Exactly, a 16 goal, 40m strikeforce is hardly the privelidge of a team cutting back. Chuck in a couple of high calibre loans and presumably decent loan fees to nab them plus Celina for another 4m and they have some firepower there. They made their cut backs culling out of contract high earners that werent playing anyway so were no worse off for losing Bony, Fer etc. They sold McBurnie and James (who is massively overrated at this moment) which was a blow but they were adequately replaced by high earning returning loans, Ayew is the best of the bunch. Certainly no reason to feel hard done by, or as a team in the top 6 to see just missing out on the play offs as success. Yeah West Brom and Leeds are in poor form at the moment. Suppose from their perspective every team hits a bad run and at this time both are not in immediate danger of surrendering their top 2 places.

Youd choose to sell a player who has consistently scored goal after goal since he joined and is our best player over a kid who may have potential like quite a few others in our ranks but all we know from his first team appearances is that he is miles away at this moment so it is very difficult to quantify that potential. No chance that anyone signs Buckley for 5-10m but I would happily take my chances that it would bite us in the arse later on and take the money.

Whatever a teams expectations are, and I didnt realise that Andre Ayew, 20m and 80k a week talisman classes as own talent, if a team finishes just outside the play offs then its going to leave their fans dissapointed, even if they didnt expect to get in the play offs, if they just missed out they would be full of regret and frustration.

The best way to re balance their finances would be to get promoted. If they just missed out on the play offs, like any team that just misses out on tangible reward and achievement, they would be gutted. Top 10 in a league in which the top 6 teams are rewarded either with promotion or a further chance of promotion is a strange target, essentially 7th to 10th are teams that have come close but not close enough. Tomights game was lacking in quality and entertainment.

How would a team currently in the top 6 finishing just out of the top 6 be a successful season? Surely it would be agonizing? Bizarre mentality. Been some absolutely soul destroyingly boring games on TV from the Championship in recent weeks.

Still fancy the top 2 to stay there, both teams in really poor form but still with a gap ahead of the rest. Fulham have an incredibly expensively assembled squad, on paper I would say better than Leeds and possibly West Brom too but their manager carries the question marks for me, much prefer a Bielsa or Bilic. Brentford are a good team but not sure they have enough firepower, after the main 3 of Benrahma, Watkins and Mbuemo they have no one else really. Swansea are a dark horse too, no one seems to talk about them but considering they have I would suggest the highest paid and one of the best players in the league in Ayew, another big money striker in Baston who has eased off but is good to have and have been able to attract and afford the extremely highly sought after loan signings of Gallagher and Brewster, they have to be taken seriously. The league is there for anyone this year, the standard is as poor as I can remember and I have seen so many drab games lacking quality. Our season is going to be tinged with regret regarding our big money recruitment and our injury woes because I am not sure especially with FFP about to crunch that we are going to have a chance like this again for a while.

To be fair, a seven figure fee I suspect makes it a non starter for us.

Have you seen much of him? Any good?

Downing?

Im not sure a good Championship left back is going to ever emerge from one who has been a consistent liability since he arrived at the club and lacking both offensively and defensively, at the age of 25. Need much better.

Certainly wouldnt consider giving Bell a new deal, hes been poor throughout his time here, I didnt think he was particularly good v Preston to be honest anyway. Hes poor defensively, flimsy and doesnt usually stop crosses coming in, hes very slow of mind and dawdles on the ball and he seldom does anything but turn back on himself. Ive not seen this player full of potential or attributes that just need some confidence. Hes fast but that it. Move on and get better.

Please see below your information that has come from asking Sunderland fans, something you have suggested you take no notice of to others prior. Also "sound a good choice and what we need in the keeper area" isnt really that ambigious IMO.

I take on both of your points about his potential, he has plenty of attributes but as a player at this level I dont think at the moment he has done enough to warrant bigger clubs circling just yet. I suspect that he will get a run as a striker and he is undoubtedly our primary goal threat but his numbers and his impact in his season and a half in the Championship here on the back of a couple of underwhelming loan spells elsewhere at this level wont have people beating down the door just yet. I think there are both questions and answers, for each strength a weakness. A player with such electric pace will always carry a threat. That being said, his movement is often quite poor and the stats show he is never far from seeing the offside flag. Fast players often rely on their legs rather than their brains and go a yard too far when they dont need to. Also, give him space and a simple kick and run approach often is what makes him the most effective. When he dribbles because his pace terrifies defenders he sometimes gets past through luck as much as skill, I dont think his dribbling is the most refined but you see v Preston a perfect example, he actually overran it but the ball luckily fell back for him to slot in. He is technically decent and has scored a couple of belters but Mowbray is right that he needs to score more scrappy goals and tap ins, they are the bread and butter. I do have doubts about his ability to hold the ball up and be a nuisance, I appreciate that he is small and slight but he often doesnt even challenge, you look at Paul Dickov who was similarly small and he was a right handful to every defender because of his attitude and intelligence. Chaddy you have used the saying "theres a player in there" about Gallagher, I disagree on that but its a quote that certainly applies to Armstrong. Its now to make sure that player comes out and if and when he does, that is when the interest will come. Hopefully the numbers will go up, he will become more prolific and then thats when it goes with the territory that the vultures shall circle. I wouldnt like to play against him.

No but you have told me before that you dont care what fans of other sides think so I was shocked to see you using it to back up your opinion!

Armstrong is again one I wouldnt be imminently worried about losing. His numbers (7 goals, 5 assists) but when you compare to the numbers of some other players, they dont make him stand out from the pack and his overall performance and numbers in this league are unremarkable. Last season I felt like he was pretty poor and his numbers arent great, he had one brilliant month but aside from that he was poor in the main. Prior to his last 10 games many were demanding that he was dropped. He is young and he is a fast attacker so if he does start to perform better over the course of a season and he takes on the mantle as our main source of goals and main striker then the opportunity is there for him to turn heads. Him, Lenihan, Travis and Nyambe are 4 potentially high value players and have become key players to us but all of whom have certain doubts attached to them and I would be surprised to be poached just yet.

One thing that I would say is that the standard of goalkeeping right across the division is really poor.

I think ultimately the overall season is the best indicator. Yesterdays win was absolutely brilliant, but also is in isolation, was totally unexpected in terms of poor recent form and was whilst I am not saying that we wouldnt have won v 11, it was v 10 men. Clinically ruthless and dominant and very pleasing all the same. To trouble the top 6, we would have to go on a freakishly consistent good run that we havent threatened to do in any way up until now. Weve had good runs and bad runs in equal measure, something consistent since promotion, we have good players and we have weaknesses, we have never been in the top 6 or in the bottom 5, we are the definition of an inconsistent mid table team. We have also struggled more since our best player got injured and we dont have much money to strengthen. Suggesting that the top 6 is a very real proposition based on one game is a little fanciful, equally suggesting that we might get into trouble is equally difficult to back up with historical evidence.

He has only established himself for a year to be fair, he amidst more experienced options of Corry Evans and Bradley Johnson has made himself the first name on the teamsheet for us which is very impressive. And as others have said, Mowbray deserves plenty of praise for that. He I think statistically is only behind Jacob Davenport (from yesterday) in terms of his passing, hes quite a safe passer usually though which is fine but he hasnt got the range of say a Downing. Hes industrious and tenacious, and he has plenty of energy and a turn of acceleration so hes a well rounded player. Got plenty of strings to his bow and plenty of time to improve. Of course he will need to be able to run games a little more and stamp his authority on games for longer. I just think that whilst he continues to impress, I am not sure that he stands out enough to have vultures circling, he is a good midfielder for a mid table team. If you wanted a Championship midfielder, there is Phillips at Leeds, Pearson and Johnson at Preston, Sawyers at West Brom, Cairney at Fulham, theres a few that are probably a bit ahead at the moment.

But presumably that applies both in terms of making positive and negative assumptions and suggestions, and raising both potential positives and red flags. I raised a couple of doubts which I think are valid. Doesnt mean he wont be a positive signing if he came, that I couldnt be convinced otherwise and if he signed that I wouldnt judge based on that. As I have with Downing and Johnson who both proved me wrong in opposite ways. For example, @chaddyrovers is making an assumption that he will be a good signing, he is using stats, youtube videos to create a collage of positives. Seemingly has seen as little as you or I. And also he has used the opinions of other teams fans which is a good way of collecting opinions but one he has repeatedly berated me for using in the past as "he doesnt care what other fans think" so theress an element of hypocrisy there. Ultimately, the fact that Nixon is reporting it makes it unlikely that it will happen anyway! For example, regarding Schmidt, presumably there was no point even bringing his name up because none of us have regularly seen him play. What we can do is comment on what he do know or can assertain, position, age, league that hes playing in, stats, situation, things like that without saying player x WILL or WILL NOT be a good signing

I think Travis and Nyambe have become very important players but I am unconvinced that we need to be too nervous at the moment in regards to them being poached by Premier League clubs, think they have a way to go yet before then.

I questioned whether he would be an upgrade based on the fact that whilst I cant proclaim to have seen him on more than a handful of occasions when Sunderland are on TV, I do know that he has been dropped for part of this season at a League 1 club as I mentioned. Surely this potential worry can be flagged? Im also incredibly skeptical about the prospect of him signing based on Nixons lack of insight as shown by the screenshots on the Mulgrew situation within 10 minutes. Out of interest, is it ok based totally on conjecture and things like highlight reels to state the positives of what a player we know little about can bring? Signings and expectations can go either way, Downing had very limited impact on games at Boro towards the end and at his age there was always a red flag there. Hes come here and is enjoying an indian summer. Adarabioyo had a poor spell at West Brom, their fans didnt rate him at all and nearly everyone on here correctly pointed out that he was being played in the wrong position so there was always a question. Hes been a very good signing. Conversely, Johnsons signing was greeted solely with positivity. And hes been with occasion exceptions, a poor signing and has been unable to get a regular start for months. So it can go both ways. But if we cannot make a judgement on potential signings, based on positives and negatives either ideally from what we have seen ourselves from a potential signing, or from other evidence, positive or negative, good stats, bad stats, being dropped, being a sides best player, playing out of position, having a side built around him, price, whatever it is, then we may aswell close this thread.

To be fair, Mowbray again came out yesterday and said that we hardly have any money to play with so that does somewhat strangle the transfer thread. Difficult to speculate on a nameless signing with no information and I dont really think theres much in the way of ITK. The buzz is naturally in the thread of the game in which we got such a brilliant result.

This is quite interesting, we are on the same points that we were at this stage last season. Not really progressing as good as yesterdays win was.

The stats were incredibly flawed though because they compared someone who is a right back with the occasional time at centre back v someone who plays here there and everywhere, sometimes in midfield. I think most could see with their eyes that Bennett is poor wherever he plays, especially at full back where his recklessness often leads to him diving in, being drawn out of position or giving away penalties. Nyambe is a far better one on one defender. That being said, you are right that Nyambe is reliant on confidence.

Not sure he knows much based on this! When I look at that side yesterday, the main 3 players that first require improving are LB and the 2 wide roles. McLaughlin, video showreels aside (they made Brereton look competent!) has apparently been in poor form at Sunderland so not sure if he would even be an upgrade on Walton.