Ric Flair

2 years ago he was quite possibly in the top 3 biggest prospects in Europe from outside the top 5 European leagues. It's not gone hugely well for him at Leverkusen and part of that is he's been left behind in a side that has shot the lights out. Is that a concern? It certainly shouldn't be ignored, it's a league that favours creative forwards like Hlozek over pace merchants like the Prem and yet it's just not worked for him. I think them doing so well has also made him gettable for a modest fee, which to me makes this such a tempting deal. Ability wise, he has everything none of our other strikers have had in recent years, including Vardy. He's powerful, his 1st touch is excellent, he carries the ball well, he holds it up and links play. He can take players on, he can finish, he has the technical ability our forward line isn't overly blessed with. Curiously I could see him being ideal behind Daka in a carefully put together system, that's the sort of creative forward Daka thrives alongside, like he did at Salzburg. Can he be the 9 on his own? He can if we deploy 2-3 runners around him such as Zaha/Mavididi/Fatawu. I could see that working extremely well.

Maxwel Cornet for left back, ticks all Cooper's boxes.

Forest last summer has Tavares, Santos, Montiel and Origi all on loan and registered. Only one of those was under the age of 21 as well.

Even if Bouonanotte counts as 1 of the max 2 loans, Zaha would count as homegrown it would seem.

There's more to it, Sheffield Utd had McAtee, Luke Thomas and Larouci all registered last summer

That is an outrageous bargain. WOW

Big lovable Gal. Dove the love.

Hlozek has gone to a top 5 league and not been a huge success. Mitigating circumstances are he's gone to a club that have shot the lights out and he's just not had the environment to be 1st choice as they've smashed it. However, it has put a mark on his copy book and it's not 100% he's going to be a revelation at the very highest level. He does have the game to though, both technically and mentally. He's got it all. He's my number one pick because of his age, experience, ability and cost. They all feed in perfectly.

Has someone photoshopped this and mucking me about?

Tell the Welsh Steve Bruce that, he seems determined to ignore our academy. The amusing thing is, if other managers did the same we'd have gone bust a good while ago. We need our academy to pay for all the muck we waste money on and can't get rid of.

All of them, they have absolutely no shirt term future here under Steve Cooper. Braybrooke and Wanya badly need minutes at their age. Logan Briggs would benefit from a year in League One as well.

Our injury problems are farcical once again. Coady hadn't ever had a long injury before he arrived at Leicester and then two pre-seasons on the spin he gets crocked in a friendly or training session on LCFC pitches. So that's Stolarczyk, Vardy, Coady, Daka, Thomas all currently injured.

He's the Welsh Steve Bruce but without a decent set of novels in his armoury.

Cooper wouldn't play him

Fans can stick up for Spaghetti Coops in regard to ignoring our academy players like Alves but his use of Ricardo is mind bending. Genuinely one of the few remaining top class players and he's going to use him as the back up right back who plays as a RCB for large parts of games.

He's an extremely talented player, the sort I expected Sporting or Leverkusen to get. I don't want to get excited as I also thought this of Daka but could pinpoint his flaws that he had wheres Ioannidis has the technical game and goalscoring ability that should get him accustomed to a step up in class. I'll slag the club to all and sundry when I'm u happy but if we snaffle this bagsman then we've done very well. I'm on the Gerry's

No, because we'd replace Cooper with Parker.

It's just bizarre though. With absolutely no creative midfielders, this pre-season was the perfect opportunity to test Alves with the players around him and get him used to playing in this team in whatever the development plan for his career is. Even if he's going on loan or we're waiting for 6 months before introducing him to a settled PL team, it's pathetic what Cooper has done this pre-season. So many academy players get momentum from being given a chance in pre-season. Don't even get me started on what he's done with Ricardo.

It was nothing to do with them not being ready, it was injuries. Alves was set to play a few times and he then got another niggle. It might be Cooper is wary that they might still be too delicate but given his complete disregard to others I'm not so sure. He'll barely use Nelson either, despite him looking superior to Okoli so far.

Yes especially as Solanke has now gone.

I'd be over the moon with that.

Whilst I think he needs to be asked to leave ASAP, he is finding out just how unusual it is to work under Top and Rudkin. He's not helping himself though. It is essential our club develops and builds our side around our academy players, if you take away such a philosophy then we'd have gone bust ages ago. It has been the single source of club generated revenue in the last 4-5 years. Whether it's right or wrong to sell academy players, we seem to have done pretty well at bringing a select few through and them going on to be highly coveted for tens of millions. Ideally they stay and you make vast returns on players you've bought and sold but whatever, the model has to be that we sell the occasional asset and reinvest with a proper plan. That plan is absolutely nowhere to be seen for a long while but it is critical for us to survive to utilise our academy. Not to mention we have the best facilities in the country and had a near decade run at being the most powerful club in the midlands to hoover up talent. Spaghetti Coops has absolutely no interest in our academy right now, Alves, Nelson, Braybrooke have all been seldom used in pre-season. It's the single thing that's pissed me off more than anything. Not the failure to score a goal in the last 3 pre-season games or register a shot before 80 minutes yesterday. He's looking such a poor fit for us, he hasn't got a clue what our identity or his identity as a manager in this situation is. He has to go, just hold your hands up Top and act now.

He's as complete a striker who's possibly available that I can think of. I think it might be desperation now but we have to act and may have to pay big.

When the chips are counted he'll have a worse managerial career than Steve Bruce and Alan Pardew. That's what's we're dealing with here. I've never ever been this low. Please make it stop.

I think he's about to take top spot in the hall of fame off Peter Taylor. Absolutely tragic manager, should be nowhere near this level.