Danny

Call me insane, crazy and mad, but how can an injured player pass a medical?

I mixed up the previous season. He played 20 out of a possible 38. 16 actually. And Flamini played 24. Hence why I said Flamini and Van Bommel. I didn't mean both individually. No, you were just too quick to try to get one over on me. And seriously, he was not 'crap' last year. He had his best season for years.

Problem with the long term financial benefit plan is no one else wants him and he's not getting any younger. His stock at the end of the season before last was as high as it will get, him having been in the CL and the world cup - and he stayed because he admitted no offers had come in. And that's why he looks like staying again. I am not keen on him remaining given just how wantaway he is. I disagree he's anything like 'great' tbh. But will concede I'd rather him than Broadfoot. That said, I'd rather ME than Broadfoot.

As a Milan fan I watch just about every Milan game there is. Season before last Gattuso was extremely poor, and looked well past his best, but last year he seemed to get a new lease of life under Allegri and while he only played a third of matches or so (Van Bommel and Flamini featured more), he looked not bad at all. It's only normal that he's a bit slower these days, he's 33 after all. I don't know if I'd take him though. That all said, I don't really believe Gordon Smith is talking to him at all. I think it's someone else entirely.

I don't even know who your reply is about Gav. Davis or Bougherra.

Or they'll look at our more recent performances in Europe, beating Lyon, VfB, Bursaspor, drawing with Barca and Man Utd, getting to the Uefa Cup final yadda yadda. I guess it just depends which webpage they click

The SPL is a very poor league, true, but what sets it apart is having two giants in it who should be in a bigger and better league. So your point isn't entirely valid given that we're the champions rather than a Hearts or a Dundee Utd.

I forgot about Gothenburg and AIK. Maybe I was a touch premature in calling it a weak league. Still say we have enough in our armoury to beat them.

In this thread I assume it's Kyle Hutton on second reading, true, but someone in another post said we were in for Hutton, Cuellar, Gattuso and Miller.

I dunno where Premiersports came from - never heard of them till a couple of months ago. It's a �£8 subscription channel on Sky who cover some small time and obscure matches. Last night's Dundee Utd match was Premiersports and I found a stream of it fairly easily.

19-4 in favour of not concerned. Fairly overwhelming majority.

Initially I thought you were literally saying we didn't sign another winger, but now I realise your opinion of Weiss is so high that you don't believe Juanma to be a decent replacement.

Ok, I've heard the Rino rumour which I think is a load of bollocks tbh, but where's the Hutton talk coming from?

Quite honestly if we cannot beat the champions of a very poor league then we don't deserve to participate in the CL anyway. It won't be a walkover, and we should treat them with respect, but the Swedish league is somewhere between the SPL and the first division in quality, with no teams close to the quality of Rangers or Celtic. That all said, the might of Torshavn from the Faroe Islands could well come back in the second leg...

We've replaced Weiss with Juanma. Otherwise I agree.

I think it's safe to say that regardless of how we feel about preseason friendly results, and performances, we are all united in pretty significant displeasure at our club's rather woefully inadequate performance in the transfer market this window. We have made just the one solitary signing, the promising looking Juanma, in the tricky slot of winger, so it's safe to say that Weiss has been replaced. But elsewhere we appear to be going sideways. We've failed to bring in any strikers at all, with failed attempts at getting Hemed and the on-going soap opera that is Goodwillie. Now we've turned our attention to Kenny Miller, which looks like the easy option. And I understand Ally has a personal friendship with Miller which may explain his interest in getting him back. This isn't the end of the world - we have the best SPL striker in Jelavic, the well-rated Naismith, the enigmatic Lafferty and the potentially effective SPL goal getter in Healy. Which isn't appalling. We also have Beattie too but best to gloss over that one eh? Midfield hasn't fared too well either, with links to Wanyama, Livermore, and Danns coming to nothing - leaving us looking like, bar Juanma, going into the new season with pretty much the same midfield as we had last year. This isn't a total travesty, because again, we're quite well endowed in this area - Ness, McCulloch, Edu, Davis - it's not Xavi and Iniesta but it's not bad. I guess the area we're all most worried about is defence, and it's clear Ally is too. At present we have Whittaker as a cert for right back, and it's becoming clear why Ally was so desperate to hold onto him - we wouldn't have been able to find an adequate replacement. In the middle we have the seasoned veterans Bougherra, Weir and Broadfoot - none of whom really inspire confidence despite being more or less ever present 3 seasons in a row. And at left back the honest but limited Papac, something of a cult figure but only because a really good wing back these days costs a bomb or requires a lucky find in some South American league *cough* Izzaguirre *cough*. It's for this reason we have been linked significantly to around 7 defenders - Cuellar, Wilson, Bartley, Rodriguez, Khomalo and Wallace. And appear no closer to signing any of them, having had an apparently paltry bid for Rodriguez rejected by his parent club Espanyol. Bids for Cuellar and Wallace were also dismissed out of hand and it's pretty clear that bringing in players is a hell of a lot harder than it used to be. It does help having money - Walter Smith during his second spell had to fix the side and was able to buy players like Naismith, Thomson, Whittaker, Davis et al - guys who cost 2M a pop easily. Nowadays, even under this new ownership and a new era, we simply don't seem to have the cash to splash out on players the club desperately need. It's not easy to sign a player - the negotiations can go on for a long time, other clubs can hijack deals, and ultimately a bid is rejected. But it's clear Smith, Ally and Whyte have to up the ante to bring in players otherwise this increasingly rusty team is going to break. Especially at the back - 7 defenders we are currently in negotiations over, which appears to be like a lucky dip - you take what you can get. Well we have to hope we get something good, and soon.

You know something, I almost feel like there's an immunity about Weir. That Ally is actually too afraid to suggest he retire or offer him a coaching role. Weir himself just wants to keep playing, and it's like the management just feel an obligation to let him and to keep him in the first team. Weir has started every preseason match so far. I have no idea if that would change should we bring in a new defender or two.

Bread and butter for us is the SPL - our threadbare squad won the league against timmy's massive team. I'm not saying it's ideal to go in again with such a disadvantage, but it really is interesting to know if they have actually signed anyone at all yet. Oh wait, I think they signed Wanyama albeit he can't play due to work permit issues.

I thought it was relevant to us hence putting it in here.

We're full of stress at the lack of new faces in our squad, but given our competition is Celtic, are they way ahead of us in the new players class? Who are their new players - including anyone who's in on pre-contract.

I don't know why the fuck I follow him. He is just a tabloid attention whore who will sell his morals down the river in order to court controversy. All he does is say 'look at me'.

No, I'm not asking for dyed in the wool bears either. Yeah, we do have Healy which is nice, but that kind of player is rare. No, I am just asking players to have some respect for the club, and if they want to leave, keep it to themselves or hand in a transfer request. He's been whoring himself out for over 2 years for crying out loud. It wears thin.

Apparently the Rodriguez bid was 200k plus 200k addons.

Seeing as this one is loaded, I felt it worthy of its own thread. Gordon Smith talking about the possibility of bringing back Miller, of signing Goodwillie, and a host of other shit.

tbh the name did indeed comprise champions to start with, but once they decided to expand the number of groups to eventually include non champions they really should have considered rebranding it back to the European Cup.