S-Clarke

And then he gets injured for a long period of time. Puel gave him a run, scored goals, then landed on his shoulder and was out for 4 months. MP gives him a run, scored goals, then he's done his groin and is out for months. No one is denying that he scores goals, but he seemingly doesn't have the fitness to sustain a run at the highest level.

The amount of pressure on VVD will be huge, they will concede due to the gung-ho way Klopp’s sides play, and for any goals they concede he will be looked at under a microscope. Let's hope he's got broad shoulders. It’ll be interesting – and hopefully funny – to watch it pan out.

In the summer apparentley, but that's not too much of a surprise.

Given how he's set Newcastle up against City, I'm not sure he'd be any bit different to what we've had. Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.

Hollow crap.

Villas-Boas is not an avaliable candidate. He's quit football and is due in South America next month as a Racing Driver.

I'd have hoped we've already got 1 or 2 of our 'main' targets quite far down the line, the release of this news was seemingly on both parties wishes.

I honestly don't think anything is about to change in this regard.

It's time for our black box to have a similar effort to that of the summer of 2014. Obviously not as many in during January, but I'd like to see a minimum of 2 gaurenteed first team starters who improve the squad.

It's a headline fee which you'd have to say is released from our-side, but I'm somewhat disapointed he's going to end up there. Maybe they're still the only club who have bid.

No, that was an absolute fail by Puel. Words fail me as to why he ever suggested that.

I would agree that we need a focal point in attack like him, but we also need people with the ability to supply. I personally wouldn't go anywhere near Carroll as he is too injury prone, you'd only ever get handfulls of games from the bloke before long lay-offs. We already have one of those in Charlie.

Yeah nothing ITK there, just a strong assumption that we will sign a striker, otherwise we're dead in the water.

**** me we need a striker.

Club were caught in a difficult position really, but it was a fair stance and they stood by their word - can't fault them for that. Unfortuntley VVD has turned out to be a bit of an idiot, although he's played and hasn't dropped any clangers, you can see his level has dropped and he looks disinterested, the fact he doesn't get the captain's armband says it all for me. Give the club their due, they made a stance, but they now need to do what is right and let him go in order to strengthen the rest of our side.

Because we wouldn't be relying on Long to score all our goals.

Pretty much, it shouldn't really be a surprise that we're strugging to score goals when those are our creative force. Boufal and Hoj should play every week for me, let them build up some understanding and form. Midfield 3 of Hoj, Lemina with Romeu sitting deepest. Boufal playing off of Gabbiadni and.....our new signing...(whoever that may be). Push Cedric and Bertrand forward to create the width, get Hoj and Lemina to cover full back when they push forward as they're the most mobile. We kinda played that way against Everton at home and it worked, but then we changed it again. Although one positive, we haven't had many blanks recently.......it's just the other end that is screwed now.

To be honest, our signings in the summer were better than previous windows (Bedranek aside). More along the lines of proven first team quality who go straight in and improve the 11, so a couple more of them this window and we may swing ourselves around. We do of course also need a manager who is able to coach and pick a consistent 11...

Need to just keep an eye on the GD, that's all I'm looking at for this game.

Long is not a goal scorer, he has never been one. He is a handy support striker to someone clinical/better (i.e Mane/Pelle) and he will probably chip in with the odd goal, but having him as a 'focal' point is destined to end as a faliure. Not sure why the club can't see that. Might as well just get shot of him.

Ok, so we're approaching what is likely to be our most decisive transfer window in recent times. Get this wrong and it will have huge repercussions. What do we need to do? Ship out some of the squad to free up space and wages - Long, Gardos, Bedranek (loan), VVD, McQueen (loan), Pied, McCarthy. Use the funds to strengthen the entire squad. New GK - Someone good enough to push Fraser immediately. New CB - Replacement for VVD - someone who could form a partnership with Hoedt long term. New ST - Absolute must, given that we're now probably missing our only goal scorer for most of the season. We need someone strong, quick, tall- someone in the ilk of Aboubakar at Porto (not saying he is realistic, but that 'type' of player). New attacking midfield player - Again, an absolute must for me. Someone who can play across the front 3, but someone who actually has genuine pace and the ability to get in behind and stretch teams. It's all way too safe and predictable right now. New RB - Someone to push Cedric who we can rely on - as we seemingly don't want to use Pied. Big bucks to be spent on a CB and ST. Key attributes for any new additional would be pace, power, strength and height. Get that injected back into the spine of this team. This transfer window will show a lot about us as a club and it's time to put this fabled 'black box' into action.

He didn't even respond to Lallana's phone calls FFS.

They look almost as bad as us, not quite though.