Lets face it we could have Franco Baresi and Bobby Moore at CB and Howard would still concede 20 goals a game.
As for Everton denying his transfer request to retain credibility: maybe they will, but it'll be a pyrrhic victory. Two things will happen: 1/ we'll go with what we have, to coin a phrase. There'll be no marquee signings of players who can give us creativity; 2/ we'll be stuck with a disgruntled player (and even if he got his head down and grafted away he'll be a run of poor form away from being hounded at this club. This club's fans wont accept what he did. Not a chance).
Everybody does reallyOH FFS HE'S GOT ME ON IGNORE
We're splitting hairs as our club does not have the guts to do such a thing but we'd only have to name him as substitute and get him on the pitch in 3 more matches this season to meet that obligation.
As an aside if someone refused to play because their transfer request had been denied (hence Stones being in the corner of Finch Farm by himself) how would that person establish "sporting just cause"?
Do you think Kenwright is likely to turn it down Steve?
True more than a few in the squad every week! on more wages too!why not ? .... we payed more for players who sit on our bench week in week out.
No. @Woolly Blue can ban me for a month. I consider my self yet another victim of Kenwright and the EFC board
As @davek said.
I can tell you this. Another club inquired about Stones and were flatly told 'not for sale'
However, it appears to me that things were going on in the background. Theres too many coincidences of 'late transfer requests' happening that suits this board down to the ground.
Like I said. I shall take any ban with good grace.
Everton are peeing me off right now. @davek was right.
I think you are right about a small victory. It's like the way people carried on about keeping Baines. The reality was the asking price wasn't met and had it have been he'd have been sold.
The reality is, any statement of keeping Stones would merely be postponing the decision to next summer. There will be no investment, no ambition shows to match what he would want. A top team would go and sign 3-4 top players and make it clear to Stones we want him to be a part of that.
The only counter to that, is if we keep Stones for another year it gives us a years successional planning time. Presumably MOri will take a little time to adapt to the league. Likewise with primarily Browning/Galloway they are probably a season off being ready to be first team starters. Likewise we'd be a year further down the line with Holgate/Pennington/Kenny.
Essentially we would be in a better position to see how strong or weak we are in that department. I could see us moving for Jonny Evans on a free transfer tbh.
How do you think Martinez sees this situation? Do you think we have a Walter Smith scenario on our hands when Fergusan left?
I don't think he envisaged losing Stones at all, given we let Distin and Alcaraz go, and he'd have looked to move on Barkley/McCarthy/Coleman/Mirallas ahead of him.
Kenwright is now playing with fire on this one. It only makes sense to have left it this late if they were planning to keep him, or alternatively were confident they could get replacements in quickly.
A small part of me will die if I see Martinez on September 3rd telling us about the phenomenal talents of Evans/Fazio.
I know I suggested some weeks ago this would play on on the last day, with us signing Evans, Lennon and an Austin/Yarmalenko type signing with Stones going out. It is looking more likely.
Yes. The problem I see if we get to the point of negotiation, and I still feel Stones may stay, is that Bill, who is a good negotiator and these days usually does a better than expected deal, is currently ill and might not be in a position to be as sharp as usual. Stones has been pressured into a transfer request and it may be that its not what he really wants, the media and Chelsea have 'got at him', so we should turn the request down, or get him to withdraw , and tell him to carry on being professional.
We're splitting hairs as our club does not have the guts to do such a thing but we'd only have to name him as substitute and get him on the pitch in 3 more matches this season to meet that obligation.
As an aside if someone refused to play because their transfer request had been denied (hence Stones being in the corner of Finch Farm by himself) how would that person establish "sporting just cause"?
What we really needed was yarmolenko in and then a keeper next summer -- would be looking quite strong then in 12 months time.
As it is, losing stones would be a disaster and leave us not only massively short at centre back but the timing is 12-24months too soon for the younger players to come through.