christ

The BDB/Tino conundrum is literally the only thing I really question him on. Everything else that’s happened this season there are massive amounts of mitigation. Absolutely no way his position should be up for debate. Utterly deranged conversation to be having.

We haven’t coped at all well with going from a keeper who plays on the edge of his 18 yard box to one who is terrified of leaving his six yard box. That’s not a criticism of Dubravka btw. We’re just struggling to adapt.

It’s a bit of a concern that our head’s completely go when we go behind at home. Very lucky we managed to rescue it because it was looking very Boxing Day for a while. Howe has a big decision to make when it comes to Burn and Tino. For my money he can’t justify sticking with BDB any longer. It’s twice in a week he’s been completely pantsed by a player with a bit of pace about him. He’s going to be targeted for the rest of the season.

I’d gladly ban 90 per cent of posters on here for their shite football takes.

Tonali’s got some decent patter about him. Bruno absolutely hates to lose

I’d be bothered if FFP wasn’t such a live concern, or other clubs were chucking cash around while we couldn’t. As it stands though the entire window has been a non-event. Might as well give Jim White the Wednesday off.

Yes to Ramsey and Onana. They’d both improve us in the short term but they’re young with very high ceilings. Billing I’m not mad about, but his style of play is very us. Hard working, great presser, can contribute at either end of the pitch. Assume we’d only do a deal if it’s very favourable to us.

He was a monsterous dickhead in Germany too.

He’s a cunt. Delighted to see the back of him.

Every transfer window on here has had no small collection of doyles moaning about how much of a disaster it was. We’re not far off the one year anniversary of us ruining our CL qualification hopes by not signing Sander Berge. The thing that makes me certain Tonali and Barnes will be absolutely transformational signings when we get them on the pitch is because HottigersBogBrush thinks the summer window was terrible.

Not sure how anything that’s happened is particularly unprofessional like. The Trippier stuff (which is the only deal I had reservations with despite the fact I understood the logic) was leaked from the Bayern side. The rest of it? Well, speculation and rumour is kind of a core part of football transfers. I didn’t think that would be a surprise to people on here but I live to be astonished. Miggy and Wilson fall into that category of saleable but replaceable. We don’t have many of those. If we need to move them to make some deals then we better get cracking.

It’ll all come out in the wash

Typical Howe, shopping in the PL.

What’s wrong with being Sekso?

It was always going to happen. Alternative is we stagnate on the pitch and hope we can overcome PSR with commercial deals and prize money alone. It feels like to me like the club have identified Botman, Bruno and Isak as the core of the next iteration of the team. They’ll not be going anywhere (save for an absolutely astronomical bid on our terms). Challenge now is finding players of a similar profile with a similar ceiling. We’ve already got a couple in Tino and Gordon (Tonali and Barnes tbc), but doing that on a larger scale necessitates player trading.

I’d get your ears syringed

Neither am I. Shite since Jeff left.

£25m for a 33 year old right back would be absolutely insane tbf.

If he does go it’ll be very interesting to see whether this kick starts a bigger rejig on the playing side. I don’t think Miggy will be anywhere near as effective without Trips, so we might look to upgrade there too while his value is relatively high.

I’ve absolutely no idea, but as I expect we’ll demand a substantial fee up front and that under FFP purchases are amortised over the length of the contract it would obviously make a big difference in FFP terms.

This is the kind of ruthless deal you have to do under FFP unfortunately. Move on an asset at the peak of its value to reinvest. Of the ‘purple’ players, Trippier is arguably the easiest to lose. That’s not denigrating him as a footballer, because he’s one of the best full backs in Europe, but he’s 33 and we have a readymade replacement in Liveamento who we can’t justify keeping benched. If Botman, Bruno or Isak go on the otherhand we’re absolutely fucked. Gutted if it turns out to be true, but I can see the rationale.

On the one hand I think it would be insanity to sell him. He’s one of the best right backs in the world, integral to how we play and a massive influence around the club. On the other the club may be aware that his value is as high as it’s going to get, and we’ve got a player in Livramento who is far too good to be sitting on the bench week in, week out. It would be a calculated gamble if we did move him on, but it’s the sort of risk you have to take under FFP sometimes. I hope he doesn’t. I hope this is all speculation and we keep him. But I trust the club.

In fairness to him that’s not a particularly unusual position. It’s what I want.

I’m anti-new stadium, except when it comes to the arena site. I think it would look outstanding, keep the club in the heart of the city and provoke a lot of regeneration of the surrounding area too.

It’s all about getting value though. The club will have a rate card for all of this stuff, and they’ll wait for the deal that matches it. Why lock in on a multi year training kit sponsorship now for example, when you expect you could do a substantially better deal on 12/18 months time? We’ve seen the arse on we’ve had with getting out of the Castore deal. Brands want longer term partnerships to maximise their exposure and association with NUFC so there’ll be pretty punitive break clauses if we try to wriggle out of things early. The commercial side of things seems to be ticking along quite nicely. The Saudis and InPost partnerships are likely to be reasonably lucrative. I expect bigger deals will come but only when it makes sense for the club.