Transfer goss and rumours, Summer 2016.

I like Mutch - versatile, expansive, creative and probably too good for the Championship but not good enough for the Prem. If we "swoop" for him I won't be unhappy.

 

Apologies if this has already been posted - Alex Neil has warned Premier League vultures there will be no fire sale at Norwich City.
"The Scot knows City’s relegation will spark a summer of fevered speculation his best players are heading for a Carrow Road exit. Neil revealed yesterday he will hold talks with all his first team squad next week after the Premier League swansong at Everton. Midfielders Robbie Brady and Nathan Redmond are sure to be in demand, with Redmond already being touted with a £10m close season move to top flight trio West Ham, Crystal Palace and Stoke City. People who want to come and tempt Norwich players are going to have to come and get their money out. We won’t be selling players on the cheap," said Neil. "The one thing I will make clear is we are not in any need to sell players. There is no need to sell, we are financially stable and in a really strong position even though we are dropping down a division.”
"There is a whole variety of things that we have to look at. Because they are a senior player doesn’t mean we have to sign them up and keep them ticking along. If they haven’t performed well enough that is not necessarily the case. I have meetings scheduled with every one of them and that will happen next week."

http://www.edp24.co.uk/sport/norwic...ity_after_premier_league_relegation_1_4533900

 

I like the sound of that!

 

Interesting from Jonny Howson tonight: "There's a real togetherness here. If we keep together, we can move forward."

This from Michael Bailey's twitter feed!

 

Think he's out of contract isn't he?

 

"A real togetherness" until someone waves their chequebook, then we'll see how much togetherness there is.

 

So just to be realistic, if Klose does make the euro's then lets face it he is gone, we can all hope he stays but it's kinda a pipe dream, and a massive blow as well, Redmond going is a possiblity, but not a huge body blow, as he is so up and down, as for a lot of our squad who we want to go or think may go, the question is who would want them who would pay comparable wages, I honestly think we may struggle to offload some of those who we deem surplus to requirements until they are out of contract

Bassong is an easy one to pick out as he does what he does, looks solid for 65/70 mins and then has that disaster moment where he plays like me, but realisticly who would take him off our hands on terms he would agree to, pretty sure the answer is nobody, same with a few other players in our team as well, so the list of should get rid of is reasonably long, but where could we get rid of then to is the big question, as they aint prem quality and a championship side are probably not gonna pay them more than we do, so we get to an impasse with players who we don't really want, but cant move on, and if we can't move them on then we don't free up funds for transfers and wage bill stuff

 

Yes, I can see the likes of Bassong and a few others who will be happy to just collect their wages every month whilst sitting on the sidelines, as I don't see any clubs wanting to risk playing him and a few others.
I wouldn't be surprised to see Middlesborough come in with an offer for the likes of Howson and Brady. I now think Redmond is likely to leave as well and I would like to see what we can do with Jarvis/Josh Murphy etc and spend some serious wedge on a striker to challenge Jerome.
Whether Klose leaves or stays, we MUST also spend on some better defenders, as the number of soft goals we have conceded over at least the last 3 seasons is frightening!!!!!
Yes, AN has to 'earn his corn' next week when he sits down with each of the players and I hope for all our sakes that he has the balls to decide that some of our players should no longer be part of the first team squad at NCFC!!!!

 

Mutch is decent. I'd be happy with him, if we lost a couple of players. Like Howson. Otherwise, if we keep our key players I don't think he's an essential type of player to focus on.

 

*Merson believes Villa should pounce for the Norwich marksman.*

He scored three (3) goals in an entire season, Paul!
http://www.hitc.com/en-gb/2016/05/1...on-villa-to-sign-norwich-striker-cameron-je/?

 

Merson is probably the worst pundit of the lot of them, just spouting words and comments without any foundation.

 

Be fair Cromer, he scored 4, but the ref disallowed it for dangerous play. Still way short of Premier quality though.

 

Which needn't bother Villa overly much next season?
They'll be mixing it with the binmen for all eternity!

 

Some thoughts from AN today - "A lot of players have been here for a number of years,” he said. “That carries its own problems at times but what I will be doing is sitting across a table and looking into my players’ eyes and deciding if they are up for the fight of taking us back up, and that will be a major part of deciding where there future lies, as much as anything else. If they are not then it will be a problem. We will have to try and inject a certain amount of freshness."
The City boss is also pledging to give the club’s crop of younger players an early chance to stake their claim in the Championship after the likes of the Murphy twins, Harry Toffolo and James Maddison also had loan spells in the Football League this season.
"I can assure you in my plans going forward they would have an opportunity, " said Neil. "They will be in pre-season with us and able to stake their claim going forward. It really will be up to them to show they can play a major part and they are good enough to do it."

Let's hope he's true to his word and we see a very different starting 11 on the weekend of August 6th to the one that started against the Hornets - 12 weeks today!!!!

Full story here - http://www.edp24.co.uk/sport/norwic...alex_neil_on_his_norwich_city_plans_1_4534659

 

That is everything I want to hear from our manager. Let's hope he is allowed to do that.

 

Sensible comments from the Archie's sports reporters - http://www.edp24.co.uk/sport/norwic...rwich_city_to_start_looking_forward_1_4535502
Well worth a read and pretty much agreeing with what we've been saying - especially on this thread!!!!

 

When Mbokani leaves Jerome is our highest scoring striker
Surely Hooper or Lafferty would have at least equalled three (3) goals over thirty eight (3
8)games if given minutes on the pitch ?

 

He only appeared in 28 matches and many of those were as sub. I'd also include his wrongly disallowed goal against Palace. More to the point next season would be the 18 goals he scored in the Championship last time, as well as the vital first goal in the Play-off final. He'll be important for us next season, but we will need at least one more striker if Mbokani leaves.

 

That's good stuff!

 

He should be good again next year hopefully but 1 in every 9.333 games at Premier league level is not good enough .
If we manage to bounce back.
We need fresh blood in the attacking third.