capt_oats

Yeah, I found the whole "told to find a new club", "free to leave" thing interesting in the sense of what they're realistically thinking about him. They're supposed to have paid £1.5m for him and he's got 2 years left on his deal. You'd think they'd want to claw at least some of that back but he seems to be in a situation similar to O'Halloran in that he'll be on a wage that he's unlikely to match elsewhere so it's a case of them either writing him off and reaching a settlement (which I'd imagine Celtic are better placed to do than Sevco) to get him off the books or he just bleeds them for another couple of years. By all accounts his loan in Poland won't have made him any easier to punt for cash money either.

No idea what we're looking for specifically it's just that the names that we've been linked with eg: Stewart via 'Arry and apparently Scougall along with every other Premiership side etc it suggests to me that we're looking for someone in that area who's capable of playing a creative role which to me, for better or worse, is a role that McDonald was being asked to do. In truth I'm probably skewing things by making assumptions based on what I *think* we need in the team more than anything. McDonald chipped in with goals as well and was our 2nd top scorer the past 2 seasons a player like O'Halloran scored 2 in 19 in his first season at Saints, 10 in 46 in 14/15 and 4 in 25 in 15/16 granted most of that time he was playing as a winger but it's not exactly the mark of a proven striker. I concede that he's absolutely rapid though and I've no real doubt that he'd probably improve us as a side, I just see him more as a winger with pace than someone who'll play centrally and hold the ball in and link the play which again is me making assumptions. I'm not necessarily banging a drum for us to sign Ciftci it's just curious to me that more hasn't been made of the fact that he was a player who's since been bombed out Celtic's squad that we confirmed definite interest in to replace a player who's subsequently left the Fir Park. I don't necessarily mean on here, just on your Twitter and the like with people who spend a lot of time speculating on that sort of stuff. I totally take on board that there's been a change in management since our interest in January, that's why I mentioned it in my post, but I'd have thought it's probably going to be a pretty limited pool of players that we'll be able to recruit from.

Given we were very public about our interest in him on deadline day in January as an option then I'm quite surprised there hasn't been more 2+2 being done given that Ciftci's effectively been told to do one by Celtic. It's clear that we haven't, as yet, replaced McDonald and from the sound of things we were looking to bring him in in the event of McDonald leaving, in fact there was talk that we'd have taken him regardless of the McDonald outcome. How much of that was just bluster IDK. Obviously there's been a change in management since then but there seemed to be comment at the time that the player/agent was keen. Clearly the deal fell through and the player ended up being shipped out to Poland but it wouldn't seem a huge stretch to think we might still be interested as options for that "second striker" role were going to be pretty thin on the ground in the first place and players we're reported to have shown an interest in who may have fitted the bill (Stewart, Scougall et al) have moved elsewhere and I'd imagine St Johnstone would be a much more obvious destination for O'Halloran and to be honest given the sort of qualities I'd think we'd be looking for as a replacement for Skippy; drop off the striker, hold the ball up, bring others into play etc I'm not sure that's O'Halloran anyway.

It gets better. According to Scott Burns it's actually Ross County who are in for him.https://twitter.com/scottburns75/status/880328075443130369

Going by P&B it's Dundee who are in for the excellently named Coulthirst rather than us. Which makes a bit more sense given he kb'd us in January for quite specific reasons (he didn't want to move away from London). Given that reason I'd have thought it quite odd if we'd gone back for him.

I still think that comment was intended as a joke tbh.

I'd have thought that (depending on his fitness situation) the best and most cost effective solution for both the player and the club would be to try and get him out on loan to someone. Easier said than done since unlike Laing who at least had a successful spell at Notts County behind him before he joined us Blyth's hardly got much of a record to sell; 3 goals in 11 games (over 2 spells) at Northampton, 5 in 22 at Burton Albion, 3 goals in 8 at Blackpool. The main thing that got him his move to Leicester was a single prolific season in non-league. Even if he was/is fit he's got Moult, Fisher and Bowman ahead of him in the pecking order for that position so it's unlikely he's going to get a game here either way.

In fairness he left the park on crutches after about 5 mins of the u20s game against Falkirk in April. He didn't look like he'd be back playing any time soon so it wouldn't be a surprise if he needed an operation. Having said that Robinson was talking about him in one of his press conferences recently saying that hopefully he'd be ready for the start of the season. Either way given his injury record and performances to date you'd think he's pretty much a write off regardless.

I had a feeling McFadden may end up there seeing as Naysmith's the manager at Queens. Doesn't seem a huge surprise.

Nah, he had 2 years to go on his deal IIRC.

I'd imagine so. He's got 2 years to go and he's only 20 just now so we'd be due a development fee as he'd be under 23. I'd depend on the category of club he moved to but given we got £200k for Hall who had barely played 20 games then I'd imagine Cadden's value would be more. Certainly more than the £100k Hearts are reportedly offering. How much did Erwin end up going to Leeds for? Was it £350k or more?

The report has apparently been lifted by The Sun from the Sunday Mail (which isn't any more reliable). In fairness the headline is that we've rejected their offer and that the bid was immediately thrown out. Quite right too.

My main takeaway from looking at Dembele was that Stevenage are actually a league side rather than non-league as I had just assumed they were. Even more surprising was that they were a League 1 side when he signed for them. Every day's a school day. It seems he captained them as well, so that's something. He and McHugh should be able to relate: From looking at the YouTube video of Kipre I thought he looked very Heneghan-y though is quite possibly (faint praise here) better on the ball, though there are some long diagonals there he also seemed to play the ball direct to the feet of whoever the centre forward was. There's not a lot of chat about him on Leicester's forum, which is hardly a surprise if he was in their u23s but what comment there is seems largely to be about his size. 6ft 5, he's a big lad and based on the photos from training the other day, he's got pretty good hair.

Difficult day for Trevor Carson's da' straight off the bat.

Sibbald would cost £200k+ and that's largely the problem if you're signing young established players, it's a question of value. I'm not wholly disagreeing with you and it's not really the point you're making but it's unlikely we'd be taking the likes of Meekings on trial anyway. It'd be a straight up signing. I take it the boy from Barnet is probably here on a recommendation from Beresford.

Which is the number of central defenders Robinson said he was looking for in that extended interview he did a couple of weeks ago.

Joe Chalmers and David Ferguson training with ICT according to the P&J

I'd agree with you if we were at the tail end of pre-season and scrambling around in the way that Hartley seemed to with Dundee and Accies regularly do but we're still in the middle of June. I'd hang fire until you actually find out who the trialists are tbh.

Already signed. His squad number is #32.

Given Laing's parting shot when he left it'd seem very unlikely. I'd imagine if Premiership sides are interested then it'd be someone like Accies or Killie that would be interested. Killie only have something like 4 defenders on their books at the moment and one of them is from their dev side. The same piece indicates that League 1 sides in England might be in for him as well so I'd have thought if he was going to end up anywhere through choice then he'd be back down south.

As a couple have mentioned you look at other clubs like St Johnstone, Accies, Thistle etc and you have fans moaning about hearing nothing from the clubs or those in similar positions to Burrows and he's getting grief here for dropping a couple of informal tweets with a bit of news as to things to look out for. He's got fans tweeting his personal account on what seems like an hourly basis asking about everything from new signings to a scoreboard FFS. You could possibly level an "unprofessional" accusation if we were making actual announcements via his personal Twitter but that's not what's happening here. All the announcements will be made through the various official channels and that's the difference IMO. It's not even as if the info he's shared is done in a show-y, "look at me" way like a Darragh MacAnthony-type character. Burrows has informally given a heads up about a series of announcements that will be happening today. Honestly, fans at other clubs would welcome that sort of thing.

A Killie fan on P&B mentioned the other week that he had heard they were interested in him though seemed to be suggesting that the interest was for their 20s, which seemed a bit weird.

Mackin signs with Livingston on a 2 year deal. http://livingstonfc.co.uk/another-new-face-arrives-2/?platform=hootsuite

In the short, fat and out of contract stakes I'd have plumped for Kris Commons.

100% If him posting about Celtic or any of his other chat about Love Island causes folk issues then don't follow him. Mute him or block him. Whatever. Grown men raging at what a young footballer posts on his personal social media is all a bit...