Ah good old Rich

As an anti-loan man I've reached the stage where I'd be quite pleased with Cunningham on loan for the season. Expectations have plummeted to the stage where any competent defensive additions would be welcomed.

Move quickly and get the deal done? Not likely here. Why would Cardiff do us or anyone else a favour by loaning him out on the cheap?

I'm convinced that Mowbray sees our CB options as being Mulgrew, Lenihan, Williams, Nyambe and this City lad and thinks he has enough there. Ignoring of course that three of them aren't really CBs and three are injury prone.

Fair enough to let Magloire out to get games IF there's a CB coming in but if not then I give up. After what happened in January/February with letting defenders out and ending up with injuries and having to call upon Magloire in the league we will have even less depth should either Mulgrew or Lenihan get injured. Playing a dangerous game here.

Rovers have made reference to FFP rules on a consistent basis over the last 2-3 years, eager to point out to fans that they are restricted as to what they can do under FFP constraints and suggesting that they'd like to do more but can't. I've just pointed out that Derby have found more than one way around the rules to enable them to continue to recruit well, invest heavily and compete for promotion without any suggestion of a punishment. It all boils down to how much you want something. Derby really want promotion and have kept going and investing to get there, riding roughshod over the FFP rules and treating them as something to be overcome in their pursuit of promotion. Wolves, Leicester, Bournemouth, Brighton and Villa all did the same. As I've pointed out, we could spend more if we were determined to do it, but it appears to me to be a convenient excuse with little to no effort made to get around it. We fell foul of the previous incarnation of the rules, when restrictions were tighter and we were still carrying an obscene wage bill following the Shebby SIngh madness. We are led to believe that the club has sorted that out now so we should be comfortably inside it otherwise the planning has gone wrong somewhere. You seem to consider Venkys to be some sort of uniquely benevolent people doing it out of the goodness of their hearts and there's nothing similar elsewhere in this league. Without Morris Derby would be bust, same goes for Forest, Wednesday, Hull, Middlesbrough, Bristol City, Preston, Wigan, QPR, Fulham - all heavily dependent on external owners who 'could' pull the plug any day and they'd be knackered. We aren't any different. Like it or not that's the nature of the Championship these days. Any one of those clubs 'could' go the way of Bolton on the whim of their owners, we're at no particular greater risk just because Bolton is nearer to us geographically or we know Bolton fans. A benefactor model of ownership dominates the Championship and that comes with its risks. I'd actually suspect the risk to be lower here with Venkys and their 4-way agreement only system where if any 1 of them doesn't agree then it doesn't happen - rather than entirely in the hands of one person We could just as easily thrive after Venkys. It's impossible to know the answer at this stage. In the end whether they're pumping in £1 million a year or £10 million a year if they aren't running the club properly and aren't doing their best by it then I want them gone and replaced by someone who will. They've had ample time to sort it out and despite flushing £170 million away we're still making up the numbers in the 2nd division precisely because they won't take it seriously enough. I'd also point out that floating around the bottom half of this league or League One for the next 5-10 years is going to see another £100 million of debt appear. We don't have time on our side if Venkys have notions of stopping funding. There seems to be an attitude that what we've been doing the last 2 years is sustainable or sensible. We've still lost bucket loads of money and there's an argument that spending a bit more is a risk worth taking if it gets us up.

Derby being very clever from what I can see. 'Excluded items' from FFP calculations: 5.2.4 - 'costs of employee benefits for employees only partly involved in Youth Development Activities (for example, a coach having part-time involvement in Youth Development Activities and otherwise working for the Championship club)' Presumably therefore Rooney wont fall under FFp calculations. Keep on moaning Rovers. I actually respect Derby for taking the rules to pieces in full public view - 'selling' their ground and getting Rooney as a 'coach'.

I sense Chaddy is starting to turn with a few doubts coming to the surface

But we didn't get it done. Fortunately for us we could carry it over into the loan window with a deal agreed for January so it made little difference. Don't think that option is there this time around. Its Thursday or January. No middle ground.

Expect talk of impregnable mighty Fulham. Another huge.club for us to compete with with no mention they were well beaten and couldn't score against newly promoted Barnsley on Saturday..... Pressure will be all on them so owt could happen but I expect 3-1 or 4-1 to them. Wouldnt surprise me to see us take the lead after a positive start before crumbling.

Let's suppose Dyche walks out tomorrow. Does Burnley's entire footballing operation go up in smoke? No. Whilst Dyche runs the show they also have board and structure that will ensure continuity or at least minimum disruption.

In my interpretation it's all in place for another phase of slash and burn. We had the 2 years of growth under Bowyer then 12 months of cashing in the chips to cover it and sadly I expect a similar turn of events. They've even got a ready made excuse with Ffp and people feeling sorry for them for tipping in the running cost money every year because without them we'd be bust. Apparently. 2 years ago other than a raw Lenihan there was nothing on the books. Now they've Lenihan and Dack on decent contracts, Trav who will be worth a fortune soon, Gallagher who is one decent season away from doubling what we paid for him. Add in young Buckley, Brereton and Armstrong- decent seasons and they're worth good money and its looking good for cashing in. They'll probably have to get shut of Mowbray before that starts or at least not invite him to India like they did with Bowyer. Cowardly too.

Southampton were taken over and within a couple of years had back to back promotions to the Premier League. Who is suggesting rebooting and clearing out? If results aren't good enough the manager goes. His job is to coach and get results and if they aren't up to scratch it's his head on the block. It's only because we persist with this mental archaic all powerful manager system that Mowbray is presiding over scouting. Normally that would be an independent department working in conjunction with the manager, not dependent on him.

Years to get a competent scouting network up and running? Try months. Most managers especially the experienced ones have their own contacts and lists anyway. How long does Mowbray expect to be afforded to be able to take years to develop scouting? A quick look at Watford, Norwich etc. Who put excellent scouting networks together in no time at all and reaped the rewards. Never today, always tomorrow. The Venky motto and it seems Mowbray's too.

So the fee for Nuttall was £500,000. I'd say that was good business considering. Of course that ensures we are probably even for the summer and haven't spent anything net. Sounds like we are waiting to see if anyone departs and if so if anyone drops into our laps on the cheap. Very poor.

No suggestion at all that theres any intention of addressing LB. Mowbray likes Bell, he's got William's to try out again yet plus Hart who played quite well against Barrow and Mansfield....gulp.

The party line from Sharpe and co is they 'wouldn't rule out' a move for another CB before the window shuts. What's that all about? Either we want one, which we surely do, in which case we try to get one and are disappointed if we don't, or we don't feel we need one (ludicrous) but then we don't pursue anyone. 'Wouldnt rule out' just another one of those ambiguous ones trotted out. Suggests we aren't really that bothered but if something comes up we might get someone in but might not. So don't expect or demand anything but it might happen. Either way we can say we are happy with the window after it shuts.

I don't enjoy it because I've no hope or expectation of anything positive happening for us.

New ground syndrome for many. The League have already bent several rules to help them out but it will get really interesting this week if it isnt done soon. How on earth they will be able to host games with no tickets and presumably no safety certificate or stewarding will be interesting to see.

Time to forget about Ffp. We've spent net £15 million since last summer and not sold anyone and havent broken the rules. Plenty of space in there to sign a couple of decent defenders. This isnt a Ffp issue, it isnt a wages or cash issue. It is a policy issue. Either the owners will not allow cash to be spent on defenders (go and look at the list of defenders we've signed under their ownership) or the manager has chosen to not address the defence. It's one or the other or both. Excuses like Ffp, missing our targets, sob stories about the tough transfer market - all cover stories to shield the owners and manager from a failure to deal with the big issue. They've made their choice between them and unless we do something unexpected in the next 3 days then we're going to have to live with the consequences and Mowbray will be in the crosshairs.

But I'm confused because after Gallagher was signed Mowbray claimed we hadn't touched the Raya cash.

Take it the Raya money has disappeared then.

Venus has previous for dabbling in non-assistant manager territory. At Coventry he was elevated to board member status and oversaw recruitment and even property matters, allegedly. To me his role should be on the training pitch not on the end of a phone. Bizarre. At best ridiculously old fashioned at worst completely incompatible with modern day transfers.

No points or prizes for trying. Doing it is the way to success. We could try to sign Ronaldo if we cant or wont do what is needed then we are no further on.

Agree, but for me you need a settled defence with minutes together under the belt in pre-season. That way work can be done on at least trying to forge them into a coherent unit. Not only was the standard of pre-season poor but there was too much experimenting and messing about with players Mowbray has no intention of using rather than working on making the defence better,