I don't know if he hails from the north east, but I must say I'm a bit surprised he's not targeting a move to a club in a, erm, slightly less perilous position?
that stat is harsh as he hasnt played 21 times because of injury i'd have thought hasnt quite worked out for him there so far
I know we're not too far into this transfer window, but it seems very quiet compared to previous years, and in particularly we're not being linked to half as many players as last year! Last January we were being linked to pretty much every striker in europe not playing champion's league football!
Possibly because we've spent quite a bit (for us anyway) recently. I'm not expecting us to really splash the cash in this window.
Or we are making inquiries with professionally run outfits who would also like to do their business in private and so remaining under the radar. Celtic have no one we want! Bah!
Does anyone fancy Momo Diame in our midfield? (Guessing Carrabuh's going to say no....) Apparently he's got a £3.5m release clause in his contract, and whilst his supposed £50k wages might be a little steep, he might be convinced to drop down a little, particularly if the West Ham situation doesn't improve. Whenever I've seen him play, he's looked like he'd be an upgrade on Johnson - still offering the tough tackling but a better passer and more capable of joining in with attacks. Not really a position we need to strengthen though, I must admit!
From what my west ham friends have said this year he's looked a bit un interested and has done since he was linked with arsenal last january. Not sure he's all that much better than tettey on form, just given a bit more of a license to get involved going forward and scored a famous goal against chelsea which raised perceptions of him a bit I think. No way i'd ever want to sign a player off of west ham though, their wage structure is ridiculous every single player in their squad is being overpaid handsomely.
That would be my main concern. At £3.5m he'd be a decent, competitive option in midfield to rotate in a DM position, but his wages would have to be nearer to £20k for it to make sense. Wouldn't be surprised if he moved on either in January or the summer to fund other deals. QPR wouldn't surprise me as a destination. Yeah, thinking again, not a value for money transfer in a position where we've got reasonable cover already.
Roberto Martinez is staying quiet in the press conference ahead of Saturday's game regarding Johnny Heitinga - "no further news" apparently.
Just for a minute imagine having Holty back in the dressing room, maybe on loan from Wigan. I know it wont happen but there have been times when we have needed a leader and figurehead to drag the others forward. Just a fantasy but there you go!
Talking about wages at West Ham, during the R5L coverage of the Man City/West Ham match last night, someone said that Sam Allardyce was the 11th best paid manager IN THE WORLD! Can that be true? Also, for what it's worth, in the course of describing the Hammers' spiritless display, Alan Green twice mentioned that he watched our 7:0 drubbing at the Etihad and said Norwich had "at least put up a fight despite being comprehensively outplayed". There are drubbings and drubbings (which some of us may care to note).
