S-Clarke

That's why Holloway is going to try every trick in the book to block a transfer, as he knows that the kids head would be turned by anything we could offer.

No idea.

Nice bump. Shame he's not here to see where we've come, but it's all down to him. A legend. Just tragic that he couldn't see it all the way through.

Pre-season build-ups just wouldn't be the same without the insane ramblings of our favorite Switzerland based poster.

That's how I see it, seems very bitter. I remember his comments in the FA Cup game a few years back. If anything, I reckon this could have a reverse effect and force a transfer.

As I said on another thread, it's probably a complete non-event over dramatized by holloway who has a bee in his bonnet over most events. He just doesn't want to loose his best player, and he's going to do anything to stop that happening. At least, if anything, it shows our interest...!

Yep, that's a positive swing on it! To be honest, as much as Holloway moans, these sort of approaches happen all the time. Not direct tapping up as such, but the sounding out of a players representative(s) before a formal approach is made in order to discuss terms. There's no point in putting all the work into a bid if the player himself isn't going to be interested or his demands would be too high to consider, so you'd do a bit of investigating first. That's all I see this is, but Holloway just has a bee in his bonnet over most things.

Holloway is probably just over reacting, as he does to most things. It will blow over as a non-event I'd imagine.

It's a shame you don't post regularly anymore NickG. Always enjoyed reading your posts...especially on our winning runs!

Whats wrong with Hunter? Is it juts because we lost 1 game that this area is now not good enough? Hunter is an excellent coach who turned down an opportunity to assist England at U21 level. We're lucky to have him.

It's not a simple fact at all, it's made up rubbish by people who are panicking.

Michu cost more than Davis.

Clyne was around £2.5m, Gazzinga was around £1m potentially rising to £2m. Rodriguez broke our record transfer fee. I do agree with the lack of pace, completely, I've said that since day 1 - but I'm not panicking because I know the club are working on it, I know NA wants an attacking pacey player and that we'll have that sorted by the end of August. Obviously in an Ideal world you'd love it to be sorted sooner, but this is football and in the world of transfers it's never simple. The fact is that we got most of our business done nice and early, Rodriguez being one of NA's main targets and he made sure that was sorted well before pre-season which was smart.

But we had a good defensive record last season, just a couple of games towards the end where Fonte made a few errors has all of a sudden made him the fall guy. He's actually a very cultured ball playing centre back who reads the game very well. I'm sure he'll do ok in the PL, but we do need another CB just to add a bit more competition to the group. It's not as dramatic as you make out though, not at all.

You always say things like this, it's like groundhog day. You seem to create this picture of NA, NC and everyone sat around not giving a damn about anything, when In fact I'm 99.99% sure that there are phone calls taking place, scout reports being read, enquiries being made on a daily basis. They won't all be made available to the press and to be honest in terms of transfer news, the press aren't going to try and dig that far to find our info - they may do for Man City, but not for us. So don't read into the fact that there are little rumors in the press that we're actually doing nothing, I'm certain it's the total opposite. This is also nothing like it was back in 2007 either, we actually had no CB's. Not one. We have 4 at the moment of varying quality, but people are already absolutely sure that Fonte and Seaborne will fail, so therefore we are down to 2 CB's. The reality of the situation is that we have 3 rb's, 2 lb's, and 4 cbs - all we want is a little bit of quality to improve the group, so it's no where near as dramatic as made out.

I think we agree that we need a CB and a pacey RW, everyone agrees, but what we all don't agree on is the constant bet wetting over I also think some of you fail to understand what we are doing tactically this summer. We're not playing a flat 4-4-2, 4-3-3 or 4-5-1, we're dynamic with players who can cover numerous positions. I imagine we're looking for a RM who can also play as a ST, in behind or on the left if required. What's wrong with buying British? It's quite refreshing and whilst people are saying we can get better quality for less in Europe, I'm yet to see any names put to this argument. A counter argument in favor of British signings is that they blend in quicker whilst not having to learn another language, culture etc. Why have you also come to that conclusion over Davies when he's not played properly in a saints shirt yet. Fair enough if you come to that opinion by November...but you can't really say it now. Be excited about it, we're back in the PL sooner than any of us imaged. We have such an exciting game a week on Sunday to look forward to, yep, we'll get beaten, but that's what's to be expected unless we spend 100 million pounds on new players. There's no point in dreading it, it'll happen, but just embrace it and look forward to the games at home against the likes of City, Spurs, Man Utd etc - if we can emulate Norwich and Swansea then I'll be delighted. It would be silly to expect more than that in the first season back.

Let's get Andrew Davies back.

4-0 sutton

That's an interesting shout, with a guaranteed transfer fee in it. It would be like a permanent transfer, delayed by a year. I know WBA did that alot when they were relegated (brum did the same last year with Foster), they didn't sell their high earners...the loaned them out for the season and then made more profit the next year (IIRC....?) may be barking up the wrong tree.

Not just this thread, but numerous threads over numerous forums.

He went to Portsmouth on loan, and that was the start of the end.

He's pretty bad though tbf.

Long-term I'd imagine, but he needs games. A season on loan here harms no one.

What's unrealistic about it? He won't be a starter at Chelsea as Cole starts when fit (and he's always fit). Chelsea may feel that he needs a full-season in the PL to really start to kick on, that won't happen if he's sat around on a bench all season waiting for Cole to be injured. Gibbs would be unrealistic as he's already first team at Arsenal.

Gibbs is another shout, although he's got more of a chance of First team football than Bertrand.