For me Chapman is an outstanding talent. Way way better than Armstrong injuries permitting and would be well worth a punt at up to 750 or even 1m. If we won't spend £2m on a player then that will explain why We're struggling to bring anyone in, I wouldn't have thought you can buy the left bootlace of anyone decent for much less than that as we move up the levels. I'm beginning to wonder if We're going to bring ANYONE else permanent in or will it all be loans which for me would be an extremely poor window as if we survive the rebuilding process would have to start again next Season. How many loans are we entitled to make in total?

Oh dear, unleaded's info has had the "everything is under control" brigade scurrying for cover this afternoon. It doesn't really matter whether the manager turned down a bigger budget or whether he wants to "build slowly" imo. Either approach is crackers. TM should be trying to squeeze every last penny out of the owners to invest in the squad and improve the quality of the playing staff. Spending money is not the problem, if It's spent wisely it will always result in a healthy return on investment. It's spending it BADLY on ageing bell ends like Danny Murphy That's the problem. If TM and that so called "Head of recruitment" (That's a laugh) are doing their jobs properly that shouldn't happen.

Surely the requirements are greater for a newly promoted Club than an established Championship one that might simply need a bit of fine tuning? Like JH I expected us to spend around £5-£6m in fees plus loans etc. The money you get for being in the Championship is £6m as opposed to £1m and any loans would simply be replacing the ones that left last season. It never even occurred to me that the situation would be any different. We would only be standing still at that imo any more than around £6m I think you could say would be a bonus and smacking of real ambition. Certainly didn't expect this apparent nightmare of a window whereby we don't appear to be competitive.

Whoosh! BDS pours petrol on the bonfire and steps well back. Whilst we arguably need more out and out striker types that would still be a sensational signing. Almost Steve Archibald-esque. Believe that one when I see it.

For all the talk about There's no need to panic there 's still 2 weeks to go etc I think you can tell we are struggling when we are bemoaning the fact City have taken a youngster away on pre season and he would only be a loan target in any event. What if said lad does particularly well and City decide to keep him? It seems a really random and arbitrary way to operate to me. Plus you just know that if we get off to a bad start the "The team need time to gel" excuse will be wheeled out.

I thought I recognised the name Paul Man I and If memory serves me correctly he just tends to pop up every summer transfer window hinting he is massively ITK because of his contacts and then is never seen again inbetween. Whether he does have legitimate contacts I dont know but He was the one spouting Rubbish in at least one preseason about Bowyer having fallen out with Rhodes because he had a bad attitude a fee years ago as I recall

Neil Warnock: "My secret to succeeding in the Championship is scoring goals. You can never have too many good strikers." Rovers: "The market's a bit pricey, isn't it."

Well maybe not if we can squeeze about 45 goals out of Dack.........

Yep, all the momentum and feelgood factor from last season's promotion has completely fizzled out.

Really , Who cares? Lol. Don't really understand the furore over the match day surcharge, It's common practice for budget airlines and railways and the like to make prices cheaper the earlier you buy and conversely the longer you leave it the more expensive it is. Why should any other business be any different? I can't believe the surcharge actually stops anyone from attending who otherwise would have attended but if anyone was annoyed by it the answer is pretty straightforward, arrange your diary so that you can definitely go, and purchase before the day of the game. Simples! On a more general note, It's disappointing to see that fairly strong season ticket sales have not been reciprocated by the owners in the form of support for the Manager in the transfer market.

Is it a good window though if you've missed out on all your preferred targets and ended up having to bring bodies in almost for the sake of it? Guess we'll never know. The Club will claim We've brought in our number one targets all along no matter who turns up.

I'm not sure that prices would go down towards the end of the window I'd have thought if anything that selling Clubs would take advantage of other Clubs increasing desperation towards the end of the window and hike prices up. I'd also have thought that from a buying Clubs point of view the best bargains would be had by getting your business done early. But still you're right, nothing we can do about it.

It seems to be reasonably well accepted that the fee for Davenport was in the region of 500k and that we would probably have to find around 250-300k compensation for Rothwell who was out of contract. 800k for 2 players. Nothing like the 3m figure being quoted for Armstrong. Chaddy seems to think this is evidence of money to spend. I would say it's exactly the opposite and that we have to shop at pound stretcher.

Sounds like Tony is starting to grasp at straws a bit now and any chance of any permanent signings is receding fast. Would appear we're living in hope of relying on the good grace of Premiership Clubs to loan us a player or two they don't want after they've seen them in action pre Sea son. What a way to operate.

I wouldn't have thought that either. By way of comparison John Williams had to submit an overall annual budget to the Walker Trust each year including for transfers and had autonomy within that budget. However if the manager and/Or John thought it would be a good idea to sign a particular player which took us outside the budget he couldn't just authorise it they would have had to go cap in hand to the Trust and would certainly in the latter days no doubt have been knocked back.

Exactly. Or more commonly these days the Clubs reach a Compromise of say £2m plus various instalments bringing it up to a max of £3m with add ons if a myriad of conditions are met.

It would appear we might have been after Gallagher on loan but that interest will no longer be live if Southampton can find someone daft enough to fork out 7m on a permanent basis for him. I don't pretend to have any idea of who we might be after, I just don't see we are necessarily after Armstrong. The fans have made the connection because he was here last season and they liked him whereas the indication from the Club has been that he is out of our price range. We will probably have at the Club an absolute mountain of information from agents about hundreds of players who are available. We might not quite be on the Z list yet but I'd imagine we are desperately sifting through the X or Y list trying to find someone half decent we can afford.

I don't think We're after Armstrong anyway but I find it hard to think of a scenario whereby his price would go down substantially. Hold steady if he doesn't particularly rip up any trees maybe.

Clearly TM did have a list of targets (I was told he'd submitted those to the Board at the end of last season) and he subsequently conveyed the impression upon his return from India he was happy with the funds available. It would appear some weeks later as I've been saying all along that with the benefit of hindsight that funding has been insufficient to land any of the players he wanted and the rhetoric from TM has in fact changed substantially from confidently predicting bringing in six signings at the start of the window etc to being "excited" about the sort of players who would be coming in (funnily enough near the ST early bird deadline), to being "hopeful" of bringing in players with experience to admitting that we may not be able to bring anyone in at all in preference to Nuttall. You don't really think by TM would leave landing his targets until the last week or so of the window by choice and play Russian roulette by risking someone else nipping in first do you? We would appear to be in a right old mess. The only saving grace as far as I can see it is that it is still hopefully not too late for the Manager Board and owners to completely re-evaluate and put some decent funding in place to bring in players of the calibre we need.

I'm not convinced we do want Armstrong and Chapman. I'm sure TM made a comment at the start of the summer that Newcastle's demands would probably put him out of our reach and whenever questioned about Chapman he has been lukewarm at best and arguably even rather uncomplimentary.

Completely agree. I'm extremely disappointed with that news.

I find it very odd if as it appears we have completely misjudged the Championship market. TM has been around the block long enough to know the score and we would have been aware of the approximate state of the market from speaking to agents. I can't believe we would have fixed the budget before we made any enquiries.

Probably.

Exactly. Neither Rhodes nor Gestede were here when we were relegated so it seems extremely harsh to blame Rhodes.

People can't really have it both ways about Gallagher. As We've grown increasingly desperate in recent days I keep reading about what a good job he'd do for us on Loan. If you think he's a decent player then 7m for a young striker his age on a permanent deal probably isn't that unreasonable. Personally I think he's willing but fairly ordinary at best and not the answer either on loan or permanently. I'd also have thought that with the prices being bandied about for mediocre home grown talent there must be better players available abroad for the same sort of money. The problem of course is whether they'll be able to settle properly in this country and adapt to the pace and physicality of the English Leagues etc. Edit: whoops see several others beat me to it.