DJ Barry Hammond

I just think if your Leicester, Ipswich or Southampton and go in for him in a manor of “we want you!” - Blackburn don’t have much they can do in terms of resisting that move and so it then just becomes a case of negotiating a price with them. His age no doubt puts clubs off - because ‘resale value’ - and there’s probably only a narrow number of clubs that could really consider him as a viable transfer target (lower end of Premier League / higher end of Championship). But because there’s less competition for his signature, that should somewhat be reflected in the transfer fee paid and makes it less likely that the player holds out for another deal ala Soule. So I look at this as a transfer as one that if a club wanted to do and set their focus on; it could have been done early pre-season with all the benefits of doing business early brings with it.

Sometimes simply following the hot hand (or feet in this case) can prove beneficial, especially with strikers. That said - I wouldn’t be certain that this guy is a one hit wonder either. If you look over his career to date, he’s clearly someone who has shown the desire, ambition and application to climb the footballing ranks and appears to be continuing on an upward trajectory in terms of performance - so why would you bet against him being a success in the Premier League? He’s also directly showed us his quality in no uncertain terms in our last home game of last season - so given all that - I’m a little surprised we haven’t shown more serious interest - especially as in terms of making a deal this would appear to be an easier one to make happen and get over the line quickly.

Search feature (by topic title too) is available and easy to use. https://www.foxestalk.co.uk/search/?&q=Vardy&search_and_or=or&search_in=titles The one below is probably the best one to use for all things Jamie BUT there are quite a few that feature him.

Yeah, sort of post you’d do if you were enjoying something that had been a regular feature of your life for a year - but is now going to be for the last time for a while… possibly?

I’m the opposite - I get the feeling he’s going to do rather well with this Chelsea side.

Look, at least it came with something that will last forever. There’s many a club that have taken a gamble and ended up with absolutely nothing to show for it. What I felt that tweet also highlighted however - we simply performed massively outside of our station and that maintaining our position in and around the top 6 was never going to be sustainable because we simply don’t have the income base to support that ambition.

That would be a moronic attempt at a defence - and would be laughed at more than our current reported defence of “we were more shit than we had planned to be.” There is also absolutely no legal basis where that position could stand up.

OR… they have an interview with Ndidi that’s about to appear on the app. They’ve used the same 🔉 icon on tweets relating to interviews with Fawatu and Will Alves.

Interesting little tweet on wages.

Do you mean the risk of guaranteeing a players services for a season at a fixed cost without any further obligation or liability past that? In terms of cost / risk ratio, this deal would be on the lower end.

It’s always much harder to conclude transfer business early when that window involves a major international tournament. Look at the whole market - it seems very little (bar maybe Chelsea) has happened unless you count the dubious intra club PSR assisting trading of academy assets. And that stands to reason - players returns to squads are disjointed, those away on international duty are harder to discuss futures with etc. The other thing with trying to do business early is that will normally come at a premium price point.

How many strikers are available to us that have a good goal scoring record in a good league(s) - other than the guy we have already that’s coming towards the end of his career? And what’s the sort of price tag on those strikers - Solanke’s just gone for £60 odd million for example.

I think Cooper will end up being worried about Spurs’ marauding fullbacks and play BDCR* as the more “defensively solid” option in that position. I hope not… but it’s the sort of tactical choice managers make

The way the guy led the line and absolutely dominated us in doing so during that Conference League Semi-Final for Roma - I’d say that left a lasting impression that meant he’s been on our radar ever since. It’s also a tad unfair to suggest he’s had one good season. He’s had two very good seasons in the Championship with Bristol City and Aston Villa at a young age early on in his career - he also did well during the Frank Lampard season for Chelsea. Your comparison to Danny Welbeck is both cruel and weakened by basic statistical comparison too - Danny has yet to achieve a double digits goalscoring season to date and at 33 is two shy of reaching 100 career goals (449 appearances). Abraham on the other hand has 4 double digit seasons; including one in the Premier League and one in Seria A; and has already surpassed 100 goals (127 in 328 appearances) at the age of 26. That said - I would agree that I don’t think we stand a realistic chance of signing him.

Gone are the days when you can simply rely on a first 11. With 5 subs, it’s pretty much guaranteed that a team will make a change in midfield, wide and striker areas - and that those that you bring on are as important quality wise as those you start with.

Are they? They look very different styles of player to me.

A bid going in yesterday he say’s - hmmm, no doubt at around 17:14z No chance that won’t look like a bid of desperation that allows Panathinaikos to pull our pants down! I suspect Gala will smell the wiff of despair from us on the Zaha deal too.

Or do Spurs want to delay a potential Zaha transfer to us until after we play them?

Yes. Dean Smith is the manager too, adding to past club connections. Fuchs played out his career there too.

Are you serious? Even the king of evasive interviews Roberto Martinez would not have been able to defend that performance. Plus - the reason we were poor was because we were setup to be poor. One thing that was abundantly obvious in the first half was how easy we were making it for them to play through our thirds, that we were at least a yard or two off then at every point. Yet there was no change - we neither dropped deeper and became more compact, or did the reverse and pressed higher, with the back line playing higher to bring about that compactness. We were also poor in possession and failed to get any territory dominance - at which point you may decide to go a little more route one. Get yourself up the pitch, win throw-in’s / freekicks in their half, just to establish some forward positivity - but that requires touchline instruction to do that. And that has to be the most concerning thing about not just yesterday, but all of pre-season - these have been basic tactical deficiencies in our games that are not difficult to identify or purpose solutions too (regardless of quality of player) - and yet nothing has been done about it to date.

No, the lack of confidence is due to the difference in coaching / coaching styles. Enzo clearly drills players, intensely, to the point the patterns are rotations are second nature. He’s also a very charismatic character with a dominating personality. Cooper is clearly so very much different - players were looking to the sideline for a voice, some sort of instruction, from very early on yesterday. That nothing of any note came across judging by the sheer lack of tactical change throughout could be to Cooper’s quick detriment because that’s how you lose a squad. It’s not being overly dramatic to suggest Cooper has around 6 games to prove he should continue in the job.

Part of me wonders if some of the issue here is Cooper being between two stools in terms of footballing identity. That he’s been hired to continue playing in an identity that was forged under Maresca last season… but that identity is too far from his own that you end up in a nothingness middle ground. My hope for Spurs right now is that perhaps, we see something completely different - possibly 3 at the back - and maybe with Fawatu playing on the left (Ricardo on the right). We can all see that personality wise / coaching wise, Cooper is very different to Enzo, so it is completely foolish to think we can play the same way - especially when we’ve lost a crucial piece to why the way we played was so effective last season. Anyway - first international break is vs 1st September, second one 6th October, third 10th November. Cooper has his work cut out to survive all 3 as it stands.

What is even more mental about it is asking him to do it in isolation off to the right… and then move forward to the striker position (first line of ‘press’) when we defend. There’s no wonder he looks lost because no-one has ever employed such a strange tactical variant in the history of football. What’s also equally worrying - it was so obvious this particular aspect has not been working, yet Cooper’s persisted with it?

He lacks any sort of presence. The very best strikers have that air of confidence, a swagger, just something about them that catches your attention / eye even when they’re not doing much.

The stupid thing is - Cooper has put himself under massive pressure going into a season opener that in reality should have been a free hit. If it was just the one pre-season game that we looked poor in that would be one thing… but he haven’t looked convincing throughout. The players looked devoid of confidence and any practical understanding of what they are being asked to do - they’ve been playing as individuals, not as a collective. If they show that again against Spurs in a little over a week that could be a pretty ugly game. Starting well and with confidence was always going to be important given a number of our early fixtures represent potential six pointers - we face Fulham, Palace, Everton across our first six fixtures. That’s followed by October’s three fixtures of Bournemouth, Southampton and Forest - all games that will have a huge impact on shaping our season. Yet - it’s a fair question to ask at the moment whether Cooper will even get that far with us from what we’ve seen to date.