In the up to maybe 8, 10 million bracket. Not usually in the 18 million bracket I believe. Though I don't follow it as closely these days. I know it does happen but far as I've noticed, if they pay that sort of money they have hopes beyond just hoover and loan out. Not saying they don't loan them either, they need to blood them, but I'd think they're usually expecting one season of loan, if they don't have proper Champs experience already, then break through after.

He's just kidding Man U, Pears is a top drawer keeper worth 30 million. But since we are cash strapped you can probably get him for a bargain 20 mill. He's basically the Adam Wharton of keepers. Mercer is trying to put you off because he's so good is all...

I don't know if you've come in peace, but your username is obnoxious.

Yep, but they also pass on 10x those sorts of players along the way.

You don't have to be a world class talent or even close, to be worth upwards of 18 million to a Prem side at the age of 19. It's peanuts for a good youth prospect at that level.

We don't actually know he has been offered a substantively better financial package at Derby, but even if he has, very few managers if any have moved for money and then come out and said 'I'm just here for the dosh'. It doesn't play well to his new constituents, and it's not reasonable to expect him to say that to placate us. Besides, I consider it fairly obvious the real reason he has left is because we pissed him about and didn't support him to a reasonable degree.

In fairness, promotion wasn't on the cards in January 2024. At the close of the month we were 11 points from the playoffs and only 8 from the relegation spots. At the start of the window we were equidistant to both. Even if we had been on the ball from the start of the month (that can't be guaranteed at most clubs tbf, let alone this clusterfuck of disorganisation), it's speculative at best to say we'd have gone very close to promotion. Our form was already in the toilet. Selling Wharton without reinvesting the funds did, however, make a relegation scrap inevitable. January 2023, however, there can be no excuses for not seizing the iron. We were in a great position and needed reinforcements to get over the line. With the right backing it's extremely likely we'd have at least made the playoffs.

One of the things often forgotten in the 'how much more would we have gotten in the summer' defence of the sale is that we would have had another half a season of Adam Wharton to enjoy. Another thing often forgotten is that any extra money is extra money. Even if it was only a million more, that's nearly as much as we spent on Gueye.

It's literally titled 'most spent on wages'.

Pretty confident Stoke have a higher wage budget than us too. Weren't we showing as about 16th on wage budget on lists a year or two ago, and have continued cutting costs since?

Probably because it was them.

Have fun with whatever you're getting up to (or, hope it goes well - delete as appropriate). Your efforts with this have been immense.

What a shit, pointlessly convoluted system.

Should be one game though I think. Two yellows is an automatic one match ban isn't it? Perfect chance to have got some proper minutes in him though, as it doesn't apply to youth games.

I'd rather the time being wasted is just added on anyway so nobody bothers wasting time on purpose anyway, like I've already said. It's not about getting some special punitive measure that gives my team a better advantage, it's about getting a better outcome with time wasting, and my suggestion does that just fine without any need for weird corners, and is less disruptive to the game.

I can, because you just do it differently at lower levels where the resources aren't there. Isn't that exactly why we don't have VAR in the Championship?

Well to quote you, 'but we know that won't happen'.

If we know that won't happen, we also know they won't give corners because it's been 9 or 10 seconds instead of 8. The problem is the officials not the rules. It should be tracked seperately in top leagues, and officials who aren't adhering to it should be fined or dropped leagues. They'll do it then. I'm not talking about amateur level. I don't really give a fuck what they do there, that should be left up to them to do what's within their resources. I just know this corner thing sounds like a load of old bollocks. Not because 'I don't like change', I'm literally asking for change, but thanks for boiling my point down to a belittling version.

It's not just a bit of time, it's quite a bit. I get that it's more punishment than a yellow card for a position where the player almost never gets yellows anyway (so yeh they get a fine but the chances of them ever serving a suspension because of it are very slim). But it's quite a chunk of time used up to deal with the issue of wasting a few seconds of time, it's a self-defeating solution in a way, and the solution should avoid using up more time. As for an advantage, maybe for a lot of teams but have you seen our corners? 🤣 I still say like I did above, stop the clock, properly, every time the keeper collect it in his hands, and if he pisses about too long, still book him (for wasting the time of the fans, and stealing momentum from the game). If there ceases to be any advantage to doing it because the time is added on anyway, they'll stop doing it. Then again I'm also a big believer in the clock stopping every time the ball goes out of play. Even if that means reducing from 90 minutes of standard time. They seemingly started doing it more like this at the start of the season, but very inconsistently from official to official, and then they just gave up on it. The clock should be for when football is being played.

As I said, you waste even more time bringing everyone back for a corner. Just stop the clock every time a keeper holds the ball. And actually do it, 4th official's job. And still book them if they take too long.

Well that's because his career was on a massive downward trajectory and he was getting older, reducing his desire for the pressure of the big jobs and meaning he hadn't kept up with the advances in football. He has become a fairly crap manager and we wouldn't want him here. Are you saying that's what's happened to this bloke, except worse since he has stepped down several more tiers? The Assistant is less important, but has an essentially similar skillset and could take over in an emergency or if the boss leaves. Which would give us a 6th tier level manager temporarily.

So, ref blows whistle for time wasting. Both teams jog all the way back down the pitch and then spend a minute setting up for a corner. Good thing no time got wasted there!

I have to wonder why his career since has taken him to Eastbourne after that, if he's any use. They play in the sixth tier.

It'd be a real shame if we went from having left back finally sorted after all these years, to just Pickering next season. He's alright, but he's also been better with competition and not being relied on week in week out.

I doubt it. He was on an 18 month deal in Portugal and swapped it for 6 months here. Even though we are a basket case club, I think anybody would swap struggling to get into an average Portuguese side for an opportunity to make a name in England in a side in the top 6 of the Championship. I feel confident this decision came from our cost cutting crew who are refusing to sign off on any decent contracts right now.