LCCFox96

I thought similar about Ward's potential next club being Wrexham. A few reasons it makes sense for them over any other club imo: 1) Their current #1 - Okonkwo - is on loan from Arsenal. They don't have a goalkeeper permanently on their books who is good enough for top end League 2 or higher. Howard is 37 years old and out of contract in the summer, Lainton is a sick note and out of contract in the summer, and their other goalkeeper is young and has never played in English football before. They'll need to do something there very soon. 2) Since their takeover they have made a big push to bring international football back to North Wales at the Racecourse, and put it 'on the map' for football a bit more. Signing a Welsh international would be a coup that continues that push. The Welsh international connection is the only reason I had any sort of optimism about the Cardiff rumours. 3) Ward is a Wrexham boy and was in their academy as a youth player before Liverpool. A return home might appeal. 4) Wrexham - if promoted to League 1 - have one of the more likely budgets to better bridge the financial gap between Ward's current contract versus what he'll be on when his time at Leicester is up. I agree with you that I don't see a Championship side or above taking him as a #1. Unless a bigger club picks him up as #3 for home grown GK cover, then I think he'll drop down to League 1. Wrexham standout as one of the sides who might take a punt. Feels like pipe dream stuff he voluntarily wants to go this summer and we can find a taker.

Really don't fancy Yunus, Casadei, and Praet against a mobile Ipswich side with an aggressive press. We got overrun a bit in midfield at Portman Road when both Ndidi and KDH were hooked.

Fair play to him. Genuine words and takes accountability for his rash decision. Onwards and upwards.

There were very few PL exits last round - the competition should open up a bit more during the 4th round. Chelsea vs Villa and Tottenham vs Man City are great draws for everyone else. Premier League away trips for Brighton and Newcastle too. Hopefully we can capitalise on a home draw and get through.

Not really. That’s a boring comment trotted out by people who don’t follow Scottish football. Plenty of players leave the SPFL and do well in higher ranked leagues. For example, Aberdeen’s recent departures include: Lewis Ferguson (Bologna, linked with Inter and Juventus) Calvin Ramsey (Liverpool) Scott McKenna (Forest) Ylber Ramadani (Lecce, linked with larger Italian clubs) Kenny McLean (Norwich) Ross McCrorie (Bristol City) All bar one for 7-figure fees and they’ve largely all been successful to date. Lower standard of football, yes. But they’re hardly all League 2 cloggers. I’m sure Hearts and Hibs could say similar (McGinn, Hickey etc.) Miovski will be a high profile export from the league (£5m+) and when he goes, I’d back him to do well. He has scored consistently in the league, scored well against the Old Firm, and has 4 in 7 in Europe this year. Compatible with League 2 my arse.

No issue with this. The summer window is a better, and more likely time, for a goalkeeper to move anyway. With a good half season at Stoke - who badly need a keeper after Bournemouth recalled Travers - Iversen will boost his reputation and, hopefully, his market value. Freeing up the squad space and moving away from having 5 first team goalkeepers had to be one of the priorities this window, so if we can get this done early then happy days. You'd assume Stoke are covering all, or a portion of, his wages too which also helps the cause.

He's a talented striker for sure. He'll definitely leave Aberdeen in the summer window if he doesn't during this window. Wouldn't be surprised to see him rock up at Southampton. Aberdeen's Head of Recruitment, Darren Mowbray, went there in the summer and he was influential in getting Miovski to Aberdeen. That coupled with Ross Stewart's long-term injury meaning they might be in the market for a striker.

Full strength, get it won. Last game of the festive period where we’ve built up some serious momentum. A host of changes makes no sense unless any players have fitness niggles that need monitoring. Ricardo in for Hamza. I wouldn’t be surprised if Justin gets rotated out for Coady with Faes moving to LB, or to see Doyle start for 60mins, but I’d keep JJ and rest him for Millwall. Get the points on the board and then let’s regroup and assess who we have available after AFCON call ups and Vardy / McAteer / Albrighton / Praet etc have had another week to recover and get fit again. I expect the Millwall cup tie will be a fresh look line up and a chance to gel a few players together ahead of the league football starting up again at Coventry.

Get in! That’s a huge result and a gritty performance to follow up the late disappointment and sloppy showing on Wednesday. Two excellent and different team goals as well. The first beautifully crafted and typical of Enzoball with the wide players stretching the play, the number 8 driving on and standing up the cross to the back post for the opposite number 8. The second a ruthless counter attack, using quick and snappy passing to exploit the space in behind. A brilliant response and a hugely important win. Hopefully Ipswich, Leeds and the chasing pack slip up too.

My first visit to Hillsborough and it was as expected with their current league position and situation with their turd of an owner. Impressive old ground but bar a chorus ‘hi ho Sheffield Wednesday’ at the start and ‘who are ya’ when they equalised at the end it was silent. Our away end was a bit flat. I was middle upper tier and there were patches of people driving the singing but it’s a bit fractured and disjointed. It was the same at QPR in lower tier. We have different sides of the same stand/tier singing over each other and starting different songs. You can hear and can join in with some of the great new songs like the ‘I’m in love with Ricardo’ song, the ‘Fatawu running down the wing’ song and ‘I wanna tell you’ for Harry Winks but they were concentrated to one small group on the left hand side of the upper tier last night (I’m guessing UFS). Then there was another group on the right hand side of the upper tier shouting ‘you are my Leicester’ over the top or something like that and the majority go with that. So how loud it was largely depends on where your sitting for the majority of time bar the occasional all hands on deck volley of ‘straight back up’, ‘Vichai had a dream’, or ‘Jamie Vardy’s magic’ which are established chants. It’s nobody’s fault, and this isn’t a dig at any group as everyone is trying to create a loud and boisterous atmosphere but it just doesn’t carry across the whole away end in full right now. It’ll get there, and it wasn’t helped last night by a flat on field performance.

The one thing I did like last night, which we haven’t seen enough of this season, was one of our wingers assisting the other at the back post. Mavididi gets it at the edge of the box, and rather than driving for the byline he switches it with a beautiful cross to Fatawu who’s attacked the back post with an intelligent run and found himself in 5 yards of open space. Great chest control and finish. We haven’t created that combination enough imo, and if one of our #8s hasn’t made the run into the box we often got just have the lone striker to aim for which has a much lower % outcome.

Last night’s performance sticks out like a sore thumb because it never really felt like we were in control of that despite the early goal. In other games this year, even the ones we’re we’ve ground out results, won late/narrowly, or even lost (Huddersfield away, Rotherham away, Cardiff home, Hull home, Bristol City home etc) we’ve dominated the game manage to get the opposition in a bit of a choke hold once we scored. As such we’ve always looked like we’ll hang on or scrape an equaliser. Last night we looked like we could very easily have come away with nothing. Sheffield Wednesday thoroughly deserved their point. They’re lacking quality of course, but they pressed us far higher than I expected and caused us a number of issues playing out from the back from the first minute onwards. We need to regroup, buck our ideas up and respond at West Brom. If we play like we did last night we will get punished and be leaving empty handed.

Also still looking for 2x tickets for this. Any spares please let me know.

I absolutely wouldn't be against Souttar getting more pitch time this season, and his size and presence would be useful in both defending and attacking set pieces. But whilst he does carry an aerial threat offensively, his international scoring record shouldn't be a justification for him coming back into the team. A couple of goals against Bangladesh and Palestine won't change make Enzo flinch. If he comes in it'll be for other reasons. His international scoring record is good craic though. He had 4 goals in his first 2 caps from CB with braces against Nepal and the Chinese Taipei. Will be an actual f**king giant made of f**king bricks to them!

I'd have thought this too but wanted to get tickets for that alongside Sheff Wed (a) for a quick-fire double header, so thought it worth a general enquiry about increased allocation, any returns etc. I very much got the impression that there was scope for more if needed but at present they weren't doing anything about. You'd assume that the Hawthorns - which is ~26,000 - would be able to offer at least 2.4k-2.6k. I'm unfamiliar with the exact rules but it feels like we're a few hundred tickets light at a minimum.

Called the ticket office today. I asked if there was any chance of an increased allocation - was told unlikely unless there is significant demand. I said well it sold out before 520+ got any chance as I was online at 8am and there was nothing left so there probably is demand. They just reiterated it would be unlikely there will be a request for an increased allocation and apologised. 2,000 tickets for a Saturday 3pm KO, about an hr down the road, when we're flying at the top of the table in an away end that can hold close to 3,000. Absolute joke.

So frustrating this has sold out before 520+. Was online at 8am but didn’t get any. Looking for 2x tickets please.

I also imagine the overhaul of the squad will continue in January so it's hard to say how these players missing will affect us. On paper Ndidi, Iheanacho and Fatawu will be missed, especially if Nigeria and Ghana go the distance. If we're still flying and have a considerable gap to 3rd place, I can see us strengthening and investing in one or two players to support Enzo's system to give us more depth to lessen the impact. Getting Cannon bedded in and fit before Iheanacho goes is also key. Daka is of no concern as I think he'll be sold early in the window prior to the AFCON occurring - he'll need an early move if he wants to avoid transfer distractions during the tournament.

He'll ride the crest of Postecoglu's wave this year. I can't see Rangers challenging much under Beale who is a shite manager. Outside of that Celtic won't be challenged. Longer term it'll be interesting to see how he manages the change in make-up of the squad. Celtic have a massive East Asia influence in their squad from Postecoglu's time in Japan. I can't see Rodgers going with that long term (ofc he'll want to put his stamp on it) which means he'll likely have to manage a squad overhaul. We know better than most his weaknesses in the transfer market if Celtic don't have the right backroom staff around him. That combined with Rangers getting stronger again and early European exits could be enough to see him fail. They've already been dumped out of the Scottish League Cup at Kilmarnock so the treble is off already, and he dropped points at home to St Johnstone in the league in a poor performance. A few more stodgy results and getting dumped out of Europe in the groups will see a fanbase that is already split on him due to his exit to us turn quite quickly I suspect.

Hermansen is no.1 and looks good value for it. Stolarczyk looks decent and is the next best at playing that role in Enzo's system, so he'll stay as no.2. Iversen is young, has a good reputation for his shot stopping and isn't on a huge contract. He'll be sold before the close of the window, hopefully for a good fee. Ward's reputation and value is in the gutter so I imagine we're stuck with him. He'll also be on the largest contract of all 5x goalkeepers too, so expect the best we can hope is a loan with his wages part covered. In itself that would be helpful. Smithies is cheap cover, and only has 1-year left on his deal. He'll probably stick about as third choice. Be interesting to see how it plays out over the remainder of the window as we cannot hit 11pm on Friday 1st September with 5x senior goalkeepers. It's an obvious area to streamline the squad and - hopefully - raise some funds through Iversen's sale.

"Nah Miss, I didn't do my maths homework because Pep thinks I'm worth £1.4m".

Bournemouth have a £20m + £5m add ons offer accepted for Alex Scott. Max Aarons also set to join for £7m. That's on top of the near £60m already spent on Kerkez, Traore, Favaire, and Kluivert. That's with no major outgoings and nominal fees incoming for Pearson and Dembele. They're another club where I don't understand how they aren't in hot water with FFP.

This is the key point. If we weren't so short of numbers for wide attacking players, then Mavididi probably doesn't even start yesterday. We're very light for the style of winger that Enzo wants on both the left and right wing hence Mavididi going straight into the side and McAteer getting chucked in at the deep end. Mavididi playing a positive role in both goals, notching up an assist, turning out a lively performance in parts, and looking pumped to be out on the pitch for us was a good return after being at the club for 6 days. Think we've got a good player on our hands here and once we get settled with a full squad we'll see that. If we'd survived in the PL and signed Mavididi I wouldn't have been disappointed. Encouragingly, I'd probably go as far as saying that for all 5 of our incomings so far.

No issue with signings like this. 19 year old attacking talent with good pedigree from the Chelsea academy on a free. Definitely for the development squad but if he does well enough, even if he doesn’t feature for us, hopefully we can sell him to the EFL in the future.

Oh he came down on his Vespa He came to manage the City And when we're all back in the top flight We'll all be on the on the Moretti He's our man from Salerno Better than Guardiola don't you know and his name is Don Enzo Line 3 was a struggle Tune - Bad moon rising (also done by Liverpool for Diogo Jota):