TheBrownBottle

For once, I’d be confident we’d get a player ahead of Chelsea. That club is a mess - and Guehi’s visibility and reputation is growing. The last thing he needs is to enter a chaotic environment where he might find himself benched for the next couple of seasons.

Spurs - the club usually considered the lesser of the ‘big six’ - has seen their revenues grow more than ours since our takeover. And that’s with us grabbing the lowest of low-hanging fruit. You can’t be ‘number one’ if you can’t even keep pace with ‘number six’. That’s what the issue is - and the club doesn’t appear to be maximising potential income. On the pitch, we’re much closer - but to sustain it, off the pitch the club needs to be on rocket boosters.

Yep. Without all of that, there’d be no ‘pissing about’ - we’d be running around overpaying just to get shit sorted quickly. ‘You want £65m? Oh, I getcha. Here’s £70m. Keep the change’

They’d need to replace him if they sold him - so they can’t wait forever either

The back line weren’t fucking awful. The problems started when the ball reached midfield.

Botman pre-injury was superb

Yes, England are a better international side - there isn’t a metric which would say that they aren’t - and Botman’s form before his season ended was bloody awful. Ligue 1 is not PL-standard.

About 35m - Botman was also younger, and is still not a full international. Guehi plays regularly for a much better international side, is PL-proven and there will be an ‘English premium’ applied. Don’t see the issue with Palace’s valuation tbh.

Yep, though it depends on what the sponsor pays in the current football FY

Villa overtook us last season. In fact West Ham were as close to us as we were to Villa. There’s no reason at all that a side making good signings couldn’t jump a few places. They’ve got a higher turnover than Villa, and aren’t all that far behind us on that front, either. Absolutely nothing is set in stone.

There’s nothing permanent about any of that IMO

Jan Molby approves this comment

The statement alone is bizarre. I'm not saying that we might not finish 8th or lower - of course we could - but it is the best we can hope for? Bloody hell, I must have imagined the last two seasons

Bit of a hike from the Bigg Market mind - seems more geared up to the older Haymarket crowd. I wouldn’t go near it eight months of the year - it’ll be wet and cold.

Either West Ham played 40 home games, or Martin Ziegler is shit at maths

Unfortunately it wouldn’t - paying the transfer fee upfront doesn’t mean it won’t be amortised against the length of the contract. If you buy a player for £10m cash and they have a five year contract it’ll go into the books as £2m per year.

Other than that shaky spell, I didn’t.

You’ve got to love how England played Trippier at LB at the Euros in every game except the final, but he’d be sixth choice LB for us

Yep, you could legitimately catch the ball from a fair kick and get a free kick, but you couldn’t then run with it (similar to rugby league).

My last game at SJP before emigrating. I broke my self-imposed Ashley exile to go one last time (hadn’t stepped foot in the ground in years at that point). Can still see his goal in my mind’s eye - it was a rocket

Yep, I think so. January would be the last chance to get anything for him (and I would think it would be a nominal fee).

We have to be trying to keep Schar - I would hope it’s Lascelles that we’re looking to move on, possibly in January when he’s fit again or in May/June.

I can get excited by signing defenders. I was when we signed Woodgate. I wasn’t particularly excited by Tonali or Bruno tbh (though Isak was exciting in terms of potential). Signing players from the PL means you know what you’re getting. I think real, top class defenders slot in very quickly - and you immediately see the step up in quality. I always find it surprising that people undervalue the importance of quality in goal or in the back line. Top defenders add to my enjoyment of matches massively - they give a confidence where nervousness used to be.

I haven’t been this excited about a transfer in years. I think he’d be a hell of a signing. This guy could be in the NUFC and England team for the best part of a decade.

They can’t be football fans if they’re aware only of what they’ve literally seen.