[Archived] Souness for boro job?

[Amo]

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[S15]

The first part of that is spot-on, in fact the thing dragged on for all or parts of 6 days before it ended after Chelsea gave him a deadline. He would go to London in the morning for negotiations each day and be back at Brockhall in the afternoon for practice. That doesn't seem like the behavior of someone itching to accept Chelsea's offer to me. As for Souey wanting him out for the cash .........nah. We'd already sold Dunn & spent £8M on Emo , Gresko, etc... The idea was to put Emo with his crossing ability across from Duff. Oh well.....

My understanding is that Souness had already spent the money prior to Duff leaving.

[doctorryan]

We got £4M of what would've been £5.8M total for Dunn, had all performance clauses been met(they eventually were not), from Birmingham and proceeded to buy Emo, Vratty, Reid & David Yelldell for around £8M total. Duff's sale was weeks after that in mid July and Bazza came a month after that. What you are talking about I haven't the slightest idea, but you seem to be suggesting that Duff was Warnocked to Chelsea. That is untrue. There were a lot of unhappy club-associated people at American University in DC that week after. Selling Duff was not part of anybody's plan until the Ambro came over the hill for him.

[S15]

I've not suggested anything.

Once Chelsea became interested Souness 'spent' the money. The dates are irrelevant, as you've missed the context. What I've stated in my two posts is fact.

[doctorryan]

What you've stated is complete BS. Abramovich negotiated the purchase of Chelsea in the last week of June 2003 and it was announced July 1st. Duff's release clause was triggered 15 days later! The deals involving Dunn, Emo, Vratty, Reid & Yelldell were all done in June before Abramovich had bailed Ken Bates out at Chelsea. So on whom exactly did Souness decide to spend money on in this period (even if we're real liberal for your sake with the time frame(say July 1-21))?

Bazza was to be a Dunn/Duff replacement & that decision was made long after the Duff sale was completed(Monday July 21).

Those are the facts sonny boy, now stop wasting everybody's time.

[S15]

What you've stated is complete BS. Abramovich negotiated the purchase of Chelsea in the last week of June 2003 and it was announced July 1st. Duff's release clause was triggered 15 days later! The deals involving Dunn, Emo, Vratty, Reid & Yelldell were all done in June before Abramovich had bailed Ken Bates out at Chelsea. So on whom exactly did Souness decide to spend money on in this period (even if we're real liberal for your sake with the time frame(say July 1-21))?

Bazza was to be a Dunn/Duff replacement & that decision was made long after the Duff sale was completed(Monday July 21).

Those are the facts sonny boy, now stop wasting everybody's time.

Honestly, you have no idea how correct I am. Like I say, what I've posted is fact, and as I know this you're responses are making you look very, very silly.

[Bobby G]

I also believe this was true. We started our spending spree when it became clear that Duff and Chelsea was WHEN not IF.

[doctorryan]

Honestly, you have no idea how correct I am. Like I say, what I've posted is fact, and as I know this you're responses are making you look very, very silly.

Whatever teenager.

I also believe this was true. We started our spending spree when it became clear that Duff and Chelsea was WHEN not IF.

What spending spree? The players in question (except for Bazza) were pursued and bought before Abramovich made his move on Chelsea. How could Souey have planned to spend money in June when there was no reason to imagine there being a Duff windfall at that point? ManU & 'Pool had made it pretty clear they weren't willing to meet the clause and Abramovich's muscle with regards to Duff wasn't flexed until the first bid was lodged on July 10. That's 11 days (the sale was completed on July 21) for Souey to think about MAYBE 1 guy (Bazza, who we bought in the last week of August). Everybody else was already in the fold.

[S15]

Whatever teenager.

What spending spree? The players in question (except for Bazza) were pursued and bought before Abramovich made his move on Chelsea. How could Souey have planned to spend money in June when there was no reason to imagine there being a Duff windfall at that point? ManU & 'Pool had made it pretty clear they weren't willing to meet the clause and Abramovich's muscle with regards to Duff wasn't flexed until the first bid was lodged on July 10. That's 11 days (the sale was completed on July 21) for Souey to think about MAYBE 1 guy (Bazza, who we bought in the last week of August). Everybody else was already in the fold.

The Duff money was spent on Ferguson and Reid.

Honestly cowboy, you're out of your depth.

[doctorryan]

I'm not wasting anymore time with you Romper Room. Whether you like it or not, Souness did not sell Duff to fund other transfers. Dunn, yeah probably, but Duff no way. Period. End of. Talk amongst yourselves.

[S15]

I'm not wasting anymore time with you Romper Room. Whether you like it or not, Souness did not sell Duff to fund other transfers. Dunn, yeah probably, but Duff no way. Period. End of. Talk amongst yourselves.

Okay, rest assured that you're wrong. From (one of) t'horses mouth and all that.

[mark1875]

What you've stated is complete BS. Abramovich negotiated the purchase of Chelsea in the last week of June 2003 and it was announced July 1st. Duff's release clause was triggered 15 days later! The deals involving Dunn, Emo, Vratty, Reid & Yelldell were all done in June before Abramovich had bailed Ken Bates out at Chelsea. So on whom exactly did Souness decide to spend money on in this period (even if we're real liberal for your sake with the time frame(say July 1-21))?

Bazza was to be a Dunn/Duff replacement & that decision was made long after the Duff sale was completed(Monday July 21).

Those are the facts sonny boy, now stop wasting everybody's time.

Brett Emerton July 10th

Lorenzo Amoruso July 14th

Steven Reid July 28th

Vratislav Gresko August 1st

David Yeldell August 4th

Barry Feruson August 29th

AND:

David Dunn was sold on July 3rd

SO HOW MANY WERE COMPLETED IN JUNE EXACTLY?

[doctorryan]

Those are the dates when they were registered, business official and all that & some of those dates are off. Everything but the crossed T's & dotted I's with regards to Dunn, Emo, Amo(remember Berg talked late on about staying another season because his house wasn't finished & Souey said no because he'd lined up Amo already), Yelldell & Vratty were finished before the end of June, with Reidy tied up in the first week of July. Millwall were dragging it out trying to use Reidy's transfer to exact revenge for giving up Lucash so cheaply. The 7/28 date was the Monday (first business day) after the plane arrived back from Washington (with Emo, Yelldell & Amo on it). Vratty was still recovering from the injury at Elland Road and did not make the trip. His loan to permanent conversion date is just when the paperwork was finished. The Bazza date is correct. He was in civilian clothes at Stamford Bridge the next day.

I stand by my story. We had all our transfer work for the summer essentially done until the Ambro came over the hill for Duff. Bazza's signing was a response to that, not something that caused that.

Is there anybody else posting on this thread who dealt with people on the business side at Ewood that summer(specifically during the time period this went down & no I'm not dropping names) or who attended either any of the training sessions at American University or the friendly against DC United?

Anybody?

[S15]

Bazza's signing was a response to that, not something that caused that.

I'm telling you that this is fundamentally wrong.

[doctorryan]

We're just going to have to disagree on that Shill. I can certainly live with that.

[nicko]

Interesting debate.

Rovers put a huge price clause in Duff's deal and thought he would stay for the length of the deal.

Chelsea were after him for weeks and eventually paid the asking price. However that was not end of the story.

Duff didn't really want to go to London but realised it was for the best in the end. He wanted to go to Man U instead, but Fergie thought he had too many injuries.

Souey did not want to sell, but had no option.

Souey had been after Barry Ferguson but did not have the cash to buy, so the Duff sale helped him raise his offer. Even then Everton thought they had outbid Rovers only to be gazumped at the death [those were the days, eh?].

http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/football/premier-league/blackburn-win-race-for-ferguson-537395.html

These things happen in football.

[S15]

We're just going to have to disagree on that Shill. I can certainly live with that.

Don't be fooled by the dates supposedly surrounding the Ferguson signing. Let me tell you it went on for well over a month, and was a complicated process, much more so than it ought to have been.

[doctorryan]

I'm not disagreeing with that at all Shill. I'm sure Souey thought of trying to acquire Ferguson for quite some time before the summer of 2003, but Rangers' asking price was always going to be steep and we already had a plethora of midfield talent at the time. Add to that the fact that the trust had really pushed the boat out in our first 2 years up (to the tune of around £20M) and you can understand Graeme's reluctance to ask for anything like that. Duff's sale changed everything though and the push for Bazza began, but Souey did not want to sell Duff.

[S15]

Duff's sale changed everything though and the push for Bazza began, but Souey did not want to sell Duff.

He may not have wanted to sell him (in the ideal world) but trust me he had the final word (given the choice of two scenarios), and made the decision.

[b12_simon]

It's Tony Mowbray

[Tim Southampton Rover]

Good manager for a club that needs to bring bums back on the seats. They'll probably end up playing some good football up there now. At times they've been worse than us to watch this season!