Eddie

I’m not surprised with that name

This is the one for me. Players always seem quicker and the pace of play seems much faster

Modric on the way!

Exactly that. Forced to. The bollocks of PSR - they got forest’s 3rd keeper for £15m+ to offset so it worked financially for both sides. He’s a proper player though, regardless.

FFS

Agreed, there would be ways to soften the blow. But then let’s say we go straight back down, you’re locked into another £3.75m of future payments with £12m less revenue. Whichever way you look at it, to make big (enough) you’ve got to be spending big (relatively) in the first place, unless you can rely on an academy system to produce them instead - which is why Conway will be given a good shot at it next season because if he can prove himself to some degree at the Championship level then we’ve potentially developed our own c.£5m asset. Anyway, straying into the finance side but it was just to highlight that the gambles on player signings have (possibly obviously) just stepped up a notch!

I agree with the view that loan, we have a chance, buy we don’t. Just using it as an example though, it’s where the world of second tier football becomes a massive gamble. We won’t break even without profit on players and frankly, £1m here and there won’t do it either. Say Brighton would sell for £5-6m with a nice sell on clause - I don’t think we have the capital backing to stump it up at this point, but if we did and the shareholders saw the opportunity, do you find the £5m on the gamble that he has a wonder season either this year or next in the championship and suddenly you can sell for £10-15m? He’s the kind of player that could have that season, he’s the kind of player that would catch the attention, but then again he could have another season like he did at Rovers and there goes your £5m. Glad it’s not me making those decisions (again, I don’t think we’re in a place at the mo to be making such big ones but maybe at the £2-3m mark we are).

I presumed he’d be about 36, turns out he’s only 33.

Simons smashing that goal in in the 2nd leg. I haven’t celebrated like that for a long long time.

I noticed every bugger in Bradford had one on when we went up there. Boiling hot and the majority of their fans had scarves round them.

You were dying to get that out, weren’t you? 😂 About a 1% relevance to TMGJ’s post and you were on it in a flash.

He got a mention from us over the play off final weekend (because Baines and some of the coaching staff jogged past). Apparently very keen to keep playing - doubt he’ll look to move from the North West and he isn’t moving to another prem club. Pretty well known to be the best of the best in terms of squad presence / behind the scenes stuff. If his legs are still there then I’d have him in, although you wouldn’t be doing it if Christie is genuinely sticking around as our second right back, it’d be like Dad’s army down that side.

I’d need to buy a white coat. It needs to be about 40 degrees outside for me to just wear a t-shirt in the west upper - it’s at least 25 degrees lower than outside up there!

Any transfer news?

If that’s right (no reason to doubt you) then fair enough. Clearly wants to be closer to home and who knows it might have been a better offer. He will have known it right through the play offs and still was up there for 3 motm awards - he ended up playing left back in the final and still looked decent. Well done to him and he’ll get a warm reception from me when we play them this season.

Some made up assumption that Zog. I think a less sensationalist way of saying your point would be - does Sheehan have the overall midfield attributes to compete in higher quality league, where he’s less likely to stand out for his passing ability? It’s a fair point, but you could ask it of any of our players - can they make the step up? Based on the fact he’s played quite a lot of international football, Sheehan would probably be the one you’d say has the best chance, but it’s far from guaranteed. If you can prove that the majority of midfielders in the Championship can pass to 80% (what does that even mean) of his ability without compromising other midfield attributes - then fair play because I wouldn’t know where to start.

Said this before - he’s also someone they trust to fire the ball into (and ACD) as an easy out ball. Before these two came into the team it was Sheehan or other centre back / full back, putting a lot of pressure on him, once they came in you had multiple options to have confidence in getting us up the pitch.

Very rarely listen to stuff like this (other people’s opinions are often terrible) but you’re spot on, that’s really good. The Oxford lad’s first 10 minutes of talking about the game could have been coming out of my own mouth - so he must know his stuff 😂. He might want to change his passcode to his phone though the idiot.

Centre mid is an interesting one. I think any of the 4 going would be a shock but then it doesn’t leave you much space to improve it. RR - only just come in, looks like he could make the step up quality wise Erhahon - paid a decent fee and only been with us a season. I think he might struggle but still think it would be a surprise to see him go. Simons - again, only with us a season. Clearly has something. Young enough to improve but not shown enough this season to be good enough without that improvement for the Champ. Sheehan - new contract last season, heartbeat of the team through L1. Would be very surprised to see him go. If none of them go then there’s only really space for 1 to replace Dempsey, but I think he’ll want more so I reckon we’ll see a surprise or two. Maybe a Simons loan to a top end L1 team to free up another spot?

I agree, and also agree that if they did it’s a fucking phenomenal reflection of their character given their efforts and performances through the play offs.

Some fucking hangover for these lads, if they have only found out today

We currently lose about £12m a year. Broadly speaking, if we were to keep the cost base (ie mainly player wages) exactly the same then we basically become break even next season. The question then comes - how much do want to unbalance the books again? How much are you happy to increase the wage budget by to give ourselves a better chance of staying up and therefore create a loss again. Bonkers industry. It’s like your cost base is always 1 league ahead of your revenue (and that’s without considering your budget for spending on buying players).

I might be completely wrong on this, but I don’t think the linesman is meant to flag retrospectively for a foul, only for offsides once the phase of play is over. In which case, I don’t think we can say that either of them ‘missed it’ as such.

I’d actually spotted it as it happened because we were on that side of the stadium and I saw his head whip back (whip is a bit exaggerated). It’s only because I saw what happened when Calvert-Lewis had his hair pulled v United that I knew it was going to get pulled back. I was saying to the lads as they were breaking away that it doesn’t matter because it’s coming back for a penalty - as much as it was great in the end for us, it’s a ridiculous way to watch football.

If we didn’t have VAR on Sunday then I reckon the ref gives the foul on Johnston - it’s too obvious to the naked eye that he was clipped, there was no other reason to go down. One of those where I think the ref refs it differently because he knew he could just wait to see it more clearly once it was all done. The hair pull we wouldn’t have got - but frankly it’s farcical that that’s a red and a penalty anyway (I know, rules are rules) so I wouldn’t exactly be fuming if that one wasn’t given but you benefited from no VAR.