RicoS321

All the more reason not to let McLean go yet then. I'm assuming he's going nowhere before tomorrow now. Says a lot about fitba today that Man City can have a player that is not actually able to play in their own country.

Trying to suck yersel aff? In - SS Think we'll tank the fuckers. Nigerian based hat-trick fae the new boy who's name I can't be bothered looking up.

Get it done quickly then dons and make our move for a replacement ASAP. If it's SPL then get things moving before Saturday. We're totally light in that area now (if McLean goes). Our central midfield is made up of only one recognised central midfielder (being a bit harsh on Shinnie!), the Nigerian, and we've never actually seen him play. He'd better be fucking good!

Nae sure about Devlin like. Hopefully it's a smokescreen for Doherty. I'd take Devlin on a pre-contract like, but we're fine for centre halves for the remainder of the season. Has to be a midfielder or/and a striker.

So it isn't a no brainer then.... In a nut shell though, fit you said. The replacement has to be in this window, and it has to be before the Scottish cup tie if we're buying SPL in my opinion. Otherwise no deal. Having a guy "who wants to leave" is nonsense, we're nae little kids - not everyone has to be devoted to AFC for life. Christie wants to leave by your logic. Same for Ball and Stewart. It's not a deal in the modern game. We're nae likely to see a drop in performance for players playing in a good team, that have set high standards, but looking for a contract elsewhere.

Aye, but McLean actually is disciplined enough - for the most part - to play deeper (imagine Christie playing there - for example - if we didn't get anyone to replace McLean?). It's not his best position, but he's better than O'Connor there or Tansey and the like. Against bottom 6 opposition too, we simply shouldn't need two holding midfielders, so it's no bad thing to have a player like McLean how can sort of play both roles. I agree about McLean's shooting though. Although if he was a better goalscorer he wouldn't be playing for us....

Very true. I should have said "should be". Or, more aptly, AFC fans are bound by it's decisions (for the next 100 years). Anyway, recognising Marischal Square is a mistake surely doesn't merit ignoring AFC's proposed mistake? It seems like an extreme case of whataboutery.

Have the club ever asked? The council seems to have suggested multiple sites. Milne has shown throughout his career that he has little or no time for ACC. The Cove site was approved. The club chose to back out because Cove dicked about and ACC gave up. If the cooncil hadn't decided to charge for the land, they'd have been on pretty sticky ground I expect. But it has to be more than that. It has to be a complete collaboration. Drag the cunts to every fucking meeting, and get them involved. Kingsford might be a great site in the future, if that's where the city decides to expand to. It isn't now, and it isn't going to be anytime soon. I live out of town (Sooth, ten miles), and I can get in to the game on time leaving after 2pm. Also, I could get a train, a bus or bike. It's hugely accessible. The point is, it's integrated. It's as good as Aberdeen's infrastructure (poor) allows, and any improvements in said infrastructure will directly benefit the club. It's part of the city. Not relevant. I objected. Loads of people did. However, it's not a members club. AFC is. AFC is accountable to us, the fans.

That's bollocks though because, at present, the only replacement options we have for him is O'Connor, Storie or Tansey (County, I ken) - all of whom are worse. We need to sign someone better than all those 3. McInnes isn't great at signings that aren't obivous SPL based ones. He's no world beater, and we can improve on him definitely, but he isn't simple to replace either. I think we'll struggle to bring in someone with little time in January. Also, at the recent Hibs game, Shinnie and McLean absolutely dominated McGinn and McGeouch. There was no contest. Nor do I think Hibs will let him go in January I'd take Docherty like. He'd be the one to replace him from the SPL. PS. I never heard anyone say that Langfield was the best we could expect to get. Edit: to add, if we're going for either Docherty or McGeouch then we have to act before the weekend. If we're ditching McLean then we can't afford to have a replacement that's cup tied. It could be the difference between getting to a semi or even final having a player in that role. O'Connor isn't getting us there.

It doesn't have to be there though. The only points I was making were that: 1. Don't just build something for the sake of it, it it's not right then it's not right. Saying "I/you can't think of anything better so we just have to get on with it" is sheer stupidity and something that we'll ultimately regret as the city grows and changes. 2. Build it as part of a design for the city and in tandem with the city so it is completely integrated (like Pittodrie was when it was built - it certainly can't be held responsible for the shite design of BOD). If that means we have to wait a bit, then that's fine too. We shouldn't be doing this as a stand alone project with no infrastructure - that's suicidal.

This. His work rate is very good, even when he's not playing that well. You have to look at the standard of recent replacements too and compare him with those. He's twice the player Tansey is for example. I think we'll struggle to get anyone in January who will fill the gap. Is £500K worth risking second place (£300K between second and third in prize funds - but it'd be more damaging than that in the long term)? In that area of the pitch, that's what we're talking about really. Maybe if the Nigerian is half decent it won't be an issue. I'd be cautious though. £500K isn't going to offer us much in January or even in the summer. If the Nigerian boy is good then I'd say yes, otherwise tell them to do one. As Nips says, they can pay more. If anything it shows Hull that we don't dick about with half a million here and there. Motherwell took the gamble with Moult in the summer and they lost out on (reportedly) maybe a hundred thousand at most, but that returned them a cup final. Second place is absolutely massive for us, it can't be underestimated, and I think we can afford to let the £500K go. Obviously the player may be desperate to move and he'll obviously have a say in that.

Possibly, possibly not. That's not what Kowlaski's comment suggested though. Not even remotely. There is a very, very clear alternative and that's to do nothing in terms of moving stadium. If the vast majority of people recognise that it's a hugely compromised plan, then it definitely is not the right plan. Pittodrie isn't falling down anytime soon. It's ongoing maintenance - whilst more expensive than we'd like - is costed within our budget every year without issue. If the right plan doesn't exist now then we sit tight until it does. Whether that be through different land becoming available, infrastructure improvements elsewhere (or even around Kingsford) making sites more viable or enhanced building techniques and materials making stand construction cheaper, stronger (thus smaller footprint required) and hence Pittodrie re-development a possibility. This is a 100 year decision for AFC. Why in the world would we move to a shite location which everyone recognises as "hugely compromised"? There really is no immediate need to move. Before anyone mentions, the training facilities aren't part of the discussion. They can go ahead, there is no reason for them to be anywhere near the stadium, but they are definitely required. Couldn't give a shite where they go. Packaging them with the stadium was a deliberate smokescreen (see the document where all ACC sites were turned down due to them not being 25hectares (or acres, canna mine - fucking imperial shite)).

Grow up. Folk have opinions that don't match yours, so they're in some way destroying the future or heritage of the city? Kingsford has fuck all to do with the city of Aberdeen, this is an AFC stand-alone project. It is entirely for the benefit of AFC, and has zero benefit for the rest of the city. It doesn't integrate with the city and it doesn't sit inside a city wide plan. People recognise a hugely compromised plan. It it was a good plan, it'd sail through. But it's not.

Swinging I expect.

Strictly speaking, Aberdeen will have one and so will Westhill.

That's probably when they changed the rules to allow it. In terms of the hun purchases, these loans look more like structured deals to allow them to pay for the players when they can actually afford them post season ticket sales

£301K I heard.

Shiftkey to Motherwell? Half decent I suppose. Always thought he was massively inconsistent and would be a frustrating player to have in the team Similarly (inconsistent) Cummings, going to the hun. Along with Russell Martin who's pretty solid. A couple of decent additions that'll strengthen their squad.

Ahh, I see. Doubt it'll make a difference. Carillion are only one of 3 I think on the AWPR. I don't think anything will get in the way of the AWPR. Although the dons might use it as an excuse to put the planning back another few months as the transport plan doesn't actually exist to be "out the window".

Why?

Fair doos. I think we missed out massively this season by not getting Moult in order to get us to the group stages of the euros. I think it was a once in a decade chance given the draw. I don't think it'll happen next season. If it does, I still don't think we'll get there by buying a £1M player. We'd have to buy 3 x £1M players in order to get the return (based on current signings where 1 in 3 turn out good), which is in the realms of stupid. For that, we need to be looking at squad building as elgin says. That means two or three additions at perhaps the £400K mark (or free but on higher wages). We could easily have signed Moult before the Apollon game and then he got injured immediately and we'd have been fucked. I'd have gambled personally, but I can see why we didn't stretch to the £700K or so required. That'd have been the cost of two players in our squad. When you pay that much, you're not only putting pressure on the player but hoping that he doesn't get injured and also putting him at odds with the rest of the team because he's valued so much higher. May comes in at the high end of our budget, but not double the cost of GMS or McLean for example, so he fits in nicely. As we improve, we can expect that to grow to £5-600K as a reasonably fair investment. We have to do it sensibly and incrementally. I'm not sure there'll be players in the £3-500K range that will fulfill our requirements available in January. By saying "splash out a £1M on a single player" you're setting that benchmark for all our signings, and I don't think we can get there yet. Not even close. We took £1.3M for Hayes with a year remaining, £300K is not the benchmark for our selling of star players, and that sort of offer is 6 - 8 orders of magnitude too low. The club will ensure that.

The problem with that is that a dutch league 2 players banging them in will cost more than £1M. We then have no idea how they'll perform in our league too. Lots of players are shite in Scotland that were decent elsewhere. We'd have to be absolutely certain they were going to hack it in the SPL - hence why we generally only spend on players who've done it here before. You should never spend money on a player unless you can afford one or two more at that price. That way you're not putting all yer eggs in one basket. If the player turns out shite, there's not the same failure. If we spend £1M on a player, that'll be us for a few years. If he's pish, we're fucked. £1M is way too much for our income level. Personally, I don't think we should spend any more than we make. I don't want us ever to owe money to Milne or anyone else again. It ends in us leaving the city. That's just my opinion of course.

What do you mean? Who are we not buying because of the cash required? May was £400K, with GMS 250K. That's the most we've spent on players in years (this century?). Neither of those are likely to give us a return on that investment (i.e. they won't go elsewhere for more in a few years). All the signs suggest that if McInnes had a target that was going to cost us, the board would fund it. PS. Manc, McKenna contracted until 2021

It'd have to be a big offer. He has all the attributes to be a top class defender. I didn't rate him at all when he first came on to the scene before heading out to Ayr, I assumed he'd be gone but he's been fantastic. Given the paucity of centre halves, I'd expect him to be in the Scotland team in a couple of years time no bother. Good that McInnes has stuck by him and kept him in the team (he had a poor game against the hun and could have easily been dropped) and given him the confidence that has allowed him to play a bit too - previously I thought he was prone to the speculative hoof, but he's shown that he has a lot more than that. I think McInnes will easily talk him out of a move to Hull and with his contract expiring in 2021, we'll get a good fee for him when he does leave.

Surely he already has a UK permit if he's playing for Man City?