This is where things blur. There was talk of the lad from Croatia - Skoric. No nonsense defender, captain and 29 so bags of experience. Can't imagine he's on a fortune in that league and would probably jump at the chance of move. Fee would realistically be the lower side of £2mil. May not be a world beater but could he strengthen a championship side- undoubtedly. Exactly the type of player we should be looking at. Certainly more chance of making an instant impact and us more competitive than a young lad from the Prem at £10 mil who may or not be the next great thing. However, we've seen an absolute reluctance to buy a player at that age - no doubt due to lack of a future transfer profit. Semi Ajayi is another who would have been a great and affordable (given what we spent on Gallagher) signing. Offering instant improvement on what we had. Our transfer strategy worked best when cherry picking the best players from clubs lower than us. There's a lot throughout Europe! It's how we got our 2 best signings in Dack and Rothwell. We don't have the financial muscle to compete with teams around or above us. If we do sign anybody from those clubs, we either overpay (Brereton) or end up with players deemed no longer good enough at this level (Downing). I expect we will sign a player, possibly two but again these probably won't be the type that we fans expect or fill positions that are needed. They will be players with potential, who can play several positions - made with future value in mind. Rather than players who will slot in straight away and help win matches.

I said before, with Jones, Hanley and Duffy, we've made more by selling defenders than strikers. The most profitable area if the team.

Spot on post.

TM has been very quiet since Saturday by his standards. Let's hope he's busy landing defenders

Because -as Mowbray admitted- he can no longer zoom past a player. If you can't do that, you can't really be an attacking winger.

Yes. The repeating pattern is the experts continually making the wrong decisions? Football analysis is always fascinating. We don't see training sessions, work on tactics, have personal or professional freindships with these players. A manager lives inside that bubble and will react accordingly. As fans, we watch from a distance - have no bond to players and analyse what we see over 90 mins every weekend. You could argue we have a clearer view of the performance than those involved. Ex pros (Gallagher, Atko) have been scathing of the defence and some performances over the last 12 months. Do they know nothing or just compare what they see against other teams - using their judgement...just like the fans do.

I said in that thread he will do or die by this summer window. 4 days left to turn a league one defence into a championship top ten one...

I think there's a strong argument for a whole new back 4 - although I think Nyambe should be brought back at rb. Even Lennihan is replaceable. Which leads me onto to Dack - poor preseason and pretty anonymous yesterday. Time to sell?

I would have said 'barely adequate' before. Splitting hairs I suppose ?

Suddenly looking like a poor window now. Five days to sort the defence. At least 2 defenders and a decent keeper required.

So just shite all round then?

So basically the same as last season. That is an undeniably poor result against a team we should be beating. Defensive mistakes, conceding from corners. Learnt nowt.

Luton are really going to struggle when their promotion bounce wears off!

Well Boro wont be keeping clean sheets this season!

That's hilarious. Most I've seen have us between tenth and fifteenth with a couple of those flagging us as dark horses for this season.

There's no doubting the atmosphere/attitude around the squad is miles ahead of anything for the last 8-9 years. Younger squad is also a massive tick. I would say his transfer record is around 50/50.. which isn't bad really. Mowbray has to be given great credit for all of that. What is up for debate IMO is team selection, tactics and the lack of specific players in specific roles. If he can't get us challenging top ten at least after this window, where he's had funding again, then he should rightly be on borrowed time.

I also think we'll get another defender and probably some left field 'bargain' signing as well. Remember TM saying they hadn't spent the Raya money.

I can't imagine we would be in for him - unless they're giving him away.

What on earth has he done to warrant that value?

Because we only have one?

I would also reckon that Chapman can play anywhere across the front 3 (including the number 10 role). He played there against Stoke in a cup game during his first loan spell with us if I recall correctly.

If we could bring in the croation lad at cb, a full back and a winger on loan then it would be a very good window. Very open league this year. On paper, August looks a stinker but the first month is usually a good time to play the relegated sides, whilst they adjust to the Championship. 9 to 10 points from August and we should be looking at a decent season.

Pre season friendlies are never a massive puller. Even the Barcelona game (2001)was no where near selling out on the back of a great season. Holidays and other things take precedent and I expect there's a fee involved to the bigger club. No reason why we couldn't tour Holland or Germany though - especially given our scouting 'links'!

Anelka brothers were notoriously difficult to deal with - family involvement can be an issue. For me, if the kid has any issues about coming in on loan, we should drop the deal like a stone.

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