Wednesday 29 August 2012

Goalkeeping addition

The rumours about us being interested in Tottenham fourth choice goalie, David Button, were proved correct yesterday as we signed him. There was an undisclosed fee and the Grape Vine was mentioning £500,000 which would be hard to believe under normal circumstances and nigh on impossible if we have cash flow problems. 

Once again, it must be said that we appear to be strengthening our squad for a crack at the Championship irrespective of Boardroom challenges. Jordan Cook, Salim Kerkar, Lawrie Wilson, Dorian Dervite-Vassoue, Ricardo Fuller and now David Button all need paying and the names being linked continue. Nigel Reo-Coker could be the holding midfield player we need (don't ask West Ham fans for a reference) and there are other names being bandied about too.

As I said yesterday, the obvious fear is that we will sell to fund all this and I would be very sorry to see Chris Solly sacrificed, although delighted if we could do it by losing Dale Stephens to Villa. There will come a point where the sale of Solly would be justified given the overall strengthening of the squad and Lawrie Wilson is an able full-back in his stead. The only other conclusion I can draw is that we also appear to be moving to a position where the sale of an asset would only help us balance the books and not 'save' us money. 

Mssrs Slater and Jiminez, therefore, may be approaching some form of redemption, although that remains to be seen and whatever the situation, it would have been so much better for the club if they had communicated more openly than they have so far, if only to rubbish the rumours. 

As a footnote, I should add that the long-suffering Royal Oak is finally under new management although the lease remains with the same person (Ken Ryan) and the funds needed to shake things up are very unlikely to be forthcoming. We can live in hope.

Finally, I thought we had the knack last season of playing sides at just about the right time. Forest will be a big test again for us on Saturday but it was good to see them given a hard workout by Wigan last night and conceding four to the Premier League visitors. Next up after that is Palarse and I rest my case with them - they lost Paddy McCarthy for six weeks yesterday and conceded four again at League One Preston in the Capital One Cup. Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!

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