aka Dus

We were much the better team. Spurs controlled th game for 10 minutes at the start of the second half. After our goal I thought they lost their bite tbh. Spurs can play a little. I thought we put in a very good performance.

Thought his use of possession has been a little below average today and v Luton TBH. But a great signing and as he learns an excellent player inthe making.

He doesn't want big namez, we don't have the money for super big names every time we need a player and moreover he's not going to take it up the hole from any f ckwit chairman asking for silly money. "End of" as some might say. Benitez: English players are too expensive 14/01/2006 - 11:25:10 Liverpool manager Rafael Benitez has been put off buying English players by the price tags. Benitez has signed Dutch defender Jan Kromkamp and Danish defender Daniel Agger during the transfer window. He admits he would like to sign young, talented English players, but feels he can get better value for money shopping abroad. ?Ideally my aim is to have a young squad based on English talent but the problem is always the price,? Benitez told the Daily Mirror. ?You ask about a teenager with no experience and you are quoted £5m (?7.3m), maybe more. You can go abroad and buy a player with international experience, who can go straight into the team for half that price. It is a problem for the game in England. ?There is still young talent coming through but the high prices make it very difficult to bring them to clubs like Liverpool where they can play at the highest level. ?If the talent is going to keep coming through then we need to adjust the prices that the clubs are paying. We will not pay the high prices ? we will only pay what we feel the player is worth.?

Stan the manager Bobby "International football consultant" Kevin McDonald as coach Alan Kelly as Goalkeeping coach not so sure about that Sean- Like I said earlier, we'll just have to wait and see who does what.

No, it was simply standard practice to try guage whether you were in WUM mode or not. As usual with your views on how the football club operates (or 'Entertainment Industry Franchise' as you may deem more appropriate) you seem mystified by any motivation other than raw personal ambition. And the standard 'I know stuff I can't tell you' just set it off with a beautiful touch straight out of HSB.

Gone to South Africa with MFF for their Winter training camp. Depending how he goes he'll be given a year's contract. He really wants it. He doesn't need the money, god knows, but he's dying to put one good injury free season in. The whole MFF squad did a pretty rigorous fitness test before Christmas and Jari was rock bottom of the list in every element of the test. So one reasonably serious injury and I'd say he'll be looking for a new club.

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I agree with you. And I agree with Rafa's policy of rarely if ever going for 'galacticos'. So I suppose there's even more cause to be a bit peed off if January passes without who he wants coming in, dtransfer window difficulties or not.

Where is he going? Interesting transfer story. Figaro, you heard anything in Spain?

I'm not doubting you but where are all these Spanish speakers coming from that every time you open a thread there's a different translation of something Rafa said in Spain?

heh heh!!! You have the original article/interview/quotes?`

Seems like Kevin MacDonald will be Stan's coach. Their time at Liverpool didn't overlap to any great extent, did it? Interesting appointment´if true.

What I take it to mean is that the board to need to give him money. Whether you interpret it the Mirror way or the translation as given from the original Spanish article, the difference is hardly important. But I don't think the money he wants is for these marquee players you seem to hanker after. Rather the kind of players he always seems to buy. So my point is that we're a long way down the road from worrying about whether we should be buying players for big money.

We'll see how it goes. It remains to be seen how involved Bobby will actually be.

I refer, again to Rafa's comments as reported by the Mirror.

Of course I was but we aren't in a position to throw 30 million at a player with ability equivalent to what you mentioned. Which is what they would cost these days. Xabi was an exception in that he wasn't for stellar money. I knew how good he was before he joined but 10.7 million is hardly the stuff of CM vvank fantasies. We already have as many 'big names' as we're going to get IMO.

I dunno DH, give me a league won by guys brought through, hand plucked and nurtured into a true 'team' over one with a few (no matter how hard working or down to earth) superstars brought in after other clubs did the work educating them and devleoping them, and I'd take the former. It's how the team plays that gives me the hard on.

This is all but confirmed now. It was O'Neill or nobody. Bit of a mockery because Stan won't have the FAI's full unqualified support unless he defies expectations and does exceptionally well. The realpolitik of this situation is that Stan/Robson is an interim appointment until O'Neill sorts out his future and joins Manchester United/A.N. Other/Ireland (on the very very off-chance).

Nice. Thought the lads with the cup at Luton on Saturday was brilliant.

I've been amused why people are sticking their heads in the sand over Rafa's comments as reported in the Mirror. I don't see any reason to doubt the comments. To me it would appear to be the most relevant factor (maybe it's a known known, maybe it's an unknown known. Someone will doubltess set me straight) in all this tiresome transfer gossiping and contradiction of other people by 'in the know' consensus formers on the forum.

All the same, whoever buys it might give clear hints if anyone is seriously interested in the club. Anyone looking for a majority stake will have to deal with Moores obviously but it might still be relevant. Their stake in .tv should go to someone with a global market reach.

I dunno, bit confused (and saw the article in a media stories review, so I didn't buy the piece of 5hite paper) but the Mail on Sunday are running a story on page 6 that "ITV is understood to be finally selling its stakes in Arsenal and Liverpool football clubs." Anyone read this? For some reason I thought ITV had already sold that stake... no?

You said it.... Come on Banjo, name names... The ones you think are flip flopping, name em and shame em... It's a bout time we had some proper rows. Some proper blood letting. It's all been too cost since we've got good again.

:D My weekend well and truly completed.