I reckon we'll be making a bid for Jordan Rhodes, a 21 year old striker who plays for Huddersfield. He's already scored 21 goals this season, so far. Remember, you heard it here, first.
HIAG with all due respect to him, Rhodes is playing League 1 (3rd division to us oldies) and we do know that the gap is huge when playing at a higher level. What sort of fee would they accept even if they did and he wanted to go.
Rhodes was mentioned on here a while ago, though I can't remember who by. I'm sure that they'll refresh my memory, sooner or later.
*ahem* Whilst I'm here, I'd just like to say that I hate to say I told you so, but... ...I told you so.
http://www.espn.co.uk/football/sport/story/129759.html Blackburn boss Steve Kean ruled out the January sale of Chris Samba to Tottenham or QPR on Saturday, despite the fact the player did not feature in Rovers' 2-1 FA Cup loss to Newcastle. Kean rested a bunch of his key players at St James' Park, with Samba not even in the matchday squad. The towering defender's absence sparked speculation that he could be on his way to one of the London clubs, with QPR registering a £5 million bid on Friday. However, Kean rubbished the idea, insisting the Congo man would stay with Rovers to help them out of relegation trouble. "The situation is simple, before any bid came in, we said he is not for sale and he was having treatment on a hamstring so we decided not for him to travel and that had nothing to do with any bid coming in," Kean said. "We want to add to the squad. He is not for sale, he is seven or eight months into a five-year contract and he is certainly a defender that we feel has a presence and he has held us together and is a big part of what we are trying to do." Addressing the additional absence of Yakubu, Kean once again doused talk of a January move, insisting his top scorer was merely rested. "The message is simple, the Yak is our player and is performing very well, we brought him in during the last transfer window and he has done fantastic for us, he is not for sale and is very happy, he is carrying a few knocks which is why we rested him today. "
I see Loic Remy is the latest target - would be happy with this signing. Thought he has a dodgy ticker though?
Pavlyuchenko's agent is moaning that Levy wants too much for his player. He claims that there are 4 bids on the table, but that none of the teams want to match the required fee. On one hand, I can see why Levy would do this. There are multiple bids for him, so he's clearly in demand and it's likely that at least one of them will budge. On the other hand, I'd just like to see this done and dusted, so we can bring in a replacement quickly.
He's one of those players that you can see going on to do well elsewhere though, similar to Bent. I think selling him for about £10mill when he transferred to Villa for £24mill 18 months later would've annoyed Levy as he bought him knowing he'd have a high sell on value. I'm not saying Pav would have a big sell on but he could easily be a success elsewhere and Levy won't be keen to let clubs think he'll sell cheap when he's still got a lot of other players that he needs to move on.
When Bent was sold on by Sunderland, they had to pay up all of the remaining clauses in his contract, YV. Levy got his £16.5m back, somewhat surprisingly. Pavlyuchenko could do well in another league, where the striker isn't relied upon to do much work. He's a good goalscorer, but he's lazy and not really suited to our current system, either. Probably his last major move, though.
I didn't realise we got so much for Bent! No wonder they wanted £24mill for him. I think Pav would do well in the Premiership when he's played regularly, overall he really hasn't done badly for us.
Yep, it's a balancing act - £10m plus decent add ons would seem a fair price for Pav. It's so key we get in a new striker, IMHO.
Pav and Bent both suffer from "dodgy first touch syndrome". The both miss simple chances because of it. However, both know where the goal is. Spurs ought to get Pav on the training ground and keep firing ball at him until his first touch improves, then he could be great. Berbatov was a lazy b'stard but he had such a good first touch.
Wesley Sneijder? Oh please, if MUPLC had the funds available to buy him, they would've signed him in the summer - and certainly not expected Paul Scholes to retire from being retired...
There's one thing for certain whatever we speculate, Levy will do the opposite or the unexpected. Harry does drop a lot of clues but I think its just to give those lazy hacks something to print, not anything definite.
Not necessarily - sometimes we do have long-time targets, such as Parker or Andy Reid, join the club. Thankfully, Stewart Downing didn't...
