Lallana's Left Peg

Talks very well, sounds like potential captain material. Hopefully he's not rubbish.

I think some familiar issues will continue to haunt us but we've made steps to address others and it feels more positive. It won't be an exciting season, but it'll be one in which we'll have plenty of new players to watch and one where I don't think we'll be looking over our shoulders.

This is quite a prestigious tournament - great going from the team.

You probably could. But could you identify ones that are available, that are within budget, that fit the recruitment profile, and that we have the right relationships with their agents and club to get a deal done whilst also facing competition for the player and having to manage timescales and the dependencies the deal hinges on?

England did very well this tournament but our ability in possession is massively lacking and it ultimately cost us. We progressed through great organisation and belief, but the quality has not been there. There are loads of things to be pleased with, but equally still lots to improve on too. To say we were unlucky is wrong - we got what we deserved last night.

If we persist with the narrow two behind the striker and the width coming from the wing-backs then we may not. In that formation, Armstrong would be considered one of the two to play behind the striker and wingers are not required.

The point is valid - we absolutely need several departures to have a manageable squad not only financially, but also to be able to actually register them. And that's even before any more signings.

I haven't seen much of Gunn but there is a lot of hype around him. If the fee really is only £10m, and he is willing to leave Man City for us to compete for the #1 spot and we can also shift Forster for the same amount to Chelsea and (I presume) Gunn will be on smaller wages for now then this is a really good move by the club. Given McCarthy has signed a new deal, then we're probably going from a tandem of McCarthy and Forster to McCarthy and Gunn and it hasn't cost us anything. McCarthy does need viable competition, and Gunn seems like a great player to provide it to him.

It's encouraging. I think the club have tried to be too clever in the recent past and now other clubs are after the same sort of players it just comes down to money and the promise that when a bigger club comes in we'll let them leave.

This is a bit different: Clearly benefits from being bigger and stronger than others his age in these clips but not often we get kids from Academies like Real Madrid on trial with us.

So the financials likely aren't as simple as this but at a high level you could suggest Vestergaard is costing us £5.5m and Boufal. Considering the later has no future at the club, that doesn't seem too bad.

That is absolutely awful from Forster - straight down his throat he jumps up like that giving him no chance to save it. He's completely done.

A new scholar joining: http://football-wonderkids.co.uk/player/lucas-defise/ We do seem to pick up a lot of kids who Chelsea and Arsenal release.

Yep, absolutely any goodwill they get from being brave and pressing high they lose by some of the worst game management in recent memory. These are professional footballers and they did one of the most amateur things possible so you can't have any sympathy for them.

I think that is how it works from an accountancy perspective but in football terms any time you sign a young player for a lot of money and you sell him for quite a bit less, it's a complete bust. He looked good on paper, I don't recall many saying he was a bad signing, it's just that a combination of his attitude and our circumstance (and lets face it, some bad managers) meant it never worked for him. I'm happy we can get a fee and move on rather than have to keep loaning him.

Interesting article: https://www.vg.no/sport/fotball/i/m64Eg0/moi-til-vg-etter-rekordovergangen-de-kjenner-meg-nesten-bedre-enn-jeg-kjenner-meg-selv He's going to wear number 11 and we've been scouting him for six years!

Here is a list of starting CB's in the Premier League who are under 6ft: Nathan Ake Tim Ream Denis Odoi That's three out of 40. Size may not be the be all and end all for ability in the air, but in the Premier League it clearly matters alot and that is why Premier League teams recruit big centre backs. Santos is not a good size for this league. He needs to be outstanding in other areas in order to make an impact.

Looks undersized to me, especially for the Premier League. Not convinced but I suppose £10m is cheap these days.

It's not even a question of money - we can only register a certain amount of players and with younger prospects now of an age where they also need to be registered rather than not be, we simply have to trim the squad otherwise we'll have players who can't play for us in any league game which is a waste of everyones time.

Yeah it seems odd to me as well. I assumed our move for him was off the back of McCarthy leaving, but even if Forster left, are we really going to spend £15m on a keeper as a backup - and one who wants first team football? It doesn't add up to me, though I'm not saying the stories are rubbish, I just wonder what the big plan is.

That's Ajax saying they have paid 11.4m Euros for him, rising to 13.7m Euros dependent on bonuses. That's £10m rising to £12m. That is dirt cheap. An absolute steal.

They absolutely all play different roles but they are all competing for 3 spaces in the team dependent on how we set-up, and its not sustainable for us in our current position to have 8 senior pros competing for those positions. It wasn't sustainable last season for us to have 7, so Clasie and Reed left, and now they are back and we've added to the group, so something has to give. Clasie and Reed seem obvious, but another must surely go. Davis has struggled but I can't see the club letting him leave.

Like the look of this guy based on YouTube (which is of course no way to judge a player): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VvYpQiznHO4 Did well against Man City too, which isn't always easy to achieve.

He's a signing in the area of the park we're already well stocked. Who's off? There is no way a club of our size maintains the following in the first team squad: Reed Romeu Clasie Davis Ward-Prowse Lemina Hojbjerg Armstrong Clasie and Reed were already loaned out last season as we had too many, and now we're adding another.

Doesn't exactly scream ambition to me but given our track record with Celtic I'm more than willing to see how it goes.