David Kelly

All of which is bad news for us no matter which way you look at it.

I don't know if there's been any update on what I read yesterday but it seemed to be then that our bid hadn't been accepted or rejected and the thought was that it was broadly what they wanted and we just needed to tweak the payment terms a little. Surely if this is the case we should just tell them we can pay it all up front? Unless my thinking is wrong, we are just about the only club on earth who paying out in installments makes no difference to whatsoever. If the idea is to get in and get it done before the mancs can pull together the finances, then accepting Red Bull's terms is the way to go about it.

One of the most off putting things in football in general these days is that the cunts are entitled to loyalty bonuses despite their agents engineering moves, if they don't put a written transfer request in. I can agree with any amount of the reasons that are given as to why these massively well players keep wanting better wages that they feel they are due. But I can see absolutely no justification for paying any bonuses like that to the cunts.

Hand in an actual transfer request?

Exactly where I'm at now. I still think we can have a bright future, but any thoughts of us winning the league have completely left me now. Challenging for Europe and the good runs in the cup was a dream I couldn't see happening five years ago so it's far from the end of the world, but it's a bit of a kick in the stots after what we were promised.

The one thing that is of no concern to us is money up front. The flip side of that is, that it probably is a concern to most other clubs. So again we are in the position to tell them to go and fuck their wall pushing cunt selves right up their own arses.

Ben Jacobs (is he reliable?) saying that Liverpool have no plans to bid again based on the refusal they got.

He did look like a very good player in the U21's. But that's the U21's and certainly doesn't make him a ready made replacement for Isak. I thought I'd read he'd went to Bayern but obviously that's not happened yet. From what I saw of him I'd be happy to see him here (certainly a lot happier than with someone like Muniz or DCL) but he'd certainly need to be along with someone like Wisa or Watkins, both of whom are not the right age profile but who you would be confident could get a good amount of goals.

Even assuming he would be second choice to a player of an interested Isak's ability, DLC isn't an improvement on Wilson other than being younger. He's only ever had 2 seasons where he scored more then 9 goals. I can't see anything that makes him a good signing. As a replacement for Isak he would be an insult.

You're not seriously trying to talk yourself into thinking that DCL wouldn't be a shit signing now are you? This window is seriously messing with our heads now!

Having a better management structure (or any management) at the club may allow us to move more quickly and decisively for targets which may allow us to sign better players on occasion or the owners saying fuck PSR we'll just spend what we want and take a points deduction and work around it are the only things I can see changing this until the PSR rules are changed (most likely through the City case).

After a season of winning a cup and qualifying for the champions league we now need to be improving our squad for the challenge of the extra games. We have been incapable of signing the players we want to improve the team and squad because, largely, the established elite can offer them better wages and the prestige they have built up by being able to spend whatever they want and win trophys. Add to that, we can't afford to keep our best player. If we sell our best player that will allow us to spend more on other players but they will be ones that the established elite don't want because they aren't as good as the players they have already taken out of our grasp (obviously there will be exceptions when players don't progress as expected or get injuries or we take a chance on a player to develop who turns out to be a star). So despite having the best season in any of our memories, there is a strong chance that rather than improving, we actually start the season with a weakened team/squad. As a result of a team/squad that hasn't been improved and the additional difficulties presented by the champions league, our results in the league aren't as good and we don't have Europe again the following season. This means we can't attract top tier sponsorship and again we can't bridge the gap on the elite. The following season because of some clever recruitment and no distraction of Europe we up our performances and get back in Europe. At which time we need to improve the team/squad but we can't because the players we identify would rather sign for the elite because of the better wages they can afford to play even if they are bit part players in the enormous squads. Subsequently we cannot improve, cannot attract bigger sponsorship and cannot qualify for Europe again because we've not improved and have the extra games. PSR is thing that makes this happen.

Unless the City case comes up with something that helps us I'm not convinced we can. If we can keep picking up the odd cup I'll end up being more than happy anyway but it really feels like the takeover happened 10 years too late for us ever to have the chance to really make it to the consistent top level. Unless we can get rid of the rules that have been put in to block us.

Will we ever be able to get there though? The rules they have put in place are preventing us from paying more which means that whenever we have a season like last we are in danger of one of the cartel swooping in and taking our best player because they can pay him more than we can. We also can't afford to buy the additional players that would allow us to move further on because we are going up against the same teams who can afford more. This inability to push on will prevent us from securing better and better revenue streams and then we hit the ceiling (you know the one Klopp claimed we didn't have) and at that point interest starts to fall and we lose Howe, can't attract top quality managers who can perform the same miracles with the same restrictions and get sold to someone who has the same problems but less money in the background and we fall away again. I realise we can still get more sponsorship deals, sell naming rights for the ground and training ground, training kit sponsors etc but it feels like they will put blocks on us getting really lucrative ones (certainly from other PIF companies). So we are just stuck and won't ever be able to really move in on the cunts above who are blocking our growth. Obviously I'm not feeling particularly positive the way this summer is going but I do feel what they have done is completely block any chance any club has of truly breaking into the established elite because no matter how badly they fuck up they have the revenue to buy themselves out of it that us, Villa, Everton, Forrest etc will never be allowed to match.

This simply has to be the case. Mind you if we do this you can't imagine we can keep him past this season and then where do we go? If Sesko goes to Man Utd there's not a lot more options we can look at who aren't going to be a massive downgrade on Isak. Obviously players can come to the fore in the space of the next 12 months but it's hard to see that we can be in better (in terms of being in champions league and have just won a trophy) position than what we are now. What was being talked of as a transformative summer for us is certainly looking like just that at the moment. Just not in the right direction.

If the best we can get after selling Isak, is Muniz then we simply cannot sell Isak. I couldn't give less of a fuck what he wants. An unmotivated Isak would still be better than going into the Champions League with Muniz.

Is it a major minor injury then? Or a minor major injury?

Playing about as well as we did against Celtic here.

I just don't believe that Ekitke was being courted to play with Isak. I think they knew they would most likely be forced into selling Isak so we trying for a replacement. I don't think we will sell him without thinking we have a replacement lined up.

Did we really though? It had been talked about for quite a while before that. I don't buy that this all happened with Isak just in the last couple of weeks.

Were we really serious about buying Ekitike as an addition to Isak though? We will never know whether we did or didn't unless we do sign Sesko and keep Isak which looks unlikely at this point.

I can't see there being any movement from us on Sesko unless Isak moving is a done deal. As it doesn't seem anyone at the club is actively discussing anything with Isak, this doesn't look particularly close. Unless the Diaz deal free's Liverpool hand. On the positive side, it looks like we have actually wrapped up a deal quickly for Ramsdale so my main objection to that deal is gone. I'm still not particularly enthused by his signing but certainly concede that having him and Pope is better than what we had given that Dubravka surely wants away and the Greek is clearly never going to play for us.

I think your point about not being an established CL club and not being able to offer those sorts of wages etc is spot on. But that's also kind of my point. We aren't one of those clubs so we have to act differently to them. Which surely means either shopping in a different pool to them or acting quick enough to get in before those clubs have a chance to move. Obviously both things are difficult but the second option in particular isn't something we are very good at so is the first option not what we need to be looking at? What are the other options? Just keep going in for the same players as the big five (not really sure Spurs need to be included here) and not managing to sign them or just waiting for them to make all the signings they want and we pick up the scraps?

Yeah I do get that, and PSR is clearly a bigger concern probably than we ever thought it would be. But I still think we there must be players that Nixon and co can identify that would improve us. Surely he's done enough to show that if we provide him with reasonable finances, he can find these players.

I think the question is, do we need to be fishing in a different pond? If we could pick up more players of the standard of Bruno and Botman as they were when we signed them (ie without premier league and international experience) surely they would improve the standard of our squad? Admittedly that wouldn't necessarily be an upgrade on Isak or even Schar, but surely there players out there who are upgrades on Lascelles or Willock/Miley? I find it difficult to believe there aren't players who can upgrade our squad without necessarily being of the standard of player that Liverpool/Chelsea/City etc are looking at. So we would have an easier time getting them.