King Kante

At this moment in time, I would take a Ben Foster over Kepa, so yeah, any GK will do.

Cillisen is the best of the three GK's so hopefully if this is true it would just be Cillisen here. Onana's handling is fairly poor, he saves stuff but he always pushed it back into really dangerous areas. Plus you have to lose him once every two years for the ACoN's. That isn't going to work of he is GK1.

I wasn't too sure about Rice but after watching him consistently for the last 5-6 games I am starting to become more and more convinced that he would be a good buy for us. Problem is actually getting hold of him. I reckon it will require Rice putting in a transfer request and Moyes still having a boner for Barkley.

To be fair, Maguire for £80m looks like the bargain of the century compared to £72m for the funsized GK with T-rex arms.

I can see us getting another 5 players in (including Harvetz.) What people are forgetting is that usually a club will have 4 players in/out a year and we have essentially 2 years of transfers to do in one. At this point in time, the absolute No.1 priority has to be a GK. At this point Kepa is so bad we just need to get a bang average one in order to see a massive improvement. This could simply mean getting a Ben Foster on a free or someone similar as Kepa is literally being out played by most other teams GK2. After that, a CB is needed. This is the real tricky part as good CB's these days are like rocking horse sh*t. However, again we have such shocking players, even someone like Dunk would be an improvement. The thing that will be important at CB is to not overpay and try to shift at least one of our current lot for similar sort of money. This will probably mean Zouma. At LB, I am not too worried as there are a few knocking about. My preferences are for: Telles, Gosens and from the little I have seen of him Hernandez. For me, Tags needs to be avoided as we cannot afford another physically weak player and Chilwell needs to be avoided as vastly overpriced and not that great. If we buy him, it wouldn't surprise me if people wanted yet another LB in one years time. No.8 - Harvetz. Just get the deal done. As for other areas of the squad, we then need: AM4 (if Willian leaves), DM (if Jorgi leaves) and possibly a physical No.6 (this would require Kante to leave.) However, those areas may need to wait as the above is more important, although I wouldn't be surprised if one happens (most likely AM4.) As for players that need to leave; Batsh*t - Palace are desperate for a CF and he did well for them last season. Anything at £15m+ is a win now owing to his contract. Baka - Cannot afford to loan him yet again. Just get shot. Kepa - Loan him out. I just do not want to see him in standing in our goal like some sort of closet gimp. Literally had enough of him. If needs be, put in the u23 squad. Barkley - Sell this summer as otherwise we'll end up in the situation where he will see his contract out. Zouma - All our CB's are not good enough but Zouma is still rated fairly highly. Take advantage of this and try to get £30m+. If needs be do a loan with compulsory buy. As for the complete dregs: Drinky, Baba etc just write them off as complete losses.

Problem is he plays as No.10 for the US national team.

Anyone that is left defending Kepa needs to be banned from all transfer and player rating topics as they clearly know nothing about football.

343 tonight please SFL. Team should be as follows; Kepa Dave. AC. Rudi James. Alonso Kova. Mount/Jorgi Willian. Giroud. Puli Bench: Willy, Zouma, Emerson, Jorgi/Mount, Barkley, RLC, CHO, Pedro, Tammy Things that I have considered. 1) Zouma/AC. This season has proven these two are respectively incompetent at dealing: physical teams (AC) and high press teams (Zouma). Please let this not be forgotten as it was at Sheff Utd when AC started. 2) Giroud/Tammy. Giroud is currently one of our best players and Tammy has been dire in his last two starts. Lets remember this. 3) Mount/Jorgi. Torn on this one, could do with Mount's pressing but also need Jorgi's passing ability under the press. Coin flip on this one. My preference is for Mount to start and Jorgi to calm things down later on when the pace is a little slower. Understand if it goes the other way. 4) 433/343 - We need to defend properly for the first 60-70 mins as they are a lot fresher than us. A draw is ok in this one for us. Do not let us go gung ho, have our pants pulled down and then have us under huge pressure for Wolves. Also, 343 is the formation we need against Wolves so lets not chop and change it too much. If we concede early take off one of Alonso/James and put on one of the midfielders.

It does make a lot of sense as the figures also make it work out that Atalanta get a LB for free for four years as the additional money will cover his wages for four years. However, there is nothing I can see being reported about it. Also, Gosens and Alonso are very similar so, I am not too sure if he is the right fit for us (unless we also sell Alonso, but then that requires even more churn than we are expecting.)

A Italian friend of mine has said Emerson may actually end up at Atalanta which is why we are being linked with Gosens. According to him, Gosens has been told he can leave but they need a replacement and Emerson is a possibility as he is our lowest paid player (reportedly £40k a week, which Atalanta can afford.) Deal would apparently be Emerson plus €10m or something. Personally, I am not convinced as it sounds BS, but I thought I would report.

Mount is easily our Young Player of the Year and has a chance of also being Player of the Year (Kova probably will pip him.)

Rumours are that it is £250k x 3 years. So, £39m or £40m with bonuses minimum. At that price, we shouldn't be re-signing him. I personally would love him to sign for 1 year but a £40m hit is too much, especially as he is not exactly the most athletic player. One bad injury and he is probably done. If the £250k figures are correct, then signing a Bena from Brentford makes sense. He would probably be something like £30m plus £60k a week (he will be on peanuts at Brentford). That would work out at about £42.5m for four years and you have a asset that you can sell on. Willian is a sunk cost as soon as he signs.

WHU will press them if they can still be bothered now that they are safe. However, I agree. I think we need to either hope for a Utd loss/draw tonight then a minimum of a draw tonight against the Dippers. I personally do not trust us not to buckle against Wolves if we need to win.

Been thinking about Puli's marketing potential. Surely next season, if Willian does leave, he will be given the No.10, no?

Indeed. To be fair, a LB should not be that hard to get. The following are available: Tags - Personally, not sold but cheap. Telles - I am happy with him as long as everyone accepts he isn't great at defending but can look past that for his attacking output. Gosens - Been linked but I find it odd, he would make sense as a Alonso replacement but not to be in tandem with Alonso. Personally I would just keep Alonso. At GK, even if we only get a Foster or a Areola we will be in a much better situation as it would mean a better GK placing pressure on Kepa. CB will be the tricky one. There aren't many of them about and most of the good ones are either just potentially good or already with a big team. Personally, I just want a CB that can marshall the back line and head a ball, for me I wouldn't be that against a Dunk type of signing (I recognise he isn't glamorous) so long as he could be had for sub-£35m.

All my family on one side support Palace and they really liked him. Palace this season have only scored 30 goals in 37 games, so he would probably make a lot of sense for them. I think the problem with Batsh*t will be his wages. If he is primarily money motivated then staying at Chelsea to collect £120k a week, then move next season on a free (which would allow him similar wages as therr would be no fee) is the financially savvy move. Hopefully, the Euro's will make him keen to move.

Yeah, I have been saying that we essentially need a board that smoke crack in order to get rid of Kepa. Barca, may just be the crack head's we need.

Problem is Rice's contract goes to 2024 so WHU hold all the cards. If they do agree such a deal then they are even more crazy than everyone thought.

To get Rice, it will be likely we would need him to put in a transfer request.

Can't say I have seen Rajkovic but I am now against a Onana signing, whereas before I was open to it. My reasons for this are: 1) He hasn't got the greatest hands. He saves a lot of stuff but he doesn't really ever catch it or palm it away properly, this results in the ball going straight back into dangerous areas. I have a friend who supports Ajax that I recently spoke to and he said, they call him a teflon GK as nothing sticks. 2) ACoN commitments are too much. Yes, there is not one this year but it is a bi-annual event. We cannot afford to have a GK1 missing for 6 weeks in the most important part of the season every two years.

Have to agree. My policy on CB's is, if Pep wants them, avoid at all costs.

A lot of talk about Gosens going on. I am slightly surprised if we did pick him as he is essentially Alonso 2.0. Personally, I do rate him but I am not sure about him in a back 4 as he usually plays LWB in a 5. Also, if he and Harvetz does happen, everything is going to get fairly Germanic pretty quickly. I just hope it doesn't mean we have to play Celine Dion at half time or something.

Yeah, Giroud being frozen out is easily the most cray, cray thing SFL had done since he has been here. I wouldn't even mind but he was one of the best players in the Super Cup final and was useful in a couple of others early on. Then he essentially got ghosted.

If he doesn't start the next two I will go ape sh*t. I was absolutely fuming when he didn't start WHU and SU. I mean if SFL wanted to give Tammy starts he should've done it against Norwich and Warford not the better teams.

Tbh, everything I have seen of RLC tells me he is just happy to be here. I cannot see him pushing to move if he is a squad player.