January 22 2010

Selhurst Park

The third full week of the transfer window has seen little action, but we are still in the news, writes Simon Pophale.

VicMo to go? No No (not yet anyway)

In the week that Neil Warnock proclaimed that “Victor Moses has possibly played his last game for us” and “we cannot keep turning people away” as well as the more imminent comment on Monday “a deal could be done in the next 24-48 hours”.... he is still here!

Yes folks, the Moses for sale bandwagon rolls on but with seemingly nothing in place yet, he could be included (although unlikely) for the match at Wolves in the FA Cup. Warnock probably won’t want him cup-tied however.

Following the rather good “Late Kick Off” on Monday night, the only other bit of Palace related news was the outburst from Stern John on Tuesday saying that he would like a permanent move to Ipswich. Good of Stern to say what most of us have been thinking.

With no further news on any bids for Ambrose and Speroni as yet, the next week will probably be testing our resolve to the limit.

Old boys news

One rather interesting bit of news popped out on Thursday with the bid from Middlesbrough for QPR’s Wayne Routledge. Wayne’s career seemed to have been going fine until someone wigged in his ear about how good a move to Spurs could be, but after a couple of years of being in the doldrums (Portsmouth, Fulham (when they were not much good) and Aston Villa), he could be on the move again.

Boro clearly like the look of ex-Palace players as Gordon Strachan was rumoured to be looking at Dave Martin, if the Daily Mirror (Thursday) has it right.

Around the Championship

This week’s window has seen Mark Cooper of Peterborough win the weekly award for the most active manager, as he has been-a-dealing this week as if it has been going out of fashion. First last Friday, Dominic Green goes out on loan to Chesterfield, with Kerrea Gilbert promptly arriving on loan.

Cooper then went back to his old club Kettering Town to bag Exodus Geohaghon. He didn’t stop there; Tuesday saw Kwasi Appiah head in the direction of Rockingham Road, Wednesday saw Rene Howe go on loan to Gillingham and on Thursday Cooper sent Toumani Diagouraga go out to Brentford on loan. Only one permanent signing and that of a non-league player, wont inspire much confidence down at London Road, given that the Posh are bottom.

Last week's active bod was Strachan and he was at it again, this time sending Mark Yeates to Sheffield United on an undisclosed fee. Week One saw Nigel Clough make some moves and this week saw the continuing trend as Luke Varney went back out once again to Sheffield Wednesday on loan, while getting Russell Anderson in on a free from Sunderland.

Deals of the week in the Championship were Newcastle getting Danny Simpson from Manchester United, while Sunderland stumped up £1.75m for Matt Killgallon from Sheffield United. Otherwise, a lot of clubs seem to be trimming their squads or sending out players for experience on loan; Bristol City, Nottingham Forest, Cardiff City and Barnsley all shedding players to the lower divisions.

And the rest...

Sol Campbell completed his move back to Arsenal on a short term contract, although not as short as his stay at Notts County, surely. Hull might have got themselves a bag of problems, with a few goals thrown in, by getting Amr Zaki on loan from Zamalek.

Strangest move of the week came about on the 19th when Paul Ince (MK Dons) struck a deal with his old mate Gary Ablett as he moved four of his players on to Stockport, with Ablett picking up a fifth loan player from Colchester.

The week’s news was overshadowed by the takeover at West Ham by David Gold and David Sullivan on Wednesday, before on Thursday they are willing to pay a “top player” about £100,000 a week. Given the amount they are shelling out on Keiron Dyer, Julien Faubert and others, you would think they would be more pragmatic with their resources.

One club who has money to burn in Manchester City but even they know when enough is enough – as they sent Jo off to the Premier League retirement home for failures and crocks that is Galatasaray.

As we ramp up to the last 10 days of the window, a flurry of activity, is expected.

Email Simon with your comments to simonpophale@btinternet.com