January Transfer Thread: Speculation, Lies, Absolute Cr*p and Bosman Rumours

[midnite]

The goal we scored at Sunderland was exactly how I imagined the Benteke-Bent partnership to go. Shame it hasn't worked out that way. Creativity and delivery have been real weak points for us, and we have severely underutilised set pieces this season, and really for good while since the days of Laursen, Mellberg and Carew.

Problem is, because Bent does absolutely nothing, he cannot be accommodated. Gabby and Weimann can play a little wider, help out midfield then get forward and be a threat.

Bent is a limited player, that will never play for a big club. Him scoring his goals has always been at the detriment to his teams.

I think Sunderland, Spur and Villa are all pretty big clubs in fairness!

Charlton, Ipswich and Sunderland fans would say him scoring goals was to the benefit of their sides too, and I think with all the stick he takes at the moment for apparent laziness, it should be remembered that his goals did actually keep us up under Houllier, while his double at Arsenal was exceptional. Service is the issue now, and playing a side to his strengths. I would love us to have a top quality pair in central midfield, allowing us to play with Bent and Benteke up top, as together they would be formidable in my opinion. Also, his ground covered stats suggest he is not quite as lazy as people like to make out, maybe not effective in his tracking back etc, but certainly not lazy. I like Bent a lot as a player, and would dearly love to see him scoring goals for us again.

spot on Ozz , DB is not lazy at all . its just some people on here expect him to play like Wayne Rooney .    I  bet If he played for Arsenal , he would score 25 goals easy.

Totslly agree. I never heard man united fans moaning that van nistelrooy was lazy.

Use the player for what he is. Which is a goal scorer. So he doesn't play wide or doesn't drop that deep. So what! He's a great, natural goal scorer. Use it

[KevinGage]

Looks like we can discount QPR as on of the  clubs interested in Bent.

If he's off, I'd say Fulham or Stoke are the most likely destinations. 

Not sure how they do it, but Stoke have spent a fair bit -on both fees and wages-  over the last few years.

Jol actually mentioned him by name a few weeks back - so there could be something going on in that regard.   

I'm not sure they could afford the full whack though (we should be looking in excess of £12 million). Maybe cash and one of their players would be the way to go.

Riise would fill the gap we have at Left Back -and Fulham might be keen, when you look at the average age of their squad now. For us, we need a few older heads (but decent with it, not dross like Hutton).

I haven't discounted the possibility that Bennett might come good in time, but I'd be more comfortable with the idea of him as back up for the next season or two.   We've looked weak down that side even prior to his brainfreeze v Norwich.

[JD]

Maybe we should put in a sneaky bid for Sneider, given he's in dispute with Inter 

[ashkar]

IN
Guidetti ( Played with Vlaar and KEA)
Boyata/Tom Lees (Young right sided Central Defender)
Dale Stephens (Central Midfielder, Lambert has already made a bid during summer)
Hoolahan (quality playmaker)

OUT
Bent
Dunne
Ireland

[midnite]

I think Ireland will stay. Wouldn't be surprised to see given out the door though

[Shrek]

The goal we scored at Sunderland was exactly how I imagined the Benteke-Bent partnership to go. Shame it hasn't worked out that way. Creativity and delivery have been real weak points for us, and we have severely underutilised set pieces this season, and really for good while since the days of Laursen, Mellberg and Carew.

Problem is, because Bent does absolutely nothing, he cannot be accommodated. Gabby and Weimann can play a little wider, help out midfield then get forward and be a threat.

Bent is a limited player, that will never play for a big club. Him scoring his goals has always been at the detriment to his teams.

I think Sunderland, Spur and Villa are all pretty big clubs in fairness!

Charlton, Ipswich and Sunderland fans would say him scoring goals was to the benefit of their sides too, and I think with all the stick he takes at the moment for apparent laziness, it should be remembered that his goals did actually keep us up under Houllier, while his double at Arsenal was exceptional. Service is the issue now, and playing a side to his strengths. I would love us to have a top quality pair in central midfield, allowing us to play with Bent and Benteke up top, as together they would be formidable in my opinion. Also, his ground covered stats suggest he is not quite as lazy as people like to make out, maybe not effective in his tracking back etc, but certainly not lazy. I like Bent a lot as a player, and would dearly love to see him scoring goals for us again.

spot on Ozz , DB is not lazy at all . its just some people on here expect him to play like Wayne Rooney .    I  bet If he played for Arsenal , he would score 25 goals easy.

Totslly agree. I never heard man united fans moaning that van nistelrooy was lazy.

Use the player for what he is. Which is a goal scorer. So he doesn't play wide or doesn't drop that deep. So what! He's a great, natural goal scorer. Use it

Bent is no Van Nistelrooy.

Yes Bent kept us up with his goals, my problem with Bent is when he plays the team suffers.
He rarely creates a goal or scores out of nothing, instead puts so much pressure on the midfield to try and create tap-ins.

We are never all going to agree, people just think that because Bent has scored goals he is great end of, when infact him scoring HIS goals isn't always what's best for the team and Lambert seems to be thinking along the same lines.

For example Gabby is never going to score as many goals as Bent, but that doesnt nesseserily mean he is going to win us less points. It's about what's best for the team not Darren Bents statistics.

[Mister E]

The goal we scored at Sunderland was exactly how I imagined the Benteke-Bent partnership to go. Shame it hasn't worked out that way. Creativity and delivery have been real weak points for us, and we have severely underutilised set pieces this season, and really for good while since the days of Laursen, Mellberg and Carew.

Problem is, because Bent does absolutely nothing, he cannot be accommodated. Gabby and Weimann can play a little wider, help out midfield then get forward and be a threat.

Bent is a limited player, that will never play for a big club. Him scoring his goals has always been at the detriment to his teams.

I think Sunderland, Spur and Villa are all pretty big clubs in fairness!

Charlton, Ipswich and Sunderland fans would say him scoring goals was to the benefit of their sides too, and I think with all the stick he takes at the moment for apparent laziness, it should be remembered that his goals did actually keep us up under Houllier, while his double at Arsenal was exceptional. Service is the issue now, and playing a side to his strengths. I would love us to have a top quality pair in central midfield, allowing us to play with Bent and Benteke up top, as together they would be formidable in my opinion. Also, his ground covered stats suggest he is not quite as lazy as people like to make out, maybe not effective in his tracking back etc, but certainly not lazy. I like Bent a lot as a player, and would dearly love to see him scoring goals for us again.

spot on Ozz , DB is not lazy at all . its just some people on here expect him to play like Wayne Rooney .    I  bet If he played for Arsenal , he would score 25 goals easy.

Totslly agree. I never heard man united fans moaning that van nistelrooy was lazy.

Use the player for what he is. Which is a goal scorer. So he doesn't play wide or doesn't drop that deep. So what! He's a great, natural goal scorer. Use it

Bent is no Van Nistelrooy.

Yes Bent kept us up with his goals, my problem with Bent is when he plays the team suffers.
He rarely creates a goal or scores out of nothing, instead puts so much pressure on the midfield to try and create tap-ins.

We are never all going to agree, people just think that because Bent has scored goals he is great end of, when infact him scoring HIS goals isn't always what's best for the team and Lambert seems to be thinking along the same lines.

For example Gabby is never going to score as many goals as Bent, but that doesnt nesseserily mean he is going to win us less points. It's about what's best for the team not Darren Bents statistics.

I think Ozz made the most telling point: unless we get better service none of our strikers is going to score many. Yesterday, with our fullbacks not pushing on (well, until Eric came on) we were very narrow. Weimann and Gabby had obviously been briefed to sit a little deeper and we were less effective upfront.
I'm not an advocate for two wingers, but we need our FB to be more attacking (look at Baines for Everton yesterday, for example); then, we'll see more goals.

[Shrek]

Good point. But with Benteke in the team we will naturally create more chances, but Bent can only play in Benteke's position, so Lambert has decided to stick with Benteke.

[Monty]

Good point. But with Benteke in the team we will naturally create more chances, but Bent can only play in Benteke's position, so Lambert has decided to stick with Benteke.

That seems to me to be the point. And even Van Nistelrooy got shipped out by Fergie years ago, who said that when he's not scoring he's not doing much else. People scoffed at the time, but it's true. If you have Hernandez or Solskjaer, content to play that role coming off the bench, then that's ok, but if, like Van Nistelrooy and apparently Bent, they want to be the number one all the time, that's more of a problem.

[Ads]

I predict a phyiscally huge central midfielder from the Bundaslega to come in to really strengthen the midfield. Also a Villa favourite, a Scandinavian centre half of Norse legend proportions in size.

Wouldn't be surprised if Keane comes in and a tricky young Frenchman with pace.

I think the squad will be getting bigger in every sense. Size does matter.

We will fly up this league post January.

[Clampy]

It's going to be interesting to see what happens with Bent over the next few weeks but we're not in a position at the moment to be thinking of selling the best finisher at the club. Benteke as good as he looks is still only 21 and will go through spells where he won't score. Same goes for Weimann too and as hard as Gabby works, he dose'nt seem to be the threat he was years ago.

I'd personally keep Bent until the end of the season at least and maybe look at it then. That said, IF there is a rift between him and Lambert and he's on his way then i hope he has a replacement lined up because we'll need one.

[midnite]

Good point. But with Benteke in the team we will naturally create more chances, but Bent can only play in Benteke's position, so Lambert has decided to stick with Benteke.

That seems to me to be the point. And even Van Nistelrooy got shipped out by Fergie years ago, who said that when he's not scoring he's not doing much else. People scoffed at the time, but it's true. If you have Hernandez or Solskjær, content to play that role coming off the bench, then that's ok, but if, like Van Nistelrooy and apparently Bent, they want to be the number one all the time, that's more of a problem.

I totally get your point there. You don't want one player scoring 20 goals at the expense of the rest of the team not scoring.

But I personally don't agree with the notion that Bent is lazy. He gets into good goal scoring positions. I've seen him come deep to pick the ball up. But if he is to go out wide to get the ball then we're not using his skills properly.

we used to slag Heskey off for being a striker who never used to score goals. But would at least try to play for the team.


Bent is a goal scorer. Of course he isn't van nistelrooy. If he were he wouldn't be playing for Villa. Even with is lack of minutes on the pitch so far this season he has still managed to bag a few goals. I've come to accept he will be gone in January. The manager and the way he wants his team to play isn't right for Bent.

He'll go on to somewhere like Fulham and score a bag full of goals and we'll all sit here asking why he couldn't do it for us.

[eastie]

Newcastle aim to beat Aston Villa in the race to sign striker Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, writes the Sunday People.

Sunday People Sport revealed ­earlier this month that Villa chief Paul Lambert was tracking the highly-rated St Etienne forward as a possible ­replacement for the out-of-favour Darren Bent.

But Toon boss Alan Pardew is ­desperately keen to strengthen his depleted squad in the January ­transfer window, and he has the 23-year-old front man in his sights too.

Pardew realises he could lose Senegal striker Demba Ba in January, so has been using the club’s strong French scouting network to come up with new options.

And Gabon international Aubameyang is the player now being identified as the latest African import who can make an impact at St James’ Park.

Versatile attacker Aubameyang can operate as a winger as well as striker and St Etienne will want in the region of £10million for a player who has become their prize asset.

The fee will come as a shock to AC Milan as the Italian outfit sold him to St Etienne exactly 12 months ago for a mere £1.5m after previously farming him out on loan to Dijon, Lille and Monaco.

Villa won’t give up on him either, as they still expect Bent to leave when the transfer ­window opens for ­business. Fulham boss Martin Jol, who signed Bent for £16.5m from Charlton in 2007 during his time at Tottenham, is also lining up a move.

[Monty]

I don't necessarily think he's lazy, he's just selfish. You're absolutely right when you say his goals come at the expense of the team not scoring - that is a fact borne out by the statistics throughout his career. His type of player is now wholly an impact sub, really: they come off the bench when there's space late in the game, and that can change the game. Look at Hernandez: started last week against Norwich, they had no way of changing it up later in the game, but when he comes on it's a completely new threat, fresh at the right time. If Bent thinks the whole team should be geared around him starting the game, he's mistaken.

[barrysleftfoot]

 I think PL will try and buy 1 if not 2 inside fowards to play off Benteke.He has been linked with 2 recently, to replace Gabby and Weimann.Not quite sure they are up to it in the 1st team.

 I reckon he will be looking to pay £10m each, and if that means selling Bent then so be it.

 Interesting interview with Sid on TS this morning, when he intimated that Bent was not putting in 100% commitment to the cause, and that is why he is not playing.