The Regulator

Was busy most of the weekend so didn't get to see much bar the match of the day highlights, but from what I've seen and read about the match I'm going with fellaini. Sounds like he took control of the middle of the park which is what we need from him. I don't quite understand the Jagielka bashing, but I know why it's happening. Might have been the first year I was on here when we let go of Carsley and suddenly everyone was saying what a terrible decision it was and how we looked completely out of sorts, the first game we played we were desperately short on numbers and Jags played in midfield. He was awful to be fair to him, but over time he progressed at CB to the point that in one game against Villa a few seasons back he made a dreadful error and gave them a goal. I remember the fans chanting his name soon after, that's how well he was playing. Players hit bad runs of form at different times for different reasons, but the fact is the ongoing transfer speculation over his head must have had an effect; and then to see someone you've played alongside for years go to the same club you might have gone to and play Champions League football must have been an itch he couldn't quite scratch. All the same he wouldn't have stayed if he didn't see his future here, and i have a funny feeling he'll be an important player for us this season. An in-form Jags kept an in-form Torres in his back pocket more than once, and there are some in-form strikers of an even higher level playing in the premier league right now. We need Jags to get back to his best, because we all know on our day we can take down anyone. Chelsea at Stamford Bridge, Man City at Eastlands (or the eithad or whatever), we have the potential to run rings around the lesser teams and hold our own against the big boys. all we can hope is that this performance spurs a positive result against Wigan, and our recent successful history against Man City continues. Hopefully that will fuel an early, and continuing, run of form. that being said, I also don't understand the problem of Johnny going at CB. if it's good enough for Holland, who are pretty good to be fair, why isn't it good enough for us? Also, if none of my post interests you, neither do shitty comments about each other, whatever the circumstance. I came to this forum to find out transfer gossip on everton, I stayed because the people on here were true blues and nice blokes. Can we try not to lower the tone of the best toffee forum going with pathetic insults and pointless bickering...you know, for the kids?

He made 93 appearances and scored 34 goals for Newcastle, when they were relegated it was almost always him and Peter Lovenkrands starting up front together. Before that point I'll agree he didn't make much movement, but their immediate return to the premier league was aided in no small amount to his 17 league goals for them. He may not have broken into the first team much in his first few years but once he did he played more often than not. I've never believed he was worth 35mil when they bought him, and still don't, still barkley has clocked up nowhere near the games carroll and henderson have, partly because of his age. I don't think henderson was worth what liverpool paid for him either, but again he was more significant to the sunderland set up than barkley is to ours.

I wouldn't sell Barkley til he's 21 at least, he could do wonders for this team with his creativity, time and space he forges without really trying, his vision....there's more than potential there, in pre-season albeit friendlies he was working his way through weder bremen and villarreal by himself at times... 15mil is a pretty accurate figure at this time, because although he has potential, potential is just that, it's not a guarantee by any means. Carroll spent a good few years at Newcastle playing week after week, same for henderson at sunderland, that's why there tags were so high. Barkley has played 3 competitive league fixtures for us remember, nowhere near what carroll and henderson had put in before they were sold. Barkley's price will rise with continued good performances, and Moyes won't sell him yet anyway, not when he knows how good he could be/how much he could be worth

I think we have a good one/bad one situation with the loan signings. I am genuinely optimistic about Drenthe, he may not have played much while at Real but he has undoubted speed and power, and seems very eager to get his fitness up. Of course the publicity spin will be that he's really up for playing for Everton but I don't think it's a facade. He has probably spoken to Johnny and can see the talent throughout the squad. He's probably also realised that a pacy winger is one of 2 things we are missing to realistically finish in a europa League spot, or get to a cup final. i have my doubts about Stracqualursi though, seems like another Zigic. Hopefully he'll prove me wrong but both these lads will need a good 4-6 weeks training before they are up to fitness, so really we can't give judge them until at least January. I can see Drenthe playing a big part for us this season though. I'm already smiling at the prospect of him and Baines exchanging one-two's down the left, tearing teams apart. As for the game, the boost of having Gueye, Coleman and Baines back in the squad has made me more confident over tomorrow. All the same Given has kept a lot fo clean sheets lately and we lack firepower, hopefully we'll take our chances tomorrow. I'm going for 2-1.

I think Ross Barkley is the love child of Chuck Norris and Zinedine Zidane.... Fellaini for 34mil is not as inconceivable as Andy Caroll for 35mil in my opinion...and yet that happened. If something crazy like that were to happen this year we'd be saved by the bell, financially speaking, and it would give us money to invest in other players, especially a striker. That Man U striker with the funny hair, what's his name? He'd be good here I reckon... Besides this is all lazy bullshit last-but-one page tripe anyway, we only know about it because someone read about it pissed up on the bottom of an empty bag of curry and chips

Ha ha dave is a legend. On a serious note i suggest we all start a vigil at the statue of Dixie, he'll show us the way. halewood blue could do stand up. I'm sure it'll go down a storm.

Neville had his chance on the international stage, Micah Richards and Chris Smalling are England's two best right back options at the moment, and while you could argue that Pip kept one of the the best wingers at the moment (Bale) quiet he has also had shockers and he's in his mid 30's now. Glen Johnson whilst nowhere near an 18mil player still gets forward well and would be thrid option to me. And I'm welsh! Either way, Capello has better options from the youth than he ever has before. The golden generation is gone and thank fuck. Everybody always expected England to do well because of it's "stars", hopefully they'll give the younger talent (Wilshere, Cleverly, Welbeck, Smalling, Barkley, Rodwell if he can recapture form) as well as Walcott and Johnson the chance to shine. Then add more experienced players like parker, rooney baines....there is a reason for cautious optimism for England in the euros. Wales on the other hand, well I hope that we get some strikers coming through because with the likes of Ramsey, Bale and Collison etc there is a good chance we could have an attacking squad for the world cup campaign. But Speed is an awful manager and our strikefroce will be depleted by then. Being welsh and everton fan, I've got to be optimistic, the only other option is suicide.

My guess at our starting line up would be : Howard, Neville, Jagielka, Distin, Baines, Osman, Fellaini, Heitinga, Barkley, Cahill, Saha The bench being: Mucha, Hibbert, Rodwell, Bilyaletdinov, Drenthe, Anichebe, Stracqualursi I'm not being ambitious with that lineup, I think whether we're winning or losing Barkley will come off between 60-70 minutes and either Drenthe or Anichebe will come on. Saha will get subbed shortly after, possibly of Stracq, and finally Bily will come on for Heitinga. If we play well, we may win 2-1, but they'll definitely score so I predict 1-1. If we have a bad day, and they a good un, we'll lose 2-0. I can't wait until Maggie and Seamus are fit again, Coleman more importantly. If Drenthe is a duck to water on the left midfield, with Coleman on the right I think we'll have real speed on the wings. Lot of If's mind.....

Or arteta will get injured/play shit again like has has for us since he signed that "new" contract, Yak will be a fat lump of shit like he was for us, Beckford will bang goals in the championship but struggle at top level.....theres always another side of the coin the fact is, we brought in a striker when we sold 2, which I admit is pretty dire considering our inability to get goals in the first place. However, we offloaded Beckford for a profit, we got yak off the wage budget, and we sold a 29 year old past his prime for 10 mil.....good financial business which ahs helped us balance the books... Also phil mcnulty reporting that drenthe confirmation is coming soon... we didn't have yak or arteta for large portions of last season and played well, beckford is a loss admittedly, but we'll see.....

Yak is gone for rumoured 1.5m, done deal, and beckford is also gone, 3m.

Maybe he's got no caps for Argentina because he's behind Messi, Tevez, Aguero, Higuain and Di Milito in the pecking order?

1315: The royal blue carpet can be rolled out for Denis Stracqualuisi, reports chief football writer Phil McNulty.The Argentine striker, who currently plays for Tigre, will join Everton on loan.

My nan's next door neighbour's hairresser's daughter's husband's brother's cousin said we'll be signing a big name by the end of the day.....you heard it here first!

Sorry I started it then.....this thread was mainly for discussion about all the transfers including any and none Everton might perfrom.... As much as it seems 99% certain we won't sign anyone we've been in that position before and I've thought we'll get noone and we have done.... Plus Kenwright stated that he told the banks they couldn't stop us from trading, so what was the point in saying that if we can't pick up a Bosman or a loan signing?

Well it's got Dead in the title....could rename I spose :s

So i figured post in here for all the news of transfers today, and your thoughts on them. BBC has Sportsday live and sky sports have their transfer thing.... And here's the latest: A few more to keep an eye out for today, then. David Ngogto leave Liverpool, Sunderland, Stoke and QPR to battle it out for Peter Crouch, Tottenham to make a move for Gary Cahill, Wigan to move for Shaun Maloney, Brian Ruiz and Zdenek Grygera to arrive at Fulham and movement at Everton, too. Though probably through the exit rather than the entrance. Joseph Yoboand Yakubu are close to leaving, it is reported. So could Joey and Yak going free up the money for a last ditch effort? Or should we accept fate?

I at least though one cheap loan/free would come........just for the sake of it. With all the players available at some clubs there's bound to be ones that won't get half as much game time as they would here, and I would think despite us having no money there be at least half a mil we could club together to fund one loan/signing on fee. I was never getting my hopes up but how hard is it to ask the question...could we loan this player? i mean the worst they can say is no so why not ask anyway? Whatever happened to haggling?

Saha will recover his form this season, as he always does, that's not in question. The question is how long he can keep the form up....which I'm banking on being at most 3 weeks, or 5 games, before he gets injured again. Beckford has the potential to be a 12-15 goal a season striker quite easily, however he scored all those goals for Leeds in a 442 formation. Anichebe, well, I don't see any fuss about him whatsoever. i think he's cack and always has been, and will not mature and develop in the next year at all. Seriously pointless putting him ahead of Vellios, who noone has mentioned. vellios looks like a good holding forward, strong and tall, with quick burts of pace. Vellios and Beckford is the two I would have against the bottom 8 of the league and i reckon they'd score. against the teams in and around us though, well it's a headscratcher. Cahill plays behind the striker, so unless we play a diamond formation, with fellaini as defense mid, osman and arteta left and right and cahill behind beckford/saha i don't see how we can accomodate cahill and two strikers. Which leaves us needing a 20 goal a season CF, which we had 2 season ago in Yakubu, who is now apparently in the doghouse. Hopefully when Gueye comes back from injury he can add to the team as well. We talk about wingers being needed, but what Gueye and Coleman on each wing?

Would be a good move for us, while I too would prefer Sturrdige, Macheda seems like he could be good with a run of games, similar to what happened to Sturrdige last year on loan. Plus I could see macheda being a very good impact sub, bring him on for the last 20 minutes or so and he could get a decisive goal, as well as being someone we could run out against lesser teams. Hope this comes off...

Don't personally understand the arteta comparison, he was never a porsche in the first place. Yes arteta is a good midfielder, and yes he has been very good for us, but it's because he's the only playmaker we have. which is why we need him so badly. Looking at the situation though, in central midfield we have Osman, Rodwell and Fellaini, with Barkley and Cahill able to play there as well as Heitinga and Neville. That's seven players that can play in central midfield for us, now granted, if arteta can recapture form in a wide position then he would be an asset, but realistically we can afford to lose him at 29 years old. 8-10mil for Arteta and 18-20mil for jagielka, and we could spend 3-4mil on someone like Onouhua as cover for Heitinga/Distin and someone like Lewis Holtby for 6mil. We get to use 20 odd mil to pay off some of the debt and we would have reduced the wage budget as well. Then we may have some money left over, or maybe from the sale of Yobo/Yakubu, to loan someone in January, possibly Donovan, and we're no weaker than when we started except we've taken a big step towards reducing the defecit, in fact, in my opinion, we'd be even stronger. But I'm sure it's nowhere near as easy as that and while I'd grin from ear to ear if that situation happened it won't, so we have to hope Arteta and jagielka can both recapture their form and push us up the league, hopefully into europe, where we have a chance at some extra revenue, and let's face it, we're good enough to be there. The europa league isn't beyond us at all, in fact I'd say it's right in our wheelhouse, and just what the younger players need. We deserve to be there so hopefully, come what may, it happens this season. COYB

I don't have sky sports news, d'yu reckon they'll repeat this on the website?

Of course there is bias but as clearly stated at the top of the article they had a separate section for what they thought about and that wasn't included here. I doubt they would have changed his responses or doctored this in their favour. To be honest, while i don't agree that we all have a right to business information about the club the thing we should know quite clearly is, are Everton's finances, management and development being conducted properly? I don't doubt Bill is trying everything he can do to sell the club, but he is an old man with very little ideas left. A group of younger, more intelligent and experienced people should be gathered together to sell this club, but Bill insists, in a Del Boy like manner, that he's the man for the job. If operating costs have steadily increased year on year, shouldn't there be a document somewhere that says what they all are and how much they each cost? That's hardly a difficult question and Bill didn't have a jar of glue. I like Bill Kenwright, always have, but just because he's the self proclaimed "World's Biggest Everton Fan" doesn't mean he can keep it forever. He's like a child that doesn't want to lose his favorite toy, and he needs to realise Everton will have to be without him sooner or later, and the sooner the better.

I believe it's europe or bust this season. Which is why I'm forcing myself to be optimistic that with a fully fit squad we can do it. We will not retain our top players next transfer window if we finish 7th. No chance. And after ten years with no silverware Moyes will move on. Hopefully Europa league will be enough to keep Moyes and get us a bit of extra revenue. We could also do with making a cup final, preferably the fa cup..

The main downfall for people is resale value and age. Well to be honest I don't get that at all. Distin is 33/34 and is one of our fastest players. Cahill and Pip are both past 30 but look in great shape, in fact I seem to remember Neville saying he's in the best shape he's ever been in at the moment. So why are we presuming that Donovan, playing in a league he's played in before, and therefore knows the requirements of it, will get slower just by signing for us? Donovan, IF it happened, would be the perfect signing this season. we already know he can play wide, and while his pace may slow over time, I doubt he'll be a slug on the wing. With Coleman behind him on the right, or Baines behind him on the left, he has options to lay it off if he can't beat his man. He's a goal threat, he plays as a striker a fair bit and and he'd be behind only Saha in our list of strikers. He likes playing for everton, so much so that when Man City wanted to go in for him, he stated the only premier league club he'd play for again would be Everton. Morale wise the whole team know who he is, how good he is, and most have played with him before and know the positive impact it made. It will be a big boost in the dressing room to have him there. 29 as well is not an age where I see a player on the way down. I'd see it as more 32 onwards when all that pace and tenacity starts to burn away. It's true football is getting faster, especially at the top level, but right now I'd have to think he is in the peak of his career. he won't learn a lot more at this stage, but he is a seasoned pro. If we bought a 21 year old, he'd make lots of mistakes, be inexperienced, have lots of ambition but ultimately wouldn't want to stay if we couldn't further his career. Donovan has achieved most of what he can, i doubt he'd come here for glory, more for purpose. he knows the fans love him and I'm sure he'd play his heart out for Everton because he's proud to wear the shirt. As for resale, well no we wouldn't get any resale value on him, but if we had a midfield with arteta fellaini cahill donovan and one of Osman/Coleman/Barkley in it, it would be a midfield that other teams wouldn't want to play against. I'm through being negative about the squad we have, it doesn't get anywhere and really our first 11 even this season is still strong enough for a top 5 finish. We just don't have depth. We need players and donovan wouldn't be the missing piece, but he would certainly give us options, and maybe I'm alone but I would rather take a risk on a player who wants to play for us and has quality, than buy a kid based on what we can sell him for in a few years because we failed to win any silverware or qualify for europe. I think with donovan and maybe one other decent signing, we could finish in that top bracket this season.

If we're talking about counter attacking football, same three players, two brilliant goals. We'll never have this kind of counter-attacking quality without spending millions...