Saint86

If we take legal action, that is exactly the kind of argument we can make 😅

Shows we haven't learned from our handling of the EFL charges though. Really isn't rocket science from the club to respect the overseeing organisations FFS 🤦‍♂️

Slightly worryingly, I don't think Scienza hasn't looked particularly happy in any of the preseason footage so far? Considering he is also one of our star players and the fans' favourite, I'd say coverage has been fairly Spartan of him to date. Could be reading into it too much, but when combined with the news of potential moves to Italy / prem / Brazil (I.e. no smoke without fire) it's not clear that he'll be here come October.

Agreed. Seems a sensible move for him. Hopefully we include a good sell on fee as I can see him doing well there and then earning a bigger move in a couple of seasons.

I know right, and the best part is that we're not in the running for it 🤣😂

Eh? That's a significant ban and would likely derail the entire season. I would hope the club take legal action if he receives any kind of meaningful physical ban.

The backpedaling generally from Boro is fairly amusing to see. They knew about salt in advance, had their media team there ready and waiting with high powered lenses to snap a young lad (who was down the other end of the training ground on his mobile), managed to magically identify him (a junior intern from a club 500miles away) and have evidence of him spying at Oxford 5months earlier (all within hours) for them to report it to the EFL that sane afternoon... The club were stupid and broke the rules, but there is no denying that Boro basically just engineered the entire thing for an advantage in the playoffs and with a long shot of getting a bye to the playoff final... I.e., cheated. And then (despite losing to saints over 2 legs and surely not being oblivious to all the above shenanigans), their entire fanbase was entitled enough to assume they had a right to take Hull's playoff spot... Thankfully they did an early Argentina and failed to register a shot on target. Now, after all of that came to naught, they are trying to row back on it (hellberg) and their fans are trying to play it down and make it all about our fans. But the reality for them is, like it or not, they have got it coming from saints this year and they can't row their way out of it... Reap what you sow etc. 😂🤣

Molina is on video punching one of the Spanish players in the chest as he ran past him - this started the entire brawl.

They will absolutely walk the league with that kind of budget and Nuno at the helm. Very unfortunate.

They have a net circa £16M coming in, which will be in installments as per the Rodgers transfer. So assume £4M per year for the next 4 years... So they can likely outbid us should they want to drop it all on 1-2 players.

Yes, but there is no guarantee that if Leicester go pop (which is not that unlikely), anyone will cover their substantial debts (£100M) and counting. At this point, I will be surprised if they don't go into admin - they have taken out advance payments on next season's parachute money and future transfer installments. All they have coming in, is effectively the league 1 tv/prize money payments, merchandising and commercial deals, and gate receipts. Against that they have their outstanding transfer fees that they owe, legacy high wage players with no league 1 relegation clauses, a rumoured £15M per year maintenance fee for their ridiculous training ground, and feck knows what other skeletons in their closet. Selling to them is a risk.

The head of the analyst team left the club pretty promptly following that debacle.

I would be very concerned over whether they ultimately go bust and we wind up getting pennies on the pound.

Very sad but not unexpected given his illness. All the best to his loved one.

Boro set to land and absolutely massive windfall for the rovers transfer...

I think you are being overly negative here hypo. We are suffering a 15M loss of income from parachute payments this year. The mere fact that we spent prior to June 30th means that we haven't breached psr last year - so we had money to spend. Given we made a £57M loss the season before that, that implies a degree of confidence going forward -albeit, we need to see the finances to confirm this. Now we are under SCR it's a new game. But our wages have shrunk significantly, and on paper we have built a very competitive squad for this level where the vast majority of players have an obvious role to play. The likes of ramsdale, bazunu, bbd, edozie, sugawara etc are largely surplus to requirements (although a couple of those could be utilised)... Shifting them raises funds against the £15M, and notably saves significant wages (on top of the likes of macca, aribo, smallbone etc. leaving - which alone must be £5M a year saved in wages). Add to that the £6M on Fernandes. None of us really know our wage to turnover ratio currently (last year's accounts will be very revealing). But: We have spent circa £9M on Dobbin, and £6-8M on Larin and Peretz. All for a fairly minor increases in wages (I assume just dobbin basically). We will sell at least one big player (I e., Charles for £25M). We need to cover the the £15M parachute payment loss. We raised £6M via Fernandes. The above listed players will raise not insignificant funds and clear a couple million of the annual wages. Dragon can, if he chooses, pump in £10M. In summary - I don't think we are that badly off. I think we will see 1 big sale without further squad additions, or 2+ but with major squad additions. Eitherway, I am fairly relaxed currently.

I agree his end product was slightly frustrating. But equally, just because he is good, people seem to be forgetting that it was his first year in English football - do players only get this as a mitigating excuse when they've struggled? Who is to say there isn't more to come from Scienza? Equally, he does have the sprinkling of star factor - at any moment he may make something happen, get the team up the pitch, cut the opposition defense open, inject some positivity into our play - i don't think that should be overlooked.

Yes, i agree there. I criticise blackmore on some stuff, but i still respect what he does. The boro lot are only really worthy of contempt/jokes.

You mean, key passes? 😄

Love the "Villain to Saint" quote. I'm sure that's annoyed a few of our new friends up north, especially as they were in for him 😆

I agree. The championship games come thick and fast, and we saw last season that a huge part of the way Eckert manages is to have players that can he can swap and change in and out of the squad and then do the same job. Dobbin, azon etc., are being signed to be part and pacel of the first team.

I suspect 2 big sales will be made this summer. Maybe one if we are lucky (Charles). Those will likely come out of Chalres, THB, Scienza, and Jander - the reality is that we look to be signing Dobbin, which means we do (on paper) have cover for Scienza. We look like this currently: All in all, its quite balanced and should be competitive for the season. The issue will come with further sales and who we replace them with. I assume we will see the following leave: Archer Ramsdale Edozie (subtract to contract, he could be retained - he gives us good depth on the wing) BBD (although i think he could do a job as CF for us) Youth players like sesay, Williams, Oyekunle i don't expect to see much off (hope to be surprised) - so have excluded. Edit - i guess we could potentially keep Edozie and use him on the right, with Matsuki being played centrally as cover for Bragg/downes/Jander in the absence of charles?

I wouldn't hold your breath. Spain just qualified for the final with relative ease against what the vast majority consider the best team in international football. They have an extra days rest, they've not played extra time or penalties, they've had no suspensions or injuries etc. They have also already won at this level. They should be considered clear favorites now.

Sell Charles or Scienza and we're basically break even, plus ofc the Fernandes £6M. PSR is done. We're on SCR now, so its just a case of being balanced for this season, and Peretz and Larin were signed last season under PSR with a reduced hit on SCR as a result - we've got a £15M drop in parachute monies to consider, we've shift a significant amount of the wage bill (Macca and Aribo will have seen something like £3M-5M per year alone i reckon), and technically Dragan can top us up by £10M per season if he wants to - plus its been widely stated that we've sorted out our wage bill and will be in a much stronger position in the years to come after the seasons of wasted wages and past transfer installments are cleared. We are not that badly off - any sales we make will be at a significant profit, our recruitment under Spors seems pretty damn solid, and we already have a very good team and manager for this level. There is lots to be optimistic about, and only the Eckert decision to worry about.

I thought it was quite balanced and actually very promising. There is clearly a player in there and they can see the potential. He's going to get chances galore playing in our side, Larin will be able to directly mentor him, and we will be flat track bullies vs most of the league. Ipswich had a fantastic squad last season - probably too many options if anything - but it says a lot that as the season went on and we got into the run in, he was getting more and more game time. Another year in the championship, already with experience of the division and aclimatised to the UK more, and you can only expect him to get better in all seriousness. Possibly slightly expensive for where we are (which adds a bit of risk), but you can see what we're buying here. Some interesting / positive quotes from that Ipswich thread: "The annoying thing is that he will have benefitted massively from last season with us & he knows the league now. He will be a much better player for them than he was with us." "I have never been more sure of a player turning in to a goal machine. All those chances he missed for us will fly in for Spain" "If it clicks for him, he could be a great signing for them. I see a lot going for Azon's game, and he was a gnat's pen1s away from being a great success here last season, rather than 'meh'."