Summer transfer, gossip, speculation and the usual butter ollocks thread

[OCD]

I wonder whether Chelsea will be looking to re-coup some of their spending especially if they spend £90m on Havertz.

[paul_e]

Preparing a bid, so they get together, someone has to get the right piece of paper out, you know the Aston Villa header notepaper because if we sent it on a get well soon card that would not work. Shit, what font shall we use, who we going to address it to, shall we type it then or scan it or put it in the post, a second or first clas stamp.Make sure we use a white envelope.
Don’t put SWALK on the back unless JT is sending it for a Chelsea player.
Fuck Dean when you wrote here is our bid, you forgot to mention how much we are bidding. ..........

Relax, there is no such thing as ‘preparing a bid’ - any article / post that contains that phrase is utter BS - by saying that you are making something up but not committing to anything so tomorrow you can make something new up. 

Nobody knows our business & thankfully those in charge of the purse strings don’t appear to be panicking, if it takes till deadline day but we get the right players we will see the benefits through the whole season not the mad panic to get it done for the first game.

I think some of it is true but I also think it's used a catch all phrase for saying the club have spoken to the players agent to get an idea of his fee and wage demands or the club have spoken to his club to see if there's a realistic chance to sign him.

[Des Little]

I wonder whether Chelsea will be looking to re-coup some of their spending especially if they spend £90m on Havertz.

By all accounts, Frank wants a keeper too, but to get one in he needs to sell players to raise funds. Is that a phone ringing...?

[paul_e]

From footballwhispers.com:

Swift has played 145 games in the blue and white hoops to date, scoring 20 times. But a closer look into his performances this season shows why there’s far more to the midfielder’s game than simply the number of goals he scores.
For starters, Swift’s record of ten assists in 2019/20 works out at 0.3 per 90 – the 12th most of any player in this season’s Championship. That perhaps shouldn’t be a surprise when you consider just how many chances the box-to-box midfielder creates. He is averaging 2.51 chances created per 90, only bettered by six of his peers in English football’s second tier.
They are extraordinary numbers when you factor in that the England Under-21 international isn’t one of Reading’s most advanced midfielders and contributes defensively as well as simply when the team is attacking. His ball-winning ability in the centre of the park is particularly notable, winning back possession in the middle third of the pitch a commendable 3.96 times per 90.
Swift therefore regularly finds himself on the ball (75.05 touches per 90), distributing it carefully and accurately. That’s not to suggest he is cautious when in possession though. Quite the opposite in fact. One of the playmaker’s most impressive attributes is the accuracy of his long balls, with a success rate of 63.54 per cent putting him inside the league’s top 25 players

I'd like to see that compared to someone like McGinn when he was in that division, I suspect McGinn would come out better on almost every metric they've used there and that's really the point. He'd be squad filler and I'm not sure i want that. If I'm honest I'd rather see Jacob Ramsey get 10-15 appearances in to see if he can step up than see us make a signing like this. I'm in no way saying Swift is a bad player, I don't know anything like enough about him to say that, I just don't think there's any reason to think he'd be coming in to be a regular in the team, so what's the point?

[Clampy]

I wonder whether Chelsea will be looking to re-coup some of their spending especially if they spend £90m on Havertz.

By all accounts, Frank wants a keeper too, but to get one in he needs to sell players to raise funds. Is that a phone ringing...?

I reckon it would be Batshuayi who would move on if anybody.

[Holy Trinity]

People are knocking me for saying that IF our targets don't want to sign for us because of Smith that he should be replaced.

If we are start this season with this squad it is entirely possible with our start that we will be bottom 3 heading into December. How many games do people think the board would give smith to turn it around with a 3rd of the season gone?

My follow up point about a new manager trying to rebuild in January is also totally valid. We can all love smith as much as we want but the football has been crap! He does not know what formation he wants to play and he can't attract his targets (supposedly).
Add to that we have one of the best players in the country shoe horned into the left wing position because that's the only option because we have mo other effective wingers.
I'm indifferent to Smith and have zero loyalty to him. He is going to be a flash in the pan of this club and he will be long gone by the time i meet my maker so why shouldn't I be more concerned with my club than some bloke who has had 2 extremely lucky end of season runs one to get us up and one to stay up. Nobody here can tell me it was his tactics that got us up and not the fact Jack came back from injury like a man possessed.

Anyway this is the transfer thread and a lot of what I have just said is hypothetical as was in my first post.
 I want us to be decisive and go get players ready for the first team not squad players and nothing we have been linked with seems to have any legs.
If we end up with another season of random players for all over Europe I will be worried. We need 2 more star players to go with Jack to kick on and 1 absolutely has to be a striker and 1 a winger. Until we have a solid link or an itsotp I'm going to remain concerned.

I'll leave you to continue sniping at posts you don't agree with. Enjoy

[Sexual Ealing]

The players don't, and shouldn't, decide who the manager is.

[dave.woodhall]

Let's assume that we did get rid of a manager who allegedly can't attract top players (which in itself is the daftest reason I can think of).

Then let's imagine a conversation with a prospective replacement:

"How long was the last bloke in the job."

"One and a half seasons. He came in midway through the first one."

"What did he do then?"

"Took us from mid-table, broke an all-time club record for consecutive wins and got us promoted."

"And the season after?"

"Started off badly but kept us up with the best escape in Premier League history."

"I'll get back to you on that one."

[Gareth]

I suspect one bad run (3/4 losses on spin) in first 3 months & the trigger will be pulled, I have no doubt that it was discussed at various points this season, had lockdown not occurred and we had been dicked vs Chelsea like the Leicester game it would probs have been then.  That is why calm recruitment is vital this summer

[Damo70]

Smith got us up, got us to a cup final and kept us up. I also believe he isn't as in control of incoming transfers as managers like Ron Saunders, BFR and MON were. He is more a a modern style head coach. He has earned himself more time in my opinion but having said that I still think that come December/January if we look like repeating the struggles of last season a change of manager would be needed.

[Gareth]

Hopefully this time next year we are starting another season as an established PL team with Dean still in charge!

[paul_e]

The premise itself is flawed because the whole argument started from 'if we aren't able to sign our targets...' and we have no way of knowing if that's the case. If a player we wanted signs elsewhere and then says he'd have signed for Villa if they had a different manager then the topic can be raised but right now it feels like someone doesn't think Smith is glamorous and is projecting that opinion onto footballers with no evidence.

[Londonvilla]

People are knocking me for saying that IF our targets don't want to sign for us because of Smith that he should be replaced.

If we are start this season with this squad it is entirely possible with our start that we will be bottom 3 heading into December. How many games do people think the board would give smith to turn it around with a 3rd of the season gone?

My follow up point about a new manager trying to rebuild in January is also totally valid. We can all love smith as much as we want but the football has been crap! He does not know what formation he wants to play and he can't attract his targets (supposedly).
Add to that we have one of the best players in the country shoe horned into the left wing position because that's the only option because we have mo other effective wingers.
I'm indifferent to Smith and have zero loyalty to him. He is going to be a flash in the pan of this club and he will be long gone by the time i meet my maker so why shouldn't I be more concerned with my club than some bloke who has had 2 extremely lucky end of season runs one to get us up and one to stay up. Nobody here can tell me it was his tactics that got us up and not the fact Jack came back from injury like a man possessed.

Anyway this is the transfer thread and a lot of what I have just said is hypothetical as was in my first post.
 I want us to be decisive and go get players ready for the first team not squad players and nothing we have been linked with seems to have any legs.
If we end up with another season of random players for all over Europe I will be worried. We need 2 more star players to go with Jack to kick on and 1 absolutely has to be a striker and 1 a winger. Until we have a solid link or an itsotp I'm going to remain concerned.

I'll leave you to continue sniping at posts you don't agree with. Enjoy

This is an intervention

What a happy chappy you are..........football should be fun,,,,,,,transfer, gossip, speculation should be fun...........relax, go for a walk  at the end of the day have a drink hug someone you love and live your best life

[ROBBO]

Lets face it the only people who know anything wont be telling the press or the likes of us before it's done and dusted, just got to be patient and save the panic for later.

[LeeB]

People are knocking me for saying that IF our targets don't want to sign for us because of Smith that he should be replaced.

If we are start this season with this squad it is entirely possible with our start that we will be bottom 3 heading into December. How many games do people think the board would give smith to turn it around with a 3rd of the season gone?

My follow up point about a new manager trying to rebuild in January is also totally valid. We can all love smith as much as we want but the football has been crap! He does not know what formation he wants to play and he can't attract his targets (supposedly).
Add to that we have one of the best players in the country shoe horned into the left wing position because that's the only option because we have mo other effective wingers.
I'm indifferent to Smith and have zero loyalty to him. He is going to be a flash in the pan of this club and he will be long gone by the time i meet my maker so why shouldn't I be more concerned with my club than some bloke who has had 2 extremely lucky end of season runs one to get us up and one to stay up. Nobody here can tell me it was his tactics that got us up and not the fact Jack came back from injury like a man possessed.

Anyway this is the transfer thread and a lot of what I have just said is hypothetical as was in my first post.
 I want us to be decisive and go get players ready for the first team not squad players and nothing we have been linked with seems to have any legs.
If we end up with another season of random players for all over Europe I will be worried. We need 2 more star players to go with Jack to kick on and 1 absolutely has to be a striker and 1 a winger. Until we have a solid link or an itsotp I'm going to remain concerned.

I'll leave you to continue sniping at posts you don't agree with. Enjoy

What if our targets don't want to come to Brum? Should we move to London?