I’d be happy with £6 million as Idah is unhappy.
Incidentally my grandson was photographed taking part in a charity fundraiser wearing an Idah shirt. Idah must have seen the photograph as shortly after he sent him a substantial contribution, he has a good heart.
Some perspective here.
One of our ex players, at the peak age in his career (25), has just left a Scottish Premier League club in order to come back to England. He’s signed for a National League Club. Take out the top two and that’s really the equivalent standard. Banging in a hatful of goals in the SPL absent genuine competition is only going to “add value” in a very small number of cases. When you’re talking 8 in 15 that’s not really much to hang your hat on.
The problem is that he showed some promise at youth level but hasn’t really stepped up consistently since. Being an international footballer for a relatively small nation in a hugely unsuccessful period isn’t really a big selling point either. Norwich want their youth development money back but that likely won’t happen either.
I’d be surprised if he went for as much as £6m in the end.
As a Wolves supporter I am looking forward to another season of dodgy VAR decisions going against us.
I think you’re underestimating the quality of the SPFL but that’s an argument for another day. Strikers, more than any other footballing position, can either just fit in to a club or be a square peg in a round hole. Idah was/is just a good fit for Celtic. Looking at it from the opposite direction Teemu Pukki at Celtic couldn’t hit the proverbial cow’s backside with a banjo but was a big success for Norwich. He just didn’t fit Celtic.
Agree with all of your post bar that first sentence
I recall James Fowler asserting about a decade ago that the SPL was L1 standard. The uproar was hilarious but no-one could produce a shred to prove it was any better and many asserted worse.
More recently the people behind the Numbers Game produced that wonderful Europe wide analysis which compared and ranked leagues. The last fame for this (I think) was that wonderful dismantling of Solkjaers previous Scandinavian managerial experience before United/Cardiff as being equivalent to the Isthmian League
That same analysis concluded that if you removed Rangers and Celtic then the SPL standard wavered between L2 and the National League. I took in 4 very different games when staying in Glasgow with a Plymouth fan for a month pre pandemic (19/20 season). My club was in the National League at that point and our style of play, if compared to music, would have been aptly described as “dirge”. I was genuinely looking forward to being at least entertained and at least seeing something faster on better pitches, but no, the pitches were shocking and the teams were awful. I’d say 1 of those teams was mid L1 level, 2 were L2, 4 were National League in every respect and 1 wasn’t even that.
These protests about the appointment of Rooney have got way out of hand in Plymouth.
Equally amused that they tried to riot in Wrexham but got beaten up by the locals.
You’ve just added £5 million to the fee for Idah!
Are we all lookimg forward to tomorrow then? I have literally no idea what to expect from my team so wouldn’t be too downhearted with a bashing from Wycombe tomorrow evening.
5:30pm kick off on the opening day very much complicates things re: public transport as has the failure of physical season tickets to arrive in time and the need to go collect a new audio descriptive commentary set before kick off. So, whats 4 hours out 0f tue day for most is looking like 12 hours for me. Very irritating.
Anyways, make yourselves known and good luck everyone.
I’m pretty worried for Pompey’s prospects at Eland Road tomorrow at 12:30. Always a very tough opening fixture but not helped by the number of injuries that we seem to be carrying as the season opens.
Think yourself lucky. Last time I went to Carrow Road, just for one match as opposed to staying in Norwich for a few days, the road trip (800 plus miles from Cornwall) would have been 16 hours & the train meant leaving Truro at lunch time on Friday for London & staying the night there in a hotel or on a bench at Liverpool St. station. Then a train onto Norwich the following morning & similar rigmarole to get home.
Was going with a Liverpool season ticket holder friend, who despite living in Newquay managed to get to about 15 home games a season, so we decided to fly from Exeter. The flight arrived in Norwich at 2.45pm but, luckily for us, the game was moved to 5.30 for TV.
Was it worth it? It was for my friend. Liverpool won 3-0 at a canter, Suarez scored the first of his many hat-tricks against us (including one from the halfway line).
And you think supporting Wrexham can be difficult at times!
I know you might not think so, but that’s an amazing thing to have witnessed: one of the greatest strikers of all time scoring one of his more remarkable goals. And, yes, I know Suarez is often viewed through the prism of his various sins, but as a striker he was (and still is) undeniably extraordinary.
One of the reasons I have frustratingly never made a Wrexham game in Torquay, Yeovil or Exeter despite my cousin living on the edge of Dartmoor. Doubly frustrating as I did once do a social security appeal tribunal for a client in Cornwall travelling there and back by train in one day and repoing the appeal through what would have otherwise been the tribunals lunch time.
Did fly down to watch us at Crawley about a decade ago. Made it with 15 minutes to spare. Was shocked at the amateur nature of the set up there.
I do find it frustrating how many clubs act like their fans are only local to them whereas the reality is that many of us travel huge distances and just as many simply don’t have the opportunity.
I’m going to our Carabao game in Sheffield on Tuesday night health permitting. No offers of a lift back this time as all cars are packed. There’s no practical way back home on public transport so it’s looking like a hotel for the night. My offspring can’t come because even if we booked a hotel they simply couldn’t get back early enough the next day for work at 11am.
The big difference for me is that travel impacts my Nystagmus massively to the point where I will be physically exhausted by the time I get there and far worse by the time I get home. I’ll be unable to see clearly and sometimes have a headache as well. The sort which won’t clear with meds but only with rest. Usually I am in bed for half a day on the Sunday in consequence.
You make me feel guilty about moaning at the lack of parking spaces after my 12 mile trip into the city.
“Convenient for Gatwick”. It’s about all there is to say for Crawley (though it did spawn The Cure and Mr Southgate)
Take care, Mike. There’s no need to travel at all if it does that to you.
Good start to the season. A player who came through the ranks and apparently enjoyed a private education paid for by the club refuses to play for them on match day.
Mind you the way we’re playing I don’t think he’d have made much difference.
Well, The Mighty Whites open their season at Elland Road, doing things the hard way, as usual.
Brenden Aaronson? From hero to zero in sixty seconds.
And Leeds, Leeds are falling apart, again.
M.O.T.
We start the season as we ended the last, struggling to put away a team which used time wasting as a tactic and hoped to nick a goal at some point. 2 shots 2 goals was the perfect first half for Portsmouth. Meanwhile we rely on our unique 604 formation again - will we ever sign the creative mid we desperately need?
Given we play 6 defenders we ought to be able to see out a game in which we score 3 - sadly our defending/keeping (can’t keep saying he’s only young) was poor. And then we blew a golden opportunity in the last minute!
Still unbeaten at home.
A crazy game at Elland Road this afternoon. I was expecting Pompey to get thumped, particularly given the number of first choice players missing through injury. In the first 15 minutes during which Leeds hit the bar three times and took the lead, that worry was felt to be coming true. Then around 20 or so minutes Pompey struck an excellent equaliser out-of-the-blue. The mood of the game then changed with Pompey suddenly believing in themselves. Taking the lead going into injury time Pompey could have nicked it but Leeds got a late equaliser and missed a sitter even later. To be honest had Pompey won it wouldn’t have been deserved as Leeds were the better side. But I’m more than happy with a point. I don’t think we could have had a tougher opening fixture upon our return to the second tier. A point and 3 goals away is a far better start than I dared hope for.
The train journey was ludicrously expensive for some reason so we decided to fly. First flight was inevitably cancelled and they were trying to kick us off the only other flight we could get and still see the match. I didn’t know until we arrived but apparently the reason we made the second flight was that Mrs. H. explained that we were going to an entirely fictional wedding at which I was the best man and it started at 3pm.
Of course we went 0-2 up and lost 2-3 thanks to the centrifugal force of cheating that was Matt Tubbs and yer man Evans.
Our hotel suite was mysteriously upgraded to the honeymoon suite too. I did t ask but ‘i think I can guess.