Greg Halford has signed a season long loan with promotion rivals Sheffield United. Given the imperative to trim the squad, this comes as no real surprise but I am disappointed by it. Greg Halford looked like a classy right-back who had something extra going forward. He is big, strong, reasonably quick and reads the game well. Sure, he had a couple of stinkers when he resorted to hoof-it-forward, but in his defence, the whole side was struggling in those particular games and no-one was looking for the ball when it was played out to him from goal.
Yassin Moutaouakil is probably the better prospect of the two and will now be first choice. The question is, who is second choice right-back? Richard Murray said the plan was to go with two pros for every position, so the failure to re-sign Halford leaves us short and vulnerable in the event that Yassin gets injured, as he did early last season. I think we need another natural right-back as cover and that's going to cost us something close to Greg Halford's wages, so you have to wonder at the logic?
Just as my desperation grows to see the quality of the promised central midfield signing(s), I am getting nervous that no-one's going to bite at Bent or Faye. After all the hype about a £3m tag for Bent and interest from Hull and Stoke, things have gone quiet. At least there is fresh speculation that Mark Hughes might be again looking at Amdy Faye, this time for Man City. If Hughes follows through on this I would dearly love to know what Amdy Faye knows about Sparky that the rest of the world doesn't! It might take movement of those two before the Board fells comfortable to release funds to add to the squad.
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Its all looking very bleak .
ReplyDeleteHalford is a quality player , although it took him a while to show it and the crowd were slow to understand that. I'm not sure I understand why Moo2 gets such rave reviews, he's lightweight and not tough enough for the Stoke's of this world. Worse than that is that Norwich got hoolihan and Palace got Carle and weve still got Ambrose .
I am pretty pessimistic about our chances . Pardew blew the chance last year with too many changes aided by the Board who let Reidy go . I honestly fear another 20 odd years in the lower reaches .
I waited last time , but I think I'll be too old this time
and to think Curbs got us up to 7th ................another day, another era !!!
Have faith. believe we can get a bounce from trimming and stabilising our squad. Numbers may be down but so far we haven't impaired the quality of the first team significantly and a couple of decent signings could alter the balance positively. Murray has been clear on the transfer policy in terms of incomings and outgoings pre-season and has said we will imporve the quality of the first team in the process with money available in january if it'll make a difference.
ReplyDeleteHave faith. believe we can get a bounce from trimming and stabilising our squad. Numbers may be down but so far we haven't impaired the quality of the first team significantly and a couple of decent signings could alter the balance positively. Murray has been clear on the transfer policy in terms of incomings and outgoings pre-season and has said we will imporve the quality of the first team in the process with money available in january if it'll make a difference.
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