Summer Transfer Thread and Gustavo Cisneros Type Rumours.

[sickbeggar]

Thing I remember  most about luke moore is everyone thought his brother was better to start with

[Londonvilla]

Emiliano Martinez stretchered off in Argentina game against Colombia

Go to 4 mins on the video

Hopefully, he will be ok but maybe we need a backup keeper?

[nigel]

I still think Luke Moore, at least, could have gone on to have a fantastic career with the right manager to put his arm around him. Instead, we had that twat O'Leary dropping him not long after he scored a hat-trick at Middlesbrough and generally treating him, much as he treated the rest of the club, as an inconvenience.

That said, he still went onto have a more successful career than probably 90% of Premier League Academy players. So did Ridgewell.

I always thought Ridgewell was a good CH.
He had a good partnership with Cahill and it looked like they could have developed into a great back 2 for us, but MO’N in his wisdom decided to get rid of both.

[sid1964]

Was part of the reason to get rid of Ridgewell due to the affair that 1 of the players was having with his wife?

[paul_e]

Emiliano Martinez stretchered off in Argentina game against Colombia

Go to 4 mins on the video

Hopefully, he will be ok but maybe we need a backup keeper?

Depends if you think Steer is good enough. For me he is too good to be a third choice and should play in the cups, etc.

From there do you want a third keeper who is young enough to be a U23 starter and offer backup or to have someone around who never plays?

[algy]

Emiliano Martinez stretchered off in Argentina game against Colombia

Go to 4 mins on the video

Hopefully, he will be ok but maybe we need a backup keeper?

Depends if you think Steer is good enough. For me he is too good to be a third choice and should play in the cups, etc.

From there do you want a third keeper who is young enough to be a U23 starter and offer backup or to have someone around who never plays?

Yeah, I'm of a similar mind ... for me, Jed Steer's done enough to justify being our second choice keeper.  Obviously he's not as good as Martinez, but I think he's shown himself as a good top-end-of-the-championship keeper, so without any other evidence I'd guess he's probably a decent Premier League keeper, albeit one you'd probably expect at a side closer to the Championship than Champions League.

[algy]

We properly got sucked in by the 2002-04 crop. Was reading stuff like Liam Ridgewell was going to be our FA cup winning captain and Moore brothers of course better than Rooney etc when they all came through but big underachievement there with likes of Stephen Cooke completely fading out of game as soon as he got released.

...

The weird one of the whole thing was Scottish midfielder Colin Marshall.  Was sent on loan to Clyde in 03/04, then released.  He then very briefly (for 2 months) played for St Johnstone, was released, then spent the rest of 04/05 playing irregularly for Falkirk.  The following season he had short term contracts with Stranraer and Dundee.  Then he dropped off the radar for a couple of years.

Then, in 2009/10 he reappeared at Tiverton Town in Devon, ready to start a frankly bewildering international journey that saw him play in Spain (Credillente Deportivo, then in the 4th tier), Iceland (BI/Bolungarvík and Vikingur, both in their Premier League), Japan (Machida Zelvia, 2nd tier at the time), Vanuatu (Amicale FC, who reached the final of the Oceania Champions League that season), then back to Scotland for a season at Cowdenbeath, before returning to Vanuatu to play for Amicale again for a season.

The story didn't end there, though.  After a season in Vanuatu, he came back and played for Gartcairn in the 5th tier of the Scottish Junior leagues, and was last seen playing Sunday league football for Drumchapel United.

[ChicagoLion]

Algy, that’s what I call a journeyman.
Great story.

[robbo1874]

The video I saw of Pape Sarr showed him taking free-kicks and penalties but has the frame of the imposing defensive midfielder that I think there is a general consesus that this is a position we should be looking at this summer. We would have to be pretty convinced by him though because at that age, a lot can still go wrong and he would probably need time to adapt.

Indeed but he is older then Bellingham who seems to do ok

This gets thrown out quite often but Bellingham is really a once in a generation talent. Before him, in English terms, it was Rooney. For every one of these there's many who won't make it. If you're spending £27m on an 18-year old, you had better be 100% confident in his technique, his temperament and his ability to adapt. Wasting £5m on Tishbola was a big enough waste of money.

if I remember right, wasn’t Rooney 16/17 when he broke through at Everton and then 19 when he went to Utd? That goal Louie Barry scored in the cup this season against the reigning champions- you’d have to think of him as a similar standard to Rooney at that age. If we look after him right, he could really be a prospect for us if he gets a bit of luck with injuries etc. I’m dying to see him involved in some way next season, but I reckon they’ll assess over pre-season and then decide what to do with him just before the season starts.

[ADVILLAFAN]

We properly got sucked in by the 2002-04 crop. Was reading stuff like Liam Ridgewell was going to be our FA cup winning captain and Moore brothers of course better than Rooney etc when they all came through but big underachievement there with likes of Stephen Cooke completely fading out of game as soon as he got released.

...

The weird one of the whole thing was Scottish midfielder Colin Marshall.  Was sent on loan to Clyde in 03/04, then released.  He then very briefly (for 2 months) played for St Johnstone, was released, then spent the rest of 04/05 playing irregularly for Falkirk.  The following season he had short term contracts with Stranraer and Dundee.  Then he dropped off the radar for a couple of years.

Then, in 2009/10 he reappeared at Tiverton Town in Devon, ready to start a frankly bewildering international journey that saw him play in Spain (Credillente Deportivo, then in the 4th tier), Iceland (BI/Bolungarvík and Vikingur, both in their Premier League), Japan (Machida Zelvia, 2nd tier at the time), Vanuatu (Amicale FC, who reached the final of the Oceania Champions League that season), then back to Scotland for a season at Cowdenbeath, before returning to Vanuatu to play for Amicale again for a season.

The story didn't end there, though.  After a season in Vanuatu, he came back and played for Gartcairn in the 5th tier of the Scottish Junior leagues, and was last seen playing Sunday league football for Drumchapel United.

Once you played for the Mighty Villa and the Bully Wee Clyde, the only way is down really

[robbo1874]

Many tried, he went through quite a few clubs in the end. Remember him scoring the winner for Swansea against Man Sheikhy, years after leaving us. You'd be willing him to push-on and fulfill his potential but it just didn't happen.

remember the blues game at VP early Sunday k.o? He was through with a fantastic shooting chance, but unselfishly squared for JPA who fluffed his lines. I still believe if he’d have smashed it into the back of the net instead of passing it, he may have gone on to better things at Villa. A goal in that match would maybe have bought him a bit of time in the side and lowered any pressure that might have been on him.

[ADVILLAFAN]

Was nosing through the players whose contracts are up in 2022.

Giroud would be an excellent addition, experience to help Watkins,wouldn't necessarily expect to start and would actually be a dangerous option off the bench.

Or we could sign Bamford to piss Leeds off.

[UK Redsox]

Read somewhere that the clubs know that the vast majority of them have no hope of making it, but they need enough for a team to play with the couple that do have a chance. Quite a sad way of looking at it really.

That's true for all sports though.

Probably the most up front about it is Baseball, where there are 120 lower level teams preparing players for the 30 Major League teams.

There's no promotion/relegation, the teams just exist to progress the few top prospects up the levels.
The bulk of the squads are made up of poorly paid non-prospects.

[LeeB]

Many tried, he went through quite a few clubs in the end. Remember him scoring the winner for Swansea against Man Sheikhy, years after leaving us. You'd be willing him to push-on and fulfill his potential but it just didn't happen.

remember the blues game at VP early Sunday k.o? He was through with a fantastic shooting chance, but unselfishly squared for JPA who fluffed his lines. I still believe if he’d have smashed it into the back of the net instead of passing it, he may have gone on to better things at Villa. A goal in that match would maybe have bought him a bit of time in the side and lowered any pressure that might have been on him.

Remember that we'll mate

[robbo1874]

We properly got sucked in by the 2002-04 crop. Was reading stuff like Liam Ridgewell was going to be our FA cup winning captain and Moore brothers of course better than Rooney etc when they all came through but big underachievement there with likes of Stephen Cooke completely fading out of game as soon as he got released.

...

The weird one of the whole thing was Scottish midfielder Colin Marshall.  Was sent on loan to Clyde in 03/04, then released.  He then very briefly (for 2 months) played for St Johnstone, was released, then spent the rest of 04/05 playing irregularly for Falkirk.  The following season he had short term contracts with Stranraer and Dundee.  Then he dropped off the radar for a couple of years.

Then, in 2009/10 he reappeared at Tiverton Town in Devon, ready to start a frankly bewildering international journey that saw him play in Spain (Credillente Deportivo, then in the 4th tier), Iceland (BI/Bolungarvík and Vikingur, both in their Premier League), Japan (Machida Zelvia, 2nd tier at the time), Vanuatu (Amicale FC, who reached the final of the Oceania Champions League that season), then back to Scotland for a season at Cowdenbeath, before returning to Vanuatu to play for Amicale again for a season.

The story didn't end there, though.  After a season in Vanuatu, he came back and played for Gartcairn in the 5th tier of the Scottish Junior leagues, and was last seen playing Sunday league football for Drumchapel United.

Once you played for the Mighty Villa and the Bully Wee Clyde, the only way is down really

maybe he just liked travelling. Good way to do it as a young kid- playing football and getting paid along the way. I was on the train home a couple of years ago and was earwigging some young English lads who were obviously cricketers talking shite. Sounded like a great life they had here in Oz.