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wodger of awabia wrote:I think that I would rather sit on my arse than lose £75,000.00 a year

You wont be losing £75k if you're out of contract though, will you? You'll be getting bugger all, in which case the drop in salary to come here whilst seeming drastic would be a lot better than Jobseekers allowance...

Knill has had 3 and a bit months probably longer to get a centre forward, it was clear towards the end of last season that Howe was going and would need to be replaced so to not have one at all going into the new season is somewhat disappointing.

Is it better to wait a week to get a better one?, yes but only if that option is actually going to become available? will we be forever waiting for the right one or another week? If we're talking to said player why do they need the extra week or two? It should have been a lot closer by now in my opinion. Manset was a waste of time, he was never going to come here, Knill could have said we were trying to sign Ronaldo, that would have shown the calibre of player we were trying to get wouldn't it? Never going to sign him either. Manset has been on good money at his last few clubs, is a bit of a rogue and doesn't stick around anywhere for longer than 3 months, he's also an unknown quantity still in terms of his actual ability for the money he would demand.

What we need is an experienced, proven player for this league to come in and hit the ground running the exact same as the likes he has already signed i.e. Tonge, Harding. There are one or two of them around and I fully understand and have been saying the exact same things about the difficulty of trying to get players down to Torquay for yonks, good that now Knill has said the exact same thigns that it seems to finally be sinking in however I'm still slightly disappointed that it seems we're going into the season with our squad still pretty far from complete.

Royal Gull seems to be the best manager around, with you making it sound very easy, could you inform us all of a list of a few players that are experienced goal scorers, who has to be a tall target man, who will join us on our budget, and wants to move here.

It's a hard job to bring in the correct players the season is 46 games, if we miss a striker for 2 of them but get the right one in then I am happy with that.

I'm sure AK would love to have his squad sorted within 1 day but we have to be realistic.

Lets sit tight this week and get behind the team on Saturday you never know we may have 2 new players in and the worrying is for nothing.

it takes 4 months to sign a striker does it?

I'd rather we potentially wasted our time talking to the likes of Paul Benson from Swindon who isn't wanted there, has scored goals in this league for 3 clubs, is west country based and fits our remit rather than going down cul de sacs after the likes of Manset to tell the truth.

I think we are 95% sure of having a striker in on a season long loan before Saturday but as Knill has said he cannot get him in until his parent club releases him from their pre-season programme and there is always the chance they can pull out of the agreement.

royalgull wrote:it takes 4 months to sign a striker does it?

I'd rather we potentially wasted our time talking to the likes of Paul Benson from Swindon who isn't wanted there, has scored goals in this league for 3 clubs, is west country based and fits our remit rather than going down cul de sacs after the likes of Manset to tell the truth.

I think you'll find he lives in London and commuted to Swindon...

Oh and how is it taking 4 months when the club had to wait till Howe's contract ran down before making a firm offer (for financial reasons) to someone else?
Had Howe turned round on the 30th June and said I accept your contract offer, what would the club do if they had already signed his replacement?
Im sure someone will turn up who knows the points of law on contracts (and breaches of).

Sunnysideup wrote: I think you'll find he lives in London and commuted to Swindon...

Oh and how is it taking 4 months when the club had to wait till Howe's contract ran down before making a firm offer (for financial reasons) to someone else?
Had Howe turned round on the 30th June and said I accept your contract offer, what would the club do if they had already signed his replacement?
Im sure someone will turn up who knows the points of law on contracts (and breaches of).

The club would have shat itself big style !

Sunnysideup wrote: I think you'll find he lives in London and commuted to Swindon...

Oh and how is it taking 4 months when the club had to wait till Howe's contract ran down before making a firm offer (for financial reasons) to someone else?
Had Howe turned round on the 30th June and said I accept your contract offer, what would the club do if they had already signed his replacement?
Im sure someone will turn up who knows the points of law on contracts (and breaches of).

That was never going to happen, Howe had made his intentions clear, a replacement should in my opinion have been sounded out earlier but it is what it is. Fingers x'd for some new before Saturday.

Benson was only made available last week wasn't he? Just a bit like Pearce was too?

So your one target that you have suggested has only been made available a week or so ago? There are rumours we are after Benson. So it seems its not as easy to complete deals as it is on football manager.

Benson hasn't been involved with Swindon's first team for over a year.

I'm going to leave it now because I'm not interested in a slanging contest, we should have had something further down the line to being sorted for a position as key as the striker position in my opinion.

Fingers x'd for Saturday.

Knill has given us an explanation as to what is happening and that's all I can ask. I believe him and trust him 100% that he knows what he's doing and is being honest with everyone. Royal is correct in the sense that it is frustrating that we haven't yet managed to attract a suitable attacking replacement for Howe given the time that has passed but i'm sure we can make do without for a while and see how we get on. You never know, having lots of nippy players might, just might work without a big man. Bodin is not a small bloke either and I know he can head a ball so if need be he can get up for crosses and things, hey maybe just sod it and play Bodin up with Benyon as a straight 2 up top. He can't do any worse than he did last season and with a fresh slate and a few goals on the board may just ignite his confidence.

AustrianAndyGull wrote:Knill has given us an explanation as to what is happening and that's all I can ask. I believe him and trust him 100% that he knows what he's doing and is being honest with everyone. Royal is correct in the sense that it is frustrating that we haven't yet managed to attract a suitable attacking replacement for Howe given the time that has passed but i'm sure we can make do without for a while and see how we get on. You never know, having lots of nippy players might, just might work without a big man. Bodin is not a small bloke either and I know he can head a ball so if need be he can get up for crosses and things, hey maybe just sod it and play Bodin up with Benyon as a straight 2 up top. He can't do any worse than he did last season and with a fresh slate and a few goals on the board may just ignite his confidence.

well if like others have said he wants a more central role and he feels he is better up front then it cant hurt to give him a shot at it.

we could play with a couple of tiny terriers up front quite easily if we play a passing game with a bit of intelligence,keep the ball played on the deck and the crosses low (much harder to defend against), rather than lumping the ball up and hoping a forward can get on the end of it.

To be honest I am personaly glad AK was out there chasing top quailty strikers, you never know until you ask, one of them might just have said yes.

As said already what is wrong with Yoeman and Benyon upfront, some seem to have short memories they played together upfront against a very good Rovers side, and Benyon scored 2 of our 3 goals in that game, a game we dominated large periods and but for 2 awful erros at the back would won with a bit to spare.

AK will get a forward he will clearly wait until the right players says yes, no need to panic in my view.

http://www.bournemouthecho.co.uk/sport/ ... _UPDATED_/

Well Bournemouth now have 5 fit strikers with Tubbs going to Rotherham. Maybe lessons our chances of getting Stockley in the near future :-(

royalgull wrote:Knill has had 3 and a bit months probably longer to get a centre forward, it was clear towards the end of last season that Howe was going and would need to be replaced so to not have one at all going into the new season is somewhat disappointing.

Is it better to wait a week to get a better one?, yes but only if that option is actually going to become available? will we be forever waiting for the right one or another week? If we're talking to said player why do they need the extra week or two? It should have been a lot closer by now in my opinion. Manset was a waste of time, he was never going to come here, Knill could have said we were trying to sign Ronaldo, that would have shown the calibre of player we were trying to get wouldn't it? Never going to sign him either. Manset has been on good money at his last few clubs, is a bit of a rogue and doesn't stick around anywhere for longer than 3 months, he's also an unknown quantity still in terms of his actual ability for the money he would demand.

What we need is an experienced, proven player for this league to come in and hit the ground running the exact same as the likes he has already signed i.e. Tonge, Harding. There are one or two of them around and I fully understand and have been saying the exact same things about the difficulty of trying to get players down to Torquay for yonks, good that now Knill has said the exact same thigns that it seems to finally be sinking in however I'm still slightly disappointed that it seems we're going into the season with our squad still pretty far from complete.

With Knills outstanding contacts I feel sure that we are going to sign a season long loan striker from a top prem club, say Man.U. or Everton. We were given to understand that he is "well in" with these clubs & able to take loan players from them. If say, it is Man.U then I would think that the player would be in his late teens, & fifth or sixth in line for a prem start, he could perhaps be a non European signed from their world wide scouting network. If this is the case then why do they need to keep him until their pre season has finished? Surely you would not need your fifth or sixth placed striker to stay until the bitter end if he was to go out on a season long loan. Better I.M.O. to release him early to his loan club to give him a chance to settle in.