Had a look on the greenun24 site and they are reporting that the agreed deal for Wickham involves only a £5 million lump sum up front!!! If this is the case then heads should roll, we got screwed in the Bent transfer and if the above is true then we would have been screwed again. We should accept no less than £10 million up front and we don't want any players on loan, why should we help enhance another teams player in exchange for one of our brightest prospects. CLEGG I'M WATCHING YOU, DON'T SCREW THIS UP!!!!!!!!!
It's all paper talk at the moment. I feel any lump some will be about ten Million. Unfortunately for us I feel these leaks are to goad Liverpool into making a bid.
Just been on the sunderland board and they are reporting 9 million upfront plus 4 million add ons, if this is true somebody should be shot at the green un for having fat fingers and pissing me off on a tuesday!
If true that is a pathetic amount. So much for 'our backs are not up against a wall.' And how much of this amount is PJ likely to get his hands on to replace him. I'm holding my judgement until something is official but personally I feel selling him shows a complete lack of ambition.
TBH i would like to see him have 1 more season here but money talks!! Sky sports are reporting that talks are ongoing and nothing has been agreed!!!!!!!!!
On TWTD the fee is said to be £9mil plus £4mil in add-ons, which for a 18 year old with no Prem experiance is a pretty good deal I think. Not sure how to feel if it has been accepted, wouldn't it be better to wait untill Liverpool or spurs put in a bid?
The thing is, they go on about a bidding war but that aint gonna happen, other teams know roughly whats been accepted and will offer the same, the rest is down to the player!! All this talk of a bidding war etc is just hyped up Bullshit!!!
Spanish I am beginning to suspect that you are dead right! Our football club is totally lacking ambition and desire to be promoted! If Wickham is sold even at £13 Million we are ****ed in my opinion! No quality players will want to come here when we are selling our prized assets! We should be adding to this average threadbare squad not bloody selling the only decent prospect we have! I will be gutted if Connor is sold because that will mean that we will have to buy another quality striker as well as all the other players we desperately need! I can't see Evans allowing PJ to spend all of the transfer money from the sale and other clubs alerted to the fact that we have come into a windfall will start asking stupid money for their players al a Doncaster for example! I thought stupidly that we would keep Wickham for at least 1 more year and pair him up with Chopra. I am seriously considering asking for a refund on the season tickets if we don't start making decent signings! I am sure there will be many more like me that bought Season tickets on the basis that the club had ambition to be promoted next year!
JWM I hope i am wrong but i don't think this is sending out the message that we mean business. As you have stated, PJ will not be given all the money to strengthen, we may get someone in like Sharp for an inflated transfer fee but tbh i would rather CWick!!! For me this is rather a sad day for ITFC!!
Guys, lets just chill a moment. Don't get me wrong i don't want to see connor given away but every player has a price. the bare facts that in the past the club has held on to young talent to long sometimes, don't forget we could have got 2.5 million for Garvan or 2 million for Billy Clarke but we held on to long they didn't make that final push and we got peanuts in the end. And the most telling point is, Connor isn't the defining thing that will gets us promoted or relegated. But We could invest this money further across the team which can only benefit Ipswich Town Football Club.
I understand what you're saying Guru but time and time again we sell our promising players and you can bet your bottom dollar we won't get an adequate replacement if at all! Maybe the die is cast in that Chopra and Ellington will be our strike force and Ellington was bought as a direct replacement for Connor!
It's been fairly obvious to me for a while that Connor won't be here for the new season. There is too much interest in the lad and the figures being talked about are too large to pass up on. It is a shame but we are only talking about potential here. Who's to say he would score 20+ goals for us next season, lets take the money and run. If we have to pay over the odds for a new striker, so be it. As already stated by Guru, we could hold onto him for another year, he ends up doing diddly squat and all of a sudden he's not the next best thing and his value is halved.
i think its going to be up to connor and whether he feels it is the right time for him to leave, by all accounts it looks like we will look to cash in if the right offer comes. for me connor will be far better off with us for at least another season and see where we are. what we can offer him is a pretty much guarenteed place for a season which none of the interested premiership clubs cannot, whatever they might say. he is only 18 and i think you will all agree he still has a lot to improve on but he will get that by playing a full season with us banging in goals rather than sitting on the bench (if that) and getting only limited time on the pitch. i know that his dad is his agent and hopefully he will tell him to sit tight with ipswich and score a shed load of goals, if they go up stay with them and if they dont then you can look elsewhere with your value hopefully increased more. from an ipswich point of view, i think it is imperative we keep him...our best talent for years and it will send a message of a lack of serious ambition to get promoted (a point already well made by others)
As you say JWM, selling our promising players. Promising is the word I would use to describe CW at the moment. Personally, I don't think he is good enough for the Premiership yet and ideally, as Spanish has suggested, we would have kept him for another season. Whichever team has CW next season is taking a gamble - they could find he scores 20 goals or he might fail to fulfil his potential (as many others have in the past). IF we get £12-13m then I think we have little option but to take it. However, I did not like Sunderland's idea of a week ago where they suggested half up front and then the other dependent on how well he performs. That limits their risk and exposure greatly and is a crap deal for us. Finally, one more thought. Should we really stop CW from taking the opportunity to play in the Premiership? If we did, do you think he would play for us with the same spirit and enthusiasm he has in the past?
Its quite ironic isnt it, when we sold Bent and more to the point Henderson, a lot of Sunderland fans were saying the same as you on this thread, "why sell a promissing youngster/20 goal a season striker, are we a selling club now", i said at the time, its the heirachy of football (even if we dont like it) bigger clubs will come in for our players, and we will go in for lesser clubs players (just below us in the divisions i meant) and their fans will be pissed off with us for going in for their players. Its just how football works im afraid, and not a lot as supporters can do about it (yes we can mumble and grumble but thats about it). I am realy not sure about the lad though, havnt seen too much of him to be fair, He may get a first team slot from the get go, and if not, knowing our injury history it shouldnt be long till he gets a chance.
Rushmere the point is we don't need to sell or so we keep being told from the cheeses at Portman Road. The rumour is that we will get £5Million up front and the rest in drips and drabs! That's not any good we need at least double that up front so we can make the signings we desperately need! I am just so fecking depressed about this. Evans will have to authorise some big signings over the next few weeks to change the mood!
That's it in a nut shell JWM, I will be equally p****d off about this if we sell and don't then build. For some reason, though clearly not based on historical trends, I am trying to keep the old chins up in the hope that Evans really does help change the mood. If not, the brown stuff will hit the whirly thing, big time.
