Sadly although not surprisingly, most of this week's content seems to relate to players going out the door rather than more coming in.
Let's start with Sunday - "Red-Top Hack in 2+2=5 shocker" as a new manager in Steve Bruce is appointed at the Mackems. The former Manchester United captain was rumoured to be interested in our very own Steve Davis last summer while manager of Wigan therefore, he simply must want to spend some of the £50 squillion kitty he has on the Ulsterman, mustn't he? Perhaps he could use some of it to get the mop of his cut. As is the norm with the red-tops these days, no quotes, no info.......complete guess-work.
One thing that isn't guess-work (Unless you look into the reason why it happened) is that young Spaniard Aaron Niguez has left the club to return to Valencia. "The Jewel in the Crown" of the Valencia youth set-up, according to the red-tops, was a dead cert to star for a youthful Valencia side next season once the Mestalla-based side has it's expected fire-sale to clear some of it's massive debt. Yet again they were proven to be prophets of pish when the chap was farmed out to Racing Santander within hours of returning. Never mind, fellas.
Blackpool assistant manager Steve Thompson confirmed that the club want to take Charlie Adam back permanently next season. The only stumbling block could be the £500k fee that they don't necessarily disagree with - but probably can't afford. Whilst Charlie wasn't everyone's cup of tea, I'm thinking playing and scoring in the Champions League, taking part in a run to a European Final, playing and scoring in Old Firm games and at one time being on the fringes of International football in an area of the pitch where Scotland is arguably strongest......Then I'm thinking Evander Sno......THEN I'm thinking £500k? Bit on the cheap-side? Over to you Mr Bain....
"Oor Barry" is now attracting interest from Big Eck at Birmingham. Eck stated he was on the look-out for "A Barry Ferguson-type player" earlier this week. I've got to say, big man, If that quote was an attempt at subtlety then it has got to go down as a huge, huge fail.
Remember January this year? The Mint gave an interview to his poodles which one of the red-tops titled "Murray Park kids will save us a fortune" as an attempt to lessen the impact of Kris Boyd's potential move to Birmingham which thankfully fell through. One who was tipped by many to make the break-through, Georgious Efrem, has left the club to join Omonia Nicosia, who are clearly the Cypriot equivalent of Real Madrid in the spending stakes. Also joining the former Arsenal starlet in the sunshine will be Bruno Aguiar. The Portuguese player who was heavily linked with the Scottish Champions in recent weeks joined fellow former Jambo Christophe Karipidis in signing from the Cypriots.
Speaking of departing youths, fans of Blue Heaven will perhaps be shedding a tear as young Chris Craig was released from the club, along with Ross Harvey, William McLachlan and Latvian shot-stopper Artur Vaiculis. I sincerely hope that none of them show up at an English Championship side and wind-up with 7-figure transfers in the near future.
From Sunny-Cypriots to, erm.... Cold Icelandic chaps? That'll do - Portsmouth defender Hermann Hreidarsson has once again name-checked Rangers as a team he'd love to play for. He's out of contract, pretty fit for a 34 year old and could "dae a job" for a year or so but one would question the wisdom in such a move when decent wages are something we're looking to cut down on - especially for players of Hreidarsson's age. I reckon we can file this one under "not happening".
Speaking of old-people, many of them wear glasses, right? Well, so does Craig Levein (seamless link, there!). Something else he wears is a baseball cap...I think it looks quite jakey Regardless, Levein has denied that he's looking to bring Andy Webster to Dundee United on loan next season. The player has toiled with injury ever since arriving from the club we used to sign him for hee-haw by-proxy, Wigan Athletic. Part of me still believe Webster could be a player but a physio-table with his indent on it says otherwise.
A man who has gained a lot of attention over the past year or so for using his fingers (You know? Drinking, smoking and.....never mind.) Allan McGregor is a target for Hannover 96 in Germany if the Sunday red-tops are to be believed. Meeting Shagger's wage demands won't be a problem for the Bundesliga side, and a fee of £3.5 million is supposedly what they will offer. Frankly, £3.5 million is as good as we're going to get for the keeper. Comparisons with Craig Gordon's fee are irrelevant when you take into account our financial situation and other club's awareness of it......and throw in his off-field behaviour of late.
Dean Furman has seemingly rejected a new deal to stay at the club....one wonders if and when he'd get a game, a permanent move to Bradford beckons for the South African.
Bar the comments from the Icelander, speculation continues over the potential signing of Chris Brunt, which could well be thrown into doubt if Tony Mowbray takes over the manager's job at Snake Mountain as expected......A part-exchange for Mowbray target Barry Ferguson seemed the only way we would be able to generate the fee necessary to bring him here. Other rumours suggest us looking at loaning a Barca B team player for the season and possibly being in discussions with a Republic of Ireland international.
Let's hope that with a few more players off of the wage-bill, my next installment will feature more tidbits about incoming players.
Till Next Time,
BdTS.