Midfield_General

Another slam dunk to add to the Alex Crook hall of fame 🤣 Absolute joker

Holy shit Incredible bit of business. Could well be our most important signing of the season.

I’ve always thought that culture-wise, Stoke beats the shit out of Florence

True. Dibden Purlieu’s just down the road, in case any of them need a new hip or fancy an all-you-can-eat carvery

On a slight tangent, I wonder if RM has had any assurances that he stays in the job even if we go down? Because it would be pretty difficult for him otherwise, buying into a transfer policy that is all about the long-term, if he thought he might still be for the chop if we do badly in the short-term.

Nice. Maybe £16m base, rising to that with add-ons? No idea, but you have to say that regardless of whether the fans think he should be given a chance in the side or not, those are pretty good numbers for a fringe player who clearly wasn’t going to be part of the plans under RM.

No idea how it’s structured, that’s just the headline figure being reported. Agree though that it’s unlikely to all be up front, hardly any deals seem to be done like that anymore, it generally seems to be done in instalments and then some add-ons

Being reported as around £16m

Fair enough mate. I don't agree but it's a game of opinions 👍

Oh well that’s that then. He wouldn’t have saved one goal in one match so therefore he’s no better than him and we shouldn’t sign him. You’re on a wind-up right? Who do you think we should sign?

Quite right, nowhere near good enough for us and certainly not an upgrade on our current options. Who do you think we should go for - Donnarumma maybe? Alisson? Neuer? Maybe get Ter Stegen as well, he'd be a good bench option if one of the others gets a knock.

‘Very good’ isn’t always a quantifiable thing though unfortunately. Worth noting that some of our biggest flops have been the players we paid the most for. Sulemana, Vestegaard, dear old Guido, Onuachu and Elyonoussi are all amongst our top 10 biggest ever signings, with Lemina, Hoedt and Djenepo not far behind. All disasters. Just paying more for a player doesn’t guarantee quality or that they’ll be a success. Not putting all our eggs in one basket is a risk mitigation strategy, although on the flip side you could also argue of course that buying cheaper players with less of a track record brings it’s own set of risks. Damned if you do, damned if you don’t, basically.

Superb goal from Leeds, playing out from the back. Perfect passing move starting with the keeper.

The season we went down, when we were absolute horseshit, we still beat Chelsea home and away, drew with Arsenal home and away, drew with Man Utd away, drew with Spurs, drew with Liverpool and knocked a very decent Man City side out of the league cup. Our problem was that we were absolutely shite against everyone else. If we can make ourselves hard to beat this season then there's no reason we can't get some points against the big boys. Need to combine that with winning the games we 'ought' to win at home against the bottom 6-7 though, which we singularly failed to do last time round. And that needs to start with Forest tomorrow.

This will be the first game I've taken my nephew to so raise your game please lads, if it's rubbish tomorrow he'll end up wanting to support PSG or some shit

My guess: BBD: 7 Arma: 5 Archer: 4 Insane shock coup deadline day loan signing no-one saw coming: 25

Saido Berahino, who scored 20 in 45 games for West Brom in 2015, almost signed for Pochettino's Spurs and was being talked up for England has just signed for Rajasthan United in the Indian second division. Could have been the final part of the jigsaw.

Keys and Gray haven't been on TalkSport in 10 years

Fake news, fake news

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If that's accurate (I have no idea who Sam C is or whether they are a proper source) and they're just quibbling over £2.5m then just get it done before Wolves snap him up, that's pocket change in today's market

The last few times we stayed up we had a player who could score out of nothing. Either Ings, who was good enough to be able to carve out and finish his own chances when it looked like nothing was on, or JWP who got so good at direct free kicks that being given anything within 25 yards felt close to being given a penalty. I think we've added some decent breadth and depth, and I think Lesley, Fernandes, whichever keeper we sign and probably BBD will probably all end up being upgrades on what we had in those positions last season. But I agree with you that it's hard to see where that bit of magic is going to come from. Someone who can pull something a bit special out of nowhere and win you a game that you don't really deserve to win, against the run of play. It would be great if we pulled someone like that out of the bag at the end of the window. No idea who, but someone exciting who really gets people off their seat, and is a proper goal threat either by scoring themselves or by drawing people to them to create space for others. I keep thinking of Barkley going to Luton last season - someone like that.

Yeah I'm not sure that's entirely accurate actually

Janny B's far from perfect, but you have to say that for the £5m we paid for him we've done alright

Yeah I'm not sure he's going to be able to time injuries to suit our schedule. Anyway. Fingers crossed that the Feyenoord fans are wrong and he's ready to play a full season.