TWar

Not interested tbh. We have our own young CMs to develop in Diallo and Smallbone as well as a very good pair of first choice players in JWP and Romeu. If it had an option to buy then maybe but there is basically no chance of that happening.

The issue is, beating a man in an efficient way is not as simple as giving it to someone in space and letting them go. If you beat someone, nowadays their teammate will be close behind them in the danger area ready to clean up and beating two people is very very tricky and very uncommon. You get players like Saint-Maximin for newcastle who can beat a man, but most of the time to get the man alone you end up running past them into a blind alley which is why he has elite dribble numbers but his actual attacking output is pretty mediocre. To beat a man efficiently you need to create positional overloads and catch teams out, which involves just as much passing around and patience as trying to pass it through a team. You need clever runs to draw that second player out the way so that when Redmond beats the first guy he then has space to work in. Adams is very strong at this, but our attacking mids are not so great at making the most of it.

"As announced last Friday , Romain Perraud (23) will leave Brest to join Southampton, while Leeds also coveted him. Negotiations between the two clubs are continuing and final details related to bonuses remain to be finalized, but the transfer of the left-back, linked to SB 29 until 2025, is expected to exceed € 12m" Update from L'equipe (https://www.lequipe.fr/Football/Actualites/Transferts-romain-perraud-brest-proche-de-southampton/1260431), hopefully that's close then

Depend on the situation. If we don't win a single one for our first 10 games then it would have to be the managers fault, barring extenuating circumstances. Obviously if we sign those players super late, we have a tricky opening run, and we lose some key players to injury in the summer then maybe we could see past it, if we were playing well and there were a number of draws.

Could be Tavares. Hope not though, I have since heard exclusively bad things about him.

Nah it that link they say "Perraud seems closer to Southampton, which has good relations with the Finistère leaders. The two clubs have already collaborated last summer for the transfer of midfielder Ibrahima Diallo to the Saints , who had approached Perraud this winter. The operation should be completed in the coming days."

L'Equipe broke it first tbf. https://www.lequipe.fr/Football/Actualites/Romain-perraud-brest-vers-l-angleterre/1259168

What ego? I don't mean to pick holes I have just never heard evidence of him being especially egotistical.

Anyone got an athletic subscription and can give the gist of this?

Most fullbacks are around 5'10 or lower: -Robertson and Trent are 5'9 and 5'10. -Walker and Cancelo are 5'10'' and 6'0. -James and Chilwell are 5'9 and 5'10. -Shaw and Wan-Bisakka are 6'0 (apparently, dunno about that) and 6'0. -Aurier and Regullion are 5'9 and 5'10 - Tierney and Bellerin are 5'10 and 5'10 KWP and Perraud would be 5'7 and 5'7 which would definitely be a little shorter but not miles off the norm.

The lad they went after (Galan) is apparently one of the best dribblers in europe. Tbh Perraud suits us better by the looks of things as he is three years younger so fits our model and plays mainly in a back 4 whereas Galan operates mostly as a wingback in front of a back 3

Should have said, broke about 3 days ago by l'equipe and now being repeated by le10sport. Both are pretty good sources but not iron clad.

Seems close enough now to have it's own thread. What do people think of this deal? Seems like a bargain to me, great attacking numbers and very compatible skills. 3 goals and 7 assists last season is pretty handy.

Not really. We have very high fullbacks and four dedicated attacking players. If he pushed right up too then we would be very exposed on the counter. His job is to be more of a Schneiderlin than a Steven Davis. If you look at any formation that effectively has four forwards (4231, 4222, 424, ect.) they always have a deep sitting double pivot because 7 attacking players is dangerously excessive and fullbacks are told to bomb on.

Because that would put us at risk of relegation which would be orders of magnitude more harmful than a debt we don't have to pay off till 2025 anyway

Villa have a bit of cash but they are much further away than the likes of Leicester or even Everton. They have two top players in Grealish and Martinez. Three players who are decent but honestly not much better than we have in Cash, Watkins, and Konsa. And then a bunch of very average players, some might get into our side as we are below average in those positions but definitely are a mile off top 6 worthy. No Grealish and they crumble to bits immediately. Buendia looks handy but he is very much unproven in the prem and, while his underlying numbers were good, is certainly not a certain bet.

Maybe he wanted to give Henderson a game to see if he is fit enough and if not just claim he aggravated the injury in the game and replace him too.

One of them got relegated. If you think "number of wins per season" is a baseball statistic I don't know what to tell you. Counting number of wins is about as simple as it comes. Sounds to me like you are the one with an agenda, pining for someone who finished 12th or lower five out of their six seasons and getting relegated in the process.

In his first two prem seasons he had a win rate of 29% and 31%. His overall prem winrate was 29.4%. Ralph had win rates of 39% and 31% with an average of 35.5%. Ralphs worst season with saints had the same winrate as Howes best with Bournemouth. Bournemouth also had a much higher net spend than us. Howe was an average manager who got relegated, it is not us that are rewriting history. He did well to get promoted but being a good championship level manager doesn't make him quality in the big leagues.

We'd be mental to give him up for that. Top player, key to how we play, one of the best holding mids in the league statistically, and provided 15 goal involvements from deep. He is worth well more than that to us. Being top in the league for goals from set plays and assists from set plays in worth that alone, must have won us atleast 10 pts from his set pieces this season that others wouldn't have.

No chance. England international, just signed a long term contract, still just 26, our captain. He'd be £60m atleast and they don't have that sort of money to drop on one player.

Diallo is fine, he's still getting up to speed. Djenepo has not kicked on how we had hoped but it's disengenuous to single out those two and not mention, for example, KWP who was one of our players of the season, or Adams who has come along well, or Salisu who looks quality.

Salisu and Adams have been good imo, Diallo still to be proven. Also Ralph is twice the manager of Howe. Spent more than us every year and got relegated, no thanks!

Sounds it yeah, Perraud looks quality tbh.

Would be a superb signing imo