decisions later then were 30 years later and 100s of millions behind

Ah we were way behind, even by mid 90’s they had a global fan base buying shirts and other merch.

Now a case can be made that we were ahead of or at least on parity with some of who are considered the big 6 now. Certainly Spurs, definitely Chelsea.. Liverpool are hard to gauge because they have or should have a global reach like Man Utd but they didn’t for whatever reason in the 90’s so yeah we could probably match them financially at that time.

Arsenal seemed to connect with African market, whether that was lucrative or not is another thing but massive shirt sales.

Our woes had probably started the summer after we signed Shearer.. just a series of bad decisions. Selling Ferdinand was just mental but we probably had to lose someone to keep running costs of the club viable. Never bought into that gentleman’s agreement shite.. Shearer did his ACL and we had time to pull the plug on that Ferdinand deal to Spurs. We’d have at least saved the season in terms of challenging up near the top. But the board/shareholders decided we needed the money more than a sporting chance.

Keegan never would have let that happen which again is why he upped and left. He could see the writing on the wall with going public.

From the remnants of the 90’s and early 00’s, Manchester United and Arsenal forged ahead commercially, gains which still give them a platform even today.

In Arsenal’s case, Wenger kept them in the Champions League places the whole time while spending next to nothing. That’s the only reason they are able to compete right now.

Man United should be competing, the platform financially is there for them to succeed even now.

But those trying to make a case for why sovereign nations should be allowed to spend whatever are pissing in the wind. The reality is that the minute Abramovich took over at Chelsea, the stakes were upped. City just built on that. It’s here and here to stay.

We don’t need to justify ourselves as the table had already been set by others.

Their process so far has been to hire outside consultants to bring candidates in. This whole notion of biding time until the right fit comes along doesn’t really hold up, especially if it’s the same process that brought us Ashworth. He may well tick boxes but it seemed that some at the club saw through him from an earlier point. (Very much reading between the lines but some here also hold that opinion)

The idea of a sporting director is still a  slightly controversial one in English football, it works at some clubs and others not so much. The likes of Howe and say someone like Rafa Benitez are very much control freaks.. someone would have to be working for them as opposed to the other way round.

It would certainly have to be a case of one bringing in a manager that they wanted, having someone there who’s well gotten their feet under the table like Howe has just seems like a wrong way to mix the cake.

Ashworth got rid of Hughton and brought Potter in so the hierarchy was clear at Brighton.

Whoever their chief scout was is the one we should have been after. We should be signing the next stars while they are still relatively unknown given our FFP position.

2 minutes ago, astraguy said:

Did we have any debt when we were sold or was in priced into the 300m?  See everton owe 777 208mill 

The “debt” to Mike Ashley was worked into the price for the club. It was a clean slate when the current owners came in.

4 minutes ago, TRon said:

 

I think he would have happily come here if one of the cartel clubs hadn't come in for him. We just aren't allowed to compete with them under the current PL rules.

No not this summer.. I think the rule changes open things up for next summer though, especially if we get top 4.

Assuming we don’t have the same injuries we should be stronger to make that kind of challenge but we also need to replace what we’ve already lost (stating the obvious) as well as upgrading the squad in any way we can.

Howe needs to seriously improve on getting that consistency.

We’ve had dips mid season in both of his full seasons now, there should be enough data to see patterns now.

It’s not out of the question to suggest that without that mid season blip in 22/23, that we could have been challenging for the league by the end of it, given how strong we finished.

Kelly is only a 3 year deal because of the medical risk.

I would have assumed Tosin would have been offered a 4/5 year deal based on his profile.

There’s no way any signing comes in as one of the top earners straight off the bat.

Now one season in and he’s pulling up trees, the club would have renegotiated, but he’s taking a short term view and I suppose in the same position you’d take the job that’s offering the best pay/benefits but it’s still disappointing.

I don’t think we were ever close, maybe for as far as an offer and they’ve just taken that info and shopped him about.

I didn’t know an awful lot about him before he was linked and I’m happy enough to just let this one go.. it’s not the same as that Hugo chap and his arsehole agent.

Who writes this shit 

He always seemed to play much better at International level for Ireland but even that piss poor team has outgrown him.