If we signed Cristiano Ronaldo tomorrow these pages would be full of very happy people even though the window would be open for a while to come. Quite rightly people would express their delight. As we've done very little business and the manager is now seemingly backtracking people are voicing their concerns, quite rightly in my view given the tragic defence we had last season. Only one way to stop that - sign some decent players who will improve us!

Like most stuff they come out with at those meetings I think they get a rush of blood when surrounded by supporters and with a microphone in front of them. Most supporters are quite easy to please and talk about new players etc. will send many home from the meeting happy and looking forward to the future. Unfortunately it has become a theme at this club for there to be lots of talk about what the owners, manager and others want to do but ultimately when it comes down to delivering the goods it's a different story. I agree that we are now seeing a gradual scaling back on expectations. In my view Venkys will have told him to sell someone if he wants serious funds and will probably be asking why he needs new defenders having dished out new deals to Williams, Mulgrew, Lenihan and Nyambe in the last few months.

As expected the link to a young midfielder on loan from a Premier League club's academy appears. Cheap, easy, low risk and short term. Ticks all the boxes. Liverpool more than happy to send him here for a season so he can play Championship football and it avoids the need for us to commit to a fee or large wages. I wouldn't mind if it had ever worked for us but every time we do this it fails and we end up with the same faces in the team. Harper, Palmer, Samuelson, Byrne, Hendrie, Barrow, on it goes yet some get carried away because its Liverpool or City. News flash- our u23s are as good as theirs so if we're so keen to bring younger players in why not do it with our own rather than helping another club out?

We can buy all those players if we want to. That's 7 new arrivals and we've already let 3 go from last season and should be looking to offload another two or three like Smallwood. We got Dack for less than a million whilst spending 7 million on Brereton so good business can be done. The trouble is we don't seem to have any serious desire to improve on those already here. All the talk at the moment appears to be around padding out the squad, filling gaps rather than getting rid of some and getting better ones in.

For Rangers? Doubt they'll have sold 1000 in 2 days, probably just run out of online sales and need to add more, or an error with the website. If they do manage to shift 1000 there will be more made available, provided it isn't a couple of days before the game.

I'm a little uncomfortable with the concept that we are pursuing players as 'back up' to 'maybe earn a spot'. As far as I'm concerned whether you are Man City or Accy Stanley every player you bring in should be with a view to that player being good enough to play in the team regularly. Clearly Man City can afford to stockpile a collection of players who will sit around doing nothing whereas lower clubs won't be able to take such risks but the principle should be the same - any player the club pursues should be seen as good enough and as a first teamer. Only when he's in the building and training does a decision then get made on who starts games. It's a similar thing with this bizarre Brereton deal. We're supposed to believe that he was a 'project' signing and that we paid out millions of pounds on a player that was never expected to seriously contribute last season and was some sort of pet project for Mowbray or others to polish up and then presumably prove a point down the line by him being worth more than we paid. It's all just nonsense and is unheard of at other Championship clubs. You sign players who are good enough and ready to play. Enough of this back-up, squad filler, making up the numbers or development project stuff. Just sign some players who are ready to play who are better than those already here! If Mowbray was unconvinced about Bauer's capabilities and never saw him as a starting CB then he's wasted a lot of time and energy talking about him and pursuing him. It will also be shown to wrong if Bauer now plays every week for North End and is a central cog in a stronger defence than ours. I wasn't against the Downing signing given he was a regular at Boro recently but already we're seeing it - he hasn't gone to Austria with the squad so next news is he won't be ready for friendlies as he won't have had the intensive training, then next news is he'll be playing catch up fitness wise and he'll be struggling to break into the team from that point on. Seen it before.

My expectation is that the money men, having agreed to no sales in the last two windows, are now hoping or expecting a sale or two to keep things ticking over. Naturally we then look at who out of our bunch would attract serious interest and cash and we're down to a couple. The cornerstone of Mowbray's tenure as manager has been an obsession with increasing player values ahead of hypothetical future sales. It is clear that is the vision he has sold to the owners or they have instructed him to follow. Some might say that's a good policy to have, and I agree insofar as recruiting sensibly and ensuring value in the squad, but not if that comes before getting the best players for the job or development of assets comes before results on the pitch. It wouldn't surprise me if Mowbray had gone to India hoping for a pat on the back and a chequebook to build again only to meet owners reluctant to stump up another 5 or 10 million without a sale or two to plug the shortfall over the last few years. They'll be expecting a sale or two sooner or later to offset their losses, so why wouldn't it be this summer? Mowbray isn't going to kick up a fuss because he's in a good position on a good number so will do as instructed from above.

Going into a season assuming or hoping that youngsters are going to step up, improve and perform at this level is a big ask, especially when we're talking about 4-5 of them in Chapman, Davenport, Brereton and the u23s who between them have so far done very little at Championship level. On the other hand Graham is getting on and I think it is inevitable that sooner or later his body will start to break down and it would be extremely foolish to try and depend wholly upon him.

Not happy with that personally. Too many questions and concerns. GK position unchanged. Question marks at full back. Still reliant on Dack and Graham. Question marks on Chapman, Rothwell, Davenport, Butterworth and Brereton in terms of capacity and capability to play regular Championship football. Essentially weaker than last season without Reed and an older Graham.

I suspect he's been on the radar for some time now. We wouldn't pay for him last summer whilst he was still on Huddersfields books so now he's free its more appealing to us. Plus he's probably been knocked down a peg or two after getting relegated with Bradford and will be happy to 'fight for his place' which seems to be the requirement of any new signing these days. If we'd have kept him last summer after promotion I'd have been happy, but 12 months on it feels quite lazy/desperate and backward looking to bring him in. I quite like the lad and think we could do worse but I'd have hoped for a bit more imagination than that really.

I'm not sure the age issue is a factor. Warnock is in his 70s yet manages to put together a side to succeed and players buy into it. I'm more of the view that sitting around a table with Ridsdale and Neil providing clarity, coherence and a proper offer and answers will have won the day over waiting for Mowbray to arrive back from India then having to wait for India to authorise any deal etc.

Its obvious that this is the way Mowbray wants to play. Yet here we are in his 3rd pre season not really any nearer to being able to do it. We're already at the long term point. He's been in the job long term by Championship averages and we should be well on the way to being the way he wants us to be.

Of course Tony may be covering up his or the club's failings by claiming that the issue was not offering Bauer guaranteed game time. That excuse is the most palatable to concerned supporters who will prefer to believe this line rather than the uncomfortable truth. The alternative is of course that Preston gazumped us by virtue of being better organised and prepared, could sell themselves more or could pay him more, or indeed just actually offered him a proper contract rather than messing around.

Seems to be at odds with Mowbray's plans for the window which he broadcast earlier on this summer. He claimed to be after new players good enough to start immediately and replace those who had struggled last season. Strange

Agreed. But I don't see why Rovers feel the need to say it, as though we should be grateful to be playing them. I'd expect magazines and media to describe them as giants but not a club of our stature. Then again after the West Ham 'Premier League giants' slap in the face nothing should surprise me.

Just call them Scottish team, club, side etc. No need for Scottish 'giants'. Whatever your views on them I always think that sort of language from official club media is embarrassing.

Most clubs aren't in the same position as us. Most clubs don't sign players for the future costing millions of pounds.

Just wait for the talk about it only being 4 months until January when we can sign players instead.

Going to be inconvenient when we reach a stage where most clubs have signed more than us after people have spent the last few weeks claiming nobody else is doing any business.

Suspect the club staff will be sat waiting for a transit van to turn up one morning outside the shop with boxes full of kit and start unloading. Until then they won't know, or indeed care, about when it is going on sale or what promotional material to produce. We need a kit deal that works for the club rather than sitting around waiting for Umbro to sort it out. Heatwave coming. Would be great weather to sell a load of new replica shirts......

https://www.lancs.live/sport/football/football-news/patrick-bauer-reveals-reason-joined-16483078 Written by a certain Alex James. Wasnt he the resident dingle at the Lancashire Telegraph for a while?

At least with an embargo in place Uncle Harry won't be able to 'do his thing' with their transfers.

Gladwin came here from QPR and joined them at a time when they were throwing money around. Safe to say he wont have taken much of a cut when penning his 2 year deal with us. If, and it's a big if, he's only been on 5k a week, that's half a million over his contract. About 1700 adult season tickets. Perhaps that is enough reason to be baffled/concerned by the talk of handing him a 6 month extension to enable him to get fit. If he goes down to 2k a week and signs on until January that's still nearly 60k committed on someone unable to play. Amazing given all the talk about Ffp, balancing the books etc.

Sounds like we've dished out a contract of some description to Ben Gladwin who hasn't played for 18 months and wont be for the next 6 months and even then he isn't good enough for the Championship. Don't think Mowbray will have any qualms handing Rodwell another deal even if he's not fully fit if he can fill two slots in the squad and doesn't cost much. Easier than finding an alternative.

The fact we might be able to get a few quid for Evans but clearly won't for Smallwood should mean we keep him before Richie.