Ex Lion Tamer

Wigan are packing the centre of defence, could be tough to find a way through

Amazing shot from Lallana

Guly looking good so far, crowd singing his name at one point

Not sure he fits the system we are trying to play, we tend to attack on the wings

Its not just about crosses, I can vividly remember Guly failing to win clearances from our defence. At least once he did his usual thing of pretending to go for the ball but actually not jumping at all. I'm not a Guly hater like some and I don't necessarily think it was a bad decision to start with Lambert n the bench but we did miss the latter's ability to hold the ball up when it was cleared in the air

Yes, would give us midfield cover in a 442, but I imagine in a 433 he would be left back as a replacement for Fox. Seems like we want full backs who can push on, like Clyne. Assuming this isn't just paper/agent talk of course

Glad we're still in for a left back

Those were the days. Proper exciting as a kid to read a newspaper after going without for a week or so. My inability to leave this forum alone for more than a day is driving me crazy. I've gone from being positive about our transfer dealings to pretty worried and negative. Just need to remember that there is still time

Amazing stuff, brilliant performance. We need more quality but plenty to be positive about

We need a left back

Clyne is just brilliant isn't he, bargain of the season

Never trust an article which ends the first sentence with an exclamation mark

What sexy centre backs are there that we might be considering then?

A smokescreen for what purpose?

Its a very black and white view to say that just because one player can be obtained early, all players can. Some clubs will want to sell early in order to invest, while others will want to hold on in the hope of a receiving a higher bid. Meanwhile, some players will be happy to go to a club that is interested straightaway, but others will want to wait and see if better clubs become available. And as a bidding club, we may not think certain players are worth the money being asked, and so want to wait until the transfer deadline to see if the selling club will lower its asking price because they don't want to be stuck with an unhappy player. This is where the disconnect occurs, because Adkins wants players in early but Cortese will believe that prices will drop when the deadline looms. Its not even as if we haven't signed any players early, anyone can see that, we've signed several. And if the Buttner deal hadn't hit an unusual snag, we would have done even more business. We obviously decided it was worth paying over the odds for Rodrigues as we are so convinced he is quality and had wanted to get some business finalised. If say we need to make 7 signings over the summer, we can't leave them all to the last minute, but now we only need 3 or 4 we may believe we can do it in the timescale.

Because clubs don't want to sell the better players and haggle for higher fees. Reading on the other hand have picked up a load of free transfers because they are available rather than because they are real quality

I agree that we don't want to find ourselves gambling again like we did with Hooiveld (although you have to give credit to the scouting team for recognising that he had talent that wasn't being fulfilled), and we should sign 2 centre backs to mitigate the risk of one of them not being good enough. Hopefully that will happen before the end of the window. I'm not really that impressed by Reading's signings and think we are aiming higher. Pogrebynak and Shorey in particular are very overrated I think - the former scored a burst of goals and then went through a long dry spell and the latter was dropped at West Brom for his lack of positional sense, after which time the defence looked much better. And Guthrie isn't any better than Davis. Part of the issue I think is that Adkins is very particular about the type of player he wants to fit our system, which means we can't just take whoever comes along. For example, we could have gone for Michu but didn't because we don't play with an attacking midfielder. Ultimately this will (hopefully) benefit us in terms of having a coherent team which will be better than the sum of its parts.

Personally I never believed the target of getting players before the City game was realistic. Of course Adkins would want them in sooner but he's not the one who has to make it happen. Progress has been a bit slow in the last few weeks but it was always likely to go down to the deadline, and I expected us to be a bit short for the start of the season. I don't think that's a disaster. Perhaps this is why you and others are disappointed, because you held too much stall in what Adkins said?

Don't you know we're in a big rush to get players in before the City game?

Cue criticism that he was in the Championship team of the year so not good enough

No, obviously its a generalisation. But you seemed to be suggesting that we should just ignore these problems and be happy, like we were in the Olympics. Probably you're right that most people wouldn't care about this stuff if it wasn't in the papers, but its important that we all do think about the economy and the effect Tory policies are having on others less fortunate than ourselves. By the way, as a middle class person struggling with the increase in rents in London, I really didn't get this Olympic feelgood factor that everyone has apparently experienced. I enjoyed the opening ceremony and some of the sport but I'm quite glad it's over now and we can be free from the enforced jollity. I am much more excited about the start of the football season to be honest.

At the risk of being a left wing cliche (!), I doubt the 2.5million unemployed forgot their troubles during the Olympics. But because the middle classes and the newspaper reporters were having a jolly time we can assume that everyone was happy

Of the 20 economists who wrote to Osborne in 2010 to express support for his debt reduction strategy, only one is now prepared to defend it: http://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/politics/2012/08/exclusive-osbornes-supporters-turn-him

I wonder if we've put this story out ourselves to try to generate some interest in him, and used a couple of clubs we knew were interested in the past

I know our need is probably more pressing than Spurs', but I was looking for info on Danny Rose and this thread gave me de ja vu: http://www.tottenhamhotspurs.tv/forum/players-lounge/29293-stop-doom-gloom-paranoia-etc.html