The Kraken

Stephens in pre-season was like a rabbit in the headlights; perhaps why Butterfield is playing tonight and not him. We just don't have options at centre-back right now.

Good idea. Who should we put on for him? Bearing in mind he's already playing alongside a right back.

Michael Owen.

Lennon didn't want him, and neither did FC Copenhagen who had been out on loan with (they turned down their option on him). He was very much out of favour at the 2 clubs he'd been associated with, and I'm not even sure he would have been on our list of targets at the start of the summer. I think a list of new targets was probably drawn up late in the window after all our other targets had been extinguished. To say that Hooiveld was anything but a last minute roll of the dice is churlish.

He looks like a tramp in that photo.

Its nice to evolve, but such a rapid rise from League 1 to Premier League will inevitably mean we have players we need to offload, and some still onboard who are not good enough for anything other than a bit part role this season. Our policy of purchasing the best players from the league below has caught up with us. We're lucky to have a genuine PL player in Lallana, Lambert I believe is good enough too. Aside from that there's not many other players who you'd think any other Premier League team would have selected from us to put into their team. Steven Davis was a very good signing, Jack Cork and Morgan will do a decent job, but we're very light aside from those and a major rehaul was needed to bring us up to speed. If we survive in this division then the spending policy next summer will be altogether different, but right now its an absolutely necessity to improve in many areas.

No. No better than we already have, I'd rather have Chaplow and de Ridder.

There were reports that the transfer fee being offered was only around £6M or £7M; which (even despite being in his final year) is comparitively low. You could argue that he's worth that much to Swansea just if he stays for one final season and helps them to push on; £7M doesn't necessarily get an awful lot these days in the UK market.

That really would be quite the scandal.

A couple of my friends are associated with football recruitment and coaching. How it works (during the season) for them (at a Championship club): there are a number of regional scouts and they will get dispatched to games at the direction of the head scout, to report back usually on one particular player he has targetted. If a particular player has two positive reviews of him returned by the scouts, that's when the head scout will typically get involved, and will either direct the scouts back to watch again until he deems it worthy of a visit. Only once the head scout has watched someone and again the player has ticked the boxes will the manager become involved, at which point the head scout may go again to watch the player or in some cases the manager himself. The head scout will obviously have a direct liaison with the manager and will know the type of player and position that the manager is looking for at any particular time. Oftentimes scouting will also just be done for potential future purchases.

Reading have a similar system, and their's keeps going so the points keep racking up. Therefore someone who is a ST holder for 4 years gets more priority than someone who has just renewed for the PL. I guess it works in that regard; but then you could have someone who was a ST for many years, hardly goes to any games now but is still at the top of the priority list, which perhaps isn't quite right. Personally I'd start it afresh each season, but your previous season's points total gets factored into it so ST holders who went to many away games have the highest priority, and so on down to those who just went to a handful of matches who would start just above a new member.

Easiest way is just down towards Bevois Valley and then take a left down Mount Pleasant road. Past the school, over the level crossing and follow the road on up which comes out opposite the Shell garage. Useful for going back that way after the game too as you avoid the bottleneck of the footbridge; if Britannia Road is open you can walk that way, or skirt along the right hand side of the queue for the footbridge and use the underpass.

No. He budgetted for us finishing in the spot above the relegation places, and for us exiting the cups at the first hurdle. As and when we beat those benchmarks, so the budget changed. And to his credit he was also one of the pioneers for inserting relegation clauses into players' contracts.

No. He's 28 years old now and on the downturn of his career. He plays in a position that requires pace and he'll be getting slower as the years have gone by. We'd likely only get a year or two of top level service out of him, his career then will probably see him changing positions and moving inside rather than on the wing. £7M and £40K a week would be an enormous sum to pay for someone like that.

I disagree with that entirely. For our status at the time a lot of them were very good signings, comparitive A signings. Jaidi, Fonte, Butterfield and Murty all dropped a division to join us. Jaidi may have been old but he was probably our highest wage earner, or at least one of them. Compared to the clubs we were competing with they were A class players, epitomised by Fonte. I wouldn't be averse at all to going for a Jaidi type figure, a been there done it defender. We have a decent blend of youth now, an old campaigner could be just what we need at CB.

It isn't £70K a week.

Ha ha, I remember him,, blonde and absolutely tiny! Wiki says he went to Hamilton Academicals and then Yeovil. No info on the amount of games/goals though.

Not exclusively by any means. Hooiveld, Fonte, Hammond, Connolly, Murty, Jaidi, Butterfield, Guly and Steven Davis were all around 27 or older when we signed them. And we've had plenty of others around the age of 24 or 25 when we got them (Chaplow, Harding, Fox, Richardson, Sharp, Lee etc etc). Only a small proportion of our total signings are youngsters, the majority have been playing league football for a number of years.

How do you come to that conclusion? JRod I'd concur is a bizarre transfer; Steven Davis looks like being just what we need, an experienced and quality head in the middle of the park. Clyne looks to be a very good signing, one for right now and for the future. And Gazza is clearly one who is going to challenge Kelvin pretty soon. We haven't made enough transfers, that's of course not for debate, its a fact. But I would struggle to be overly critical of the trabsfers we've actually made; JRod aside they're pretty self-explanatory I'd have thought.

I wouldn't hold much store in that; I've been pulled over a couple of times and breathalysed before (I'd not been drinking) and on both occasions the police officer told me that it was because my driving had been "erratic" (it wasn't) and they suspected drink. I think its an excuse that gives the pulling over a bit more credibility than just "I suspect you've been drinking".

My prediction is 2; Ramirez (or another winger) and a centre back. Which then potentially leaves us scratching around for a GK, second centre back and/or left back, or leave further business until the January window.

I can only think it must be something like that. Or for clubs to think "Oh God, our team is actually much sh*tter than we first thought, better buy some players".

No, not all clubs are in the same position. Many of our peers have either completed their summer dealings already, or are holding out for just one or two players. We're around 4 or 5 players short of our earlier stated summer ambition. But you're right that the window should shut on the first day of the season, its crazy to have it open for just a couple of weeks following kick off.

I'd guess wages could be a tiny bit of a problem......!

I don't West Ham's included the Jarvis fee, so they go up to £20M.