Thin on the ground???

[canarychris 0]

Gallacher, Lewis, Ostembor, Colin, Hughes, Cave-Brown, Drury, Shackell, Docherty, Dublin, Rossi Jarvis, Spillane, Safri, Etuhu, Fotheringham, Lappin, Croft, Chadwick, Eagle, Huckerby, Ryan Jarvis, Martin, Brown, Earnshaw

These are what i think we can assume is our 1st team squad at present. There are 24 names of which it seems highly likely 3 (Colin, Hughes and Earnie) will leave over the next few weeks and a further 5 (Lewis, Cave-Brown, Rossi Jarvis, Eagle and Ryan Jarvis) may well be loaned out. This will leave us with a squad of 16 players (excluding the likes of Renton, Halliday and Smart) to take into the new season. In my opinion we need to add 5/6 players assuming the above sales and loans happen. We need a goalkeeper (Gallacher or Camp), a defender who can preferably play anywhere across the back (we didn''t get Billy Jones so i''d bring back Kenton), a ball winning midfielder to compete with Saf and give cover during the African Nations (Kevin Nicholls), a left sided midfielder (David Vaughan or Kris Commons) and 2 strikers (Sharp, Eastwood, McLeod, Cureton Grant Holt or Boyd).

With a squad of 22 players we will be able to field strong sides even when injuries and suspensions kick in without having to rely on youngsters and this should all be feasible given the fee we can expect for Earnie.

[WilliamG 0]

sorry has earnie left??/stop being so pessimistic  familiar with the concept of a self-fuffiling prophercy? this board is rapidly driving him out of the club

[canarychris 0]

Just being a realist Butch, normally when a player says they want to play in the Premiership a deal will be done and i certainly don''t want to go through the whole Ashton thing again. It is called player power.

I would love to see Earnie here come the 1st September but i also want him to want to be here.