Beckenham Saint

Well, Lampard had 26 appearances in the league, Cole 17, Ba 19, Ferdinand 14, Buttner only 8, Bardsley 26, Gardner 18, Colback 32, Davies 34, Vorm 26, Pozuelo 22, Jones 21, Ridgewell 33, Reid 16, Collison 9 and Taylor 20 so only Buttner and Collison out of the lot had less than 10 apps and the rest were always in or around the first team squad and 9 of them had 20 or more appearances (pretty regular IMO)...

Well, apart from Ashley Cole, Frank Lampard, Demba Ba, Rio Ferdinand, Alexander Buttner, Phil Bardsley, Craig Gardner, Jack Colback, Ben Davies, Michel Vorm. Alejandro Pozuelo, Billy Jones, Liam Ridgewell, Steven Reid, Jack Collison and Matt Taylor, but yeah, I see where you're coming from.

More concerned about no new contract for Boruc as yet, to be honest. Isn't he in his last year of his contract?

And handed captaincy

Fonte contract until 2017 and selected as captain.

http://www.sportnews.ro/ultima-ora-bomba-florin-gardos-fost-vandut-steaua-batut-palma-cu-un-club-din-anglia-cat-va-incasa-campioana-romaniei-55795.html https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HHZFeTj2VoE

We barely sold players on Cortese's watch, (Yeah, we got over the odds for Chamberlain, but didn't we get over the odds for Lallana, Lovren, Shaw and Chambers? Maybe Cortese didn't handle these things all himself, the Cortese love-in is so over the top it's unreal) however, all clubs at some point buy players and sell players in staged payments. It happens all the time, Cortese or no Cortese.

I'm starting to notice a recurring theme in your posts, Robbo!

Same, I think he's a great poster. He's absolutely bonkers, but great!

ART is the one true ITK (in so much as only he knows wtf he's going on about)

As opposed to wearing it where?

Not that I'm superstitious but here's a bunch of superstitious nonsense anyway! I personally don't want us ever signing any Sunderland players as it's not good to let a black cat cross your path.

Probably the one that WC just made up

Hahaha!

I've just used Chrome to translate all his tweets to English for me, I can't work out if he is a football reporter or a philosopher!

God, Imagine if we got Rojo and Hernández!!!

I think last year Astori was more an option to us, I doubt we seriously ever went in for him due to how speculative all the rumours were and the fact that we got Lovren instead. Rojo seems to be more of a priority to us, instead of an option. Also, just seen this comment from a Liverpool fan on YouTube: What a bunch of muppets the scousers are!

Is it similar to Astori last year in as much as we've been linked to him? I can see no other connections between the two.

http://www.sempreinter.com/2014/08/07/pedulla-schelottos-move-to-southampton-comes-to-a-halt/ (I've nicked this link from Waggy's post on the last page...)

Won't be Argentinian as the Portuguese media have stated we are now waiting on a response for our latest offer (unless we are in for any other Argentinians!) Doubt it would be Forster, van Dijk or Vlaar due to recent events (the Celtic players only playing last night and Vlaar's seeming commitment to Villa.) Wouldn't be surprised if it's either Ings or Belhanda, although that is just sheer estimation on my part...

We 'lost' Osvaldo But in all seriousness, I can think of one, which is Schneiderlin... Whose the other?

I know I'm not quite MLG but I've just had a look through Wiki's list of our players year by year, and yes, he was both our last Algerian player and he indeed wore No. 17.

"Lions respond today." This is the key point from the above. Looks good, if true. Would be a great signing. Looks like our scouts have been trawling this board as I suggested Rojo would be the player I wanted us to go for from the tournament in the "Players We Should Sign from the World Cup" thread...

But he plays CB for Sporting!! He plays both CB and LB. Bertrand is a natural left back, and as such will be playing LB when available and if we get Rojo then he will be LCB and play LB when Bertrand is unavailable. Targett will likely play cup games. Bertrand is more than adequate at holding the LB position down and making that position in our squad his own. He is a good player, just needs to be given a run of games and I personally think we will take him on permanently next year. All my Chelsea mates maintain that he was their Man of the Match in their Champions League winning final, he is more than good enough to hold down a starting role in our team, even with Rojo in the squad by virtue of him being a CB. I don't know how many times people will have to say that...