GrahamC

Brighton have sold Mac Allister & fully expect to lose Caicedo. They have qualified for Europe for the first ever time & will need a squad at least 4 players larger than last season’s as a result. Milner is 37 now & likely to be used as a right sided squad player, possibly at RB. Gross filled in there but he’s much better further forward. Whether they sign Scott or not (& I would not be at all surprised) they still need another midfielder, or 2 when Caicedo goes.

No, there are 12 subs & he wasn’t one of them, same thing happened to Joe Low with Wales.

He didn’t make the match day squad, hardly a surprise as this was his first call up at all.

They’ll sign another 5 on loan in the run up to the season, not a chance they’ll all arrive in the next week, as sides usually decide on those they loan out after pre season has started. Their recruitment so far (basically a 34 year old who wanted to return to the area) mirrors their new “stand” progress, loads of talk but not very much action.

This is so spot on. I don’t have an issue with Ipswich as a club but read a BBC article by former player Mick Mills last week about “how the buzz was back”, he could “see them challenging for back to back promotions” & just thought you’ve been in League One since 2019 pal & have absolutely no idea how brutal it is. Fixtures are our next week, wait until you have a week where you play for example Middlesbrough away, Sunderland home & then travel to Rotherham. He’d be thinking that 3rd game is easy, reality is they’ll battle like **** & won’t give you a moment. They are by no means the biggest club in the division & like us will go up against 5 clubs with a massive financial advantage, I’d be keeping my mouth shut if I was them.

He’s just rehashed Jones’ usual guesswork & trawling the internet. None of us really know, presumably having played a lot longer than most of the players because of the U20 games Scott is currently on holiday, which explains the silence in public to me, but no one knows for certain.

Problem with that is it quotes Jordan Jones, a Cardiff fan who knows the square root of **** all about us. Might as well talk to someone stood outside the Barley Mow as that *******.

Some villages In Cheshire would be in the Champions League.

That was Cornick.

They are very rare these days but certainly an adjustment of the fee for Knight makes sense if they do end up going in opposite directions.

No way could Exeter pay his current wages or afford the fee we would want. Plymouth much more likely, Rotherham & Derby would be my 2 other guesses.

Lots of talk in France that he’s headed back to Monaco.

Yes I do. It pissed down, I got soaked & spent a lot of the game wondering why I was there. Shelton was a great player, up there with Marvin Elliott of all of those post our time in the top flight for me.

Think they moved from Leeds to Man U at a very similar time, plus of course were international team mates. I’m sure this will have hit him hard. Very sad, 70 really is no age.

Firstly that last bit clearly isn’t true, some on here obviously know far more than others, they certainly aren’t predicting signings that then come off weeks in advance by sheer guesswork. This is just a completely unrealistic suggestion, Kalas has had an injury hit year but no way on earth has the conversation gone “how do you feel about sticking around for 6 months on half your old pay & then we’ll see how it goes”?. Baker got a new two year deal when we offered him a contract in a similar case, & he had actually played fewer games in the previous season, so it will almost certainly be that sort of duration. He is clearly keen to stay but also smart enough to realise that if he can get better than what is a 50% pay cut from July elsewhere then he needs to give that full consideration. With his current contract expiring in a fortnight now we will know soon enough.

If you consider that Massengo seems virtually certain to move on, Kalas’ future seems to be 50/50 & Bajic & the club need to have a conversation about exactly what’s happening there, should all those 3 go then that’s probable, even before we get to Scott’s situation.

He’s 35 next season, so my guess is he has been offered longer by them than by Plymouth. He’s from this part of the world (Chepstow) so makes sense, plus he’s going to find League One a darn sight easier than the Championship these days.

He was a brilliant actor. Always remember him in Porridge, where like everyone else in the cast he was superb. Someone says to him “never judge a book by its cover” to which he replied “I do, I can’t read”.

They do need to sell, but Ruben Neves would probably cover that on his own. Lopetegui said in his recent conversation with their board that he accepts the FFP situation is difficult so wants to sign “young, Championship players” fairly obvious who he has in mind.

Spent about that on the Kyiv lad in January & he’s rarely featured.. Pretty sure they spent circa £50m in total during the January window. I don’t see him ending up there, still think he’s destined for Wolves myself but all guesswork at present.

I think if Kalas does sign back on & Hayden Roberts joins as expected that’s probably it for defenders. We’d have Tanner, McCrorie, Vyner, Dickie, Kalas, Naismith, Pring & Roberts, plus Atkinson to return after his ACL injury at some point & the lesser spotted Kane Wilson. Looks enough for any eventuality to me & then the focus would presumably be on replacing Massengo & awaiting the outcome of whether Scott stays or goes.

Just 34 of those were in the Prem, has to be him.

Stuart Taylor, I guess.

If anyone thinks this is either new or we haven’t taken advantage of this in the past, in our L1 promotion season GJ loaned in a lad called Sean Thomas to do this job, then when Basso was injured late in the season we could bring in John Ruddy as a result.

They said it would be a “trouble flashpoint” & they “didn’t have the resources” to man it. Seemed nonsense to me but I was told then (this is many years ago) they would block any attempt to build one.