To be fair you've kind of missed the point I was making. If I've never heard of him, he's clearly not stood out at championship level so compared to the other names we've been linked with, he's an underwhelming signing (to me at any rate). He doesn't seem to fit with our modus operandi for spending decent sums. He may turn out to be great but I bet he wasn't on the A, B or C list..certainly won't be somebody JDT is familiar with. It's also a relatively large fee. Let's go back to the early interviews with Broughton and JDT. If you were told we're going to spend around £7 million (if fees are to be believed). Then get told in the next breath who the 4 players are (Brittain, Szmodic, Morton and Hyatt) what would the general reaction have been?

Well batted 👏

...well yes because we would no doubt be signing them from Gibraltar, Andorra and San Marino.

Cool. What are his best attributes?

Compared to the other centre back signings we'd been linked with. Hyam is an underwhelming option - whether you like to it or not. It's like us signing Bauer from Preston. It's not a terrible signing but not as good as Anel or JPVH would be. Rovers do it every year- get linked with good players who we all get excited about but they never arrive. Then up pops some left field signing.

Had you heard of him?

Highly regarded by whom?

No Coventry defender has stood out in any of the games we've played against them. I'm sure he's ok but it's an underwhelming option. Again.

Anel: 23: Malmö: Bosnian international: highly regarded✖️ Ben Davies: 27: Liverpool: well regarded at Champ level. Good enough to earn a prem move.✖️ JPVH: 22: Brighton: Dutch under 21: previous player of year.✖️ Dominic Hyam: 26: Coventry: played for Aldershot before joining Coventry in League 2. ✔️✔️✔️

Never heard of the guy. Certainly Sounds no better than Lennihan after a quick read. £2.5 mil seems an awful lot.

Kick the bucket down the road for another year.

What would your expectations be by the close of the window for it to be a satisfactory one?

No chance with wages on any of that lot.

So by that logic, surely domestic prices will rise accordingly. Edit: The only players that may come down in value are those like Diaz, with one year left.

Exactly. Everybody bemoaning the small pool of players available post Brexit, yet as the deadline approaches, they are all going to become cheaper. Surely, it works the opposite way.

Another day with no activity or rumours - except outgoing. Standard. Tick tock goes the alarm clock.

Good move for Brereton I'd say. Stays in the North West, good chance of getting game time and if he does really well, bigger clubs will circle. If he goes, I think he'll go for around £12.5 mil plus add ons. Broughton made a big deal about our budget not being dependent on Brereton going. That tells me we won't be seeing any of it reinvested.

And not getting the player we spent all that time on?

Or very badly if we are pinning hopes on a guy that we all knew would fail a work permit! Given that we never seem to get deals done at a weekend and have a league match next weds, is our cricket analogy now 6 runs from the last over?

Fair play. Good result.

If it's from us he's likely to be left standing!

Did Mowbray actually buy anybody last summer?

He's like a reverse Brereton😂

Don't disagree with any of that. Still feel that the defensive situation could be addressed adequately without spending a possible 5-7 million on one defender though because as you say, there are holes everywhere.

I get the rock solid investment scenario. I just feel decent centrebacks are easier to get hold of than forward players. Let's say Adebayo at Luton was available for the same potential fee as JPVH. Which one do you make the special case? IMO the Luton lad would offer more to our team dynamic than JPVH. All about opinions I suppose.