Right, 1 squad place left and the possibility of more freeing up when the loan window opens. So who's available and who would you like: Defenders Emmanuel Eboue Ashley Cole Ron Vlaar Midfielders Yoann Gourcuff Otman Bakkal Kevin Nolan Nery Castillo Anthony Annan Wilson Palacios Ilsinho Urby Emanuelson Forwards Carlton Cole Georgios Samaras Ezequiel Schelotto John Utaka Ricardo Vaz Te Kalu Uche
There'll be a bit of a scramble on for Vlaar when fit I would imagine. See the Netherlands are in the **** as well, wonder if they'll go for Cocu or De Boer when they fail to qualify.
2-4-1 on Nigerian knackers with Uche and Utaka? Pretty much with everyone else so far. Bakkal could be worth atrial if Dick knew him at PSV
Gourcuff would walk in our team, but we have Toivonen for that role............thing is Ola isn't our player Gourcuff is free. Gourcuff is very high profile though I imagine he's a free agent still because he is being ultra picky and waiting for a CL club to come after him. He'll want a team playing in a capital city and will want a ton of money. Doubt we could get him. I'd take Cole on a season's contract if he'd do less than £40k wages. Who better to teach and push Paddy Van? They have Chelsea history too most likely, that's if Paddy was allowed to train with the first team.
Cashley, Vlaar and Gourcouff are the three that stand out. I'd imagine they will have offers to chose from. The others are mostly a bunch of has-beens and knackers. Nolan could "do a job" at a bottom half of the table club but can't see him improving many teams. Palacios is an odd one, was very good at Wigan and excellent at Tottenham (he lost his spot in the team when they got Modric - who is one of the best prem players of the last decade) but been too poor for too long to expect anything of now. Shame, only 31 but for whatever reason has gone backwards for the last few years.
