So you must have well hated Shearer then? Embarrassed when Dickovs in the team?!? I'm more bloody embarrassed at what we have to offer when he's OUT of it! Dunno how often you come up from London but Dickov's absence was felt mightily in the last couple of matches. Our soon to be Nationwide leaguers Gally and Stead could not hit a cows backside with a banjo! Bothroyd? 'This boys cheese has slipped right off his cracker' (q from the superb Green Mile) and Jansens lost his cheese totally nowadays. If we had to sell the lot in the summer I guarantee only Dickov would be playing in the prem next season........... unless Steve Bruce gets hold of the chequebook at Brum. Please try to cultivate less predjudice just cos he doesn't look like a proper centre forward. Since Sav came he'll be Mark Hughes 2nd name on the team sheet or I'm a monkeys uncle. whilst I agree shearer got stuck in, he was the genuine article and his football did the talking more than his elbows. dickovs game is just pure running and trying to get his opposite man so wound up that he'll kick out. Whilst I totally agree with you that we need him in the team at the moment - that is purely because of the lack of other striking options we have in the team. That still doesn't mean to say I like him or respect him as a player. BUT - I'll always get behind the team regardless of who wears the shirt! It's on here that I can vent my spleen!

I only watched the game on the telly, so maybe it looked different live, but I ( and my gooner flatmate) was very surprised when jose singled out savage. & to be perfectly honest Mark - I don't like the type of player you refer to in terms of bullying the opposition etc. It's for that reason I really can't stand paul dickov; but Savage has most things that you need in the modern day centre midfielder. I think it has become easy to slate someone like Savage because he has such a dodgy reputation, but against Chelsea he didn't do much wrong. A few too many passes went astray,but I guess those mistakes will be eradicated as time goes on. I guess you were just going along with the mood of the away fans, because whenever savage gets the ball, people boo him. Try watching him with an open mind next time and you might well be surprised. I had to do this when hughes first signed for us as a player. I absolutley hated the guy when he played for man u, but learned to respect what he did when he came to rovers. sadly - I can't say the same about dickov. I really am embarrased to have him in the team. And whilst we are talking about the midfield - what on eart happened to Thompson? It was probably his worst ever game in a rovers shirt. Needed about 4 touches to get the ball under control!

you can't have met many 'southern' people then mate to form that opinion.

utter rubbish. he will be around for a long time yet. he may have spent 200mill, but those players are not worthless now are they! He also owns the freehold to one of the most expensive areas in the country ( valued conservatively at £150million) he is in it for all of the reasons philip said and good luck to them. What does it matter whether he was a fan or not? We lived the dream thanks to Uncle Jack and now another set of fans are living the dream. I don't have a problem with that at all.

Can't really agree with that Jim or Revige. JW never said that we were holding out for what we paid for him. If you re read his quotes, he said the original Rangers offer was no where near what he was worth considering we paid £6.5 for him 18 months ago. He may have implied he wanted £6.5, but he never actually said that. No one in his right mind would expect us to get £6.5 for a player that frankly bottled it in the premier league. I think the £5 mill is actually a good bit of business considering. At least it gives us some money to strengthen in the summer. And don't worry about relegation - there are 4 clubs that are far worse than us! Yes - he was our tidiest midfielder, but how many games did he actually outperform the opposition? I don't even want to blame Souness for paying £6.5, because at the time - he was highly rated and coveted by so many clubs. Everyone was holding their breath to see if he could cut it with the lampards, keanes and gerrards, but sadly - he never could. Would he have done that in a better team? Who knows! But to blame JW is just daft and you are both jumping on your 'we hate JW' bandwagon again. Fergies heart has not been in this club all season. Anyone watching him could tell that. hughes might have said he wanted him to stay, but i wouldn't be surprised if he really doesn't mind that he's gone. It allows him to re build the team around people he wants there. The only real shame in this transfer window is that we couldn't get another striker in.

couldn't agree more philip There is definitely something fishy going on here though. Why did it take a week for the transfer request to go through after the initial meeting with JW? Which club/s has Viola been talking too? We know he spoke to Rangers, because Murray said he had been alerted to Barrys situation. Newcastle? Sounesses record in the transfer market always has the speculation before the signing. There has been very muted, or little comment which I find strange, so maybe Souness is not interested at all. Things are very quiet with Everton and they are probably the only other club with any cash at the moment. Could it be, that we actually want him out and the initial meeting was held to discover if Barry still had a future with savage coming in?Probably not, but I can still dream about getting rid of Barry for 5 mill and signing scott parker.

ooh the conspiracy theories are always the best! talk about endearing yourself to your new club - pull off such a coup that no one saw it coming... we live in hope!

is he really that thick? i've never really heard many interviews with him to be honest. one thing is for sure - agents get paid a whole lot of money for doing very little!

A slightly naive view of company accounting. It WILL have been accounted for. This is a completely different thing than the cash being available. Possibly it is, but it could be that Rangers have been warned that we would be unable to make the payment, and so think they can do this deal at a price we'd be forced to accept. Who on earth would warn rangers we couldn't make the payment? If there is one thing we can be sure of - our club is run extremely well. You may see it as naive, but an educated guess would suggest it more likely that a football club would be able to make the money available to the manager should it not be needed to pay the original debt that it was acrued for.

looks like my source could have been right. lets see what hughes has up his sleeve in the trasnfer market. maybe he's wanted fergie out for a while. . .

Must admit - I'm a wee bit worried over the timing of this. Birmingham have been really knarked about the whole Savage thing & they could decide to just let him rot in the reserves for the remainder of the season and thus weakening one of their main rivals. Assuming you get £750k for each position you finish higher up the table ( that's probably more than savages wages for the next few months), if they didn't sell him to us and we lose Fergusson, then we are in trouble! And for anyone else worried about this £2.5 million payment - THAT WILL HAVE BEEN ACCOUNTED FOR, SO IF WE WRITE OFF THE DEBT TO RANGERS, Hughes would get the cash for a new player. It's not like we would be losing anything. If we get anywhere near £5 mill we should take it and move on. Scot Parker anyone?

But we overpaid for him to begin with. He is still worth the 4 mil that he was when we bought him. I don't think we did overpay at the time. He was the most highly rated footballer outside the premier league. Was the international captain and had played many games in Europe where he was the best player on the park. Players like that don't come cheap.

SCOTT PARKER. . . EVEN THOUGH HE'S INJURED AT THE MOMENT - SIGN HIM UP HUGHESY

neil? interesting choice. I've neve really seen him as being vocal. thompson seems to have the respect of the players - could also spur him onto new heights

I'm sure he knows exactly where's he going Martin. The wages conversation has probably already been had too.

& one other thing - all this nonsense about the £2.5 million yet to be paid is a complete red herring. That money will have been firmly in the budget, so it's not like we have to find it from somewhere. Whatever money we get for Barry - I'm sure Hughes will be allowed to spend the full amount on a new player.

The thing that dissapoints me the most, as Bryan mentioned, is the fact he picked up his wages whilst being injured for 6 months. It's not all that gutting though considering his patchy form. Big question is whether Hughes has enough time to get someone else in. If he doesn't - we are very short of quality midfield players

Let the games commence! Great potential but if he wants to walk back to glasgow having failed in the premier league - that's his choice. Come on Graeme - do us a favour and big 6 mill for him, so that Rangers have to match it! Actually - forget that - souness has more loyalty to Murray than he does to us!

Far too much for a player that age but he really could energise the team. Him and Ferguson playing together is a very exciting prospect. To get back three million (we sure as hell wont make much back on him in two years time) he needs to play like a man posessed, but funnily enough I think he might just about justify it. Now everybody moans how awful the Rovers team at the moment is etc. but with the lineup I think Hughes is aiming for we only really have two glaring weakness IMHO And those are a real 15-20 goal forward and a decent proven leftback. I doubt we really be able to provide either on the budget we have either, unfortunately. There are plenty of positives though: Plenty of bite in the midfield, creativity, good passing, decent wingers (if MGP cannot do it Reid and Thompson will have the chance to shine), commanding centrebacks, good keeper, reinvigorated right back and a useful scrapper up front. We are not short on strength in depth either with Reid, Thompson, Nelson, Gallagher (Great player, will be so good for us in the future), Johansson, Bothroyd, Flitcroft, Tugay on the sidelines. All these players have something to add to the club either as subs or working their way into the first team. On balance I think the squad has a huge amount of talent. you would play MPG ahead of thompson? WHat planet are you on?

lets for one minute suppose that hughes wants fergie out to change his midfield. Does he have somone else in mind to come into the midfeild ( taking it that savage is coming anyway?) what about selling fergie and buying andy reid from forest? thommo and savage in the middle with emerton and reid on the wings? could be very tasty! With Reid to fill in on either side and flitty / tugay to fill in the middle. Assuming Hughes had a small transfer fund of around £2-3m mill ( inc. of the beattie money & compensation from souness) - it would suggest he has to sell before he could buy anymore to get the team he wants....

That makes a lot of sense Andy. Also good to see that Hughes is fully in control of the situation. Let's see what happens with the Savage deal but I expect that the details are NOT released. Now let's see, £2.2m bid "not worth the fax paper" + £0.5m forgiveness of the tail end of the Dunn deal + £0.5m bargain price for a 30 yo former contracted ex-England international = £3.2m = saved faces for Sullivan et al at Brum + = a shrewd piece of business for Rovers + = some unhappy Rovers fans but what's new? I suspect your not far from the truth Phil. One thing is for certain - when rovers go after their men - JW normally gets them & negotiates in style. So - I wonder if Hughes doesn't rate fergie as highly as a lot of people on here? Personally, I would have loved to have seen a midfield of emerton, savage, fergie and thommo. Can't be too many teams that would have better ones than that!

morning folks not one to normally talk about gossip, but this comes from an excellent source. savage WAS at brokhall yesterday. rovers expect to get him for around £3.2 million. fergie is settled where he is, but it looks like hughes want to radically shake up the midfield and will listen to offers. souness expected with a bid in the next few days. again - it's not gospel, but this source has not been wrong about anything in the past.

sorry bobby g - must have posted at the same time!

bruce really is an idiot. I don't mind brady and sullivan getting upset - but here is a man that has deserted the previous 2 clubs he has managed when he has got a better offer!

I find it hard to believe we can offer Savage more in wages than Birmingham already do. & in slight defense of the Brum board - they have to look as if they are trying everything to keep him. Then they will attack the player if it becomes apparant that he wants to leave so that is distracts the fans from the truth - that there captain, best player and fans favourite wants out to join another club. If they did all this quietly without shouting from the rooftops at us and savage - they would have their season ticket holders threatening to rip up their books and shouting 'no ambition' to the board. When it's pretty clear this is the opposite. Birmingham have put significant investment into their team since promotion.