Blackburn have been sniffing around for a year and he probably wants to go and have a chance of being first choice. He's at that stage in his career. I don't think we particularly want to extend either. But ultimately we need to sell to strengthen (and pay some of our bills too)
Macca wasn’t on a great deal of money, something like £10k a week when he signed that new deal. Jones is on more than Macca was. The big hitters on our wage bill have mostly already left, there’s only Alzate, Millar, Belloumi and Matazo that are now what you’d class as high earners at the club. And three of those won’t be going anywhere for the time being.
But surely, youre not paying bills by selling him for 500k or selling him period. Theres seemingly already talk of a replacement, who may or may not be on more and thats before the sale of Jones. Who knows, maybe the manager thinks Cathal McCarthy can make the step up.
If memory serves me jones was brought here as a defensive midfielder to protect the back four, not sure who started playing him as a cener back. I could be totally wrong but something at the back of my mind said midfielder first back four later….
What I can't see is how we can strengthen an ok defence with free loans and free agents. When we could keep the ok defence and try to strengthen a poor attack with the freebies. It's arse about face....again!
Egan and Hughes are the preferred pairing and finished the season that way - under Selles as the best defence in the league outside the top 3. We have Ajayi for cover and I suspect there will be a loan or a free coming in as well for cover. Makes sense to cash in on Macca whilst we still get a fee. With Jones we need the money and he'll go for significantly more.
So we bring a loan in as defensive cover who will spend a season here and contribute the sum total of **** all. Finn Burns anybody?
I read somewhere we’ve got a defender lined up but won’t be announced until after the appeal! I’m still WTF about that! Once again asking why we're not signing/announcing a free until after the appeal? Things like this just sound like bullshit & more spin from those at the top!
Oh, I totally agree it's robbing Peter to pay Paul, but that's the problem with 'cashflow issues and administrative errors".
Certainly alludes to more than just a fee restriction in effect - unless we're thinking we can switch target and pay a fee if it's lifted.
He would likely be 5th choice now. Its paying someone 4 or 5 grand a week who won't even be on the bench. Andy Smith would have done that for 500 a week. I'm not saying I agree he should be 5th choice by the way but looking at what we have at the club in that position it appears that way. Therefore getting half a mil for him and getting him off the wage bill is a smart move.
Hughes will be worth a lot more at the end of next season than he is now imo. Fortunately it looks like a school kid making up rumours in the holidays anyway
Hypothetically, if we do sell Hughes as well as Jones and McLoughlin, how does Acun justify it to supporters with a straight face after saying we don’t have financial issues? ‘Oh, he wanted to go so I let him leave on the cheap. Nothing could be done.’