The stance on the price tag was mentioned by Broughton. Had we accepted the bids and he subsequently turned any clubs down, different story. I dont think he would have turned down the likes of Nice who were playing in Europe and Everton.

Wahlstedt Brittain Hill Hyam Pickering Tronstad Rankin Costello Dolan Szmodics Sigurdsson Ennis Would like to see Hill at CB with Carter who has been poor dropping out, and also a natural striker with Dolan (who deserves to stay in) taking that problem position on the right, Adam Wharton (if fit) is the one reluctant absentee. Him or Tronstad is the most difficult choice, happy with either but again opted personally to keep Tronstad in.

Did Rooney do a good job at Derby? It is such a difficult period to judge, Derby were in such a strange situation that it felt like any points won were considered above expectation. They did have terrible off the field issues even though they had some talented players, and he had Rosenior behind him who is a good Championship manager in his own right. His win record at both clubs he has managed is in the 20s in terms of %. He will get this job for no other reason than being Wayne Rooney.

Not great news for us, puts a key player who has played lots and could do with a rest in jeopardy of injury. Injury to him or Sigurdsson would be a huge, huge problem. Very surprised it has taken so long though considering the dearth of talent that Ireland have, well deserved.

It's nothing to do with hindsight. Any properly run club does not turn down bids in favour of allowing players to enter the final year of their deal. Stubbornly not entertaining bids based on an unrealistic price tag is not doing all the club (or moreso the owners) can. The price was also based on Armstrong who was a totally different player in a different year, he had scored 28 goals so naturally he would generate more money and that deal actually turned out to be a stupid one by Southampton so we got lucky that they bid so high. £8m would have been such a big sum to modern day Rovers. Our current squad cost around £10m (maybe marginally more) spread across the course of about 5 years.

1. Who has ever said that we should sell him in the January? The bids came last summer. 2. Why would the club consider supporter reactions to any decision anyway? An eficiently run club wouldnt consider that.

Well obviously, but our leaky defence (might have changed after our clean sheet yesterday to being the second or third worst) is as much of a concern to me, a byproduct of how we set up. We equalised against Ipswich, Sunderland and Leicester so conceding first was not a terminal blow. Conceding 3 and 4 goals suggests a problem beyond merely not taking the chances. Our goals for tally should be higher but at 17 it is only bettered by 7 teams.

There has been rubbish in the past about £10m price tags but I think Buckley is at a big risk of slipping away. He has never repeated the purple patch he had as a false 9 during our great run under Mowbray which was 2 years ago and whilst he obviously has talent, there seems to be questions marks over his application and also as to where he plays best. I was against him leaving because it would leave us short, that was when we only really had Wharton and Travis truly in front of him. Tronstad had played an hour and then at times fallen out of the matchday 20 which didnt bode well but his recent 2 appearances have shown signs of promise and Rankin Costello had never played in a midfield 2 apart from when chasing a game but he has done well there in those 2 games, albeit the worry is we are a full back unavailability away from needing to move him back, although whilst I dont think it suits Hill, his versatility to cover right back maybe lessens that. Even Garrett who I still dont think is Championship standard has impressed in the cups. So I am nowhere near as against him being loaned out, albeit the issue is still the overall numbers in the squad, had it helped to create some flexibility to get another wide man in for example which it should then that would have made more sense.

Its not irrelevant, thats just a managerial cliche. Obviously it is very volatile because there havent been that many points available but a win now counts as much as a win in 4 months. Weve got 13 points from 11 games, an average of 1.18 a game. You need to average 1.52 points per game to hit 70 points (which often isnt enough) so we are well behind. The only bodies of significance out (aside from Wharton who missed one game) are Gallagher and Hedges, neither of whom are consistent enough and especially the latter but both are out for a bit.

The issue is the lack of autonomy to the people in footballing positions. Those who can best judge said peaks in value are ignored by brain dead stubborn idiots. The director of football and/or manager should be fully trusted on sales as they know whether the value lies in keeping them or from potentially reinvesting. The proclaimed model will never work under these owners.

That was my quote from after the Leicester game.

He should have been sold last summer. There was no mention of any bids 6 months prior so its a non starter anyway.

He won us something like 15 or 16 points if you base it on taking his goals out of his games.

VAR cant give second yellows, so out of its remit. The first one maybe was a red by itself but the second one was the clear one and it was in plain sight for the ref. Been a drab game.

But we wasnt offered that sort of fee so its a case of either accepting still a very high sum or allowing him to run down his deal. Many attackers score in bursts, you cant argue with his numbers in the last 2 seasons.

Think its premature to say "a frankly remarkable upgrade on Diaz." To achieve that, he would need to score significantly more than 37 goals in the next 2 seasons if indeed he even stays that long. Very promising start though, the most eye catching of the signings on paper within a very difficult window and very promising on the pitch now he has got himself fit. Brereton left a huge gap in being the one player capable to get into goalscoring positions and not even as a central striker. Sigurdsson has shown signs of having that same knack and whilst not sharing the same speed, he seems a more technical player too.

Cairney has always been an attacking midfielder whereas Wharton is more of a player who sits deep and dictates a game. Im sure he would have thrived against an awful QPR side. I think him and Tronstad could work well, indeed him and Rankin Costello showed promise and even with Travis it would just need Tomasson to reign in instructing him to play so high up and he could help to reduce the load on him off the ball.

Well no as we wouldnt have got the 8m had we not spent money on him in the first place. It would have been a strange situation considering how long it took him to push on but it would have been a case of a player leaving for a (small) profit (would have shown as a considerable one over FFP considering the amortisation) having scored nearly 40 goals across 2 seasons. Reinvest a big chunk, keep a bit aside, sign a couple of new players. Thats the model Broughton and Mowbray before mentioned that the owners have always prevented us from using.

And thats Venkys for you. That sort of decision impacts us not only for one summer but for a few years as £8m of income is such a large amount for us.

Clearly nothing to talk about for him between transfer windows. Amazed that anyone pays to read his rubbish. He is not at the stage to be playing first team football for Newcastle.

We conceded 3 once and 4 twice in those games though, when that happens you can't put the main portion of blame on poor chance conversion.

He also played the majority of the Cardiff game where he looked out of his depth and I didnt see any attributes that stood out. Plus he also can barely get any minutes in a side that has had no fit strikers. I hate this idea that we can only judge a player based on a certain number of minutes, as if we should not discuss him before. Had he scored 2 in those minutes and/or really stood out those same people would naturally be judging him and waxing lyrical and rightly so. Lets judge as we go and we all hope he makes the massive step up.

People will cheer Telalovic if he scores goals, not sure how that is relevant. No one dismisses praise over Sigurdsson because its "too early." That argument only ever is made by the self appointed negativity police.

There is often a clamour to play Bellingham deeper to fit in another attacking midfielder but he has to play where he does for Real Madrid. Ideally with Foden from the left and Saka from the right. I see that Southgate has still stuck to his old favourites with his latest squad. Maguire, Phillips and Henderson are such stupid selections.

To be fair I would agree that we werent as gung ho in those first 4 games and we actually got 7 points in those, including a win at Watford playing tactics so different to how we played in the few games since. Hill playing at right back I think is a defensive move although he has still been bombing on quite a lot. Rankin Costello has also come in for Travis who was often so far forward pressing teams really high up. I wonder how much if any of it has comes down to the quality of opposition too, its not as if its been a total difference in tactics like we saw at Watford. QPR are appalling and did get to a certain point before their lack of quality saw attacks break down. Coventry had struggled to find a win for 6 games until they got one in the game before us too. Prior to that our naive approaches were against the likes of Ipswich, Leicester and Sunderland who did have the quality to see us off, and Plymouth (aided by goalkeeping incompetence) who have some good attacking players. Boro did create a lot but again they misfired.