Plus there is a fine line between having enough players and having too many. For instance if we did have a right winger to play instead of Roberts last night, Browne or Rigg wouldn’t have got the minutes.
Me either, but you can always improve. Ballard has been outstanding for us, but Mepham is clearly an upgrade. There might be a better option than Hume at RB, or Roberts at RW. Imagine Amad is available - unlikely of course, but surely you take that gamble?
Yeah, fair. It's a difficult one. If we are where we are at the beginning of the transfer window it would be pretty harsh to sign upgrades on anyone. Think the big risk would be spoiling the incredible squad harmony that seems to have developed. But yeah, Amad is just an unignorable counter argument.
Can definitely upgrade in a few places. Upgrade can also include cover as we are short in some areas. Fullback, is an essential one for me. I would also like greater competition out on the wings, especially RW. I don't see poveda being able to offer a serious run of games to be that player. CDM is another but that depends on Samed and fitness. We should be moving on the AA, Ba and Ruskin and replace with better.
The worry I have about January is the fodder it'll be for the 'show some ambition' crew. I see it as you tbh. We don't have any glaring needs. We're likely to be able to get away with full back even (with Ballard imminent and Alese and Seelt back in the near future). Maybe a little bit of additional magic on loan from the Prem. Maybe a Brian Deane type big lad who we can throw on off the bench if needed. Perhaps a super experienced midfielder to slow the game down at times. Other than that I'd rather we brought in a couple of younger players to acclimatise before next season. You can be sure that a failure to make big (ie expensive) signings in January will be screamed from the rooftops as a definite reason why we missed out on automatics if we fall away, though.
Totally agree with this, not that impressed with Poveda, however he does have the skill, so we will see on that front. As for Henderson, I think it would be a massive statement from the club, not only will he run through brick walls to try and get us up, his professionalism, experience and mentoring for the likes of Jobe, Rigg, Dan Neil, I think would be second to none, not very many players are tee total and have been a serial winner, I think he would give the place a massive lift then hopefully get him into coaching with us in the future. club is definitely moving in the right direction, and it’s nice to see that we’re struggling to see where we need reinforcements.
Decided to put this in the Winter transfer thread rather than the Summer. Don't all get excited at once!! https://fc-zenit.ru/news/2024-08-23...wqS9VYHK1qjNGhQKYg_aem_BNUlG5_XjI6bCzwmEaE8nw
Wasn't that announced at the time. Pretty sure it was because people questioned how it would get over the line given the restrictions of finance heading to Russia. Pretty sure we also aren't paying any of his wages.
Think there were a few doubts that we would get him in, plus there were a couple of 'additions' that would not have been made if it was not russia...fairly sure they agreed to pay all his wages, not sure how that will come into play with the transfer fee but either way we could be getting a very good bargain.
Sure it was mentioned somewhere, we pay all wages & for players bought from Russia all funds are held currently as to not pass money back into Russia.....unclear when or if Russia clubs will ever see the money if that is the case Be interesting.... although not sure how we would find out, how much the purchase clause is, taking into consideration Zenit had an obligation to buy for £3.5m then immediately loaned to ourselves....it might be they with the rush of him/them trying to get him out they might have simply being looking to get their money back
"Russian football insider Ivan Karpin also proclaimed on his Telegram channel that Sunderland is not paying a loan fee. Karpin also claimed Zenit are footing the bill for 100% of Isidor’s €1.1 million salary for the season. The journalist who first broke the news, Andrey Pankov, has also reported on his Telegram channel that there is a buy-out option (with un-listed clauses that must be met) of €4 million at the end of the loan period."
