Funds were there last year. The problem was that old Tony was trying to get a new contract and he believed not spending their cash, selling Rothwell and generating funds for his 2 signings, would be more likely to earn a new contract. The offer for Dembele was made after Venkys rejected the Rothwell offer as funds were available for transfers, although it was only around £3m. In hindsight we probably should have sold Rothwell.

Jack used to over rule managers all the time, no one seemed to complain then as it was his money and he could do with it what he wanted. He purchased Kevin Davis without even discussing it with Roy and several others as well. It happens all the time with owners and even more on the continent.

I think more Barnsley trying to get a bidding war going.

Is Ayala injured or just being rested? Hopefully Wharton is back for Saturday.

There is a plan now and they seem to be building from the back as well for the first time since Hughes. With what they inherited and what needed to be replaced they are doing all right. All of the signed players seem to be an upgrade on what left. Wage budget seems to be under control and we are not wasting the cash we are spending. They are pretty much doing everything we have asked for, for the past 3 years and yet we are still complaining. Hope 4 more players join tomorrow and we can have a great last day of the transfer window unlike previous years.

Yet if we sign 3-4 players in the next day, you'll be here on Friday telling us we now have a playoff capable squad etc.

Yep being a trading club. The Brentford etc approach.

So they haven't made an offer according to that just a discussion. The only club to actual make a written offer so far is Nice which we rejected.

At least we are now enquiring and making offers for players like this. Under TM we were little old Blackburn and should know our place.

Venky's haven't dropped an asking price yet, and it's up to them if they want to let him leave for free.

Who is there in the £5m range? As soon as someone hits 15 goals in a season in the Championship they are in the £15m range. It seems to me a good approach, with us being able to spend the cash in other areas this season.

It will be an up to £5m deal, probably £2m plus £3m in performance clauses and a 20% sell on. It won't be £5m all in one go.

If he did let his contract run down, at his age it would go to a tribunal for Leicester compensation to be agreed.

He has just had his Chelsea contract paid up so had 3 years of wages into his account in one go. If he wants to rebuild his career, dropping out of the limelight into the Championship does make sense. If Big Sam was here I would say we would have signed him, now we will be a fair bit down the list. It would be amusing if it did happen for the response on thekitguy.

Which is why they are happy for turnover to stay as it is as if it did increase they wouldn't be able to put £20m a season into the club. They want what's best for their overall business. If we were owned by someone who either couldn't put £20m a season in or wanted what was best for the club, then things would change very quickly.

Nope, don't think any offer has hit double figures yet.

Tomasson may have been referring to 3 permanent signings and ignoring any loan signings. Should be an interesting last week of the transfer window.

Apologies, 78% was 2018, 2019 was 72%. I was looking at precovid accounts but now realize they had their last 2 years of parachute payments to hit those figures.

There is also the owners potential to invest, more say in who he signs, better club infrastructure etc. Probably more chance of promotion in next 2 years etc.

According to Middlesbrough's last set of accounts the wage to turnover ratio was 78% so they do have a lot of flexibility to increase.

Difficult to know. Without FFP and with their owners I think Stoke would be the only club who could spend £150m in the championship if they were allowed to. Everything is in place at Stoke and their owners/bet365 just wrote off the £200m debt they had, so the club is now debt free. I think it's also easier to attract players to Stoke than the North East and Neill still lives in Cheshire so possibly wants to move to be closer to home. We possibly may see Mowbray at Sunderland?

Waiting for Venky's approval and funds to be sent. It seems to be 2 weeks to get this. I hope we can get them to speed up next week.

We really need a new signing today to calm everyone down I really expected one of the two Vans to have signed this week by now.

I don't think there will be an increase in budget apart from for a special case player even if we sold him.

Why would we vote against the new rules, you can inject £20m a season and have to control wages, what's wrong with that? They are pretty much tailor made for us if we can start increasing turnover and to be honest your wage to turnover metric should never exceed 90% in the first place.