Moves expected at Goodison this afternoon for talks over a deal for "at least 2 years" according to Sky. He might keep them up, anyone should keep them up really, but I can only see it ending in tears after that. They usually say never go back and it's a very unambitious appointment for me. Maybe Dyche had gone stale there but otherwise I can't see that much difference between him and Moyes.

Do you have the same view on Kent then? (FWIW I'd take Shelvey but wouldn't touch Kent for the reasons you mention)

Nail, hammer, head.

I don't think the side is set up specifically to protect Batth. Eustace is a pragmatic manager and would probably set up the same way no matter who the CB's were.

The poster first mentioned it in passing a few months ago but no-one picked up on it at the time.

We need to win this one badly to get some momentum going imo. Plus in the past when we've rested players we haven't looked the better for it on their return, the team have usually looked like they've never seen each other before and we rarely play well or get the win the following game.

Kitching maybe isn't a great example (an uninspiring potential signing we hadnt heard about rather than a great one) but I agree on your general point.

Well if the names linked so far are "too good" for us it might be Eustace tipping us off that that the Club aren't matching his ambition. We don't know what tone the comment was said in either. I suppose he could have said it in a sarcastic manner. We won't know until the end of the window I guess, but early signs are very unencouraging both in terms of actual activity and names linked. The only hope is that the Club have been keeping their cards close to their chest and they surprise us with some great signings that haven't been mentioned anywhere so far.

Has Eustace said that? Very disappointing if so. He shouldn't be saying that even if we we were being tentatively linked with some genuine superstars on loan etc. I'd go the other way, I'm not excited by anyone we've been linked to yet.

Don't bother reading the thread then if it offends you! To be fair if you'd been patient and taken the "wait and see" approach every other January under this regime they'd virtually all still qualify as a disaster. The only decent signing I can recall in January off the top of my head was Armstrong - and to be fair he was a stonker. There's a lot of points to play for in January. A good or bad month could make all the difference. Same every month I guess although at least in January you have the opportunity to try and do something about it.

I rather think he'd have better offers. At the top level though think his lustre might just be wearing off a bit. Bit like Mourinho.

Hopefully they'll go for Gregg Broughton.

What I don't get is, regardless of size of budget, why are we never ready to go on January 1st? We never seem to have any specified targets and the argument that the owners are the problem by being slow in getting back is nonsense. If you know they normally take say 2 months (for the sake of argument) to respond then do your leg work early and put any requests in at the appropriate time. Instead it comes over like it catches us by surprise that there's a winter transfer window every year and like we only start looking once we're into January at which point we've already missed out or we're taken aback by how much players actually cost. It's all the recruitment department have to do all year. There's no excuse. There's still time to get John Park back before the end of the window I guess.

I mean, if we did lose Eustace at some point (I sincerely hope we don't) and Edwards was still available we could do a lot worse.

Agreed. I don't see how it can be. What happens in practice is the big Clubs have loan managers who monitor the progress of their loanees and recall them if they're not happy with their progress or lack of game time. People just said that about Morton because they couldn't believe how he'd been so shite and was still starting every week and/or how he was keeping Adam Wharton out of the side. And given how Wharton has excelled in whatever environment he's been in when playing those people were right I'd say. Morton also looked like he'd had enough of being here last time by about December imo. Hopefully just a random suggestion that's gained legs and got everyone aereated unnecessarily.

It's a game of opinions, a lot of managers here seemingly rated Jason Lowe and Corry Evans as well. When did he make those appearances for Liverpool? In the EFL Cup?

I'd rather rely on unleaded's info. Earth calling "International Rescue. Come in please." There was another chap as well who was always extremely positive and according to him everything was always hunky dory behind the scenes and everyone we signed was always a good signing in his eyes. Can't remember his username. Whereas unleaded used to tell us what was really going on and invariably painted a picture of complete chaos behind the scenes. Lol.

They didn't get a "hands off - he's ours" then. Fairly predictably.

He doesn't get any game time whatsoever at Liverpool according to Wikipedia and rightly so he's rubbish.

Reserve defender from Coventry, Tyler the crab Morton - this is all getting extremely depressing.

I actually thought he was making a joke about Tronstad.

Seconded.

We can't let Leonard go at the moment without probably two coming in that are an upgrade on him. So of course we probably will.

And which doesn't even matter anyway because they only have to give personal guarantees if they want to send any money over.

Tyler Morton - for the love of God, No.