Next week it is for signings then Howe?

Third-string keeper appears to be high on Eddie's wish list. At least we can afford one of them I hope!!

Eddie came from a lower league club, and his first and only two signings were from lower league clubs. Its not in his comfort zone to go looking for players in the Premiership and to some extent the Championship aswell. Thats the downside of instating a manager from a club thats a league lower. If we had appointed a former Premiership manager, it would be the opposite. But Im not saying we should have. Also, I dont think we didnt have enough money for Cork, I think Eddie was implying that he didnt want to spent a massive amount on one player. Even almost every Claret fan in the country believes that anything around £2 million would be a good price for him. Maybe Chelsea wanted a lot of add-ons aswell that would cost us more money in the future, that we dont know. On the other hand, we still brought in Delfouneso and Duffy on loan from Premiership clubs, so hopefully that signals that there is atleist a decent chance that Eddie could make a permanent deal with some big clubs. Who knows ? Im just a bit fed up with Eddie continually looking for players in his comfort zone in lower leagues, rather than being a bit more risky and showing the fans that he means business for next season.

One thing I would say about lower league signings Adam is that it totally depends on who they are. Most people for example who were pretty pleased that we had managed to get Charlie. I think the important thing is to get a balance. Some up and coming youngsters from the lower leagues that we can maybe bring on. Some who already have the quality ( such as a Cork).

I'd have been more than happy to go with Eddie's signings from the lower leagues, and to trust his judgement, had we signed the one player that we should have signed this season. You've put it in a fine nutshell up above tmp, and there's no more to add to the Cork saga than that really. I'm still hopeful because we've got a good squad especially with the return of McCann, Pato and Austin , and I'm looking forward to a strong promotion challenge. But we should have signed Cork ffs.

I think we will see a mix. Agree with your comment above TMP. Three of the four players who have left have huge experience and were probably big characters in the dressing room as well as on the pitch. VR has been commenting for months about the need for leaders. I would say it is essential that we bring in at least one player capable of filling this role.

We have McCann, Pato and Cort at the moment back it really is all about how angry you want to make yourself. Pato back is like a new signing as is McCann and Cort well...... lol

If we sign 4 players who are better than the four that have left, we will have a better squad than last season. Having a better squad doesnt necessarily mean bigger. In addition, I dont really know how good our younger players are, but if we pay for players to jump straight ahead of them - we may never find out. I can kind of appreciate your frustration/disapoinment/annoyance - but I think we need to try and be positive. Being negative ( even if you feel it is justified) will probably not result in a positive outcome.

D J Campbell available for £1.25M from Blackpool I know who I would be picking the phone up to, but wait ... we have a wage structure in place don't we..... so off down Townley park to see if I can spot someone that will play for us you never know we could get lucky .... Blackpool confirming today they will bring in around five players Ferguson and Phillips to name but two !! Awhhhh !!!

Intrigued that I expressed concern about bringing in a manager whose radar would be tuned in to the bargain basement before Eddie was being signed, and that others are now saying this too. Having got those negative concerns out of the way early, I now continue to warm to Eddie, and am hopeful he might be the sort of manager to turn promising young prospects into first-teamers. I also like his lack of nonsense in interviews. Phillips to Blackpool... oh dear. When he was 'linked' with us a few weeks ago, no-one on here wanted him. Well maybe one or two, but not many. And the doomsayers pay no attention to his departure from Brum when analysing their strengths, but seem to think he's boosting Blackpool's. If he's that bipolar, Kevin probably should consider going to a psychiatrist. Anyway, continuing - in the spirit of debate that is held dear on VB - to try to offer attempts to answer points raised in this thread, it was said clearly on the club site that one of the problems in the Cork deal was indeed the add-ons that Chelsea wanted. If Cork is indeed as good as he's now being made out to be (which I don't feel so sure about), we'd have struggled to keep him for more than a year or two. Maybe those add-ons would have meant Chelsea getting the benefit of any onward sale, not us? Where's the money gone? This mantra is getting dull, because when there's an honest attempt to do the sums, no-one joins in, but just keeps on chanting their mantra. It's like a really, really bad chart song, that just keeps buzzing in your head. Was it one of the 70s glam rock bands who did that awful 'where's your mama gone'? The Sweet maybe? Why could Saints spend more than us? Again, it's dull that the same question gets asked rather than discussion develop around the fact that Southampton got a big new investor who will have looked at things like the size of the town, the size of the TV market, the average attendance, the proximity to an airport and the yachty Solent lifestyle. All of which begs the question of which club is actually spending more. Can anyone on here tell me the size of Southampton's payroll? Sorry lads, but I am getting really bored. Used to be you could come on here for an argument. Now it just feels like a parody of a Monty Python sketch. You've got to laugh.

The salary cap needs to be adressed. If we release or sell two players on 15k a week, we cant spend 30k a week, we are limited to spending 15k a week twice. Its just stupid and doesnt make any sense. Releasing Thompson, Alexander and McDonald would surely have given us enough wage to bring back Cork, who we were paying anyway last year. The salary cap is a joke and in addition to some poor judjement by the board etc, cost us a valuable player.

How much of Cork's Chelsea salary were we paying, all or some? How big was it? It's also intriguing to me that we take at face value that Cork wasn't so concerned about the money. Did we learn nothing from being burned by C*yle? The difficulty in breaking the cap is that you immediately get calls from every other payer's agent, and you weaken your negotiating position in every deal you work on after that. (Assuming of course that we are working on any. :-)) I'm like everyone, sad we didn't get Cork, but not as sad as some. (Oh dear, now I have confessed to the Claret in my veins being watered down or something. Tell me my punishment.) I think he's good, but not amazing, and if signing him really was a make-or-break thing, I'm left mystified about the importance of things like teamwork. Salary caps have some good things to them, and some bad things, like any management approach or decision. Take Brian Laws's's management as an example: vilified, but did at least sign Cork. Give me the full half-hour please temp, but if it's not a real argument, I'm not paying.

Paying? News to me!! lol ;-)

Can we stop going on about Cork please. The boy is now at Southampton and there's nothing anyone can do about it! The one thing that does concern me, and has done for a while, is the fact that our defence is weak. It looks like we are going to let Carlisle go whilst keeping Cort. Now that doesn't make any sense at all to me. Are there any rumours about new defenders?

Hi Brian. Good luck to Bournemouth in 2011-12. We know what it's like to lose a manager in midstream (Judas Coyle ;-) ) ' 'Surprised that you haven't spent some of the parachute payments to bring in some quality players' is a statement that I for one can't understand either! We are scrimping and saving still, despite a season in the top flight! Disgraceful