Paul Caddis has signed for his old club Swindon, if anybody could give a smidgen of a shit.

Poorly written speculation piece about us showing interest in a 24-year old Australian striker at Livingstone with a shite goalscoring record: Lyndon Dykes Claiming TeamTalk as original source. Six Championship sides meant to be interested according to them, including us, Derby, Boro, Bristol City, Cardiff and Swansea. Christ knows why (probably not true I'd think). 5 goals and 2 assists in 14 games this season (SPL and their League Cup). 10 goals and 16 assists in 52 appearances at Scottish SECOND tier last season and various Scottish cup competitions. Sometimes playing in advanced midfield roles, which would suit Tony to a tee. His total time at Queen of the South (before Livingstone) yielded 23 goals and 34 assists in 136 games. Excuse me whilst I jizz meself.

He can rot in hell. Don't care if he turns into a new Beckenbauer, he can fuck off. I remain convinced to this day that he took money to pop those own goals in. Astonished it was never investigated.

Injured last I heard.

Smallwood is a worse player than Evans at this level (but better than him in League One, where his technical deficiency wasn't shown up), and there is literally no room for him in the squad other than to occasionally, pointlessly, hold back a u23 from getting a game at that level. However, Evans is probably on double, maybe triple the money. I'm of the opinion we could shed both and not be any weaker as a squad. In the medium, or maybe even short term, we'd be stronger, as it would open the pathway for the youngsters who play that position. Even if we decide we need to rely on experience instead, we'd still have: Travis, Johnson, Bennett, Downing. Even Buckley and Davenport both have a bit of experience at this level too. Arguably Rothwell or Dack can play there too in certain games, in a more advanced capacity. Thanks for the immense effort Richie, and thanks for playing well when you felt like it Corry, but it's time for you both to move on for the good of the club and your own careers.

Yes, and then, after a promising start with us, turned out to be pretty shit and never carved out a career in the top flight. Then you have players like Vardy and Wright who didn't pull up any trees until relatively late in their careers but went right to the top. It's incredibly hard to judge u23 players for their first team potential. But even harder if you never give them a chance/run in it.

If only they'd been that cheap.

I expect the same fans are over here on their jollies for the group stage, so would have been at the Benfica game in similar numbers...no real excuse for being caught out on that count. So, stuff safety and save money, yeh.

I was going to say that in fairness you don't expect that kind of shit from an u23 game crowd...but then I saw you say they didn't even split the home and away fans, which is just a bad idea at all times.

The fact Brereton wasn't even on the bench after what TM said means he must have picked up another knock. Sounds like the youngsters (Plus Samuel) didn't too well against Berlin. 2-0 defeat. LT report made mention of Mols doing a couple of poor things, including giving the ball away for their first goal. Chapman shoving a Berlin player just before the end out of frustration soon after the second goal.

Is Vale injured? Not even on the bench.

Any chance this one is being screened anywhere online?

It's his age that gives me added pause. If he was 18 I'd get it, but I dunno what we are accomplishing by taking on a 22 year old then putting him back down 3 tiers below us where we found him. The LT article talked about Davenport pushing for first team involvement, well if that happens we need the bodies in the u23s, which is why I thought we got him in the first place.

Wondering what the point is of Tom White going out on loan to the same level we plucked him from. Thought he was doing well?

Hope so. Otherwise it is Bell at LB and Nyambe on the bench...

My only issue with that (other than whether Lenihan will be ready to be plunged right in) is Johnson. He has been very shit the last few times I've seen him. Currently I'd put nearly any of our CM options ahead of him, he's been that poor. Evans, Bennett or Downing. Not that I'm sold on any of them.

In a nutshell. Tony just isn't a good judge of a player. That's probably his single biggest problem, closely followed by having no clue where to play them on the pitch.

Sorry, I thought you meant January. I'm still not convinced it'll be the right area of the pitch to target in the summer, but the budget should be larger then. More because that's when a new pool of Venkys money is likely to appear, if it does at all, than because of the outgoings above. Walton and Jayson are going to need replacing. Tosin and Cunningham are going to need replacing. Even one of Hart or Bell is going to need replacing for depth. Mulgrew may need replacing (I know we aren't playing him now, but we are seeing that we are too thin even on numbers at CB..I'd be looking at two CBs). Smallwood doesn't need replacing. If TM is still here you can bet your left nut Bennett won't be going anywhere. Even under another manager, EB is likely to be deemed a useful, experienced, versatile squad member (hopefully not a fucking starter though) so may be kept. Downing I wouldn't replace unless someone special shows up (that might be where a Milner might fit tbf), think we have enough wide options and kids coming through there. Graham and Samuel out of contract is likely to be more than swallowed up by the need for a new striker (again, jesus...). Unless this is a clever loan, there's probably gonna be a big fee sucking up any savings we make after replacing all of the above and probably more. I don't see a lot being left over after all that. I'm not even sure we can afford getting the right quality of players to replace those properly as it is, unless our recruitment steps up its game big time or some youth players absolutely light it up this year. I can't see us shifting Evans for more than 500k. With his wages we could be lucky to get that. If we did sell Lenihan we better be spending the proceeds on a better CB. A Dack sale is the only one I can see raising enough that a Milner level expense in a Milner area of the pitch might be a good move. I think Holtby can replace Dack, albeit with less goals, but it still might be sensible to spend a chunk of the sale on another quality player in his area. Christ I just depressed myself.

Because it's the wrong position unless we have a ton more budget than we think and can afford to fix the whole backline too. If you can't see that, not only are you not the only sane one, I'd have to question whether you're sane at all. It's nothing against Milner as a player.

Fair enough, not sure how that applies either tbh. Do you mean harsher? Since you seemed to be talking about levels of patience. Sucks that there are any politically influenced clubs but there are...were most of them from Italy and I'm guessing maybe Russia?

As someone who is left wing and thinks Simon consistently talks tosh, albeit eloquently, I don't get you there. It's football, not politics, there's no correlation between political leanings and wanting our manager sacked.

For comedy value you mean? Aside from the realism factor, I wouldn't want to spunk another huge wad of the wage budget on yet another midfielder, no matter how good, when we are sorely short of a decent defence and goalie.

His name popped up a fair bit on the boards this summer, but I seem to remember a few people saying he was inconsistent? Won Ipswich player of the year three seasons in a row though, so...

I actually thought he was going to say Darlow.

Or zero minutes in this case.