Desert Fox

Ken Bates is very stubborn. He would rather let a players contract run down rather than be forced to sell (Beckford) unless of course he needs the cash, but of course Leeds have no debts having screwed their creditors.

He doesnt strike me as a typical PL player in terms of attitude and this smells of his agent generating interestFurthermore, given that we already have De Laet on a season lomng loan, I would be amazed if PL loses flexibility regarding teh second loanee this early in the window. I expect that there will be a lot of horse trading tywoards the closure of teh window as the bigger squads look to comply with the 25 man rule. I hope this means that we are waiting on either Arsenal, or more probably Liverpool to make a decision about Lansbury or Pacheo.

[quote user="Mahogany"]Tierney was fantastic towards the end of the season, if he''d have signed him last summer I reckon he''d be held in as high regard as Martin. Our defensive problems last season came from the way we played, it left us open to counter attacks and that''s something we''ll need to solve for next season, not sure if that requires major changes to personnel though. A really tenacious DM could be useful for games where we know we are going to be up against it. Fox is a great player, but he''s more of a deep lying playmaker than a full on defensive midfielder.[/quote]Even a high quality DM would not make that much difference - more importnatly will be the formation and tactics we adopt to make us less open. This may be why PL has been targetting players with pace, as it would allow us to play deeper and play more of a counter attacking game.

De Laet is primarily a left CB or LB, but has the versatility to play across the back four. Versatility is also the reason I guess that we are interested in Snodgrass as he has played both left and right wing for Leeds, depending upon where Gradel is playing. However, as Gradel only has a year left on his contract and could be sold (West Ham ar rumoured to bidding £1.5M),  Uncle Ken is going to be very reluctant to lose his other winger. According to the papers this morning we have made two bids so far, but Uncle values him at £8M. So, it looks like sort of a player strike, he wont be leaving. For soem reason, PL doesnt seem to fancy the cheaper and theoretically more available Gradel.

Agreed, Tierney will kick on again with his devlopment, especially know that he as competition from De Laet. However, I expect that he will not be pushing so far forward as often as he did last year.

According to the BBC gossip page this morning, Bougherra wants to leave Rangers for Champions League football. So, looks like this story might not have legs.

De Laet can play across the back four and I guess will provide competition/back up for Tierney and to a lesser extent Martin, but I agree with you about needing an experienced CB to play alongside Barnett, who will have improved since he was with WBA first team in the PL.Also, I suspect that PL is looking at playing different formations this year to tighten us up in the middle to provide more cover for the defence.

Chicken,I agree with everything you say, but my understanding is that Daley was born in November 1989, which means that he was 21 before 1st Jan 2011. If this is correct, he would count towards the 25 man squad, and for this reason, I am sure we will loan him out. With the likes of Adyemi/Steer/Francomb etc, we can decide to loan them out at our discretion (e.g, to gain experience) rather because we more or less have to.

I dont think there is a problem either, which was the point that I was trying to get across.However, clubs with big academies are going to face a huge pressure in the next few years. This is highlighted by an Arsenal blog (see below) which states that Wenger is going to be under pressure to decide whether to keep Lansbury or not. Liverpool are under less pressure with Pacheo becuase he will still be classed as under 21 at the start of next season. For this reason we are more likley to be able buy Lnasbury now than Pacheo.http://www.thefootballnetwork.net/boards/read/s378.htm?721,12506185,12506567

I read a report in the Times a week or so back which suggested that we were amongst the clubs that were over the 25 man squad limit, although we were well within the home grown quota. This was probably just the usual lazy journalism (e.g. ignoring the released players and loan returnees)However, by my reckoning, if we assume that we buy/loan 7 players over the age of 21 (as at 1st Jan 2011), we will need to sell/release or loan out at least five players. This would be less if any of the new players are counted as under 21s. For example, Pacheo and Lansbury would be under 21.If this right, we would have space in the squad for say Cody McDonald plus one other. Given that 3 of the 7 that I have listed as being potentially marginal players are strikers, this reinforces the impression that we will not be chasing any more strikers (e.g. CMS).Equally, we have room for more new players if all of the marginal sqaud are sold or loaned out.What does everyone else think? Core Squad Marginal Squad Under 21 1 John Ruddy 24 Luke Daley  Matt Ball 2 Russell Martin 25 Steven Smith Josh Dawkin 3 Adam Drury 26 Cody McDonald Jed Steer 4 Zak Whitbread 27 Owain Tudur Jones George Francomb 5 Andrew Crofts 28 Oli Johnson Tom Adeyemi 6 Grant Holt 29 Aaron Wilbraham Korey Smith 7 Simeon Jackson 30 Stephen Hughes Declan Rudd 8 Andrew Surman 9 Wesley Hoolahan 10 David Fox 11 Chris Martin 12 Simon Lappin 13 Leon Barnett 14 Elliott Ward 15 Anthony McNamee 16 Marc Tierney 17 Steve Morrison 18 James Vaughan 19 Elliot Bennett 20 New Player 4/Ritchie De Laet 21 New Player 5/Bradley Johnson 22 New Player 6 23 New Player 7 Josh Dawkin Jed Steer George Francomb Tom Adeyemi Korey Smith Declan Rudd

[quote user="Barclay hero"][quote user="flecky76"]Am really pleased that we have been given quite a few fixtures against the clubs in European competions, for the weekend following their midweek fixtures: Liverpool a after (possible) Europa League 20 Oct [/quote]   Liverpool arent in Europe..... [/quote]Otherwise - good research Flecky. You are right the CL clubs never look the same immediately before or after a midweek fixture, especially Man Utd.

Looking at the April fixtures of the teams likely to be near to the bottom, QPR (Man Utd, Spurs, Chelsea) and Wigan (Arsenal, Man Utd, Chlesea) have an equally horrendous run in. Wolves have Man City and Arsenal, but generally have lighter fixtures. But the by far the easier run in is for Swansea, who play none of the top six.

Yes - pairings do work across leagues as well (e.g. City vs Ipswich), but within the Premier League there are also pairings (see link below).http://premierskills.britishcouncil.org/premier-league/how-fixtures-are-producedThe obvious pairings are:Liverpool/EvertonMan Utd/Man CitySpurs/ArsenalBolton/BlackburnSunderland/NewcastleThen there are teams in local clusters where there are permutations of pairings::Chelsea/Fulham/QPRWolves/WBA/Villa/StokeFinally, there are odd teams out, from a geographical perspective:CitySwanseaWiganSo, having studied this a bit further, there are greater permutations of who we could be paired with than I had originally thought:SwanseaWiganOne west midlands club (incl stoke in the midlands)One west london club

In all seriousness the PL will pair us with a team for fixture setting pruposes. This is to avoid near neighbours in the bigger cities playing at home on the same day. Arsenal will be paired with Spurs and the obvious pair for us will be either Swansea, Stoke or Villa as all other teams have a close local pair. If Stoke are paired with Wolves, this means we will have Swansea as our pair becuase then West Brom woudl e paired with Villa. Although we are nowhwere near Swansea, I hope this makes sense.

[quote user="KingOfSpainNCFC"]I agree entirely with this, a strong, disciplined defence is a must in the Premier League. I think, as already said, Martin and Barnett can handle it. Tierney, I think his passion for Norwich and the game will help him through. However, I think Whitbread could possibly do a job with Barnett, he reads the game so well, although lacks pace. I believe that we need a CB and a RB cover as everyone has been saying. Matt Mills is a good shout, but I''ve liked the looks of Ryan Bennett at P''boro. He is very young but looks a really promising talent, thats if we want to invest for the future. Mills would be my choice if we had to buy a CB to come straight into the team with Barnett. De Laet will be a good signing, due to the versatility, who knows, loans can lead to a permanent signature if everything goes right. I''d also like to point out Kyle Walker of Tottenham. He is an unbelievably good player, and IMO will be the best RB England have in the near future. However possibly out of reach, I''m surprised Spurs haven''t played him with their lack of RB''s?![/quote]King of Spain,Good post and you are right about Kyle Walker. However, the problem is that he is already close to being the best RB in the PL, nevermind the future. I fully expect that he will be Spurs first choice RB this season and would say that his value will be close to that of Henderson and Jones who have both gone for £15M plus fees recently.

Chicken, Good post - I completely agree.

[quote user="Jacko"]This is complete drivel I am afraid Bly. Lambert''s recruitment policy has been entirely based on the British transfer market up until now. If he was to go abroad I would expect him to sign someone from Germany where he has a lot of contacts and inside information.[/quote] Jacko - that''s a bit harsh. Whilst this may appear to go against the grain in terms of fitting the PL mould, Bly is merely reporting a rumour that he has heard. I am interested to know how Bly heard this (presumably the scouting community) and whether this has originated from anyone credible. PL is clearly after a left winger (hence the interest in Snodgrass) and my hunch (subject to any further info from Bly) is that this story could have more legs than might normally be the case.

Although this does use one of our two loan slots, this player has pace which we lack at the back and is versatile in that he can play both CB and FB. This is important given the squad size limitation and addresses one of our biggest weakness in terms of the lack of cover for Martin at RB.

[quote user="Row D Seat 7"]Haha makes me laugh when people on here claim to have secret news on transfer targets. Joey Barton''s wages would be huge, and Johnny Evans wouldn''t come here. I don''t want either of them. Someone saying we could get Osman for £6.5m. That''s about £4.5m too much in my opinion.[/quote] Although Osman would not come here, he is a much better player than you are giving him credit for (i.e he is not a £2M player). After Baines, he was probably Everton''s best player last year in a side that finished 7th. I would guess that he is pretty much Moyes first choice midfielder, if rumours about Arteta departing come true.

[quote user="Yellow Submarine"]Brighton would be a good bet for Lansbury I think. He wasn''t a regular starter for us last year, and to be quite honest I found him a bit lazy at times![/quote] He was a good impact player for us and handy to have on the bench for something different. He has at least one of the three key skills that are especially required for the step up to the PL (speed, physical strength and ability to unlock defences), plus let''s not forget he is still young and will develop considerably from where he is now. After all look at the difference in teh Jack Wilshere who played for Bolton last year and the England international this year.

If I recall from the Portsmouth game, he has really good pace for a defender, which is going to be a prescious commodity in the PL. Plus with the limitations on squad size, his versatility could be important.

City 1st,A very perceptive post.

If you want an interesting insight into what is going on at Derby you have got to listen to Robbie Savage''s rant at Derby''s equivalent of Chris Goreham. Boy is he angry! http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/teams/d/derby_county/8453055.stm

7rew, Unless I am mistaken, Holt played for Blackpool in the fizzy.

Canary Cherub, No it wasnt in last years accounts as it was renegotiated in Dcember (i.e. after the accounts and the AGM). I am sure this came up in one of the supporters forums (possibly the infamous Munby and Doomy seesion) and that it was posted on here as one of the Q&A''s. As T has implied, this is unlikley to be the subject of the going concern problem as it is asset backed and attacting a very high rate of interest. So long as the club maintain these interest payments, the debt holder should be happy as they can step in recover their asset (which is effetcively mortgaged by them). The real problem will be those debt holders whose loans are securitised against future ticket revenue. Unlike the LSE land there is no little advanatge to recovering the asset as there is no real secondary value to a football ground. This is why Norwich Union let Ipswich off a big chunk of their debt becuase effectively they had a gun put to their head. If Ipswich had folded they would have no one to repay their debt, so they took the view to write a slab of it off enabled their loanee to mainatin some cashflow repayment. I suspect this is a tactic that the club may be exploring as part of our restructuring exercise. The problem will be (again as T has alluded to) that the debt holders may call the club''s bluff in that they believe that the Delia is capable of pumping in more cash first. Interesting times - particularly if you are a supplier to the club.