The Fish

Just reminded me of thing I watched with my parents a while ago that may have been that show, could have been Grand Designs Down Under or whatever. There was an older couple, I think she was an artist, anyway they'd had their dream home built and were describing the decking to the presenter when the old bloke said "Ah I larve to sit here in the morning and watch the bush arand moi dick."

Shocking 1st half, 2nd half was a little better. They were barely awake and we were fortunate not to go in at half time a couple of goals down. Cannot understand taking Murphy off for Ameobi and not Mitrovic. Yes the big mad Serb was poor against Oxford, but he's still a better striker than a tired, poorly performing Gouffran, isn't he? Re: the interview, it is a concern, but I'm not ready to throw the baby out with the bathwater just yet.

Yeah, what he said.

To be honest I'd have loved to see us sign those two Croatian youngsters, bed them into English football. Coric is an attacking midfielder that should have helped Shelvey and Benkovic could have been blooded here and there. But when a £35m bid is rejected, there's not much more we can do. At the same time I would be annoyed if we spent £15m on Townsend, which meant in the summer we couldn't afford to spend £30m on a player to improve on Gayle, or Shelvey. "We were going to be promoted anyway, why buy a luxury player?" etc.

Lets be clear, we're not just 3 points ahead of Reading, we're 3 points, 2 games and 27 goals ahead of 3rd place. Yes, Shelvey is integral and I'd have liked to have seen a player brought in to help shoulder that burden, but Newcastle aren't the only party involved in transfers and if Everton are demanding market-inflated eye-watering sums for James McCarthy I understand why we didn't sign him. If we cannot assure the player he'll start every game I understand why a Premier League standard player (who are the only players we should be looking at) wouldn't want to drop down. If the other team wants cash up front so they can juggle their own squad, I can understand why they wouldn't let a player leave on a loan deal.

But if the next increment is in only 6 months time, is there much point in buying Townsend now? Gouffran is first choice wide left, and while Townsend is much better than Gouffran, he doesn't play there. A Spurs fan I know joked that if you played him on the left, he'd still cut onto his left, take it out for a throw-in and then shoot. If we were in the chasing pack I think we would have strengthened, but we're doing very well and £15m for Townsend is gilding the lily imo.

Maybe he found a few of CT's Roman coins behind the bench at Selhurst?

Interesting you say that (and I don't disagree), but I see the eagerness to sign Townsend this window as a bit of panicking from the Newcastle fans. We're doing well in the league (you could say brilliantly were it not for Brighton's equally extraordinary season). If we maintain our average PpG we might even break 100pts. We surely don't need a player and certainly not a winger. Nobody seems as bothered that we didn't sign a Shelvey-like player which is clearly more of a concern. We didn't sign a striker in case Gayle's hamstring goes again. People are upset we didn't close a deal for Andros Townsend, a winger that would either share the right wing berth with Ritchie, push Ritchie to the opposite flank or be played out of position himself. I doubt that Townsend wants to be anything less than a guaranteed starter. When you see the sums being asked for players like McCarthy and Cairney, I can understand why we didn't secure a CM. And strikers aren't going to be cheap, or interested in a substitute role behind Gayle. I'm sure Rafa wanted players in, I don't know of a manager who doesn't want to buy players every window, but I'm confident that while disappointed nothing happened I don't think that he'll kick off given the context of the market.

I was close then?

You're on fire with obscure 'keepers from our history today Who's next, Peter Keen?* *goooooooogled

Dyer + Southampton always brings to mind that horror tackle that nearly ended Dyer's hopes of going to Japan with England. I cannot for the life of me remember the Southampton player's name. I keep wanting to say Tal Ben Haim but I think I'm just being a massive racist

That's a dig.

I do. We don't know if Championship stalwarts like Gayle, Shelvey, Hayden, Clark, Darlow will cut it in the top flight. To guarantee a midtable finish we can't risk half a season with them as lynch pins. We could probably rely on them to deliver 13th-17th with a few additions. I reckon getting midtable over a couple of seasons would cost less than going for it in 1. Doing it in one means we have to hit the ground running, our stars, our squad and our staff need to perform a level that is several levels highers than they are now. Frankly I don't think Gayle will get 20 goals in the top flight, I don't think teams will afford Shelvey as much space and time, I don't think Darlow will face as few shots. I think that added difficulty will mean we can get safe but not much more than that. To guarantee more would mean overhauling the squad. Over two seasons Mitrovic might suddenly find his feet in the summer after our first season back and become a 20 goal striker (he won't), a decent club might get relegated meaning we can steal their standout, wantaway star for buttons, we've more time to identify and court targets... dunno, it's hypothetical. But aim to guarantee safety 17/18, push for mediocrity in 18/19, see where we are and where we can get. Maybe even give the cups a proper fucking go?

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I think more than safety (>14th) would cost £100m in our first season. Aiming to jump from Championship to midtable would need a reliable striker in the Prem (£25m?), a strong pair of CBs (£30m?), a game changer in midfield (£20m?), and depth across the squad (£30m?). I'm content to walk before we run.

Or an intransigence on the part of the other club, a lack of available targets, or targets being available at a more reasonable price in the summer, or players uninterested in joining a Championship team without assurances about playing time, or, or, or, I don't think any of us know enough about the machinations behind the curtain to state that it is definitely anything, we can suppose and assume and speculate, but nobody knows for sure. I agree that had we signed someone like Townsend we would have been in a better place in our chase for promotion and yes, an impressive signing in the January window would have signalled intent. But is intent really worth spending £13m on? After every game Rafa says "We've got to keep working hard, we want to win every game, we want to be promoted", So does whichever player is wheeled out. Is our intent unclear? I don't like buying a player for buyings sake, there'd be criticism of a bloated squad of average players if we signed a bunch of cunts just because we can. I genuinely believe that we've enough in the squad to get up automatically, if not as champions.

That makes sense. Is Brady more of an Allardyce player than Townsend? I don't know enough about him, but surely Allardyce prefers a winger that gets chalk on his boots to one that cuts inside more often than not?

No, a couple of leftbacks and a defensive midfielder (traditional Allardyce signings). Wonder if there was someone they were looking at, but couldn't make a deal and that then had a knock on effect with us?

I don't think we'd need to spend that much to be better than 3 other teams in our first year back.

Did Townsend's availability become solid after Palace had secured their targets? :dunno?

Don't know how we managed to get to 58pts in 27 games, especially when we didn't even have Ameobi and Sterry. Think you're confusing "want to" with "need to" to be honest. We remain presumptive champions, we remain odds-on to go up automatically. Would Townsend have kicked us on a gear, sure. But I don't think our promotion push is scuppered without him, and it's certainly not under threat because we didn't sign Mo fucking Barrow.

Jesus, really?

@tfweeklypod has the best insight on this so far. They spoke to Rafa in December and even then Benitez emphasised how difficult the window is, and that he'd only be buying the right players. Have to say, the reaction hasn't been surprising in the least. Townsend would have been a good addition, and I believe we were working to that end. However, I don't think him staying at Palace signifies a return to the bad old days, I don't think it signifies broken promises, I don't think it spells the end for Rafa or anything else. I think it means that we tried to sign Townsend but either the deal wasn't right for us, wasn't right for Palace or wasn't right for Townsend. I think we looked at players like Barrow and McCarthy and at least one of those three things meant those transfers didn't happen. Rafa apparently wanted to buy for the Premier League, is Mo Barrow going to be Premier League ready, can't we do better than James McCarthy in the summer?

Derby, Norwich, Villa, Brighton, Huddersfield, Reading.

Wouldn't fancy Townsend and Yedlin on the same flank if we face anyone half decent.