nogs

This can't be true - can it?! If Lescott cost £24m, how can a player who is a year younger and has been capped 47 times for the Netherlands already - and will be first choice in the World Cup next year while Lescott is warming the bench - be worth just FIVE million?! I've seen Heitinga play a few times for the Dutch and he looks class - if Moyesey does pull this off, I think its time to apologise for all the bitching about leaving it late to sign anyone and recognise that he has pulled an absolute blinder. Joleon WHO?! Papers are saying that Heitinga's wages might be a problem - well if he's only costing £5m, surely we could offer him a lump sum golden hello (£1m up front, say) to seal the deal. It would still mean we've managed to sign two class defenders for half what we got for Lescott, plus an exciting left winger. You gotta say, selling your best players is never ideal, but if you look at it like that we're a stronger team for it

The welcome reprieve from our abysmal Prem start with what should be a straightforward game in Czech has got me thinking about what I'd really like us to achieve this season - do I want another top-six finish, or a glorious cup run in Europe or at home ending in us lifting a trophy? Ok, in an ideal world, I'd like both, but we all know we haven't got the biggest squad so competing on all fronts is difficult. I know everyone says the league is the bread and butter, but tbh, I want to win something, and if I had to choose, I think I'd take being the first club to win the Europa League over finishing in the top four and qualifying for the CL (I know which our accountants would prefer, but that's another story). What does everyone else reckon - given the poor start and the fact that there's serious competition for the European places this year, would you take slipping to mid-table if we won something? Obviously, we'd HAVE to win something coz I'd want to be in Europe next year... anyway, just a thought, I think i'm more excited about Europe than I am the Prem this year.

Brett Angel has got most votes on here and I wouldn't disagree. My Dad and my brother are both reds and they used to rip the piss out of me something rotten that we had Angel in our side. God they were dark days. I'd also like to give Vinnie Samways a mention just coz the lazy fucker could never be arsed flying in from his villa in Spain to actually put in a stint for us - "Nah gaffer, I dan't fink I can green-grarsed to pplay this week, tell the press I've dan me knee again" As for Tony hibbert, shame on you all, he's been our regular right back for 8 seasons, yes he's got his limitations but he's been a great servant to this club and is when on form is a reliable, tough-tackling, hhard-working full-back who could do a job in any side. Not his fault the Brazilians invented wing-backs in the 90s... Oh, and a final mention for Nick Chadwick, who is now helping Chester City in their impossible fight to avoid relegation to the Conference North after a 25 point deduction. Scored two on his full debut for them mind, but still an utter donkey playing where he always belonged.

Woo-hoo some good news! From what i've read he went into Euro 2008 the hottest tipped player in the Russian squad behind Arshavin and was closely linked with Chelsea. Maybe a slight concern that his form/value has taken a dip since then, but he's still only 24 so has time to develop, he's big, looks like he's got a turn of pace and was also made captain of Locomotive at 22, so he's got some leadership qualities which i think we need. Can't wait to see him in a blue shirt!

I don't know if it's the choice of pre-season opposition but something is going badly wrong in our preparations, we've started badly in the majority of seasons Moyes has been in charge. And yes, failure to bring players in in good time, injuries, arsehole 'star' players deciding they want to leave two weeks before transfer deadline day and speculation over Moyes' own future doesn't help. BUT, why are we the only team that year in, year out goes through these same dramas? Why aren't we learning from oyur mistakes? And ok, we're missing three first teamers through injury but bar Lescott, this is pretty much the same squad that finished last season - why, then, has the standard of performance slipped so badly? I don't accept that it's all down to off-the-field stuff, something is not working right on the training pitch in pre-season, Moyes has time and time again failed to get his players up to speed in time for the new season. So whether it's playing in these pre-season tournaments or not, something has to change.

Well he has a simple choice, doesn't he - p*ss off without his 'loyalty bonus' or rot in the reserves, train on his own and miss next year's World Cup. Out of interest, does anyone know who lescott's agent is? Coz if anyone needs filling in, it's that guy.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009%E2%80%9310_UEFA_Europa_League Always trust in Wikipedia, my friend

I've got a mate who works for the Border Agency, I'll have a word with him see if having a Tommy T on your webcam is an offence likely to lead to the denial of a work visa!

Yeah it does stink, and is typical of the modern footballer's attitude - they're treated like Gods, so they think they can snap their fingers and get what they want. I still hope he doesn't go. Moyes keeps banging on about what a 'good boy' he is, and I believe him - as with Rooney, I'm willing to bet the biggest villain in all of this is his agent, whispering in his ear like a devil on his shoulder about the all the gold he can get for selling his soul. But what's his agent's advice if the deal doesnt go through by the window? Keep sulking, lose your place in the team and then don't go to the World Cup? Surely Lescott's got enough about him to realise he's not actually in that strong a bargaining position. Although I think the most likely outcome is, unfortunately, gonna be selling him, like I say, i hope not, and i wouldnt be shocked at all if we are hearing a grovelling apology from lescott in two weeks time saying how he wants to put it all behind him and do well for the team. Even if we got another season out of him (giving his all of course), like Villa got from Barry, it would give us time to get a proper replacement in, and he'd still be worth top money with two years left on his contract. It's a gamble, but sometimes top managers have to take these risks with players - its making them work out that proves who's best

Fair shouts Tenacious, Duncan and DM - I'm playing devil's advocate slightly coz he does look like he's got talent and we could do with ANYTHING to shake us up a bit right now. Not sure if he's got the takling abilities to play the Mascherano role myself Tenacious - although I like the look of your formation if Rodwell comes on enough, playing deep with Arteta and giving the rest license to bomb forward. And DM, if you played the lad further forward with Arteta in behind, I think we'd just be replicating the Cahill/Fellaini role again, and we've already got one too many of those. Anyway, its all idle speculation for now. Permit hearing is on Friday according to the Beeb, so we shall see

Work permit or no work permit, Banega seems a strange signing for me. Don't get me wrong, he's clearly got bags of ability and I'd love to see a little South American class in our midfield. But in terms of priorities, do we really need another central midfielder? Is there really room in our team for him once Arteta is fit? Surely we should be looking at a CB, RB and RW first? The other thing to think about is his lack of impact at Valencia. Argentina and Brazil churn players like this out by the truck load - technical ability that makes us lumpen Brits gawp, style, flair, finesse - it makes watching their domestic leagues (where Banega was an absolute star for Boca) wonderful. Except that South American football is played at walking pace compared to the top leagues at Europe, its built around beautiful play rather than kick-and-rush. It means only the very very best from SA who can adapt to the pace succeed in Europe - and if Banega has found life tough in La Liga, how's he going to find the Premiership, and more to the point, under the tutelage of a man like Moyes who demands so much of his players physically?

Dunno why so many have such a downer on Dunne - ok he's not the footballer Lescott is but he did ok for us as a young kid and has grown into a solid, reliable centre-back at City - the fans love him, he's won a couple of player of the year awards, and the big thing we're missing at the back now, he's a leader and an organiser. He's not the quickest but Yobo and Jags aren't slouches and could cover for him ok. Anyway, as someone else said, he's on a par with Senderos. £20m plus him, thank you very much.

I don't see why he'd be looking to leave or be asking for more transfer funds - he knows exactly what the financial situation is, if it was a deal-breaker in terms of his job he'd have never signed a new contract last year. He knows full well the board haven't got any more money to give, but at the same time I don't think he'll look to sell either - unless Lescott's whining really does start to affect the team. The fact is, there is some money there - we had enough to go in for Naughton and Delph afterall, but got done on that front coz Spurs and Villa offered more cash up front and/or higher wages. Simple as. Those two factors have no doubt been a spanner in the works in other negotiations, especially given the way Man Shitty have inflated the going wage for top footballers yet again, but you've also got to factor in the fact that Moyes is incredibly fussy when it comes to picking players (esp since he had his fingers burnt by the VDM/Koldrup signings). All the money in the world wouldnt see him go out and throw the cash around like Hughes, he believes in the team ethic far more than star names. As an aside, our best bet would be a salary cap and a limit on foreign players in the first team - maybe we should divert some of our limited funds into hiring a top-level lobbyist, coz we aint gonna get any fottballers at this rate!

I totally agree we're weak down the right but let's be honest, Osman is one of many players we've got who are naturally suited to playing down the middle who is being asked to do a job out wide - Arteta has had to do the same for most of his Everton career. And our lack of wide players is another reason why i don't like 4-5-1 - it works best when your wide players can quickly get forward to make it 4-3-3, we have Pienaar capable of doing it on one side but Osman lacks the pace. In any case, after Saturday surely it would be worth putting Neville back in at right back to give us some leadership at the back and seeing how we go with two up front - I'd even be tempted to start Rodwell instead of Fellaini so we have some composure in the middle, and giving Gosling a go on the right just coz Ossie looks so bang out of form

Hmmm well that was a rather brutal dose of reality to quench all my pre-season optimism! Thing is, even though the final scoreline shocked me, I wasn't that surprised we got turned over in the end - that's now five losses out of eight season openers under Moyes. And I don't know about anyone else, but to me it always seems to be defensively that we get caught out early season - the thing that stands out for me about the Liege game at Goodison last year was how vulnerable we looked to their pace out wide, and in particular how dodgy Lescott looked against their right mid (Dalmat?). Surely there's got to be something going wrong in the preparation for this to keep happening - the second and third goals on Saturday were criminal (and pretty much made the finals core obsolete), simple balls into the box and we looked like we hadn't done a set-peice defensive drill for months. Solutions? If this was a one-off then yeah, perhaps we could blame the Lescott situation for disrupting the back four. As it is, I think its a perennial problem and i think a big problem is, without Jags, we lack a natural leader at the back. Yobo has always been too quiet, and I don't think Lescott's natural game is as a commander either. The second and third goals would never have been scored with a) proper communication and someone like Jags sensing the danger and having the courage to leave his man to clear up someone else's mess (although I admit an on-form Lescott can usually be relied on to do that). So never mind what happens with lescott for now, i'm more interested in getting in someone with a voice and a pair of balls to pull what was a ragged mess of a back four on Saturday into line - Steven Taylor seems to fit the bill perfectly. As John Terry proves, sometimes as a centre back its not all about natural ability, its about having a big gob and a big heart. The other thing that pissed me off on Saturday was the tactics - 4-5-1 at home AGAIN! I know this has served Moyes well in the past, but that was when we didn't have the same quality in the squad that we have now and when we had forwards like Bent and Johnson who would run the channels all day to bring the midfielders into the game up field. If we have any real pretence to being contenders for the top four, we've GOTTA set out to beat teams like Arsenal at home, not packing midfield and hoping to snatch it with a Cahill or Fellaini header. And it also means playing to a out strikers' strengths - Jo was useless on Saturday, but fair play to him, he is NOT a lone striker, his game is neither running the channels nor playing with his back to goal holding up play, he needs the ball at his feet in and around the box running at goal. And I'd say the same for Saha and for Yakubu, so ffs start playing them in tandem. I guarantee using combinations of those three as a front two will get us more goals than relying on Cahill and Fellaini - they were only our top scorers last year coz we had no strikers fit! Phew, feel better for that - just hope we can pull something out the hat against the Czech lot now and get our season up and running

Thank you very much Mark Hughes, you have given Moyes the perfect rallying cry ahead of the start of the new season!! Man Shitty well and truly called on their shit, Lescott put in his place, I expect us to tear out of the blocks against Arsenal tomorrow. "There is not a chance we will sell this close to the end of the window." I take Moyes for his word, put this saga in the file marked closed. "Moyes added that Lescott "has had his head twisted" as a result of the attention from City but reiterated his insistence that the player will not be leaving Goodison Park. "He should get his head around that and get on with his career," added Moyes." And he hasn't really got much choice - if he wants to go to the World Cup next summer, he better play out of his skin for us. Haha can't wait to have Shitty at Goodison now, I smell grudge....

With you all the way on Petrov being part of any Lescott deal, I've always thought he was class - pity they sold Elano, we could have had them both! I'd be very happy with Taylor, he's got the potential to be a top draw centre back, him and Jags in centre would give you two totally committed, die for the cause defenders - something Lescott isn't for all his qualities. I'm in agreement with other posters, as long as we get someone else in Lescott can go for me, don't want someone who doesn't wanna be here and he's always been prone to mistakes anyway - against Liege at Goodison last year, he gtot spit roasted by their pretty average right winger, all coz he was sulking at having to play left back. World class on his day, but remember the shoddy performances as well! The only down side with lescott going is we'd need cover at left back as well - in effect, we'd need two defenders to replace him, plus we've wanted a right back all summer. I think that's why Moyes is digging his heels in - and to be fair, he;s got plenty to bargain with. Lescott couldn't afford to stay here and play shit coz he's wants to go to the World Cup next summer. Anyway see how it goes

Amen and bravo! COYB!!!!

Of course I'm positive - we're an established top six side in the Premiership, we've got a European campaign to look forward to and got to the FA Cup final... nothing has changed, the other pretenders to the top 4 have got to catch US up. And as I've said elsewhere, don't be fooled into thinking that spending money = better team, Hull will get relegated £20m or no £20m, just as we'll finish in the top six and have a good run in at least one cup competition (hopefully Europa) new signings or no new signings - we're a top side

I believe it because we've done it before - and yeah a lot of teams in the Prem have taken a step up since then, but so have we, we qualified for the CL with Bent, Kilbane and Watson in the side (and lost our best player in January), would any of them get anywhere near our first 11 now? No one can argue that we are fifth best team in the Premier League right now, the league table doesn't lie, and in my book that makes us the most likely side to break the top four. Arsenal aren't the team they were and their form on the road could give us a sniff, like Liverpool's did in 04/05. The biggest threat from elsewhere will be Villa - Spurs haven't got a defence and City will probably get off to a flier and then fade when Hughes starts to realise he hasn't had time to work out a plan 'B' for when things go wrong

What we need to get into the top four? Patience. Assuming we don't get bought out by a billionaire any time soon, we don't have money to splash £25m on a player. But that's fine - we're going in the right direction, and i don't believe any of this 'ceiling' rubbish. What we all assume now in football is that money buys instant improvement, instant success. That's crap. Has EVERY team that has spent upwards of £25m in transfers per season in the past five years gone on to make giant strides? No, and there are some notable howlers (Spurs, Newcastle etc.) It is just plain fact that there are only a finite number of truly exceptional footballers out there, no matter how much money you have burning your pockets, it doesn't mean you'll get one. And besides from the over-inflated transfer market, you're just as likely to find a gem in your own youth set up or plying his trade in the lower leagues somewhere. The fact is that a lot of teams are now prepared to waste stupid sums on slightly better than average players, and a lot of managers (or their interfering chairmen) don't have the nouse to realise that it is a TEAM game, not about collecting star players like a bloody sticker album! Our manager (and chairman) understand that about football, and are therefore surely but slowly building a very, very good side.

Couldn't agree more. We've been through the backroom turmoil, flushing a fortune down the toilet on wasted dreams and empty promises - as have City, and if I supported them, I'd be a bit worried about what happens in 10 years time when the sheikh gets bored with his new toy. A bit of success in between might be nice, but how much pain to follow? It might take us another ten years to reach the top, but we're doing it the right way, we're getting to watch good football, we're playing in Europe nearly every season and there's just a buzz about being an Everton fan that wasn't there 10-15 years ago (I'm too young to remember the mid-80s I'm afraid!) I'm looking forward to the season, whether we can improve on last i dunno, hbut i know I'll enjoy it nonetheless, so long may it continue. And, just to round it off, in Moyes I'm convinced we've got one of the all time greats - this from the Echo yesterday, Moyes quoted as saying: "what we have got inside the club; there isn’t a word for it – you can just see it in the players. It’s built into them." Brought a tear to my eye haha!

Haha maybe he could do with learning the art of avoiding the question then - I don't think hazel Blears is doing much these days, she was always pretty good at it

My point being i think all of those I listed are decent players

I don't reckon moyes is doing himself or the team any favours by coming out and saying "the squad isn't ready" a few days before the start of the season. He spent most of last summer sulking about his difficulties signing new players and it translated into a near-disastrous start to the campaign. He knows as well as any of us what our financial situation is and how it puts us at a disadvantage in the transfer market - so why come out and say the same thing, year in, year out? On the one hand, we'll have to do what we've always done under him - make do with what we've got, and do a pretty damn good job of it at that. On the other hand, I'm not having it that Kyle Naughton and Fabian Delph are the only people available on the transfer market who fit both the Everton model and price bracket. If we needed a right-back, centre-back and wide midfielder, Roger Johnson signed for Birmingham for £5.9m, Sam Ricketts and Zat Knight signed for Bolton for not very much, Stephen Kelly signed for Fulham, Andrew Surman signed for Wolves and the young French forward Gabriel Obertan who United signed for £3.5m can operate on the wing as well. Were we not looking at any of these? (and before anyone says they're crap, Moyes himself has said what we need is additional bodies to add depth rather than superstars, and I think all of tehse fit the solid professional or promising youngster category we need). Oh and as for Lescott handing in a transfer request - take £20m for him then, he's not irreplacable. For that we should be able to get Senderos, a utility full back and a decent wide player. Then we can stop moaning and get on with the season!