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Out of the strikers with PL experience, I don’t see a way we get Chelsea to party with Tammy for a reasonable sum. Of the more attainable players, I’d look at Joshua King and Chris Wood. King’s agent does happen to be the brother of Ståle Solbakken, so perhaps Lange can use that connection to works towards a move. If we got one of those types it’d likely be at a much more reasonable fee allowing us to spend more in the wide areas, which will be crucial to our success next season.

Speaking from the perspective of a Hearts and Villa supporter, Hearts' position is not quite as precarious as you make it out to be. Supporters pump a decent amount of money into the club each month and the club also has several wealthy benefactors who are quite generous in their contributions. That said, the prevailing feeling is that Hickey will be sold this summer. Rumor is he has already been over to Italy (too see Bologna?) and will be going over to Munich shortly. If the opportunity to go to Bayern is on the table, he would be mad to pass it up. I'd love him at Villa though and with only a year left to run on his contract, he is gettable for likely around the 1/1.5m mark, which is a pittance. By no means do I believe he is ready to be in our matchday squad quite yet though. Best case scenario is to buy him, then loan him back and let him start this coming season for additional experience. Definitely a talented player and still incredibly young, but he needs to be getting regular gametime in order to progress as this past season there was a bit of inconsistency in his play which one would expect from a player of his age. He'll always be a legend for this goal:

I disagree and believe we will hopefully see a mix of strategies. Our recent history (last time we were relegated and this past season) proves you need a mix of experience and quality in the squad and with that you can then also take some calculated risks on more unknowns. This is obvious or at least should be to those running the club. The owners have often spoke of the investment going into the Academy, so I reckon a large remit of his job will be unearthing young talent to put through the academy system and later sell on at a premium, such as you see with teams like Dortmund.

Among Hearts support, the rumor for a while is that Man City will buy Hickey and then loan him back to Hearts for another year or two for development. Looks a very promising player, but definitely a bit raw which is understandable given his young age. If Villa were interested he could definitely be had for less than 2m, it’s just a matter of him not being ready for the Premier League quite yet. One for the future if we are looking to make those investments now.

While this season has taught us quite a bit about buying players with mostly foreign experience and the time it takes to adapt to the PL, I’d love us to dive into Germany a bit more for players. Milot Rashica and Patrik Schick (was on loan at RB Leipzig from Roma) would be two attainable players who might add quality out wide and up top.

His contract is rolling if I am not mistaken, so it is a definite possibility...I'm certainly not his biggest supporter, but if we did do that, it would be a bit ruthless. If the man does the job asked of him and gets us up, I do think he deserves a crack at the top level with decent backing.

Hmmmm....my memory clearly evades me! I could've sworn he played quite a few matches back there. That point aside, I still think he has the attributes necessary to play in the back and I think it'd go a long way towards preserving his overall fitness levels throughout the course of a season. At the end of the day, I think he is a player whom we desperately need on the pitch, whether it be as a midfielder or defender.

The team had its best run with him in central defense, so I would welcome Jedinak playing there more often next season. If we can get a younger/more durable midfielder to take his place in midfield and shield the back four then that would be ideal.

It's almost as if the guy didn't suffer a very serious knee injury which kept him out of football for more than half a year. Whilst I'd agree he has been a bit ropey at times this season (I certainly think he has been much more solid playing more advanced up the pitch), I'm just happy that he is back playing and seemingly shows no lingering side effects of that injury. At 23yrs old, he is still on the younger side and can continue to develop into a better defender...you don't just become shit overnight (unless your Stephen Warnock, of course ).

Ah feck, I am blind, my bad

He played a nice ball into Kodjia, who scuffed his shot, before it fell to Hourihane to score.

Absolutely, if the team can accommodate it, I'm all for it. DB was excellent when we had a decent midfield and wide players...as soon as we lost those, he was useless. Luckily, we again appear to have a more complete team and that should serve us well.

Mark Bunn says "Hi."

Super excited about this one. Seems a bit of a poacher; however, I think unlike in the past, this is now a luxury we can afford to have as we have a midfield who can actually pass the ball forward & move.

Yup, it's either in Row Z or hits the first defender. Could not cross to save his life.

What is with this guy?!? Midfielders are not supposed to score goals!

Paging Julie B

If we managed to get Hourihane that would be great...now if we managed to get him and Cairney (think that one is a long shot unless we offer massive wages to tempt him and fee of 10mill+) then I think that is the midfield problem solved as those two guarantee you a decent number of goals and assists. For the defense, I think James Bree for RB if we can tempt him with regular playing time, as well as a CB on loan (Rob Holding or Cameron Carter-Vickers) would sort us there. For the striker, I think we should try and get a loan in from the PL. Afobe and Long are both not starting regularly throughout the season and have struggled a bit, so something along those lines would be great. Outside of that, if we could possibly get a swap involving McCormack and Brady, that would be great as it offers us further width and also the option of playing him at LB.

Once Ayew and Kodjia are off to AFCON, I'd like for us to try out McCormack and Gestede up top together (assuming we don't sell Gestede right away). I think McCormack could benefit from Gestede's ability to win aerial battles and get flick ons to him. Also, Gestede is a lot less selfish and 9/10 would pass the ball up for a teammate in a better scoring position, imo.

Excellent ball across the box for the winner. I'd like to think him and Grealish are back in the team for Leeds.

Can't say I've seen much of Hogan, but from looking at YouTube (I know) he seems to be a bit of a poacher with very tidy finishing skills and a decent work rate. A player like that could work very well with Kodjia stretching defences and creating space for him.

Thanks Lambert...

I'm quite confident we can put together a run to see us into the top 3, especially if we can add quality to the squad in January and keep up with the home form. If I am not mistaken, I believe in 2011, Reading had our exact same point total through 16 matches and they went on to win the league. I think Newcastle is unrealistic to catch, but I really do believe we can catch Brighton over the next 15 matches.

It actually is an article saying Hull are joining the race for Kodjia. So in a roundabout way, he is maybe liking it because if Hull land him...well then we have a much better shot at...