Guy at Work who is a Cov fan seems to think Dicker is on his way there

[Spiros]

The way Boothroyd's teams play why the hell would he want any kind of midfielder who is simply going to spend most of his time watching the ball sail over his head?

 

[Foolg]

What it looks like is that everyone has agreed (or been told) that contract deals will only be discussed once we're definitely promoted. That way it avoids any unnecessary distractions.

Exactly.

The last thing I'd want Tony Bloom to do is offer all our players who are out of contract 7k a week in order to attain their services next season, before knowing whether we will be in the Championship or not. Hopefully if things continue we will be, but we could completely ruin our playing budget if we PRESUME we're already promoted by offering championship wages only to balls it up. Its simply a case of waiting to see what division we're in, if we go up, wages will increase understandably, if not, many of these players will not be offered significant wage rises and will probably find better deals elsewhere.

Either way, Gus will find replacements, or we'll have the current crop of players.

 

[Mellotron]

Dicker/His agent would be daft to make a decision now. I can't see Dicker NOT being a part of Gus's plans.

 

[Biscuit]

Nice one Dave. They probably did make an approach. Glad it was rejected. Lets tie his contract up soon. I can't see him going anywhere even if negotiations take a while. We've got a good thing going on right now!

 

[severnside gull]

We have been very open as a club about who bids were made for and very specific that the only bids were for Bennett from Norwich. I think, therefore that it is reasonable to say that Coventry did not make a bid for Dicker in the last window. I also think that Gus is right in saying that it is agents at work "creating" interest on their clients' behalf. That does not mean that the interest might not be real.

I would hope that the club have at least intimated to players out of contract like Dicker/Murray/Bridcutt/elAbd that we will be making them an offer once we know where we will be playing. It seems reasonably clear that negotiations are not currently happening

 

[The Fifth Column]

I may have said this before on other similar threads but I'll be bloody glad when this season is over and we are hopefully in the Championship and then next season with 15000+ ST holders and crowds approaching 20K we can stop worrying about the likes of Coventry, Norwich sniffing around and believing they are any better than Brighton. I'm not bothered who is the bigger team since that's measured in so many ways.

Financially I think we are bigger than many Championship teams at this current moment in time, we are not in debt to any banks and have a chairman who has already demonstrated he has huge financial clout and has delivered on his financial promises unlike many other chairman who talk the talk but invest very little. Its pointless other teams playing billy big bollocks to us based on average attendances since not only have we lost a whole generation of potential fans due to being cast into the wilderness when we left the Goldstone but many fans rightly or wrongly decided not to come any more once we got to withdean.

Season ticket sales for the Amex have already shown the massive interest and sleeping support for the Albion and I don't care where people come from or whether they are plastic, diehard or casual supporters I just want the Amex rammed solid on matchday and the Albion to finally put down a marker to other clubs and effectively put out the message that we are now a club as big as any other in the Championship and with Gus at the helm they better watch out!

 

[Thunder Bolt]

We have been very open as a club about who bids were made for and very specific that the only bids were for Bennett from Norwich.

Where was that said?

 

[seagulls4ever]

In all seriousness, and assuming we are promoted, how would we NOT be a more attractive proposition than Coventry to a player currently at this club?

Coventry have a bigger stadium, a larger fan base and are an established Championship team. We have the potential to be bigger than Coventry, but we aren't there yet.

 

[Mackenzie]

It'll probably come down to which division we are in next season.

 

[seagully]

The only reason for Dicker wanting to move to Cov that I can think of is the large Irish population here, maybe he has family in the area? He would be mad to move for any other reason though IF we get promoted. All the Cov fans I know are sick of watching hoofball football week in week out with poor results to match the poor football. They may also currently have a larger stadium than us, but they do not own this, and they rarely, if ever, fill it. Financially, they are hardly super-rich either.

 

[Billy Mays]

i know a guy that works down the chip shop who thinks he,s elvis... any help to you??

Yeah. But he's a liar and I'm not sure about you.

 

[The Large One]

Coventry have a bigger stadium, a larger fan base and are an established Championship team. We have the potential to be bigger than Coventry, but we aren't there yet.

Maybe, but a move to the current Coventry set-up would do Dicker's career no favours whatsoever.

 

[Couldn't Be Hyypia]

The last thing I'd want Tony Bloom to do is offer all our players who are out of contract 7k a week in order to attain their services next season, before knowing whether we will be in the Championship or not. . Its simply a case of waiting to see what division we're in, if we go up, wages will increase understandably, if not, many of these players will not be offered significant wage rises and will probably find better deals elsewhere.

On that basis wouldn't it be prudent - in some cases - to offer an either/or option? Along the lines of "We'll offer you £X and a Y year deal if we get promoted if you sign a pre-contract agreement; if we don't go up we can only offer £Z (less money) and won't stand in your way if you want to move up a division". This would give the player the reassurance that he has a deal and he is committed to it if we go up, but would also allow him to talk to other clubs in case we fail to go up. Just one example of a million variations - but it's likely that we're having these conversations now even if fans aren't hearing about it.