Sweetchuck

No, you're quite correct to point out the difference between residency and citizenship. They've applied for residency, which would not make him an EU citizen.

...was a Steve Paterson signing. EDIT: Not sure if you're talking about Heikkinen in terms of not fitting in with JC's signing policies or in terms of us potentially signing him from Luton. I assumed the former, since he left Luton for Rapid Vienna a year ago.

To be honest, if I was going to the match, I would be more interested in seeing this than the match itself. Obviously United are streets ahead of these guys in pretty much every possible footballing respect, but seeing so many of the '83 squad playing again, not to mention Jess and Shearer reunited... <sighs wistfully> Makes you realise just how much of a peak the 80s and parts of the 90s really were. You never know what you have until it's gone.

As you say, I wouldn't read too much into the YouTube clip. This guy Bakens was full of how desperate he was to play for Aberdeen when the move was first mooted. He clearly wasn't so desperate that he would turn us down in favour of a slightly larger offer from a team with an 8,000 capacity stadium. He could well have been doing the same thing as Maybury: using our interest in him to inflate his demands with clubs which he would much rather sign for. Ultimately, I guess we'll never know. I reckon JC would have made a fair offer, but it doesn't sound like he and his agent were prepared to negotiate their own demands to any significant degree. JC still has time to pull out a few more irons from the fire. I still have a horrible lurking fear that we'll end up with Scott Wilson, though.

He'll be playing alongside another AFC nearly-man in that case: Vit Valenta. In fairness to JC, it doesn't sound like an agreement would ever have been possible in terms of wages, which makes Bakens' protestations about being desperate to sign for the Dons sound all the more hollow now.

Figure comes from a number of fairly reputable news outlets like the BBC, Belfast Telegraph, Eurosport, ITV, Sky Sports, Football365 and, er, the Daily Retard, to name but a few. £150k may well be wrong, but it's certainly been reported by more than one or two sources, although I realise that the story may have been syndicated or re-printed from one original (possibly mistaken) report.

The bid which Killie had knocked back was £150k plus add-ons, and Linfield still saw that as falling short of their valuation. He does sound promising, and some of the recent transfers from RoI/NI to the SPL and Premiership have shown that the quality over there isn't as shabby as many over here like to think it is. However, we had our chance to get this lad a couple of years ago and didn't take the opportunity: I doubt we'll be back in for him again, given the asking price Linfield seem to be setting. I'd like to see us take a risk on him, but I don't think the board would sanction a £300k-500k (who knows?) gamble on a player from over the Irish Sea, and I think I'd be inclined to agree with them (at that price).

Indeed, they were quite quick off the mark with MacDonald, and I do give them credit for that (although it remains to be seen just how worthwhile an acquisition he is). I'm not saying that they haven't been doing anything, but rather that they should have had the foresight to know that things do not move quickly at this time of year, and going on holiday for six weeks then blaming everyone else for dragging their heels just sounds daft. At this time of year, players' agents are saturated with offers, and comparatively small fry like AFC will always have to take a back seat when there are bigger, more lucrative offers to negotiate. That's what annoys me: the fact that we throw away any competitive advantage we may have by not being able to act quickly during the initial weeks after the season ends. That's when transfers should be sewn up, not as and when your manager and part-time Director of Football see fit to come back to work. If getting our first-choice signings has been difficult, then I would expect us to have moved for some of our second-choice targets, but as it is, JC has been flirting with the likes of Bakens, Redan and Davids as second-choice options for weeks on end and has been just as guilty of playing a game with them as players and agents have with him. Keeping them hanging on just reeks of desperation. I'm really, honestly not having a go just for the sake of it. People on here over-estimate my negative opinions about Calderwood: in some respects, I think he's been absolutely brilliant for us; I really do. It's the manner in which our club is run which irks me, and the buck for that stops waaaaay above Calderwood's head. I'm sick of seeing us looking uncompetitive, sluggish and devoid of ambition in the transfer market.

This goes against what we have been told in the past. JC and WM have both said quite categorically that he had been released by Leicester and was a free agent. In any case, still being under contract doesn't mean we can't offer him a pre-contract. I'm getting increasingly pissed off at the absolute incompetence with which AFC seems to be handling this transfer. I dare say that going to Mallorca for six weeks won't really have helped in that respect. No-one's saying JC isn't entitled to a holiday, but here's a thought for himself and WM: how about getting your skates on earlier in the year? Waiting until this point in time is like going into a shop's sale the day before it ends and then whining that there are no bargains left for you because everybody else snapped them up three weeks ago when the sale started. Do your fucking homework and be ready to move at the earliest possible opportunity. It's really not that tough. Oh, and go and get another right back ASAP and let Maybury rot in some fucking League 2 team of no-hopers down south. He's played us off against other offers for too long. Time to call his bluff. EDIT: Spelling.

Spin fatjim around till he's confused and you may have a taker (oo-er). Discussed last week: see bottom of this page.

I don't think so. If somebody invaded my country and rebranded it as Bush & Blair Inc. in order to rape it of everything it had, murdered my countrymen indiscriminately, dismantled and tortured any organised resistance which existed and then had the brass balls to tell me they were only helping me, I could imagine being driven to some pretty horrendous lengths in response. Every single one of the 1,000,000 Iraqis indiscriminately murdered since we invaded is likely to have an extremely angry family which is seeing no signs of freedom or liberation, but rather a country which is increasingly sectarian, increasingly impoverished thanks to the Yanks creaming off all their resources, and increasingly powerless to do anything to stop the very people who insult their intelligence by claiming they're only in their country to help them. On that basis, I really don't see how anybody could feel any sympathy if Blair went KABOOM tomorrow, unless, that is, they quite like the idea of us going over to the Middle East and slaughtering a million or so Arabs indiscriminately. Guerrilla warfare may not be pretty and it may not be fair, but remember that morality can be (dangerously) subjective in cases like this. [quote author= link=topic=4948.msg69917#msg69917 date=1214840007]Okay

I don't disagree with him in that article. Blair was hugely complicit in the most shameless political/military farce since Vietnam, sending hundreds of UK soldiers and over a million Iraqis/Afghans to an unnecessary death, all for the sake of appeasing Bush and his own misguided religious beliefs. If there is any justice in the world whatsoever, he should suffer for that. Does that make me a cretin? Anyway, I don't want to get drawn into a debate about the rights and wrongs of Galloway. As I've already said, I disagree strongly with a great many things he's said and done, but it's seriously wide of the mark to call him a cretin.

[quote author= link=topic=4948.msg69889#msg69889 date=1214834941] I think it's a fair representation of a man who does, and says, anything to get himself in the media spotlight. The guy's a cretin. You may not like him, but he's far from a cretin. Saddam actually liked to think of himself as a progressive socialist: there's probably a bit of a link in there somewhere.

What, you mean the dictator that we put in place, funded, supplied weapons to, and then turned on as soon as our oil supplies were threatened? In any case, Galloway was talking about the Iraqi people, not Saddam Hussein himself. Galloway was the only MP protesting against Hussein's regime back in the 1980s when we were propping him up, so your quote is hardly a fair representation of his character.

This man, he speaketh the truth.

He does come across very aggressively sometimes, particularly on issues like Israel/Hizbollah/Hamas etc. The way I see it, the likes of Sky News seriously need to be taken down a peg or two, and newscasters should be capable of handling difficult guests like that. Unfortunately, the presenters on Sky News are all too often selected on the basis of the way they look and talk, and not on the basis of being able to engage with stories or guests in a meaningful way. That's not to excuse his approach, but the way in which people respond to him often makes it look much worse than it actually is. So no, I'm certainly not in the 'loathe him' camp - I have a lot of time for him, even if I disagree strongly with some of his views.

Don't think anyone's saying the lad's going to be rubbish, but there's no point in bringing in a loanee from a big club just because it looks good. I would far rather give Considine another run out next year. Willie and Jimmy keep banging on about giving youth a chance: why should we give somebody else's youths a chance ahead of our own? I should state that I have no problem whatsoever with JC bringing in loan deals, and I was enthusiastic about his decision to go for Aluko and Walker from the word go last season. But they have to be the right player for the right position, not just a small name from a big club for the sake of it. The way I see it, we have far greater priorities right now than temporary cover at centre-half, and I would rather see JC focussing his energy on those areas, whether it's a loan deal or a permanent transfer.

Is an inexperienced central defender really what we need?

The football 'Gossip Column' section on BBC.co.uk is reporting a story in today's Sun which has Calderwood saying that we are trying to sort out permanent transfers for both Josh Walker and Sone Aluko. Anyone know anything about this? I'm assuming it's total, utter garbage as per the Sun's usual gutter standards of journalism. I've tried to find it on their site, but as per usual, there's no sign whatsoever of the stories from the Scottish edition. It also says that we are trying to sign (on loan) a defender from Chelsea called Jack Cork.

If his looks are anything to go by, somebody has already beaten you to it.

Fatty Foulkes is twisting the knife. http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/teams/h/heart_of_midlothian/7480321.stm

Also check out his dealings with some of the Hun retards who call his show on TalkSport: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ExABpDCaepY - "Bomb ra lot a rum!" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WVnsvSDF4Y4

Some people love him; some people loathe him, I guess. Were you one of the ones attacking him at Glasgow Airport? "I've got a religious obligation to knock you the fuck out."

A few political contenders here... And now some miscellaneous...

Joe Harper or Frank McDougall.