YorkshireRam

To be fair to Savage, he changed my opinion in the game he's on about here. Taarabt was in the form of his life and probably the best player in the league at that point and he completely man marked him out the game, to the point that when Taarabt was subbed, he went off in a massive strop. Had to give him kudos after that. Also vaguely remember an incident where an opposition player went down easily and he theatrically dived on the floor to mock him. He made me laugh, i'll give him that 😂

He is, in fact, their joint top earner on £70k per week. Excellent player at this level but that's a big wage

He scored in the league (also against Hull) the game after, and then his form fell off the face of the earth. He's just been permanently low on confidence. Whenever he plays he'll try and take on a man or 2 and when it doesn't come off, he just won't try it again all game but he's the sort of winger that needs to do it 3/4 times to create the opportunity that it does work. In all honesty, seeing as Zoon is the only natural winger at the club, I'd rather use the hypothetical Sharp funds to get a winger in

I'm still quietly hopeful that Marriott will play most games once he returns from this niggle. If he can, it means we don't need Sharp, and I think Martin is a good backup. Nothing against Sharp as a player, I just think there are better transfers for us than him IF we can keep Marriott fit and firing. Re. Josefzoon- I remember when he bagged that brace against Hull and i thought ''oh, that's a cool celebration as well'' so thought it'd make a decent profile pic. Maybe I jinxed his entire Derby career when I did? 🤔 You've made me self conscious now though so I'm gonna change it 😂

I interpreted Cocu's loan strategy differently, he seemed more concerned with the 'not returning' element rather than age, in essence, he only tries to loan people that there is a possibility of signing permanently afterwards. If Whittaker isn't already learning that off Rooney who was a far better striker than Sharp ever was, there's something wrong I also disagree about blocking progress. Wilder's most recent comments suggested Sharp was a valuable member of their squad still. For us to be able to loan him, we'd then have to play him regularly. I'd rather those minutes go to youngsters than a 33 year old loanee, that's my point.

There's no longevity to the transfer though, and when our current philosophy is being created around building for the future, Sharp becomes an 'off brand' signing. I could maybe see your logic if we were simply 1 prolific striker away from promotion but we are a world away from being in that situation. I would far rather see JHI given the odd opportunity here and there, alongside continuing to blood Whittaker, than bring in a 33 year old whose mere presence does block the pathway for youth progression and development. I'm not sure that's ''clueless'', if anything it fits our current modus operandi...?

Exactly, if he had kept Knight, Bird of Sibley out of the team then it wouldn't be progressive for us as a club. That being said, he looked a better option than Lawrence most of the time and got us 3 points against Brum We want to get an actual winger in by the looks of things. He falls into the same pitfalls as Lawrence where he's wasted out wide but we now have better options through the middle (he was never going to rival Rooney 😂). Didn't do much wrong, think we just loaned him out of necessity when we missed out on Diangana and needed a wideman.

I think we'll get a new striker in summer. Cocu likes an amalgamation of the qualities of all 3 of our forwards: big, strong target man who can retain possession in the final 3rd as well as being a threat in the area. Waghorn had a pass success rate of 45.5% today and lost possession 8 times whilst only having a single shot... that's indefensible. A world away from his performance as a No.9 against Hull (H) last season where I thought he looked an accomplished lone striker. His only saving grace is that he does keep getting a goal every 3/4 games which is a good habit to have.

Waghorn's performance today completely disproves your point. Very poor first touch, doesn't possess the physicality his stature suggests and his finishing is hit and miss. Martin is a better target man and Marriott is a better finisher, I struggle to name what Waghorn offers that other options don't. This must be part of the reason he's constantly shunted onto the right wing. I really like the bloke but he's not offering enough currently, for me. Since Rooney has come in, there seems to be a far greater emphasis on long balls and diagonal passing, this also suits Marriott's game to a tee which is why most would like to see him fit enough to get a solid run of games because it's obvious his pace, combined with his prowess for finding the net can be lethal at this level, with the right service.

That attitude wouldn't have seen us land Rooney though? I fully get what you mean, that by spending time on overly-ambitious targets that are often unobtainable, we have to settle for second best panic buys afterwards. Begovic is a step above the quality of any other keeper we've been linked with though, without Heaton getting injured, we might have been able to get him (if that AC Milan link is credible) I don't see the point in curbing ambition for the sake of getting transfers done early

Nah right player, wrong game. Must have been one of the pre-season friendlies then but he definitely played RB, and looked okay. Never seen him at centre half though hence my curiosity

Has Bateman been primarily playing as a centre half as of late? Didn't look out of place v Scunthorpe as a fullback so interesting to hear his strongest position is at CB. Admittedly haven't followed the academy as closely recently as i'd have liked to

That's come out of nowhere, seems odd to sell our most promising centre half from the academy but I presume they had their reasons. I suppose Mel's comments about the academy not really producing CB's makes a little more sense with this context but still surprising

£60k a week apparently

We should all be eternally grateful you're not in a position to spend the club's money then. Maddison has got big attitude problems, hugely arrogant and the type of personality that can adversely affect a dressing room. Couple this with his problematic disciplinary record and it starts to be clear why no approach has been made for his services He's also left footed when we are openly searching for a right winger so he doesn't even fit the description criteria... but keep going off about how bad a loan is, despite it maybe giving JML, Wilson or Shonibare time to progress into the first XI themselves 🙄