Someone who can play both CB and LB to a decent level would be very handy. Assuming he can do both reasonably well, that is.

I have something rattling around in my head about a case where a club, possibly us or someone we were dealing with actually, made a case for a player's value in a player swap deal having been artificially deflated to skirt a sell on, and that they should pay more for the sell on. Course I can neither 1) Guarantee my mind hasn't fabricated this, nor 2) Remember how, if it happened, it turned out. Just thought it might trigger someone else's (better) memory if it was real.

His wiki reads a bit better than you're giving him credit for. Broke through at Leeds at what I make to be about 18. Their Young Player of the Year and third in Player of the Year that season. Next season was their Player of the Year (fans, players and local rag clean sweep), still aged about 20. Seems like he may have gone off the boil for a bit after to end up at Barnsley and then loaned to Oxford half a season later. Seems to have got him back on track though, and in the 19-20 season he was their Player of the Year. I don't know the player really but he sounds like he puts in a defensive shift? If so, the fact he has 8-9 goals in three of his full seasons at the age of 26 is fairly impressive for that type of midfielder. He could be a bit more box to box or all-action than I'm thinking though. And although you said excluding this season, it wouldn't be fair to ignore that he has just captained, been an integral part of and finished 2nd in player of the season for a club that were this season's biggest over-achievers by far. None of which matters as it doesn't seem at all likely to be one we will be able to pull off. But compared to some of the trash we have had in midfield, it seems a good punt on a free if we could.

Fucking hell, if he goes for 20 quid I'm going to jail for murdering all decision-makers at the club! 😉

I hope we do. I doubt we will be able to negotiate anything like Newcastle's, but if there's a valuation difference a sell-on could bridge the gap, and make it pan out longer term as less of a problem that we had to sell him for less than if he were fully contracted. I don't see us getting more than a 20% clause though.

Apart from that selling him before our first league game rather than a few days before the window shuts might be optimistic, it would only be history repeating really. It's quite common at other clubs tbf, the more the player costs (especially when that's high compared to what the other club/s want to pay) the more likely the buyer plays the waiting game until the selling club is under pressure (which builds more when the player has one year left on their deal) to bring the price down. I've never really expected an Armstrong sale to be wrapped up early doors tbh. And if it does drag on as I expect, I certainly expect the club to leak that he might be close to signing a new deal, to flush out buyers.

Unless they've just fallen out with him because of his behaviour (the drunken scrapping, removing that he was a Pompey player from his social media) and/or resigned themselves to him leaving a while ago so are lowering him to make themselves feel better about him going. I've seen that clearly happen with some of our fans at times. I'm not optimistic about Curtis from what I've seen and heard though.

I'm confused that you're confused by his confusion. He clearly stated he is confused, don't confuse the issue by being confused by that confusion, it's confusing!

Kaminski has a one-year extension in his. I doubt any of the others do. That's a far scarier loss of value than this summer's already concerning turnover. We best pray they don't need replacing under embargo, or this manager.

I've never seen nor heard of either of those players, nor of Mr Fjortoft, but I still have a hard time believing him for some reason... (Edit - a quick google shows me it's a fair claim for Oblak. No, I don't keep up with football above our level much anymore 😛 After googling Fjortoft I do vaguely recall him from the 90s, but why is he bumming the Gib goalie who plays in Northern Ireland? I assumed he was the Gib boss or something but doesn't seem to be)

Now they've gone up, he'd probably cost more than he's going to be worth to us for the gamble he represents.

Sounds to me a bit like we might have tried to pull a Sheff Weds/Derby style accounts fiddle to stay out of FFP sanctions. Hopefully we get away with it like Derby, instead of going down due to it like Sheff Weds. Although it could just be some routine accounting the league are misreading or being extra sceptical of due to the way others have circumvented their shit rules.

So actually more a case of, we best get some business done before June 30th just in case. I don't care how confident Maggot, like many I don't rate the man's competence or honesty.

Transfer window opens June 9th? Freebies are already moving.

Because Mowbray is safe? Old news. Or is there something else?

I don't have time to read the fan minutes, but someone on FB says they're our now and confirm we are still under embargo until 30th June. Anybody know if that's right? That would put us a few weeks behind most clubs, on top of the few weeks we are normally behind most clubs...

Christ I hadn't thought of that - this transfer cost more than enough already thanks! I hope the wording of any such clause, which I expect there probably is, says caps for England specifically and not just international caps.

I can't agree at all. Brereton looked absolutely bereft of confidence until his run after lockdown. I think smashing them in for the reserves for a little bit helped him recover it. He also still seems to be a bottle job at times in front of goal. You can put that down to technical ability, and it might be that, but for me it looks like bottle (nervousness under real pressure as opposed to lack of confidence in general play, which I think he has now). I'm not saying he has terrific technical ability btw. I do think he has a bit more than he's credited with though. The rest of your post I agree with.

I'm 100% aware of that Chaddy. My subsequent posts, talking about fitting the criteria, make it very clear I understand that. I'm not sure if you understand how hard it now is to get that many points. Joe ran the numbers before and showed that Kaminski wouldn't have qualified, for example. A guy who is now currently sat only behind some of the best keepers in the world keeping him from playing for one of the best international sides in the world, and who has just won our Player of the Season. That's why I say the much-vaunted European scouting network is now nearly irrelevant. It will be very hard to find players we can afford who have enough points.

Why? Because they're idiots. I suspect they thought they'd get it set up sooner than they have, and were chancing their arm on what the criteria would be. I'm sure there isn't a way 'around' it, but it's not impossible to sign from Europe or anything. It's just very difficult to do so at a cost effective level for a club like ourselves. The leagues where we could get good value will more or less all be off the table now. We only managed the two keepers from it last season and neither of them would qualify now under the new regs. There will be a very small pool of players available to us that are worth the price to us, and due to the shrunken market there will be a lot more competition for them than before, even if we can identify them. We know we aren't much good at beating other clubs to players. I'm not even sure whether say Lewis Holtby would have met the requirements. German international but no recent caps, second tier in Germany, those things would reduce his eligibility. Although he didn't turn out great, if a player with the kind of cv he had and wages he will have cost can't be acquired anymore, I don't see us signing anyone from Europe this summer. Perhaps someone like Joe will correct me on if he would have been approved.

I was watching a video last night that says FIFA are considering reducing the amount of players clubs can loan out. I think it was from 8 to 6. That means there will be about 25% less Premier League loans available in the market, which dicks one of our main transfer approaches. That could actually be a good thing longer term, as we are forced to rely on actually developing or recruiting our own players instead of constantly borrowing en masse. But combined with our restricted budget and Brexit shafting our brand new European scouting network into near-irrelevance, I do worry even more about the impending season with Mowbray at the helm.

I reckon we would have shifted some 5,000 more season tickets if the price had been reasonable, say 300. Which comes to 1.5 million lost through Waggot's greed. So I'd say that just fills that void (and other matchday revenue lost income), covers that loss, rather than being money for the kitty. Maybe it means we won't need to sell Rothwell to pay for an Armstrong contract extension as has been suggested though.

So it has been said. I don't know how much though. It's an interesting one, which way will work out best for our finances, as there were rumours Arsenal were going to come in for him again. Probably not going to happen if they go up. If he reaches the Prem and stays Brentford's number one, then an excellent season could see him in demand at a very tasty price, and of course we have a sell-on. On the other hand, if he flounders and shows he isn't up to that level, we will probably never hear those figures again that were quoted last summer. At least if they go up, which looks likely, the money is guaranteed. However much that is.

Motherwell supposedly interested in taking Magloire permanently.

Would you give him a 5 year deal in the Prem though?