sushimonster85

It makes sense as you know we're the side who are absolutely being watched the most carefully.

I do think it's hard to try and parse what journo's know what (if any of them know anything). But these past few days have definitely seen a shift in tone, if not in actual figures. Immediately after the season ended we heard the 100-150m figure. Who knows how accurate this was, or whether it did or did not include player sales. Personally I feel like the club is erring on the side of (relative) caution. A budget of 75-100m, meaning instead of 4-5, it's actually 2-3 high quality first 11 ready additions, alongside a resolve to keep the likes of ASM.

Actual article suggests that no one really knows what the budget is, mentioning the 75m from last week but says it's 'tricky'. Luke seems to think there has been a shift from quantity to quality.

https://twitter.com/TeleFootball/status/1668271963129757696 Hold on to your butts

They're odd. They rarely go big on a transfer story, so it used to meant when they did you knew something was going on. Now, whilst it's still rare they feature a transfer story on the main page, it seems to be totally hit and miss.

Only way I can see anything close to 65m is if it's 45m with future performance related add-ons that could take it as high as 65m.

So long as Maddison is driven by footballing reasons I think we should win out here. Spurs should be able to offer a higher fee and weekly wage than we can but lol Levy. With us he has guaranteed CL football at least next season. Spurs have no European football next season. Being brutally honest its probably going to be equally hard for Spurs and ourselves in terms of qualifying for the CL next season. So if he plumps for Spurs he is risking not playing CL football for his entire career. May sound dramatic but he is 27 in November. We give him a chance at CL football in his absolute prime. Spurs.. best case scenario he is playing CL football at the age of 28.

I tend to go with Ornstein. When he starts talking about it as a goer then 99 times out of 100 it tends to happen.

There's precedent in the past for players being allowed to temporarily leave the training camp to sort a move. Though that's usually at the very business end of the move when they have to come in and sign the contract, take the promo photos etc. Doesn't seem like we will e at that stage till after the 19th anyway.

Something definitely happened over the weekend. Whether that was anything concrete from us or Spurs, or just Maddison's camp starting to get itchy feet and giving people the 'hurry up' who knows.

Aye. He's a bit of a mess like. Has he ever actually been right about anything? Even times where he thinks he has a tap in he ends up looking stupid. Takeover goes through and every day that week Burnsie is like 'have it on good authority Bruce is packing up and saying his goodbyes right now'.... Bruce ended up staying on for a good week past that.

May be wishful thinking because it's only quarter past 9 and I'm already bored at work, but do think this is the week things start to heat up. All the business stuff with Sela and the new kit is done and out the way, season is completely over, window officially opens. Imagine we start hearing about actual moves this week.

Are we sure the blank box is even a thing anymore? Inter didn't seem to have it in the CL final.

Going to guess that's Man U side briefing. They were apparently pretty pissed Maguire has told them he wants to stay rather than go somewhere like Villa, so will likely be trying to drum up interest from other CL clubs.

Which was especially ironic considering the game that made everyone realise the kit clash issues between the sides was a total goal fest. The Alex Mathie game at St James with both sides in away shirts.

Wonder if there's no pro shirt this year, or they're holding it back.

Probably has a contracted on sale date. Same thing happened with the home shirt last season. If you bought in the first few weeks you got one without the Noon sleeve patch.

Same. First season I properly remember following along with as kid. Not a bad one to start on! If/when collars come back on fashion I'd love them to do a tribute to this top in the future.

Makes sense to cash in on him if we can. Assuming we do bring in a LB we have Burn as cover before we have even signed any potential young right footed CB.

Aye. Sticking my neck out I bet the two big ones are Maddison and Tierney.

Ultimately think we land somewhere between 100 and 120. But also think that will involve someone giving us 30m+ for ASM

All about context isn't it. Obviously purely as a daft football fan you'd be disappointed. But the pragmatic side of me would appreciate/respect that they have a long term plan and they're sticking to it. Say we over-reach and spend 150-200m, and some of those signings don't work out. It would be a few windows before we're ready (from an FFP standpoint) to go again and rectify the mistakes.

Which would be pretty stupid, at least until Gordon has been given a fair run from the start of the season.

Was FFP by all accounts. Owner more than willing to spend, but they had their hands tied by FFP after chasing the top 6 for so long.

Going to do my best to try and hold out and see the 2nd and 3rd tops before pulling the trigger.