VectisSaint

Why do you think the work permit application will be rejected technically? On what grounds? I thought he had played enough internationals for Uruguay for which he has been available for selection in last 2 years. There certainly is no issue with Uruguay's ranking. Or is the technical issue that we are not Manure or Citeh or Arse?

He was one of our better players Saturday, though that's not saying much, along with Lallana and Guly. Unfortunately with Davis not fully fit and Cork injured the MF is currently lightweight to say the least and a lot of responsibility is falling on Morgan as a result. But his ability to break up the play of Wigan time and again is very important, and I was shocked when he was once dispossessed, as it is so unusual. I think Ottery's coaching is working well.

Its not a question of passing or failing medical. The medics will assess the injury and whether he will recover fully or whether there would be some lasting damage. We would probably still sign him unless there was a serious risk that he would not fully recover. As long as we don't use the same medics as we did for Tin Man a few years back we should be OK.

We don't play Arsenal for nearly 3 weeks. Unlikely new signings would start against Manure on Sunday anyway. Reality is that very few transfers have actually completed in the PL as yet (of course there are exceptions), the reality is that all clubs do their business at the end of the window. We are actually quite fortunate to have brought in 4 new signings early on. It is ridiculous that the transfer window remains open after the start of the season which is why we have this farcical situation, but thats how it currently is, and until that is changed the way of doing business will change little, if at all.

Fonte made 1 mistake on Saturday, which admittedly was a BIG mistake and lead to their 2nd goal. Quite frankly it made no difference to the result. We were already 1-0 down with a couple of minutes to play and we would not have scored if we had played until midnight. But hey, make 1 mistake and some dumbasses on here will call you a donkey. Presumably didn't see the heaps of mistakes that Lambert made with some awful passes. Fonte played well at Man City, Jos made 1 glaring error. In fact are 2 CBs who are not good enough for the PL have really made 2 serious errors between them in 2 games.

More likely that it has to wait until tomorrow to conclude officially since it is a bank holiday today, so the FA offices are closed. Would be purely paperwork issue, but no way can a new signing be officially unveiled until the papers are all officially signed. Doesn't make a jot of difference to the work that needs to go on or has already gone on behind the scenes of course.

And all this happening on a day that some on here didn't think counted as one of the days left before the transfer window closes. Everyone was supposed to have their feet up today because it is a holiday in England. So 4 more days of transfer business left after today.

Really can't understand how come Ajax ever had JvD, one of the worst players we ever signed imho, and really has never made it that big since, despite 29 caps for Belgium. Odd thing is that he had only played 18 times for Ajax before he signed for us, only a few more than Boilesen.

Intrigued to know how you would know that they refuse to answer any correspondence "from us" - assuming you mean SFC and not letters or emails that you have sent personally. It seems quite clear to me that they have been in correspondence already, perhaps not with Oyston, but with their Chief Exec, as Holloway has stated, so doesn't seem that much of a problem to me. They are only being difficult in the sense that they want to keep what they have and don't want or apparently need to sell. On the other hand Philips is clearly not as crucial to them as many believe, after all they managed to win 6-0 on Saturday without him in the starting XI, they were already 5-0 up when he came on. I think they are probably working on the basis that he will be gone soon, one way or another. Must admit in my view, Ince would have been the better target, he really does look the dogs dangly bits, but would just be concerned long term that his old man would try to get him into one of his spiritual home teams.

I don't think "discarding a Scottish international" is really relevant. Boilesen has same number of caps as Fox, and Denmark are ranked 10th by FIFA while Scotland are ranked, oh I don't know I got down to 40th and gave up* :-) Your note about experience is more relevant, although clearly the experience has not resulted in Danny learning as much as one would expect, at 26 he is probably at his prime and is clearly struggling at PL level. I still think he will be very useful in the squad, and it will be good to have 2/3 FBs fighting for a place. But its also probably clear that NA does not think Fox is the answer, hence the 3 shirt has been left vacant. *46th actually. Just winding Kraken up.

Only if he does not meet the criteria, which is based on FIFA ranking of his international team and number of international appearances in last 2 or 3? years. Pahars took ages because Latvia were very lowly ranked. Uruguay are currently ranked 4th, so no problem there. As of Feb, Ramirez had played 9 times for Uruguay in last 2 years, so probably no issue there either. Found the rules: 1. A player must have played for his country in at least 75% of its competitive “A” team matches he was available for selection, during the 2 years preceding the date of the application; 2. The player’s country must be at or above 70th place in the official FIFA World Rankings when averaged over the 2 years preceding the date of the application

You always have to get international clearance for a transfer between 2 countries, whatever level, standard practice. It is normally a formality, and is not affected by the quality of the player. It was only complicated a little with Steve Davis because of the Rangers situation, in that effectively he was not registered with a team affiliated to the Scottish FA.

Feck, apart for 10 minutes their level of skill and control was bloody awful, though still seriously better than ours. I think this is part of the problem, some people, including Adkins it seems. believe the hype that skill and control in the lower reaches of the PL is so good. The only thing that really separates these poor PL teams and the best of the FL is ruthlessness in front of goal. But you are right, he didn't seem to know what to do to change things, and with due respect to JWP, replacing Steve Davis with Prowse was not a stroke of tactical genius, it was simply that Davis was ****ged out because he is not fully fit. We were a bit bereft of options on the bench yesterday, only Sharp and maybe Puncheon looked like game-changing options.

Lee is not a winger. He may play left or right of a front 3, but that does not and never will make him a winger. He is a striker. And the sooner he is available again the better.

Problem for anyone would be wages, not the fee.

He's 17, nearly 18 actually (1 November). The number on the back of his shirt does not represent his age. Hammond was struggling in the Championship to be fair, but he has been very important to us, but think he will probably move on. Strangely, if he had been on the bench yesterday I might have brought him on for 15 minutes to try to drive things on a bit, and wake up some of the other dozy players we had on the pitch.

No it isn't, in fact it is very much more than 6 days, if 2 hours and 50 minutes can be considered "very much more". I always assumed that maths was not an issue for you Alps, seems I was wrong. I guess you are trying to make the point that it is a bank holiday on Monday and that tomorrow is a Sunday, well here's a shock for you, people these days work on Sunday and even sign players (except for the actual business of signing the contract), **** sake even Mick Channon was signed on a Sunday. And as for Bank Holiday Monday, so you seriously believe that everyone will have their feet up because its a supposed holiday, its not a holiday in Europe, and millions will be working like any other day.

I know the OP was trying to be funny, and remind a lot of people about the rubbish they had spouted, but when I read the thread title before reading the bull**** accompnaying it, I agreed. The PL is average, the quality of football so far displayed, admittedly in 2 games, is shockingly poor. Wigan today were a complete crock of ****e, I remember seeing many teams playing better, and certainly more entertaining football in the Championship and even in some cases L1. Man City were really really average last week, and a half decent team would have got something from that game. The shock to me is that Saints management and players have seriously OVERestimated the standard, something I never thought would happen. They have tried to change the way we play to deal with the frighteningly impressive premier league teams, when sticking to what we used to be good at would actually have been a better option. Last week we saw 9 or 10 players who were clearly overawed, even scared of what was happening, only a 10-15 minute spell in the 2nd half showed what could be done with a different approach, being brave. Today was mind-numbingly awful, OK we hit the bar twice and had a few good efforts, but some players were clearly afraid to attack, and were apparently over-awed by their illustrious opponents. I have said all along that the PL is over-rated, other than the Top 4 or 5 the standard is actually no better than the top 6/7 in the Championship. Today was proof if it were needed, the sad fact is that NA and his team have misunderstood and hence we looked absolutely shocking against a very, very poor team. I know we will improve, hopefully we will bring in a few, it is quite clear a new GK, LB and 2 CBs are necessary, but we really do need the spark in midfield that is currently sadly lacking. I also look forward to Chun being fully fit again, I can see him doing well, and know that he will not be overawed like some of our players seem to be.

No, they aren't, they are a complete crock of ****e.

If Wigan were representative of "the best league in the world" then I'm a Martian. They were utterly appalling, we played much better teams in L1. The difference was we were even worse. This would have been a home banker if we had 11 players on the pitch who wanted to win and were up for it.

Oh dear, someone else who doesn't watch the game but just trots out what may be a popular remark. I agree with you on Fonte and Rod, although to be fair Fonte made one awful mistake, otherwise was not troubled by the worst attack in the PL). Guly, though was probably contender for best player on our side today, along with Lallana and Morgan. Everyone else (possibly except Jos and Clyne) was total pants. Not saying Guly was world-beating, but in terms of today's game along with AL he was the only one who you felt might make something happen. Very, very poor performance all round today, no fight, no spirit, no pace, no ideas.

Is this a FACT? I recall reading some time back that the fee was not the sticking point, only the terms of payment, and that there was a significant difference between what Bologna wanted and what we were prepared to do in terms of payment terms. I know I haven't read every single post on this thread but I don't recall the fee itself being much of an issue, 15m euros I believe (net to Bologna).

Sorry but Richmond is right, the deal with us went wrong at the same time Manure first expressed an interest just over a month ago. The timing was reported by Manure just before he signed, and IMHO is far more reliable than a dodgy Dutch journo.

Penarol may not be too happy either if we walk away, especially if Bologna chairman has effectively talked down Gaston's value.

Not convinced by the picture, looks like AL and Guly have been badly photoshopped in.