alias75

Gerrard, Meireles, Henderson think we won't see a proper winger on the right it'll be someone tucked in a little to give us 3 in the middle with Kelly or GJ getting forward from right back and Suarez also likes to drift into that wide right position.

that would be a worry, whats wrong with reina?

Suarez naturally drifts into those wide positions, he goes left and right you don't want to tie him down to a position because its that movement that makes him the player he is, there is a lot of flexibility in the make up of our midfield.

Someone made that point many hundreds of pages ago and it makes sense, you pay a little extra on transfer fees because over the course of a contract you're saving millions signing someone like Henderson who won't be on huge wages, Downing will be on decent money im sure but not top whack and the money you save on wages over a 5 year contract could be as much as £4-5 million which might explain why you pay slightly over the odds on the transfer fee. It also means if it doesn't work out your not stuck with players on huge contracts which makes them much harder to sell on (as we're finding out) so its much better to pay a few million more on the transfer fees than on huge contracts.

Think you've missed out someone pretty important

No one knows for sure what the figure is but if it is £20million its probably 2million too much when you look at what Ashley Young went for who was in the last year of his contract. I don't want us missing out on our main targets for the sake of a couple of million.

if we get a decent offer for him we'll sell him but thats not looking likely at the moment, he is a quality player but we have so many midfielders you have to wonder how much he'll figure and its a lot of wages to have sitting on the bench. There are probably 4 or 5 players in front of him.

think we'll sell Meireles and try and sell N'gog that will bring in close to £20 million

think people are going to be pleasantly surprised with Downing, will give the team proper balance down the left and will help get the best out of Carroll. He's not flash but hes a proper winger that will hug the touchline and get plenty of good quality balls into the box. We now have 2 very good left footers in Adam and Downing which will help the balance of the midfield.

First choice midfield.... ........................Lucas......................... .............Gerrard.....Adam................. Suarez...............................Downing Suarez with plenty of license to drift because we have Kelly and GJ that can get forward well from fullback plus Gerrard that can pull into those wide right positions, But you're correct we do have lots of options in midfield. Maybe Kenny is going to be a revolutionary coach ive had this thought for a while now that teams will start using midfielders differently because of the pace of the game now and with teams employing a pressing game you need lots of energy in midfield, so it wouldn't surprise me if it became standard fair to replace 2 maybe even 3 midfielders after around an hour so teams can keep that high intensity pressing for the whole 90 minutes. We could be at the forefront of the next revolution of the game!!!

are we worried that signing a left back is going to block Robinson's path into the first team?? You only have to watch him to see he's the real deal and while he's not ready to be a regular starter this season i think in the next 2 years he will be. We have GJ that did a fine job at left back last season.

very clever from Mr Henry bigging up a few we want shot of!!

hes a centre back, been caught out of position a few times at fullback but hes still very young.

Yeah Robinson is the real deal, should have the left back position nailed down in a year or two. I know its only a friendly but this game shows what quality in those wide positions can do, no offence to Kuyt cos he's not a winger but having someone like Gerrard on the right and Downing on the left would make a huge difference, when you have players like Adam that can hit those big diagonal balls you need players out wide that can make the most of it.

Commentator on my stream keeps calling Kelly, Flannagan!!

The City deal is clearly above market value by 2 or 3 times, Wenger was spot on in everything he says and its a big test for UEFA because if 99% of clubs are trying to play within the new rules and just 1% isn't it makes the whole thing pointless. Given the size of the clubs that will be within the rules i doubt they'll be quiet about it if one or two are clearly exploiting them and are still able to spend well above their means.

If we bid around £20 million for Baines i think it'd be very difficult for Everton to turn down because of their financial problems. The player doesn't strike me as someone that would ask for a move though even if he is a red, but Everton need to generate money before they can spend obviously there are other players they'd rather sell.

apart from Kev

Think its more that McCleish has come in from their big rivals and is very unpopular with a large section of their fans, if he sells one of their best players it only makes his position worse, so once he was made manager i knew it was going to be difficult to get him unless the player was very vocal about wanting the move and Downing doesn't seem like the type of player that would do that. I guess it depends on how badly Downing wants out and how badly we want him, given his age i do wonder if we're prepared to pay over the odds for him because we probably don't have much resale value with him. I do think we have other options for that position and if Villa dig their heals in we'll try someone else.

If he didn't rate him he didn't have to pick him, if we're looking to replace him with Henderson then we're worse off (imo) if we're looking to replace him with Gerrard then i can understand wanting to cash in on him now while we can. Adam plays in a totally different position so i don't see how that signing means the end for Meireles.

He was always picked under Kenny and did well, Kenny also had lots of good things to say about him. Thought he fit in nicely with the way we wanted to play, technically he was one of the best players we have, comfortable with both feet and his movement was very intelligent. Think if he is sold it boils down to the amount of money we can get for him, his age and his wage.

Pretty strange given how complimentary Kenny was of him last season. Must be due to his age and the fact this would be the last chance we'd get to sell him for decent money.

He can definitely improve in front of goal, last season he snatched at a lot of chances which is understandable when a forward comes to a new club and is eager to make an impression. But his overall contribution was amazing really given he came off the back of a long lay off for Ajax. Really looking forward to him and Stevie playing together, just imagine all those free kicks he's going to win for Adam to take next season!!!

I think you can make the argument with the reduced number of games next season we can treat this rebuilding process as a 2 stage effort. This season we need to get back into top 4, our strongest 11 is good enough to do that if we can get them on the field most weeks, no European football means we don't need as many players as a "normal" season. Then if we make top 4 and get CL football we can hopefully sign those 1 or 2 real top class players that can slot straight into the first team and hope that players like Henderson and Adam can improve.

The problem is without CL football your not going to be able to attract the really top names, so we've had to look for players that have potential to improve like Henderson, or players that are proven in this league and will hopefully help us get back to top 4.