I could forgive the goals against, only....

[PurpleCanary 5,554]

[quote user="morty"]You mention speaking to the agent, I would like to think that was done as a matter of course, and that McNally wouldn''t make things infinitely more complicated by pursuing a lost cause. And it should be pretty easy to focus on certain players in our case, due to our tight financial constrictions.

I would like to think that we had back up plans that were maybe AN''s 2nd or 3rd choice.And obviously its pure guesswork why none of them were successful.[/quote]You might like to think we didn''t pursue a lost cause but we wouldn''t be the first club to do that, and it wouldn''t be the first case with us either (trying to tempt Lee Clark and Steve Watson away from Newcastle when Deehan was manager, Roeder and Steffen Iversen, which left us with Darryl Russell trying to pay centre-forward, and more recently the Quagliarella saga). And whether we had a back-up plan is irrelevant. Such a plan is only valid if it is viable - if it works.There are some facts here. I think it is fair to regard as a fact, based on the solid reports linking us with bids for van Dijk and Koulibaly, amongst others, that one of our transfer policies in the summer was to strengthen/upgrade central defence. It is fact we ended up signing no-one (Wisdom being essentially cover at right-back). It is a fact that van Dijk went to a club more established than us in the Premier League and that Koulibaly stayed with club that finished 5th in Serie A last season and qualified for the Europa League.So it is more than pure guesswork to believe we may well have ended up with no-one because we spent too long (and got too close to the window shutting) chasing players who from the outset were unlikely ever to want to sign for us, and that such a high-risk strategy scuppered any Plan B we may have had.

[morty 0]

I don''t think its a secret that we don''t have the sort on money to spend that other clubs have, but I do wonder sometimes if we slightly overplay the poverty card, and come across as a bit "small time".Though it could also very well be because its a risk for a player going to a newly promoted club, and that second season will be easier in this respect.And thirdly, I don''t think we can completely rule out a bit of negative PR over the whole Ricky van saga, which very much illustrated what can happen to a ( supposedly) good player when he signs for a struggling team.

[It's Character Forming 1,160]

good points have been made about why it was difficult for us to sign an upgrade at CB over the summer. van Dijk was a realistic but ambitious target - I remember listening to talksport on the way back from the playoff final and he was mentioned by name as a CB target we ought to be going for. And exactly what went on at the last minute is just speculation.

My guess/speculation from what has come out is that we did focus on a couple of main options until too late in the day, and were left making some last minute bids which were too late in the day and weren''t taken seriously. It was a gamble I think to try to get some signings in relatively cheaply. Which I said at the time I felt was a mistake.

If you look back, under Hughton we brought in Turner/Bassong and that CB pairing was IMO better than Bassong/Martin, so I don''t understand why we haven''t been able to bring in a CB who is as good as Turner was then (I still don''t understand why he lost his way after then but that''s a side issue - when we first signed him he was a solid Prem CB).

Last season we saw our defence struggle to keep clean sheets in the Championship. Newcastle showed that a relatively weak Prem side still have some players who are better finishers than most in the Champ, given time and space in the area. It''s no surprise that our CBs, who struggled against that level of strikers, have found Prem strikers harder to deal with.

For me in the summer transfer window there were only 2 real priorities - a new striker as competition for Jerome, (and Mbokani ticks that box - we can''t be sure how well he''ll work out but at least he has the right quality/ability to do what we need) and strengthening the CB position. Unfortunately by failing to bring in anyone at CB we are weak in that area, the question is just whether we can play well enough to mask that weakness in enough games.

I still don''t understand why Ryan Bennett isn''t playing. I remember him looking a quality defender in some Prem games before. I know sometimes a reserve player has to wait for his chance when the incumbent player is injured/out of form, but surely now is the time ?