Today we are linked with Newcastle striker and Premier League leading scorer Demba Ba. It is reported Newcastle are unhappy with his representatives and are interested in replacing him with Andy Carroll. In the summer Ba had a clause in his contract saying he could leave Newcastle for £7million. That has now expired and Ba could cost upwards of £20million. With Carroll valued at £18million in the summer, we could have done a player plus cash swap. But now it would most likely be a straight swap, or possible even a reverse, with Newcastle getting the cash. Could we have shot our selves in the foot financially if we now decide to go and sign Ba? Is Ba the striker we need?
I know we are still short of attacking options but I don't see us going in for Ba. If we really wanted him, we would have got him in the summer. Whilst he hasn't been injured for a while, those knees still concern me. Therefore I would rather we find another striker but the market might be weak. If we can secure a loan deal (there are some interesting reports that we're linked with Villa for a 6 month loan), then it should help us see us through the season and we can get better value in the summer.
Decent player but don't see how he'd fit into Rodgers plans anymore than Mandy. Given a choice between the two I'd rather just have AC back.
We should be looking elsewhere but I wouldn't be against it. Good option to have - a better plan B than Andy anyway.
I think hes better than andy. But if we were to trade carroll and demba got a bad injury, we would look exceptionally stupid. I say no.
No. I would rather we gave him away for free than sell him to Newcastle or swap him for any of their players.
I don't think Carroll can go to another premier league club this season. I may well be wrong but I thought you could only sign for 2 clubs in 1 season.
According to Pardew the £7.5m clause comes back into play in January. However it is believed that he in un-insurable because of his knees. Now there must be more too it than a little dispute with his agent. NUFC are signalling that they are prepared to let one of their main strikers go and they are limiting the amount of money that they could achieve - it does not add up. Personally I wouldn't go for him because he's too big a risk and may break up the flow of the system that we are putting together. Plus I wouldn't give NUFC any money.
He is 27 years old with Dodgy knees. There is no way we'd do a straight swap for Andy, a player we can get £20m+ for. Striker-wise we wont touch anyone over the age of 25, it would make no sense to buy one any older
No chance we can get 20 mil unless he just turns it on for West Ham. We can keep talking about his dodgy knees but he has been healthy and scoring goals for some time now. I would still want us to get another striker though ( watching Negredo the other day, he would be a perfect fit for us I feel).
Apparently the clause is still there. Pardew said so. "There is that clause in his contract and it makes us vulnerable, " he [Pardew] said. "It's still open in the next window." http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/19655578
He has good size and strength, a bit of pace ( not crazy fast but enough), and he can finish very well ( club and country). His buyout clause is 20 mil EUros so what about 17 mil pounds? I can handle that.
