Yeah I'm quite excited at the thought Rothwell could be an upgrade on Smallbone. I'm not anti-Smallbone. I'm not actively wanting us to replace him. But if you look through our regular starting XI and try and identify who we could realistically upgrade this month, he would be quite high on the list. Maybe second only to Manning.
Is this an upgrade for them or not ? Wasn’t this a big money move? Presumably on the basis that they are a long way ahead at the top
I think they will be useful against different opponents. But can’t help but feel this is Smallbone’s level and if we go up we would need a definite upgrade
Selfishly I just want him to stay here as back up, even if he hardly plays. He is a very good 4th choice CB for this league and we might end up needing him.
I don’t feel that sorry for him. If I was as bad as he is at my job I’d have been sacked, not earning 70k per week
The Rothwell signing gives us protection if Holgate does go back, though. With Charles more than adequate CB cover and good numbers in midfield. How have Simeu/Awe etc been doing and u21 level. Not seen much.
Simeu ruptured his Achilles at the start of the season, but he wasn’t getting any game time from Martin in pre-season, so perhaps he was seen as too limited with the ball for our football? Awe was on the bench for the most recent u21 game and Jayden Moore had taken his place
Does this mean one of their attackers is moving on? Because I know this is what a lot of saints fans thought with the signing of Rothwell in a position that it didn’t seem like we needed strengthening Or are they a bit like us with most of their wide attacking players playing from the left
The next time we play a league game the transfer window will have closed. Keeping my fingers crossed that the right hand side of our squad will be stronger, not weaker, come the Rotherham game.
I still feel that we should prioritise a left back. Manning has been playing well the last few games, but up against stronger opposition he is a weakness. And should anything happen to KWP, well, I don't even want to think about it. I don't think RW is where we need to strengthen, given Adarma's form, and having Stuie as backup too.
You could argue he should have come on instead of stephens, given stephens lack of playing time. But you have to prioritise a club player over a loanee.
Brooks played another 30 mins or so yesterday for Bournemouth. Doubt they'd be looking to loan him out when he is so involved, even if he's not currently starting games. All gone a bit quiet on the transfer front.
It’s a tricky one. Do we go for it to try and cement an auto spot when we have one of the highest wage bills in the league, and will have to start thinking about reducing it pretty significantly from this summer if we don’t go up. Or do we look at the last 3 months and decide we are good enough without many/any additional players, and anyone we try and sign permanently should be with one eye on being able to play in the PL as well, which is hard to do when you are a Champ club. The obvious answer is loans, but generally these will be players who are young and looking for game time (probably not what we are after) or older and not playing for their current club (probably not what we want due to the time to get them integrated and up to match speed). I’d probably be looking at someone in-between if we can. Someone like Diallo who we could loan in with hopefully a future clause in there if we go up, like we have with THB.
Easy to say when the finances aren't my problem, but I'd be looking to strengthen to improve our chances of promotion given both the positive position we are in and the intense competition for promotion this season. We are very short on natural right wingers (we have none). AArma has been a revelation played out there, but take him away for any reason and it will be a case of throwing someone else out there and hoping they can do a job. Not ideal for a team fighting for the autos. Diallo is the one I was thinking of too. Seems the perfect fit for us, even if it's just a loan for the rest of the season with no option to buy. Is he really going to get any game time at Man Utd this season? Thought I had read a 'quote' from him saying he didn't want to go to another Championship side out of respect for Sunderland, but that seems like bollocks or if he actually said that, he is very short sighted. We missed out on Carvalho, Benson seems as though he's waiting for Gnonto to leave Leeds to go there, Brooks is featuring for Bournemouth so of the RW we've been linked with so far, he's the one I'm hoping for.
Interesting to note loan fee of £1m banded about for Benson. Obviously, hard to put a price on promotion to PL but still strikes me as steep.
