Think Gray actually deflected the question about gametime well last night, good on him. Think i'd take £30m for DD, offload Mendy and re-assess in January. With James Ndidi and Iborra for 2 positions, with King as a backup, i think it would be ok there to make some space. Vardy on the other hand is worrying, don't think they'll get anywhere near our valuation though, you don't sell proven goalscorers for less than £50m these days, regardless of age. Hes going to leave or retire eventually, so we should build for the future, just a shame we can't invest too much stock in Iheanacho with the buy back clause in his contract.
Think people are panicking a bit too much about his buyback - wasn't it like £40m? Man City are a world class team who will only want him if he gets to an Aguero-level striker which with all respect I can't see
They'd get him back just because they can - money is pretty much no object and could do it for shiggles.
Chelsea are getting pretty desperate and there are lot of rumours about Conte packing it in because he is not getting the player that he wants so can see them giving us £90m for both Vardy and Drinkwater. Our problem then is what would we do? For Drinkwater I agree with you and would include Amartey in the list but we would miss Vardy a lot - rumour is that Chelsea would be willing to include Batshuayi in any deal which wouldn't be ideal but could be interesting.
We are being linked with 19yo Italian winger Lamine N'Diaye - is your kind of signing Ed as he is from the 3rd tier of Italian football.
Am sure that we were linked with him before - name rings a bell... Here is another random one for you - we are linked with Anicet Abel, a 27yo Madagascan CM who currently plays for Ludogorets in Belgium.
I'm like you Ed, I was right excited about the link with that Luton right back James for 400k as I know they are the kind of players that Arsene Wenger tries to sign for £30mill + in a few years claiming he always knew about him but as Arsenal manager he can't be seen to spend 400k on a player!
No way our owners will sanction the sale of TWO of our high profile players, unless Vardy comes out and says he wants to leave which I cant see happening. Would be happy to let DD go for 30 - 35m. We have more than enough cover in midfield until Jan when we can reassess things.
its been so long since he has played well, so yes, starting to forget lol. Seriously though,35m is great business for him. He has his limitations and isnt consistent enough for me. Gives the ball away too much. Will occasionally ping a great ball forward for Vardy but not the sort of player we will miss. Vardy on the other hand.....
You don't think DD is the sort of player we'd miss? Then why are Chelsea looking to sign him? He has been our best midfielder by a country mile over the last 2 seasons, and (in my opinion) has always been a better all round player than James - especially in the promotion season. I could never quite understand why he was dropped in favour of James to partner Cambiasso, but he came back the next year to replace the master. Yes, he did give the ball away far too much last season because he was trying to get balls to Vardy too early to try and counteract how opponents were reacting far more quickly to our tactics from the previous season. But he is the engine in our midfield. He gets up and back better than any other player we have, he wins the ball back better and more often than anyone else and he can play out of tight spots. We are basically toothless in midfield without him.
Dunno how you can call him our best midfielder when he was so abysmal last season - imo he was our worst performer for the reasons you stated in that he couldn't pass the ball to anyone without losing it meaning that Vardy and Mahrez had to come deep, meaning that we couldn't counter attack. He also was out of position so many times - you praise his running, I call it scrambling back into position when he chases after his misplaced passes leaving holes in our defense. Ndidi was the best midfielder last season - did more in his half a season then Drinkwater did in the whole one. Drinkwater was dropped for James because he works really well when someone else is doing the work - namely Kante which is why Chelsea want him. James might not have his range of passing but can actually win the ball and offload it without losing and has more positional sense so worked much better with Cambiasso. If Drinkwater does stay, hopefully the extra completion this year will motivate him to do much better then he was last season - Maguire behind him and Ndidi next to him might cover for his shortcomings as well.
We are linkled with 21yo Newcastle winger Yasin Ben El-Mhanni. Ulloa has signed anew contract until 2019.
All about opinions. mine is we wouldn't miss him.. He was bang average Championship level last season
Because we only play 2 central midfielders we can't have both of them defending; one has to try and support the attack while the other defends. In the season before last we had DD and Kante alternating in that role and did the work of 3 men. DD certainly did not rely on Kante to do all the hard work. Now that Kante is gone, we are effectively a central midfielder short. Neither Ndidi nor James can plug the gap on their own. If we could play 3-5-2 it would make the central midfield stronger but maybe at the expense of other areas.
You have said pretty much what I have yourself - Drinkwater can only perform next to Kante, next to anyone else it is like we are a man short. Either way I do think that we will end up playing a 3-5-2 - especially if Simpson gets injured as we don't have any other right back.
I think that says more about Kante's contribution rather than DD's lack of. I do think 4-4-2 has its limitations and does leave us very vulnerable in that central area. With 3 in central midfield and a playmaker at the head of that triangle it opens up all sorts of opportunities for the strikers (if they are of the right quality) and wide men. How/where does Iborre fit in?
