Saint Charlie

This. Aiming higher.

Berra is crap. Davis is already our player and is a midfielder. This is a WUM thread IMO.

It was Metalist Kharkiv - they were in the Champions League a couple of years ago and have a good record with youth players. No idea of facilities but saw it mentioned on a Russian site. Bayern sprung to my mind also as well as Ajax and Barca but it seems Metalist are well versed in bringing young players through, and the Russian technique in the Euros was second only to Spain and probably Germany.

Wolves squad: Aaron McCarey, Eggert Jonsson, Kevin Foley, Christophe Berra and Matt Doherty are also named in the squad to take on newly promoted Southampton at St Mary’s Stadium. Several players are not being risked as a precaution including Dorus De Vries (groin), Steven Fletcher (ankle), Matt Jarvis (groin) and Jamie O’Hara (groin) but new signings Tongo Doumbia and Björn Sigurdarson are both in the squad. Carl Ikeme also returns having missed the game at Shrewsbury with a slight knee injury. Kick off is 3pm. SQUAD FOR SOUTHAMPTON: Ikeme, McCarey, Zubar, Johnson, Stearman, Ward, Davis, Doumbia, Henry, Forde, Doyle, Sigurdarson, Ebanks-Blake, Foley, Berra, Jonsson, Doherty. Having seen that squad we should look quite a bit better than Wolves, will be a good benchmark.

We have a shortage of strikers. Hoskins will go out on loan and Sinclair is the only other one. If we signed Slew for example he would be one of our own players, just recruited in a different way. You need to add at all levels. Of the great youth team of Walcot, Dyer, Best, Blackstock etc quite a few of those were signed from other tems for decent fees. The Dev Squad players will improve playing with better players and be more likely to do well in the competitions which in turn prepares the players for big games and might help attract more good young players to the club.

Would not suprise me at all if we were after a striker to play in the development squad - seems the one area within that which we are weak in.

Would it be fair to say that if Steve Davis doesn't feature in this then he would be struggling to make the City game? Hopefully he gets some minutes. Would be nice for Rickie to get a goal.

Certainly an element of truth to this. The fact Chaplow is a bit of a jack of all trades in the midfield might see him stay initially, but IMO to get in the starting lineup there would need to be two injuries in a position.

Yes, KD is the first choice keeper this season it would seem. On Puncheon, it looks like he will make the final 25 but you never know, especially if we get in another wide man as Adkins said he wants to. Plus point of Puncheon is he is versatile, can play either side and in the middle...

Barnard, Forte, Dickson all leaving. He said he has been fair to them and told them early they would need to move on and he has no complaints with their effort etc and expects them to get moves as they are good players. On incoming transfers he said there will definitely be additions, still wants CB (or two) and wide player, but when asked about Lens and Dann said right position(s), not necessarily right names. Said we need to have competition and CB certainly an area where we need that but won't panic buy. Asked about the young keeper Davies and hinted strongly that we need and will get a keeper for the Dev squad.

Forget him: Dutch article today says he is going to some sort of Arbitration to sort out his situation with Vitesse who apparantly are now asking for 5-6m euros for him. There are German and French teams interested at 2m. In the whole article there is one mention of Saints - saying that he near moved here but it fell apart.

It was on the Saints Player interview. He said he has been fair to them and told them early they would need to move on and he has no complaints with their effort etc and expects them to get moves as they are good players. On incoming transfers he said there will definitely be additions, still wants CB (or two) and wide player, but when asked about Lens and Dann said right position(s), not necessarily right names. Said we need to have competition and CB certainly an area where we need that but won't panic buy. Asked about the young keeper Davies and hinted strongly that we need and will get a keeper for the Dev squad.

Its not.

Its more the Dutch market than Dutch players that we seem to be looking at. In any case, not sure there is a great amount of value in looking at one team's squad list, especially Malaga. Ask yourself how they attracted all those players there?

Incorrect.

Zero point in repeating anything from that site.

He does seem to have a habit of saying players are going to come in and then they don't - he hasn't got a lot of control over it. We are looking yes, but he can't guarentee players coming in.

yep - those aren't the games that will define our season. As much as Fonte might struggle vs Aguero, Morgan will vs Silva and Rickie won't get a sniff from Kompany.

He will have played some matches in the Olympics though, more than Cork. Plus the season is more than one game, and its not like Fonte and Hooiveld are Alan Bennett.

Thanks - seems plausible and ties in with other updates. Guess we will wait and see, the lad has made quite a mess of this!

Dutch article I just read says that his Clubs Chairman is coming to England to watch him in Japan's next Olympics game and then maybe hold talks with some clubs about a move.

Sounds like the type we would go for. Still young too. 16 caps for Japan which is quite a few more than Tadanari at a far younger age.

I meant if we signed a CB and a winger that I felt were as good signings as Clyne and Jay Rod then I would feel they had the right sort of quality that we need. Not sure they necessarily need top level experience but agree we need some pace in the team - IMO the key reason we signed Clyne.

Agree -and with Davies rumoured to have signed as third choice then reckon GK is sorted - whther we like it or not. For me its 1 x CB and 1 x wide man which is crucial - and if the signings are at the same level as the others then I will be happy. Second Cb would be ideal after that.

IMO most likely starting team as of now is this: ---------------------KD--------------------- Clyne----------Fonte-------Jos------------Fox --------------------Morgan------------------ ---------------JWP----------Lallana---------- Guly-------------------------------------J Rod --------------------Lambert----------------- Cork and Davis won't be fully fit, and any new signigns now won't have long at all to get up to speed. Can't see anyone outside of this who is really making a push.