The Fish

Claudia Winkelman ✅

Krafth is fit, no?

That looks right up my gate. Fucked if I'm watch 1 through 23 to catch up though.

No it wouldn't. Not really.

Well, that's both impressive and not believable.

Have a I missed the whole "shitting our pants" and/or overreacting period?

Aye but it's not like going to the shops and picking up what you need, it's having the PSR room to spend when the right player becomes available. It'd be great to sell who we want, when we want so we could buy who we want, when we want. But it doesn't work like that. We need to have the cash here and now. Someone wants to give us money for our reserve centreback.

What if, we get £15m now, but couldn't reinvest it until the summer? Or, we get £15m and that plus Almiron's fee (and whatever we've got down the back of the PSR sofa) is spent on a RW who's better than what we've got?

Honestly think we're at a bit of a cross roads. Gone are the days when you could just wheel out any old ex-pro to state "Well he's got the ball there, and he's crossed it and bang, he's scored." and there's not the appetite for some bespectacled Austrian journalist explaining the treble pivot that's all the rage in the blossoming Cambodian 3rd division. The way you've got cameras on Neville and Carragher elevating their reactions to the same level as the manager or fans, or how the BANTZ with Big Meeks and Keane is done 'for the socials'... it's trying to be matey matey with the audience. Replicating the feel of sitting in the pub and watching it with your mates. I don't mind pundits being partisan, but we could do with more clubs being represented. I don't mind pundits being journalists, or ex-pros, as long as they've something interesting to add. But Paul Merson is a cunt.

Priority is RW and RCB, I agree. Kelly doesn't solve either of those problems. Nor does he solve "who do we play if Hall is unavailable?", or "who do we play if Botman is out?". In terms of depth, he's not providing anything that other players aren't. For less wages. And unfortunately less resale value. Look, if we had two equal bids, one Targett and one for Kelly, I'd take the Targett money. But Kelly is the only one who appears to be attracting interest.

You're right, in that there are two CB positions that require depth. But Kelly isn't 2nd choice for either of them, he also isn't second choice at left back. That would be Big Dan Burn. And then it's a conversation about whether Lloyd Kelly is chosen ahead of Matt Targett or not. So he's possibly 3rd to 4th choice there as well. You're arguing to retain the services of someone that, in all likelihood, won't get a game. We 100% should be replacing him, but not with a middling, 26yr old, free transfer. We should replace him with a young and promising centreback (Hujsen at Bournemouth is a good example), or we should sign someone that pushes Schar down the pecking order by being as good as or better than Botman.

Didn't we also sign Bigirimana in the same window?

If Schar is playing LCB, it's because both Burn and Botman are unavailable. Botman and Burn are both ahead of Kelly at LCB, so in his favoured fucking position he's at best 3rd choice. At CB he's definitely behind Schar as well, so that puts him 1...2...3....ohhh right, 4th fucking choice. Put it this way, if Schar plus one of Botman and Burn were unavailable, Howe is as likely to select Krafth to play RCB as he is Kelly.

Well thank fuck for Onana, I say. If it wasn't for him, school drop off this morning would have been a fucking nightmare. Also, the Man City fans knew better than to try and gloat off the back of pasting Ipswich. Only one who's got anything to say is the Everton fan.

Kelly is not our 3rd choice Centreback. Botman, Schar, Burn. So he's 4th at best. You then go on to list what next season situation will be, pushing your boy Kelly further down the pecking order. Botman, Burn, New RCB, Schar, and then Kelly. Unless of course he's usurped by one of the young CBs we've been accumulating for the youth team. So far, you're arguing that we keep a hold of our 4th, or 5th choice centreback. We'd get no money for Schar or Burn. We definitely don't want to lose Botman. So Kelly is our most saleable asset in an area of the pitch where we actually have depth. Put that up your shitter and fluff it. Now find me an up to date and accurate reading of his speed. If it's not nigh on as fast as Gordon I think it's fair to say he doesn't have "Pace to burn". There is a LOT of assumption being passed off as fact in this post. You're assuming that the fees grow steadily with the value of the player, which isn't necessarily true. Kelly isn't a young lad with loads of potential, like Tino or Hall. He's not an established Champions League player like Tonali. He's not a goal scoring attacking midfielder valued at around £40m. He's Lloyd Kelly, a middling 26yr old Centre Back, on a free, from Bournemouth. Kelly being a solid pro is not a good enough reason to keep him around when we can get c£10m for him. I wasn't disrespecting Eddie Howe, I was disrespecting you. He's Jack Colback, Jamall Lascelles, Isaac Hayden. He's not good enough for where we are, let alone where we're aiming to be. He's exactly the kind of player who, if you saw he was starting against Bournemouth you'd suddenly be very concerned. If we can sell him now for £10m, that is the most we're ever going to get for him. And we can bring in a warm body to replace him for less. Maybe a warm body who has the potential to push for a start. Have you not been paying attention? Growing the business side of the club is the only way we can compete on the football side of the club. Selling Kelly makes good business sense and also good football sense. Club seems fixated on Trafford, so we'll possibly seem him join. I agree we need a RCB, and a RW as soon as possible. I agree that Wilson will likely get an extension and I hope Osula improves. So CF isn't a priority for the summer, but lets just say it is. Back up RB will likely be a Krafth/Kelly type player, but it's a want not a need, but again lets say that it is. At most that's 5 players. Since the takeover we've signed 5-6 players each season. Hell, this summer just gone we signed 4 already (not counting Hall) and we were all pretty nonplussed. So in this window, say we sign a goalkeeper, or the backup RB, or maybe even the RW or Centreback we need. That one or more of the 5 areas you insist are priorities. Diego knows his onions. I know my shit.

Schar's reportedly in talks for a new contract and Burn's deal runs out in 2026. Lascelles and Krafth will be moved on, no doubt, but that's a problem for the Summer when we'll need to replace our - check notes- 4th and 5th choice CBs. Kelly absolutely does not have pace to burn, that's just not true. He's not ponderous, but there's no way I'd call him quick. He's 26 and hasn't shown much more promise than Premier League squad player. He's not going to be as good as Schar, let alone Botman. so at best he's going to be a squad player. The £10m pure profit is PSR accounting. That £10m on the books could pay for a much more expensive replacement. He cost us nothing in transfer fees so whatever we sell him for is pure profit. Oh, and there's absolutely no fucking way we paid £6m as a signing/agent fee for Lloyd Kelly. In 23/24 we paid £18.8m on agent fees, when we signed; Tonali, Barnes, Livramento, Minteh, and Hall. There's no way Lloyd Kelly's agent got nearly 32% of their combined outlay. Eddie might like the lad, he may think he's a super cool fun dude, but the lad is fundamentally not a top 6 centre back and if we want to improve the squad, he's exactly the type of player we need to be moving on. Him, Almiron, Longstaff and Dubravka (in the summer).

I don't read the Mail Online. Sorry.

It was supposed to say that "Just like Mrs Guardiola, you were full of Pep last night." The match thread was you at the height of your ebullience.

Late to the party but here's my two-penneth on Kelly (and Almiron). Lloyd Kelly was a free transfer that excited not a soul. He is a warm body and, while he's not going to be on the rumoured £150k per week, he is gobbling up wages while providing not a lot. Botman, Schar and Burn are the three first choice Centre Backs. Krafth and Lascelles can provide a similar level of cover that Kelly can and neither of them would attract anything like an £11m fee. Maybe Alex Murphy is good enough to be 4th (FOURTH) choice Centre back? We also have Hall, Burn, Targett as PL proven left backs, plus Livramento and Trippier who can all fill in at Left back to the same standard as Kelly. So, here's a saleable asset, not vital to our short or long term targets, who isn't going to improve much, and who's attracting interest. Fucking sell him now. If a defender of Lloyd Kelly's ability is the difference between getting Champions League football and not, I'd argue our troubles run a lot deeper than even the most pessimistic cunt could imagine. If we can get c£20m in January for Almiron and Kelly we should absolutely fucking do it. We should have wriggle room due to our caution in the summer, add £20m pure profit to the book in January it should mean we've money to spend now AND money to spend in the summer.

ffffffffahhhhkin Hell Rayvin, just enjoy it man. Worry about the worries another day.