Yep - I'm surprised that people are still surprised (for want of a better expression) that we didn't sell Grabban! It's pretty obvious we wanted to sell him (although the asking price had to be met), but that his particular role as a striker meant it was imperative we had a replacement. We have Jerome and Mbokani, but they (on the face of it) seem quite similar. Hooper has a different style, as does Grabban. Lafferty sounds like he is nowhere near the first team, so I'm writing him out of it. If we sold Grabban without a suitable replacement, we'd be left with very limited variety up top. So, with Palace pulling out of the Gayle deal, Neil obviously decided we had no choice but to keep Grabban, £7m or not. That also tells us that Neil clearly thinks he can reintegrate Grabban and sort it all out, which is interesting, otherwise we definitely would have just taken the money!
Why not sell Grabban last week and keep hold of Ricky? I hear a lot about how Ricky was on high wages, but surely any transfer fee for Grabban would more than offset that?
Good question. I don't know. Fees must enter it given our spending this summer... I suppose Neil just doesn't like Ricky's style as a variety from Jerome.
I know he was pretty toilet during his first year with us, and I have been one of his biggest critics on here, but dear me I'd rather have Ricky in my squad than Grabban any day of the week - if nothing else, when did Grabban last offer to pay for some complete stranger's petrol out of his own pocket after they'd lost their wallet?
Ridiculous example scenario: 'Player X' sleeps with the significant other of 'Player Y'. The rest of the squad learns of this, and 90% of them now think 'Player X' is a complete ****. 'Player Y' learns of the actions of 'Player X', and storms off immediately (which happens to be during the build-up to a cup game). Who do you get rid of?
Fair point, though it's a rare manager who has "Not a ****" high up on the list of key attributes for his first XI team players. Yeah, fair, but I still think that rumour just all sounds a bit too convenient and soap opera
To be honest the way the game is nowadays "sounding like something from a soap opera" doesn't necessarily rule it out as being true!
I see Bradders has got himself a load more Twitter followers today, many of which being Norwich fans so I'm guessing there are quite a lot of disappointed folk around the county this week
So out of all these 221 pages how many players mentioned have you signed? It is meant as a fair question.
Does anyone else, like me, not really consider Dorrans to be part of our summer spending? I know we only officially signed him in the summer, but he played about 20 games for us last season so I don't really think of him as being a 'new signing'. Good player though, he's getting better and better and looks to be a shrewd acquisition.
I'm looking forward to Mulumbu coming back, just a thought, but when he's back and Olsson's fit, there would be even less of a chance to fit Bradders in!
Why bother with the 25 man squad eh? Surely we'll only use 14 players maximum this season the way some people are talking
Mulumbu needs to get fit pretty sharpish as Tettey is, as ever, close to a ban. If only we could find a striker whose goals to games ratio approached Tettey's yellow cards to games ratio we'd probably be looking at a Champion's League spot.
Hey, go easy on him. He may have got one in each of the first 3 games, but he didn't get one against Southampton! That's improvement.
Fair point but would you take a bet on him not getting one against Bournemouth!!!!! I'm not knocking Tettey - I think him and Howson getting fit were hugely instrumental in our getting promoted last season. I also think he was one of the very few to have a half decent games against Saints. It is just good to know that given his dodgy knees and usual collection of yellow cards we have a player like Mulumbu to come in and share the load.
Presumably you mean 11? Anyone coming on as a sub is a fringe player after all and needs to be jettisoned as soon as possible
