Luis Boa Morte (only 34 !) has left his South African club. How about a return for the two Luis; him and Saha (only 34 !) ???
Report from Mirror 17/5/12 has Fulham winning the race to sign Striker Jordan Rhodes of Huddersfield Town ahead of Norwich, Aston Villa, West Ham for £3.2m. I think he would be a good gamble, he seems to have a gift for knocking the goals in. But I'm sure Huddersfield turned down £5m for him in January. It might be if Huddersfield don't get promoted he may be let go. Although born in Oldham he has played for the Scotland U-21/23.
Jordan Rhodes has also played for Scotland at senior level too, although only once. I think he'd be a great buy if we could get him.
I see Bolton have released 15 players including Sean Davis (ah well ...). Some are returning to their home clubs after loan, the others are - Ricardo Gardner, Gretar Steinsson and Ivan Klasnic are among those released, while Nigel Reo-Coker has activated a release clause in his contract. Paul Robinson, Sean Davis, Robbie Blake, Mark Connolly, Tope Obadeyi, Rhys Bennett, Dino Fazlic and Tom Eckersley have also not been offered new deals. The only one I might think about is the right back Steinsson - as cover?
I was going to say something about Reo-Coker but remembered we have Diarra on the books. I think Diarra's better.
I'm not saying we should sign him, but I rate Klasnic. He's a good finisher (I've seen us play Bolton twice in recent years, and he scored both times) and seems to be one of those players who does better than his actual ability, if you know what I mean. I'm not convinced he'd fit into our system, but I do rate him. The only other Bolton player I would look at is, as others have said before, Holden.
Captain, I was looking for Holden on the "out" list, but I guess he's still under contract. He's one of Coyle's favourites, as I recall.
So he won't be free, but he could be gettable with lower price than we would have paid a year ago. Could be worth a try if they need to get big wage-earners off their books.
The obvious problem with Holden is the injury - I think he's only played one game for them last year after De Yong clobbered him. But Bolton know he can be good so may want to get him match fit rather than take a lower price. And do we want to sign someone (again) who starts the new season crocked?
A very good point, Cottager. Does anyone know when he's expected to be fit again? If we start an AJ-style pre-contract medical now, it might be finished by the time the transfer window closes (that's the January transfer window).
Turkish friend has told me Turkish papers say Jerry Akaminko (24), Manisaspor Central Defender from Ghana was being linked with Dalglish at Liverpool and Fulham. Seems he can also play Right Back. So I guess his agent must be touting him to us, since Dalglish has gone.
Holden has surgery before Christmas so it's been nearly six months. I think he's still rehabbing, but I'd suspect he'll be ready for training in a month of two.
Could AJ's outlet be over the pond? Houston Dynamo are reported as being interested - http://latino.foxnews.com/latino/sports/2012/02/09/part-2-on-american-soccer/
Cottager,Quite agree about signing players with long term injuries, We hopefully are an ambitious club,and should not be looking for cheap,or free players with underlying fitness problems. Lets not become a sanctuary for the walking wounded.
Duff quietly had a very good year for us. He might have had 10 more goals on the season if he didn't have responsibility for bringing the ball up so often. We're lucky to have him.
Acording to paper reports, Arsenal are having a clear out - "Arsenal will offload seven stars, including Nicklas Bendtner, Denilson, Sebastien Squillaci and Johan Djourou, to free up cash to bid for Blackburn's 21-year-old winger Junior Hoilett". Not sure who the others are but the have also definitely released Almunia and Hoyte. Of those I can't see any who be an improvement to our squad.
I'd take Djourou if we were short of centre back cover, but that's about it. Wasn't Denilson meant to be something special at some point? Mind you, that could be said for most Arsenal rejects.
Mladin Petric (31) of Hamburg SV is on a free transfer Jol should know him from his time there I've always been impressed with him. Only his age is against him, and he has had a few injuries. Could take the place of Andrew Johnson (and I don't mean on the physio bench ).
