S-Clarke

If any deal demonstrates the shift of transfer values, this deal probably does. 5 or 6 years ago this is a £5m player tops. Dara O'Shea has gone to Ipswich for £15m. That's the level your £15m player cap realistically gets you nowadays, the £25-30m mark is where your Mane's/Tadic's/VVD's/Waynamas now live in this day and age. If we are still stuck operating in and around that £15m cap, then we have to aim for players who are running down their contract and have injuries - that's where the value comes in.

Don't they want £60m+ for him? Doubt they'll sanction a loan deal, but these are the days the random loan opportunities popup - I'm sure we've got our feelers across loads of unexpected options.

Absolutley he is, people saying he's going to be on the bench and won't demand a starting spot aren't aware of the guys ability. If he plays 20 games and signs for us, he is our number 1 for however long he is available. Bazunu will have to make do with a bench place, which if we're honest is where he should have been for a few years now. We're actually signing a proper GK for once.

Sulemana, are you kidding me? What do some fans still see in that fraud? When has he ever created anything? Replace Sulemana with SAA and you have a point.

I think what they were referring to in that comment was our recruitment, and they were true to their word on that. We signed too many kids last time, this year we've gone for more of a balance - but we do still have some enormous holes lacking any decent quality, so still work to do.

They're different types though, I wouldn't call either Archer or BBD number 9's - they both play off or around a proper focal point to get the best out of them, wide forwards is probably the best way to describe them - they're the runners beyond the focal point. We did this before in Che and we tried to stick our heads in the sand with a player not suited to what we were doing.

There was a lot of talk about this being the redemption from the Nathan Jones Forest Home masterclass, but that wasn't any better which took some doing. I think there are a few players in our side who are top half Championship players, but poor PL players. There have been tons and tons of those players over the years, sadly we seem to be a bit littered with them. I have confidence in Suguwara, KWP, Downes, THB etc as I think they've got the potential (but THB didn't help himself yesterday). Now we're sorting out GK, the area that is lacking any star quality is attack. In the Championship it's passable, but you need to have more about you at this level and we just don't have that. We started the season at Sheffield Wednesday with forward options such as Tella, Edozie, Mara, Adams, Armstrong, Stu Armstrong, Sullemana, SAA, Moussa, Charly. We now have Edozie, Armstrong, BBD, SAA, Dibling, Sullemana and Archer. We're down on numbers and quality in that area. We need an AMC (who can play across the 3) and a proper number 9 if we are to do anything this year. Sounds like the club agree though. The funds from Charly, ABK and Onuachu will help us get a few good level players into the club I hope.

Our last pickup from Feyenoord was very good, so hopefully this is similar. The only question marks are his fitness, but that's why we're able to get him if we're honest - otherwise he'd be way out of our league. On his day he had the potential to be an elite level keeper and had stacks of clubs around Europe sniffing, especially these playing from the back style managers, so let's hope he stays fit. He is probably 4 or 5 levels above anything we have right now.

We went into the 22/23 season without a striker and it cost us. We went into the 23/24 season without a striker as we signed an injured Ross Stewart, and it almost cost us. We cannot go into the 24/25 season without a striker, as unsurprisingly it will cost us. We have lots of attacking forwards, but none I would consider your ruthless number 9 type. I'm not even expecting the striker to hit 20 goals or whatever, but we need a focal point and someone to build the attack around. I still have faith that some loans will catch us all by surprise, ones we didn't even know were gettable a week ago - this is where we will get our value and best additions, I still believe that. (maybe misguided faith, but we'll see). The club cannot ignore it again, as at this stage it will be absolute gross negligence.

Yeah, I'm not sure on the Stephens bashing today. He did nothing wrong, and was probably our more passable player with the ball. THB had an absolute disaster class, so his sub made total sense. I think most appreciate that he's not a superstar, but the piling in on him when he didn't evne do anything wrong is incredibly tiresome. There were many other players more benefiting to a rant. Not that anyone deserves really ranting about at this stage.

Credit where it's due, proved his worth as a shot stopper today. Kept the score down. Still not great playing out from the back though.

It had all the hallmarks of Wigan at home on our last promotion to this league. Big fan fare return, expectation against a lesser PL side, and it's a complete damp squib. I didn't think we played well at any point. We looked incredibly nervous in the first half, we tried to force things and kept giving the ball away - it was food and drink for Forest for 90% of that match. They fully deserved their win and there's not really much else to say. When you oly have 1 attempt on target, which is straight at the keeper, then there's a problem. Way too passive and reactive on and off the pitch. Best performers for us were Downes, KWP and credit to McCarthy too who kept the score down, which I didn't expect to be saying. It's quite a wakeup call in the sense that Forest are one of the weaker sides, yet the players they have in their attack (Hudson Odoi, Elanga, Gibbs White etc) are massive levels above anything we can put out. Ourselves, Leicester and Ipswich are going to find that. We lack a bit of magic in that final third, someone you can give the ball to and get fans off their seats. We don't have that player. We need a decent couple of additions in the final few days, as it's going to be quite a painful season trying to watch Armstrong threaten at this level on his own.

I would imagine the 'this season' finances in the Ramsdale deal are very similar to that of the Bijlow, main difference is the outlay would be on a loan rather than the permanent. Something the club will have to weigh up. If they can negotiate a reasonable obligation clause should we stay up, which factors in financially what we've covered this season, then it could make sense if we get him for say £20m next summer.

That's Brandon Charles, U18 midfield player.

This is DT though. He will have a moan up over pretty much anything, it's all in his mind most of the time.

Russell was pretty clear in his press conference, that with Lis out of the door, we now need to do something in GK and we will do. It may not be either of them, but thankfully it seems clear that we will actually sign a goalkeeper much to my relief. The dutch guy is the one though I think.

Yeah he probably is gutted, but as a club we've got to be ruthless and you have to be honest and say he has been a truly horrific signing that will likely never return to a high standard. I noticed that Russell said he'll be back on the training pitch this week, but unsurprisingly he hasn't been back on the training pitch. There's 'not rushing him back' and then there's ''covering up something more sinister'', and it looks like the latter.

There seems to be a belief that every club needs a 20 goal a season, proper central 9 to be safe. Totally not the case. You quite often only have a couple who get over 20 in a season. If we want a 20 goal striker, we need to pay £70m like Spurs did with Solanke. Sometimes clubs like ourselves can get lucky with an Ings, but ideally for our level we want to be sharing the goals around. I think 10-12 for each of those guys is massively optimistic and not needed if our target is to just survive, but if all 3 hit 10 goals then we're finishing top half without a problem.

Have I missed something? Everything I've seen points at the dutch chap, we tried for Ramsdale but Arsenal wanted too much. We've moved on surely, which is why the other move is now advancing - may well get done today.

We've had some pretty bad forwards, he's up there. The fact we've got £10m for him, and he's paid for a new GK, is absolutely bonkers and amazing business.

He is/was a very, very highly rated keeper. I knew he had some injury issues, but I didn't know they were as consistent as they have been. He's missed around 150 games in 4/5 years. Last season he missed 27 games. Season before 16, season before that 27 again - so yeah, undeniably he does seem incredibly injury prone (seems to be a recurring wrist injury)….but the chances of signing keepers of his level are quite rare for clubs like us, so hopefully he doesn't end up sharing the treatment room with Stewart and we can get a decent % of games from him. I imagine the fee will be quite small due to his injury history.

Not sure what's funnier with regards to that Krapyvstov link. 1) He's called Krapy 2) It's another kid who hasn't played football professionally. 3) Chelsea are linked and they already have 200000 keepers.

I don't understand how these top clubs can get the money they can for their deadwood. Before his injury and after his decent season with us (in the January when he was with us actually) there was talk of £30m bids. Now, 2/3 years on, on the back of a mega-injury and a pretty woeful spell at Fulham, he's still worth the same. Bonkers really. To me there's no value in that one, Fulham fans will vouch for that as they hated him last year. A loan with a £10-15m is probably fair, but £30m is just nonsense and is why football is broken.

An interesting interview with his Estoril manager, who will know him better than most. Solent Sport - Vasco Seabra: Saints and AFCB get transfer insight - BBC Sounds

Outside of Ramsdale, I'm not sure of any other PL keepers available for loan who'd be suitable or gettable for us. I predictably saw an article linking us to Ukraine's U19 goalkeeper, available on a free after being released by Dinipro-U19's. Hasn't ever played a pro game in his career. I imagine that one is a goer. Free - tick Young - tick Never played pro football - tick