revolution saint

Ha, should have thought about Adam Armstrong. I guess it's not his natural position although it probably should be now.

TBF he's a right sided winger and the only one I can think who naturally plays in that position is Sam Amo. Does seem a strange one though - consensus seems to be that he's not ready for the premier league and ideally needs a season in the championship to develop. I think he could be a good player and if we had unlimited funds then it wouldn't be a bad investment but right now he's probably not what we need and that money could be spent better elsewhere (likewise with a loan).

Purely hypothetical but I wonder what our stance would be if someone came in for Sam Amo or Dibling and they indicated they wanted to move.

Seems a bit harsh on Alcaraz, he came out and said he wanted to stay last summer, signed a new contract whilst we were a championship club, and didn't kick up a fuss when he couldn't make the team. Admittedly he wasn't that great when he did play but that's beside the point. The loan move to Juventus suited the club as much as it did the player.

Their news adverts have been annoying me for a while. They're so patronising. The Radio 5 one, "The world can be a scary and confusing place at times, so lets talk about it", or Katy Kay explaining to simpletons the basic art of conversation, "And sometimes it's important to just listen". Fuck off.

Welington definitely is, not sure about Juan but won't be much if anything. Will be interesting to see how it's recorded - Goztepe could be paying us a loan fee to cover any expenses and if they end up getting sold down the line then presumably that's our profit.

Multi club ownership working well for Goztepe. Neither Juan or Welington look any good so not too worried and doubt we'll ever see them play unless it's a friendly against us.

Palace fan at work's verdict is, "I personally don't think he's anywhere near Premier League level at the moment, and we'd only loan him somewhere where he would be guaranteed to play regularly and I don't think he would at any Prem club (albeit I don't know the state of your current options on the right wing) as I don't think he's quite ready for it. " He looks like he probably needs a season in the championship before he's ready to start in the premier league so I'm not sure it's much of a loss if we move on.

If we're thinking of either getting a new striker and keeping Che, or getting two new strikers if Che leaves then I can kind of see the point in leaving the door open for him. He's not great, he'll probably get you around 8 goals but you do know what you're getting with him, knows the system and won't disrupt things. Renewing his contract would be cheaper than say getting Brereton-Diaz in and there's no guarantee he'd be any better. A free like Iheancho would be similar cost wise but comes with more uncertainty (could be better than Che, could be worse). If renewing his contract saves money for another striker then maybe it's worth it? Personally I think it's best for all concerned if Che goes elsewhere and I think both club and player could do with parting ways but from a financial aspect keeping him as a squad player might not be the worst thing. Obviously if he's asking stupid money and expects to be the main man then we definitely need to move on.

Yeah, goal return isn’t great for a decent team. I never really rated him that much, he’s ok but never seemed anything special.

Interesting we were prepared to use one of our loan spots on him (if true).

Fair enough and from a numbers point of view we don't have much of an alternative in the same mould of Downes. If we play three at the back then we won't be so reliant on a holding midfielder anyway. Even Downes was far more progressive and advanced at the end of last season when we switched formations so it might not be as big a deal.

Nice to have but would you spend a decent amount on it given the obvious weaknesses in the rest of the starting 11? If we've got unlimited funds then sure, knock yourself out, but I doubt we have. I think we should get another midfielder but it'll be more of an 8, and we need to replace Stu Armstrong unless we see Alcaraz, Smallbone or Aribo doing that. I don't see us using a loan on someone primarily as cover so I reckon if we get anyone else in then it'll be a free or nominal fee.

What is it with trying to bloat out the squad? Yesterday there were calls for a backup for Downes and now you want another CB. We've already got six. Meanwhile up front we've got Ross Stewart untested virtually jumping two divisions and hasn't played in any meaningful way for 18 months, Adam Armstrong who couldn't cut it last time out in the premier league and Sekou Mara. Attacking mid positions look weak as f*ck too. There are far more higher priorities than another CB.

You’re right, it probably doesn’t matter much which is why it’s not very exciting

Nah, not really sharing that. Welington looks and sounds a bit shite. He’s not even that well regarded in Brazil. Juan doesn’t look that much cop and has scored 4 times in 58 appearances. Plus he won’t be available for two years. I was excited when we signed Alcaraz as he was well regarded and a bit of a talent but these two aren’t. Dunno about the Japanese players but it’ll be years before we see them if ever. Not including Sugawara as he’s come from a European league and established.

Someone on here mentioned we'd made an enquiry but it's only rumour/hearsay. I read that as us looking at alternatives if we couldn't get Downes (personally think Camara is probably the same) but who knows? If we're playing three cbs then that lessens the need for too many defensive midfielders anyway - the problem will be getting enough bodies up to support the forwards.

I'm quite shocked people think we'll be going out and spending money on a Downes understudy if we've got other glaring problems with the squad. As someone mentioned above, we'll probably go for another more advanced type of midfielder (O'Riley or similar) and maybe they can do a job if needed but the idea we'd spend money on someone like Reed and sit him on the bench half the time isn't going to happen (IMO). Might get someone like Ghoddos in a on a free or nominal fee but that's probably it.

Yeah, loan would make sense although I'm not sure teams are likely to loan out many players valued in that kind of bracket. They'll be the ones that the parent club are hoping to move on for a permanent fee (like Sulemana) but unable to shift and will accept a loan in the absence of anything better. The ones who need more opportunities and game time will probably be at a lower level (at least initially anyway).

Striker is a tough one. What do we reckon our budget for that is? I can't see us going much above 30M and even that might be pushing it (plus we're getting into the territory where the player is likely to have more attractive clubs in for him if valued at that sort of price). Obviously 30M doesn't guarantee much, I thought Scamacca would be great at 35M but he didn't do so well for West Ham, Broja apparently is valued not far short of 30 and a lot don't fancy him for that price either. Could always go down the young foreign route but that's asking a lot of a young and relatively inexperienced player and again at those prices the likelihood is that a bigger club would probably snap them up. I'm thinking it might be better to go for someone like Brereton-Diaz (think Sheff Utd were quoted 6M for him if they stayed up), and then another gamble on a younger player either from a big club and frustrated at lack of opportunity / foreign / Championship level (for maybe 20M) Gamble either way really but think I'd be happier with a couple of options rather than all the eggs in one basket. A lot will depend on Che and I guess we could use the loan market which might be the better route.

He was back at Palace before Jones took over. He got unlucky and got injured around the time Palace had injuries to Olise and Eze so missed a chance in the first team. Will see if Palace bloke at work knows what’s going on with him.

Think he's more of a winger? Pretty sure he played on the wing mostly for Charlton, he looked good whilst he was there though. Palace fan at work was raving about him last summer and thought he could be the next big thing.

You could have said that last summer.

Honestly can't see any world where we sign Sugawara and keep KWP. Would imagine wherever KWP is going it's virtually done. Good news on Downes and if it's rising to 18M then that's probably about right. Midfield still looks pretty lightweight to me so would be nice to get another in soon.

Well it's YouTube so it's hard to judge - I wouldn't stick my neck out and say definite based on watching a few clips. This bloke seems to think he's Kante, Busquets and JWP rolled into one: https://khelnow.com/football/2024-01-world-football-lamine-camara-profile-scouting-report