Fans will always moan regardless. Must say, Moncur was very impressive on Saturday, he looked better once young Green came on though. If we'd have got him in L1 as Grant wanted, he'd have taken the absolute piss.
I thought Andy Smith (if that’s who was at centre half, the young sub) looked really comfortable, dare I say, he’s been watching Harry Maguire the way he calmly dribbled out of defence and sprayed the ball around. Definitely one to watch.
The embargo rules are fairly clear, it's a page of information, rather than hundreds of pages of legal documents and it clearly states 'A player of Professional Standing leaving the Club on loan does not reduce the number of eligible players the Club is deemed to have'. I think the issue might be what constitutes 'professional standing', as this isn't defined in the rules, but the rules do say that an 'established player' is a player over 21 who's made more than five appearances and they may have assumed both had the same definition.
Not keen on this hastily arranged friendly between Man U this week. It's the playing behind closed doors that gets me. We could have got 10,000 in for this one, probably more if it were well advertised. So what's the reason for it ? I know its been announced as an Under 23's game, but it's the last minute thing that makes me sceptical as to why it's been arranged at all. We are at Sunderland on Friday and Pickering away midweek so it's not as though we had nothing pencilled in for this week. Are Man U looking at one of our players ? are we looking at one of theirs as part exchange ? To me, if you are playing Man U at home you charge on the gate and cash in. I always say there is a reason for everything, so what is the real reason for this extra fixture ?
I would definitely think 'professional standing' is open to interpretation, considering a number of players who weren't in our squad of 25 are considered of 'professional standing' apparently.
Eh ? Where did you get I was blaming Grant for it from what I wrote ? I said he is saying exactly what he is instructed to do. No more no less !
There's a reason why these sorts of agreements usually ARE hundreds of pages of legal documentation - there's usually a glossary of terms defining quite clearly what every term used in an agreement means in plain English. Very lax of the EFL not to have that.
It does seem odd that our embargo is effectively self-imposed, as we haven't broken any rules - yet we seem to now be working to tighter transfer restrictions than Derby, who it's deemed have broken rules. From what I have read - Derby have been told their youth players don't count towards the squad numbers and can sign up to 5 players for a fee! We on the other hand look to be trying to get around this by agreeing a fee to be paid at the end of a loan agreement, but need to "make room" for these players, either by moving others on (which McCann hinted at) or by getting the EFL to budge on what is classed as a "player of professional standing".
Again, another instance were ours was self-imposed. Looking at Wiki, Derby look to have 24 players on their books. Half of them do look to be under 23, though the majority of them are either full internationals, or youth internationals (England, Scotland & Ireland). They also have two Polish internationals in their squad (one which they paid Arsenal £10m (with add ons) for. The other cost them £3m). They have Welsh international Tom Lawrence who they paid £7m for (with add ons). They have Scottish international goalkeeper David Marshall in goal. And well-travelled veteran Colin Kazim-Richards. They also have many ex-Premier League pros on trial with them. Not sure their hardship is as great as they plead, considering the price they paid for a couple of their players cost more than our entire squad.
No don't accept that. McShane was only appointed on Friday. This fixture has been rumoured for a couple of weeks now.
Didn't say it was part of the interview process but it's a bit daft to think the public announcement of an appointment is the first time that person has any involvement in decisions or input into the role he's going into.
The game has been planned for ages and was confirmed before mcshane was appointed. He was asked if he wanted to change any pre arranged plans but decided to keep this game
Haven’t Derby challenged this ‘Professional standing’ point? They played a load of youth team players, which are now being included in their professional standing quota.