Hooper no longer a target IMO

[Vazzza 62]

There has been quite a lot of speculation over the past week or so as to whether we still have Hooper as a target.

My opinion of this is that we no longer see him as our man, or at least way down the pecking order of ''options''. My reasoning behind this is simply because we haven''t bid. You would have thought, especially with the Hull bid being lodged and turned down, that we would have made a move by now. It all got very last minute and panicky in Jan, wouldn''t that mean beginning nogotiations early this time round, especially as Celtic look like they will have tied up their move for Balde by tomorrow, so there is no chain to worry about anymore.

Seeing a £4m bid go in for a player we were offering over double for only 6 months ago, you imagine we''d make a bid there and then, even if it was cheeky one matching Hull''s under-valuation. I think with the capture of RvW, and talks of other players such as Ola Toivonen, Hooper is no longer on our radar, and if he is, he''s a "last resort".

CH seems to be doing his business as early as possible, this is why I think Hooper is now never going to happen, as I''m sure we would have heard something already, even if it was a low bid that got rejected...

[Morisons Prozac 0]

To be fair you don''t know that we haven''t bid but I also think we won''t go back for him now. He was a good fit for us in Jan but not now. Personally I''d look for a pacey substitute to bring off the bench to run at tired defences.

[Bill 1,788]

"CH seems to be doing his business as early as possible"

or more a case of the board doing their business

it''s them the scouts are answerable to, they are the ones who conduct the negotiations pretty much from start to finish, as with McNally flying to Scotland and both Snodgrass and Butterfield being signed when we were as good as managerless, and they set the wage levels, bonuses and clauses etc