RichiBoi11

Obviously I don't want this rumour about him needing surgery and time off to be true, but if it is it makes it even more ridiculous that there was a large portion of people against us signing a striker this summer because 'Watkins never gets injured and won't miss any games'. Imagine if we hadn't signed Ings, we'd have probably been playing all three league games with Wesley or El Ghazy up top.

I'm all for the prospect of securing a player like Tarkowski on a free, but selling Mings is madness. His value to the team, club and ethos is worth far more than any potential fee.

I was literally about to say tweet Bardell, Ian Taylor etc and see if the club can do anything. He's a good guy, despite the stick he gets from some fans.

I know, there's very few players that don't get torn to shreds on here. FWIW I think Luiz is a valuable and under rated part of our team, and I'm not just saying that on the assumption he may be reading this.

Dougie reads Villa Talk, confirmed

£40 million wasted

I know it's all twitter bs, but just imagine if we did sign Bissouma. I think this forum would explode

This guy

With Hourihane off and the rumours of Guilbert too I fully expect one player in tomorrow. Whether that's a loan or a permanent signing is anyone's guess, but all the reliable sources have been saying if Wes, Conor and Fred leave we will actively look to recruit. Time to start speculating.

Smith directly said in his interview yesterday El Ghazy is highly rated by us and not going anywhere. I know some fans don't rate him, but Smith clearly does. He's going nowhere.

Stop it. Don't get our hopes up based purely on flights. We've moved on from those days

I doubt it as he's only 18 so I doubt he'd be going straight in. You never know though.

5pm tomorrow?

This could be one of those Dean Smith classics. 'We are done, nuless the right deal becomes available nad we have to take it'. It's obvious we've been putting the feelers out for centre mids before and after the JWP bid, so it seems likely the agent knows we're after a midfielder and has alerted us to his availability. Whether or not Lange etc think he's the right fit is another issue entirely. I hope they do, as on a 1-2 year deal with an option to extend, he could be a superb signing for us, both on and off the pitch.

With Davis out and Watkins not fully fit, there's a realistic chance he will get decent minutes until at least January, starting tomorrow, where I expect him to replace Ings in the final stages unless we're struggling or chasing the game.

I think the issue there might be the 'we' is the fans, not the club.

That Kristoff Terreur is claiming on twitter that Axel Witsel has actually been offered to us, and I'm pretty sure he was one of the guys to break the Wesley signing a couple of years back, so there might be something in it. He is however tempering it, by saying it's an agent offer rather than us approaching him, so if we aren't interested it'll be a non starter. If he really is available for 5 million euros and decent wages can be negotiated, I think we should be all over this.

Yeah it's amazing they can have so many players out in the cold and there's not realistically one you'd look at and go 'we need to get him'

Chelsea have an insane number of players to shift, they can only register 25 players and I think they're still at around the 35 mark even with Abraham, Zouma, Bakayoko etc leaving. The problem is any of the players realistically worth loaning to improve our team will be in that final 25, not the castoffs they need to shift.

I mean this window definitely hasn't gone to plan. Grealish sold, a disrupted pre season, assistants leaving, missing out on ESR and JWP. It's clearly far from ideal, but let's not forget the positives. 5 solid looking signings to spread the load across the team rather than one player, a fantastic youth set up with several graduates already knocking on the first team door, and we still have a side that boasts one of the best defences from last season, and we've added more goals to the side. Sure we'd like a more balanced midfield, but the younger players and Sanson may be the answer to that, we just don't know. There's still plenty of reasons to be positive.

midfielders in defence and right backs everywhere. How ironic that people think the squad is unbalanced now (which I do agree with). Just remember people, it could always be worse. MUCH worse. Cabbage throwing worse.

Missing the heady days of Bruce ball.

Yeah he is. To be honest, depending on wages that would be an absolute bargain for someone, you could easily get 2 to 3 good seasons out of him.

I'm sure it's a random and unfounded link, but the craziest thing about that Witsel rumour is the price! That can't be right surely? Edit: Also despite the fact he's 32, not played in the prem etc etc, I've just realised we'd surely be the first team in history to have two Axel's in the squad, potentially competing for the same spot. Let's just make this happen for how confusing it'd be to everyone.

It's also putting a lot of stock in Sanson, who many seem to have forgotten is still an unknown for us, but once he's match fit, at 27 and signed with the value of a £30 million midfielder, I think Smith would be expecting him to play every game.