Not that i am too fussed about it but this just goes to show how attractive we are, FFS someone start a Clegg out campaign, i mean Brighton over us!! As i said , i don't even rate him that much but its the fact that we seem to lose out to smaller clubs all the time these days, it has to be Cleggs lack of charm, i can see things going tits up this season, 8 weeks and counting and still no CB's or GK's!!
The scary thing is I wouldnt consider brighton to be a smaller club than us currently. They are a team with a lot of potential. New and large stadium and facilities, up and coming manager and have also splashed the cash a bit over the last couple of seasons. There is a vibrancy down there that I think a lot of players would buy into. You look at us and we have a good history and a decent enough stadium and facilities. We have a manager with a good track record but who is yet to fully impress in his current job and a team that has stood still for the best part of a decade really. The signings in the majority have been names who have yet to perform and the potential stars in our team actually only played well for a 2 or 3 month period last season. I think our best shot is looking at the lower leagues and given players a chance to play at a better level rather than aiming for higher league players to step down.
Shame, good GK for me although his temperament was always a thing which i questioned if he were to come here. I'd try and go for Westwood now, very good keeper at this level and a good age. It is concerning though that we don't appear as attractive propositions as we used to, unfortunately I think the decline has happened over the past decade and whoever is in charge this reputation is going to take a while to come back, although part of me says a good season would cure most of our problems!!
Lets hope your right PTC!! What worries me is that Ward signed for Palace because of the ambition the club and Dougie showed and Kuszczak said pretty much the same thing, see below:- âThe manager and coaching staff, the team, stadium, crowds, through to the plans for the new training ground, everything is geared up for playing at the highest level and I could sense that ambition to be a top club straight away. So what does this say about us, we are obviously not selling the club and this has to be down to Clegg and Jewell, more so Clegg!! Surely ME must see this and question why we can't get any of our top targets!!
Brighton have a lot of cash to spread about, I reckon that was swung it their way. But you are right, the top people obviously aren't selling the club to its full capacity which is becoming a huge problem, I can see another season of loanees on the horizon!
Spanish, I can see the appeal of Brighton. Everything about the club is 'fresh' at the moment and it must be very easy to sell them as an exciting prospect for any footballer. The fact that Palace can sell themselves more than us is definately a worry. As PTC said a decent season behind us would make it easier to promote the idea of joing town but with our current squad I cant see us having a season that would suggest we are going on to great things. Im not expecting a struggle but another season of mid table obscurity is hardly appealing to fans or players.
I genuinely think one of the main problems the club has had in the ME era is it seems to reveal its transfer targets or is not very good at hiding them, meaning all the fans know who we are after and therefore when we miss out we all know we were trying to sign this player and that player. I'm sure most clubs miss out on their main transfer targets they just tend not to reveal who they are, so this goes unnoticed!!
spanish, you are extremely disrespectful to brighton. they are an upwardly mobile club who continue to show grand ambition both on and off the field. its a lovely place to live and i'd have called it as a massive surprise had he joined ipswich rather than the other way round.
Lovely, but weird i would call Brighton as a place, not meaning to be disrespectful. They are a club who could do well this year if they keep Poyet & Taricco. I must admit i'm surprised he would have joined any club in the championship, let alone either us or Brighton. I suppose the one thing that shows us about Football, is things can change so quickly, take Brighton as an example it wasn't long ago they looked like going down the pan and now look at them!
weird you may have a point about that, but be honest, given a choice, brighton are the far more alluring club at the moment. the days of the goldstone and the withdean are gone. the team is decent, the stadium is fantastic, the finances in place; everything is geared up for promotion to the premier league and as much as you'd like to say your set up is, it isn't at this stage.
You say that Supers, But our team is on a par with theirs, our stadium (although older) is on a par if not better than theirs, and i would put the financial clout on a level playing field aswell. Where we fall down is that we are trying to play by the financial fair play rules and keeping our wage budget within it, Brighton i suspect aren't. Plus we have Clegg the ****!
bloody hell, you're stadium is NOT better than theirs!! spat my coffee out at that comment!! where did brighton finish last season? certainly above ipswich. they have 20k+ season ticket holders and are a club blatantly on the up and looking forward rather than back to distant memories. its a no-brainer decision for any up and coming footballer, that's for sure, though i'm sure having clegg won't help your cause
Don't talk wet supers, the might have 20+k season tickets holders, but thats because they are achieving better than they have done in a long time, so have the feel good factor, we have been underachieving badly thats why season tickets are so low. as for the ground arguement, we have a ground that is right ready to support a premier league team as they have so what makes their stadium better than ours?
judging by your comments, i feel confident you have not been to their new ground. go this season - you'll see what i mean. there's a big club in there, just waiting to burst out
What an out of town, buy in a flat pack stadium!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! You still haven't said what makes ground so much better then Portman Road. I'm not saying Portman Road is perfect, but i really need examples.
Also supers, by your comments i presume that you think that Brightons ground is miles ahead of Carrot Road as well!
Supers I think you will find that Portman Road holds nearly 10k more so surely that makes our ground more suitable for the EPL than the Amex, actually it also holds more than carrott road so.........
JWM He was our number one transfer target and Clogg was told to go all out/do whatever it takes to land him!!
