Apart from that...........

Especially as we weren't a Championship Club but a Premier League one when they bought us. No point swapping owners who can fund losses for ones who can't though.

To be fair, to them we're probably just a bottomless money pit but the only chance they have of getting a decent chunk of their money back is for us to be promoted so you'd think that in itself would be the motivation to provide the manager with some clever and strategic investment in players.

The news has only broken publicly just now but I presume the Club will have known about it for a while, I'd assume Stoke did us the courtesy of tipping us off in advance, maybe had to give us 28 days prior notice as per regulations. So we can expect the blue touch paper to be lit any time now then.............

Another day, another player needed.

No problem. John Fleck has apparently successfully completed 1 game for Chesterfield in the EFL trophy this season so I'm sure he'll be available come deadline day!

Yep.

OK thanks. I assumed all loans entailed some sort of fee these days otherwise there's not really that much incentive for the parent Club. Perhaps the fee and recall options are totally at the discretion of the 2 Clubs.

Except he probably wants a permanent deal at the end of the loan.

Is that the difference? I.e. if you pay a fee they can't be recalled in Jan? Edit: I'd have thought it was more likely the appropriate portion of the loan fee would have to be reimbursed.

Yep. I think that's quite a blow bearing in mind he's actually been starting recently due to our injury problems.

I wasn't aware of the rule on whether loan players can or can't be recalled by their parent Club. Having attempted to look it up, Am I right in thinking they can be recalled but only during the transfer window and on 28 days notice? If so we're theoretically at risk of losing Beck and ACD as well?

That'll be another position in need of reinforcement if true.

Because "Waggott and Co" are the bean counters. Don't forget this is the bloke who thought it was a good idea to levy a match day tax on tickets and charge people a quid or however much it was to enter Blues. Do you expect him to be jumping through hoops if (as reported), the owners authorised a loan deal for O' Brien on 50 k p.w.

Broughton and Waggott setting up deals without getting them authorised first makes even less sense.

I can't speak for WATR, I don't think I could bring myself to sit in the same room as Waggott after he tried to flog off part of Brockhall. Long term unless the owners are prepared to fund the Club properly and employ proper people to run it - which has never happened simultaneously to date - more recently we only ever seem to have had Mowbray going through the motions and wasting the opportunity or JDT and Eustace being the right fit but being starved of funding - the only option would appear to be to try and actively attract potential investors. Without wishing to be rude what can the Trust actually do? Issue a vote of no confidence in the owners and management? That'll have them shaking in their boots.

At the risk of setting RF99 off, issues caused by the Court hearing aside, I'd say it's more likely to be Waggott and Pasha putting the kibosh on everything but either way it's ultimately the owners fault for employing and continuing to employ them.

They seemed mighty keen to get out of League 1 last time for whatever reason. A lot keener than they would appear to be on the faint possibility of promotion to the Premier League via the play offs. Would they be so keen if relegation happened again now though? Doubtful.

I know it wasn't you complaining about it but I just can't get my head around criticism along these lines. All that matters is results on the pitch. Bielsa was adored at Leeds yet had to conduct his interviews through an interpretor!

According to the last FF minutes, if you believe what he says, Waggott was in the process of putting together a request for January funding at that point. Not condoning it, but if things are so slow that that's not early enough to be ready to go on January 1st then any request should be made even earlier. They've been doing it long enough. In any event it would appear that in the last couple of January windows even after funding was approved the "Board" at Ewood I.e. Waggott and Pasha pulled the high value incoming deals at the last minute.

Juan Eustacio. Lol.

There's an article online citing a WBA "insider" who claims there's been 2 people interviewed for the WBA job, one of which is Wicky, the other he doesn't know the name of, but NOT Eustace. Conversely the bookies odds on Skybet for Eustace continue to shrink (5/2, 2nd fav behind Wicky) although someone formerly at Union Berlin called Urs Fischer has come in from 20/1 to 8/1.

Never rated him particularly but he's allegedly on £162,500 p.w. so I'd be up for sacking Waggott and using the saving to loan the player for 2 weeks. (It's a joke before anyone starts saying "What are these rumours about Sterling?)

Yep, as Southampton have eventually come to find over the last couple of seasons or so. We're sort of like them, (only a division lower) in our current state. Waggott won't care less. He'll be long gone. At least his plan to devastate our infrastructure and have us training back down at Pleasington playing fields was thwarted. But he will presumably leave us with c4k adult season tickets holders and no players of any real value left to sell. Some legacy.

Well one week of the window (nearly) gone and so far no signings but we've been linked with loan moves only for two players who want loans with a permanent deal guaranteed at the end of them and a move for a former Rangers winger who's played 8 games in 2 seasons for his current Club. Sterling work. Absolutely outstanding.