"They didn't let Raya go without one pretty much done .........and there's options should it not" Well one thing's for certain, you'll be right whatever happens. You've covered every possible base there!

On holiday in Majorca at the moment so not been keeping fully up to speed with what's going on but two weeks to go until the start of the season and from what I can gather there's still no sign of a keeper, and not much more progress on the CB front other than considering a 21 year old loanee from City. Where's the experienced specialist CB we need? Why have we shot ourselves in the foot by selling Raya? Completely unnecessary. With the possible exception of Johnson, still a shocking window so far imo.

Spot on. It seems madness to me to replace a promising up and coming young keeper with an older keeper on loan who you're only going to have to replace again in 12 months anyway. Nevertheless the saving grace is that if it's anyone else but Hart the sense of relief would be massive. I wouldn't call that dodging a bullet so much as a bazooka.

Don't agree at all with people saying the forward line is not a priority as imo replacing Graham is equally as much of a priority as the defence. However, still a very strange signing for me. I'd say even on the best form of his career to date he's clearly not the man to take us forward if we have aspirations of challenging for promotion. However we're stuck with him now (and vice versa) for the forseeable future so we have to hope his season with us was not the high watermark of his career and that he can improve substantially on the form he showed at Birmingham. Hope he doesn't just get shunted onto the wing to accomodate Graham though. That would be a waste of (another) 5m.

As he would probably be saying exactly the opposite to me were he still frequenting this board, obviously not!

Apologies. Thought he was 35 in August not 34. Point still stands though.

Or a slate the people who are slating Mowbray page?

Bit worrying that Mowbray has dampened down expectations to the point where having brought in a 35 year old and a 32 year old on free transfers into an area where we were numerically already well stocked, and having sold our first choice keeper with no idea who's going to replace him, many people now seem happy with the idea of only signing a replacement keeper and a centre half. The keeper isn't really an addition or improvement, it's trying to put us back into roughly the position we were before we sold Raya. Although I'd wager his replacement won't be as good. As things stand with just over three weeks to go before the start of the season, we've replaced Conway with Downing, Reed with Johnson, have no first choice keeper, one decent CH and a 35 year old leading the attack. Although certain posters try to portray everything that happens as a positive and as part of some grand design, I can't believe the majority would have been remotely happy with that had you offered it at the end of last season.

Nail on the head. In that respect the attitude and culture around the Club seems to be identical to when Bowyer was here "Do the bare minimum." Don't bother turning up in home games until half time, just put it in for 45 mins (or less). On the odd occasion you do string a few wins together and people start thinking you might be able to achieve something then throw in a few bad performances and results to ensure that normality and the status quo are restored asap. All this nonsense about long term plans puts no pressure on the players to produce anything out of the ordinary or achieve anything either. As long as you do the bare minimum I.e. survive, it's happy days.

I'm speechless at that point of view. Graham - knackered. Armstrong - jury still out a this level Samuel - not good enough Could Brereton or Nuttall come good? Possibly but it would be a colossal gamble. I know we need a CH and a keeper as well but the keeper situation is entirely self inflicted as we didn't have to sell and presumably the sale will fund a replacement anyway. A QUALITY striker who is actually good enough is at least as important for me.

Ended up paying £3m for Armstrong. More or less what the reported asking price was all along. The assumption all of last summer was that at £3m he would be out of our price range until we unexpectedly went on a last minute spending spree.

Would be lucky to get 10 League goals (excluding penalties) out of Gallagher imo. 20 + scorers are surely in the 10-15m bracket at least these days. Sounds a lot but then again we were prepared to risk 7m on a completely unproven 19 yr. old.

Whilst Gallagher per se isn't the answer imo, a top quality striker to replace Graham is an absolute must for me. Our transfer policy really does appear to be a joke. We know what the price for Gallagher is, if we have the money and we really want him we should pay it or alternatively move onto someone else we are happy to pay the fee for. If we don't have the money then similarly we should move on and stop wasting the window hoping Southampton will sell him to us at a price that isn't the price. If I want a Ferrari that's £200k I'm not going to get it by offering £120 k , six months down the line I'm still going to be stood there with my nose pressed to the window. I'm not going to suddenly get the item on the cheap just because they feel sorry for me no matter how many times I walk round looking at it amusingly. Not that Gallagher is "a Ferrari" of a player, more like a Ford Mondeo but the principle still applies.

Given the shambles that was our transfer window last summer it's not hard to think we might be thinking along those lines again but I'd say it's a fairly suicidal strategy as a) You don't really know which players PL clubs will allow to go out on loan until the last minute and b) If there's no-one suitable then there's only a week to go until the end of the window to sort something out leading to the potential for silly money being waved at anyone still available who you don't necessarily want or need as happened last year.

Completely disagree. Had Bauer stayed at Charlton he'd have been a first choice CB for them in the Championship which is exactly the same level as both ourselves and Preston are at. I think he's entitled to assume that if anyone at the same level come in for him and want him badly enough to sign him, he'll be going istraight nto the first X1 initially until he proves otherwise by not performing. It's insulting to expect him to agree to a move whereby he will move from being an automatic first choice to a squad player. On the other hand if someone at a much higher level say Liverpool or Citeh were in for him then of course he should expect to have to work his way up and fight for his place. It would be completely unrealistic to expect to walk straight into the first team. As for your comment about Mowbray taking us up; I'll have a pint of whatever you're on!

Fair enough, as long as he pays some attention to the gaping holes in the first eleven as well.

Not sure what the point you're making is other than to have a gratuitous dig at me. We HAVE signed Downing. We HAVE got Adam and Butterfield on trial the former getting a run out in the side only a few days after ringing up to see if he could train with us to keep fit. They wouldn't be on trial unless TM wasn't at least considering signing them. All extremely desperate stuff. I didn't mention Johnson because he might be ok. But as a 32 year old free agent who won't be getting any better I'd say it's only a "might'. When or if Mowbray does something positive I'll say so don't you worry.

Typical Mowbray signing. It's a "signing" which makes it look like we're doing something but at the same time he's not going to be challenging for the starting X1 in the forseeable future therefore his pals in the first team squad won't have their noses put out of joint.

I don't want Gallagher myself but from the Club's point of view this is turning into an absolute farce, just like the extended and ultimately unsuccessful courtship of Bauer. If he's the man you really want, get the money paid and bring him in. If he isn't, move on and bring someone in you are comfortable paying that sort of fee for. Seems like our scouting network is so desperately poor if Plan A stalls we have no idea what to do next.

Dear God, that's an absolutely desperate looking line up. Keeper could be anything, no CB or main striker which are absolute priorities, and apart from Dack zero creativity. Have to hope we get busy and there is a massive influx of quality between now and the end of the window.

So does selling your keeper without lining up and agreeing a fee for a replacement first! As regards the window as a whole, all we really have to go on is who's actually come in. On that basis it's been extremely disappointing thus far imo. And yes there's currently about 3 and a half weeks of the window left but before long the amount of time left in the window is going to be another distinct negative rather than a positive.

Definitely not. Might about be on a par with John Butcher and Alan Fettis as the worst keepers I've seen imo.

After the sale of Raya and the acquisition of the likes of Downing Adam and Butterfield, Hart' would be one final kick in the knackers for the fans. Quite possibly the worst keeper I've ever seen . You just have to look at him and everything he does is wrong. How he has even carved out at a career at professional level, let alone play for England is completely beyond me. Plus, aside from the fact he's garbage, he'd be extremely expensive in terms of wages. I'm sure Dingles fans would think there was a certain symmetry to it though if their Club was paying Hart part of his wage to throw the ball in the back of the net for us.

I don't doubt Raya and the manager fell out after Mowbray (unfairly imo) singled him out for criticism and dropped him. You just know what's going to happen though. Nothing will happen for a while then Mowbray will suddenly pop up in the Press moaning about how hard it is to sign a keeper because they're such a specialist position Clubs don't want to let them go in the first place and if they do they charge a fortune for a decent one etc. Unless it's us obviously.

It all seems identical to last season to be honest, waiting until the last minute hoping some scraps fall off the Premier League loan table at the last minute then no doubt panicking like mad at the 11th hour when they don't. The Raya sale is very confusing. Indicative of a miniscule budget. However if the budget is comparable to last summer's very respectable 11m in fees plus wages and I were the owners I'd have Waggott and Mowbray back on the plane to India sharpish to read them the riot act and ask why we've signed a 32 year old, a 35 year old, have a 33 year old and a guy who just got relegated to League 2 with Bradford on trial, and have sold our first choice keeper.