Saint Matty 76

And the Roma fans are talking about how they'd buy him the one-way-ticket themselves. Remember being excited for Carrillo until I translated some tweets from Monaco fans who were just laughing at the fee.

Brereton-Diaz loan with an option, same as Sheffield United just had, seems like a no brainer. Just had a good goalscoring rate at a really poor team and it'd still allow us our two PL loan spots.

Would be an absolutely excellent signing, with/without KWP as he could just move over to the left. I imagine he'd have a better option within the league, but maybe there'd be some sort of preference for him to play in a possession system like ours? Seems unlikely, but I am intrigued to see how much use we can make out of our two PL loans this year.

Appreciate it! Wasn't doubting by any means, just truly clueless to how it's all laid out these days. Chelsea don't help.

How is this possible though, given the fact that we pretty much recuperated all the money we spent from 22/23 last year?

I'd be surprised to see us go away from the 5-3-2, especially given that CB is probably our strongest depth and it was trusted in the important games at the end of the season. ? KWP - THB - Bednarek - ABK - Fraser Smallbone - ?/Downes - ? A. Armstrong - ? Suddenly looks a little less daunting in terms of incomings. Potential for players like Stewart, Alcaraz and Lallana to fill those gaps if we don't get business done before August as well. Definitely not an exciting team, you have to say.

The worst part about the absolutely massive amount of squad building we require is that we’ll probably still lose our best player (KWP) due to him only having a year left on his deal.

50-odd PL appearances in the last three years at LB, RB, LM or RM in Brentford. Couple of spells as a starter but mainly utility player by the looks of it. No complaints if it’s true, definitely not messing about with a lack of experience this year. No genuine idea of his ability, mind. https://griffinpark.org/forums/threads/saman-ghoddos.134246/page-59 Top guy, rarely let us down but questionable physically seems to be the consensus.

Tammy would be excellent but definitely out of our reach. Any striker we sign is going to have red flags, just like Ings did when we signed him off the back of the ACL’s. Not going to be a perfect sounding option out there.

Brereton Diaz did okay numbers wise for Sheffield United on the face of it, but that really is one uninspiring list. You'd like to think we've got a decent amount of money to spend this Summer right? £130m spent in 22/23 before making £150m in 23/24, and now the added financial bonus of promotion... Going to take a lot to even have a good go at it, if we're being honest.

Confirmed we're in talks to extend both Che and McCarthy. It's a thank you and goodbye to both from my perspective, based on both what they'd want and a real need for us to progress.

One of my favourite players over the past few years, hope he gets a good move back to Scotland or that Fiorentina one I’ve seen mentioned. Great player on his day, legs are on their way out but a great signing for £7m(?).

£4m for Lyanco would’ve been a nice start. Hopefully someone else mental matches that.

Love to be proved wrong but we’re not signing Ramsdale. He’ll have plenty of better options, such as Newcastle. We should be aiming for Pope if at all possible once that happens.

Charity home regarding Broja is pretty unfair. Fair enough with Ings/Lallana etc. Given the fact he's 22, he actually perfectly encapsulates what has been our most successful business model of the last 10 years. Signing young, promising players who've fallen out of favour at a big club but could do a job elsewhere - KWP, Hojbjerg, Ings, Romeu, Bertrand. The injury is definitely a worry, as well as the Fulham spell, but I think anyone expecting us to sign a "sure thing" is kidding themselves. If it happens, I'm happy to be of the belief that an actual run playing football could get him back to where he was, rather than the fleeting in-and-out spells he's had both at Chelsea, and at Fulham behind Muniz who was in record-breaking form. Wouldn't be delighted to throw £20-25m at it off the bat, and would only love the signing if it was on more favourable terms such as a loan with an option/obligation based on performance. However, definitely wouldn't be labelling the move as a charity signing. Links to players such as Gimenez and Guirassy are just comical, and will never happen within our budget. We have to take risks.

ABK is an absolute no brainer to reintegrate for me if his heads in it, and I feel with him attending Wembley that it probably is. We'd do very well to find better than him in our price range, and with a good PL year he's immediately a £40/50m player. THB, ABK, Bednarek, Stephens + one new signing feels like a good core of CB's for me. Lawrence to try and break through, or one more year out on loan? Alcaraz is difficult. He was, for me, the standout positive of the second half of last season, but he was really disappointing in the Championship. Doesn't seem to fit the Martin style of football due to somewhat questionable passing. A good player but not one who is right for this system? Sell (if we get a good fee) and reinvest candidate, but I'd be happy to see him involved. I can't say I've ever rated Perraud. Better than what we have? Yes. At the level I'd want? Probably not. I'd understand bringing him back and using him to fill a gap if we feel like there's bigger priorities this Summer. It wouldn't be devastating for him to return, and it certainly wouldn't be devastating for us to receive ~£10m and go elsewhere. TLDR; I'd be disappointed to lose ABK. Alcaraz/Perraud not particularly fussed either way.

Absolutely fucking not! But it truly cannot get much worse.

This is where we need to stop being so "romantic" as a club. Thank you very much for stepping up when it mattered, McCarthy. However, you've been more than appropriately compensated for that throughout your contract here and it's time to part ways with fond memories. We have to get a better goalkeeper now, and we're legitimately fortunate that Bazunu is injured otherwise we'd have unfathomably given him another shot in this league. Ramsdale and Ortega are two ambitious (and remarkably unlikely) names of keepers available this Summer. If Ramsdale ends up going to Newcastle, could we get Pope? Di Gregorio was statistically the most impressive keeper this season, so that's a name I wouldn't be surprised to see a link for. Although based on Bazunu, I think SR stop caring about statistics when it's in relation to a Goalkeeper. I was impressed by Max O'Leary at Bristol City, for a more realistic name. Brentford & Brighton (the two other similarly ran clubs) pulled their Goalkeepers from Freiburg and Anderlecht last Summer however, so I'm sure we'll end up with a name we've not heard before.

I'd take Broja on a really favourable loan deal, but nothing else. He doesn't look to be the same player we had, but maybe he can get back there with a serious run of games. It'd need to be something like a buy option/obligation if he plays a certain number of games etc.

I think people care a little too much about this one. He's not going to be on a big wage, he's not going to play 30 games and he's more than likely going to be a dressing room figure than an intended on the pitch difference maker. I think his biggest playing role will be coming on in the late stages of games to calm the game down and keep some control of the ball. If he ends up doing anything more than that it's probably because he's excelled. Hopefully he can make a real positive impact on Dibling, Amo-Ameyaw etc as well. Another good figure in the dressing room with plenty of top level experience, fine with me.

Would definitely like to think our scouts could do better than this current version of Ings. However, I'd quickly get on board if he is where we landed. Wouldn't cost a lot and we never got close to replacing his level of finishing.

Just seen that since the 2014/15 season, we're actually £8m in profit on transfers. The only current top flight team who are in profit during this timeframe. The next lowest-spending team who've been in the Prem throughout this period is Brentford at -£35m, followed by Brighton at -£69m and then also promoted Leicester at -£133m. This obviously goes all the way up to Man Utd, Man City & Chelsea, who all have net spend figures exceeding £1billion in this 10 year timeframe. Chelsea have actually spent £2.35billion on outgoings during this spell, which is hilarious. Would like to think we have a pretty reasonable budget for this season. SR went quite heavy in their first year, which we recuperated most of last season after the relegation.

Fraser seems like a popular guy, and I think it's easy to underestimate the importance on good characters in the squad. Something we really lacked last season by the sounds of things. Seems to be Lumley's kicker too. I'm almost certain he's not the answer on the pitch for a Premier League team, but he put in a brilliant shift yesterday. As long as he takes a huge pay cut (which I can only imagine he will have to) I'd be okay with him as a squad player.

Ronnie Edwards be happy to be described as big for the first time though!

I'm definitely not, nah. There'll be way more squad players added, but only wrote the ones where I think we'd have the need for an immediate starter.