Steve Bruce can't f@rt without it being in the newspapers an hour before! I understand where you are coming from Dildoand agree that there are some rich pickings in Russia and I guess Hull City's profile wouldn't worry them seeing as they'd be able to play without thermal underpants on. I am concerned because some posters are saying that we should just slap Ince and Brady up front or play Sagbo on his own (are you kidding me) and someone suggested playing Maguire up front (for Gawds sake). We are in the English Premier League and we are licking our wounds after some serious injuries but we've got to get up and fight somehow and to do so we are going to need reinforcements. Band-aid solutions at this level are no bloody use whatsoever.
We need out-and-out strikers mate. Armstrong opened the scoring in Dundee's 3-2 win over Hamilton last night by the way.
I don't think there's a serious issue with players turning us down, the only players we've missed out on were those who were not realistic(Owen went to Man United), or players like Sanogo, who has a chance to move clubs without moving house. We'll obviously sign a couple of players this window, possibly more, we'll just have to wait and see who they are.
I would agree with your last sentence but I know that you have sources close to the Club and I have a source in the media and there has not been a whiff of a 'name' associated with Hull City (unless you're keeping one under your hat). I believe it's because we haven't been able to shift anyone out (and I am a little surprised at that to say the least) and there has been little interest by available players in joining Hull City.
Why are you surprised we can't shift anyone out? The reason we're where we are is because a lot of the players we've got available aren't good enough to be regular starters in the PL. Who do you expect to come in and sign them when they're on PL wages? Bear in mind as well, the players we'd want to offload if we stay up are mostly out of contract in the summer anyway, so trying to get any kind of fee for them is difficult. And we need the fee to let them go because (as well as FFP) if we go down they're the players we'd be looking to resign for next season once the likes of Robertson were picked from us by PL sides.
Because we have offered players (like Sagbo) for FREE and nobody has accepted our offer. Burnley were rumoured to be interested in both McShane and Bruce. There would surely be a 'relegation clause' in their contracts and there would be a better chance of sticking butter up a hedgehogs @rse with a red hot needle rather than re-sign Sagbo. I agree, should we go down, Robertson would be the subject of interest from EPL Clubs but not a hope for the rest including Livermore and Huddlestone.
In Sagbo's position he might as well ask for his wages to be matched to move now. He's out of contract in the summer so he's now free to arrange a deal for then as well, so long as it's not with another English club. He's got no reason to agree to an early transfer, just do the summer pre-contract deal now and then sit on PL wages for the next 6 months. African Nations is this month so it's not like he needs first team football to get in their his international squad before the summer. We don't want to let McShane or Bruce go now. They're good back up for this season and if we stay up we can choose to either let them go in the summer or renew as back up again. If we go down we could easily have offers for Robertson, Chester, Davies, and Dawson. Offers wouldn't just need to be from PL sides, top Championship sides could do it as well and we'd need to consider offers due to FFP. If UEFA were to throw a transfer embargo on us as a result of their investigation (it would be preferable to a fine, and from their point of view would actually punish us more than a ban on European entry), retaining Bruce/McShane now would be even more important as renewing their deals wouldn't count as a signing where as letting them go now and then needing to sell the others for the cash would leave us royally ****ed. (Without new signings) If we go down I could easily see us being left with this as our squad, and a lot of those are out of contract players as things stand: GK: McGregor (unless Rangers fluke the playoffs), Jakupovic, Watson - Harper retired, Oxley out of contract to Hibs or someone else permanent for first team football, Cracknell released at end of contract L(W)B: Townsend - Robertson sold for a profit, Dudgeon/Figueroa released at end of contract CB: Davies, Maguire, McShane new contract, Bruce new contract - Dawson sold to PL side like Palace for a loss, Chester sold to Championship side for profit R(W)B: Elmo, Rosenior new contract (also cover at LB), Lenihan LW: Brady CM: Quinn new deal, Meyler, Snodgrass (we couldn't even afford to sell him at a loss this summer given other offloads we'll need to make), Livermore - Diame sold at loss due to wages/injury record this year, Huddlestone probably given away due to wages (Derby a possibility) RW: Ince ST: Aluko - Jelavic sold abroad for big loss, Hernandez sold for big loss to reduce wage bill, Sagbo/Jahraldo-Martin released end of contract
I read where Sagbo had stated that he wanted to leave and go back to France. He was offered to Bordeaux but they didn't want him. I can agree with most of your suggestions but, should we go down, are we (Mr Allam) just going to 'give the game away'? Would we retain Bruce and 'rally the current troops' for another invasion on the Premier League? Would current players show their loyalty to the Club and give it another go, bearing in mind relegation wage reductions and promotion wage increases should we get back? I felt that when we got promoted we would learn from the mistakes of our previous incursion and I believe that we did by making provisions with some astute signings but our injury list (from day one with Snoddy) has been unbelievable and those left have underperformed. Couple this with some awful luck in some matches and we find ourselves in the Relegation Zone. Still hope I guess but we are going to have to rely on the teams around us performing worse then we do.
Bordeaux for Sagbo was connected to Sanogo. Bordeaux wanted him but Wenger wanted him to stay in England. We were after Sanogo, and Bordeaux had previously been after Sagbo (I don't know if that was prior to us signing him or since) so we tried offering him to get them to drop out of the Sanogo race. As they haven't got Sanogo they'll start looking at their other options, if Sagbo is one as since we didn't get Sanogo either we might not be prepared to let him go with Jela and Abel both injured. I think in the event we go down the financial situation will dictate much more than people realise. Those accounts we put out were very misleading because of the altered accounting period. I'll not go into the details, but the change they made makes sense. It's not a nonsensical one they've done to manipulate the figures, it just has the unfortunately coincidental effect of making last year look much more successful financially than it really was (by the traditional end of July end of accounting period we would have been a long way from reporting a profit, and our debt would have been significantly higher than the one reported). Players' loyalty won't come into it. If someone wants them we'll want them to go in exchange for the fee. If nobody wants them then we'll still have them. Snodgrass I think is the only player it won't come to that on. Unless we receive a big fee or are struggling for cashflow we won't want to sell him as the loss in the accounts would hurt us on FFP in the future more than carrying his wages and maybe losing him in January would. His injury I think rules out a big fee, and I know he left Norwich pretty sharpish, but I just have a hunch he's the type of player that'll want to stay for a year to give us something for our money. Norwich he'd already given, but he's not had the chance to here with the injury. With regards the out of contract players being renewed, most have been promoted with us 2 years ago and are better players now. Can you find better options than players that are free, proven, settled in the area, and gel well as a group?
I'm 100% sure this guy is the hat and jacket guy that was banned a few days ago...the one with a picture of a pug in a jacket and hat.
I'm pretty sure the reason most people wont sign for us is nothing to do with the stadium, the owner or the city itself. Despite the usual platitudes thrown out to the press upon signing, they dont care about any of that. It's because they think we'll get relegated.
I think you're both selling him short. Everton have long admired him, and with Jagielka hitting 33 in the summer and Distin about 87, they need younger CBs to help out the very impressive Stones. They'd be the most likely buyer, I reckon.
I only suggested Leicester Pearson signed him from Manchester United, but I agree Everton would probably take a look at him, especially since he is comfortable on the ball. However that depends if Martinez stays, (which is looking increasingly unlikely as the weeks go by) as Chester would fit into their style of football. (playing it out from the back)
