Summer Window 2026 - Rumours and Discussion

Scoham

AberystwythAddick said:

NabySarr said:

AberystwythAddick said:

NabySarr said:

AberystwythAddick said:

1 in 1 out might make this a very very slow window. I wonder if the owners will tell NJ he has to stick with Apter and Olafe as he only bought them last season. 

I’d be furious if it was my money that had been wasted like that. 

If they expected every expensive signing to go well then they were very naive in the first place. One look at pretty much every teams transfer business each season would tell them that this isn’t uncommon 

But in this case it was every expensive signing, going poorly. 

You can’t say that you would be happy with the situation if it was your money. 

Olaofe was what £1.5m? Apter rumoured at £2m+. That’s really not much in the grand scheme of things and the money the owners have put into the club over the past few years 

Look at any championship club and they’ll have signed players for more that have flopped. I’m sure we will have more flops in future years if we stay at this level. I know we aren’t used to spending money so it maybe feels worse to us, but this is normal and if the owners have a huge problem with it then they probably shouldn’t own a championship football club 

Other clubs are irrelevant in this situation. So are hypotheticals on what we could spend. 

It is what we have spent and they are two of our most expensive signings of the last 10 years. Certainly the two most expensive of the owners tenure. The money was paid because they were told that these were the players we needed to progress. 6 months later those players are back in league one, 12 months later we are seemingly trying to either sell them or loan them out again. 

That’s is unacceptable, there’s no spin you can put on it that changes that. 

We have one of the lowest budgets in the league those fees were huge for us. 

We paid more for Kelman, and Knibbs and Sichenje cost more than Olaofe going on the rumoured fees.

wmcf123

charlton_hero said:

It's looking like Grant is a done deal.

Surely Grant and Redmond can't have been priority targets at the start of the summer, I wonder what's happened.

Assume they didn’t think Grant would be available .  Anyway , he’s probably better than what we have bar Kelman.  Redmond feels a bit 13/14 Simon Church level underwhelming to me .  

Rothko

charlton_hero said:

It's looking like Grant is a done deal.

Surely Grant and Redmond can't have been priority targets at the start of the summer, I wonder what's happened.

Cause not every deal is going to be your first choice, and if a good player is available at the right price, you get them in

redbuttle

charlton_hero said:

It's looking like Grant is a done deal.

Surely Grant and Redmond can't have been priority targets at the start of the summer, I wonder what's happened.

What makes you think it's a done deal?

MrBurns

Don't mind Grant signing. I don't expect he was top of our list, but I think we've got to realistic that we're in for another tough season. I hope we make a statement signing in the midfield

ShootersHillGuru

golfaddick said:

charltonbob said:

golfaddick said:

CafcSteve said:

Heard a few whispers about there hardly being any interest in some of the players we’re trying to loan out and sell.

The likes of Apter & Tanto only attracting interest from League Two clubs who aren’t willing to pay any wages.

I wonder if we need to let some go before we bring in some players & hence why no signings lately. 

If so we might have to take a haircut (see what I did there) on a few like Tanto & Apter just so we start the season with the players we want. 

We need to bring in signings asap if possible irrespective of letting whoever go or we risk missing out on targets. I'm sure loaning out/selling players before the end of the window will be easier the later into the window we get whereas our targets will be getting a nice pre season with their new clubs.

Maybe the owners don't trust NJ with their money. What would you do if your employee came to you this summer & said "boss, we need another 5 or 6 players as the current ones are no good"..?. Would you hand over another £10m and say..." here you are, spunk that lot up the wall" Or would you question why those players are no good & what the manager was going to do about it ?

I’ve been as critical as anyone about the signing of Olaofe and Apter but to think the owners don’t trust Jones is plain crazy. He’s the man they’ve given a long extended contract to and in his relatively short time has kept us up. Got us promoted and kept us up. He’s massively in credit and I’d suggest the owners are more concerned that he’s wanted elsewhere and could be tempted away rather than worrying about two footballers who haven’t cut it. 

cfgs

Grant brings a bit more pace, plus he will score more than most of our team.  Can see him being asked to join the lone striker when the ball is being delivered from the other side.  His hamstrings regularly going are a concern.

dicktracey

Big signing on the cards .... he'll be the mane attraction .... just sorting out the fringe benefits with Nath.

Redrobo

golfaddick said:

charltonbob said:

golfaddick said:

CafcSteve said:

Heard a few whispers about there hardly being any interest in some of the players we’re trying to loan out and sell.

The likes of Apter & Tanto only attracting interest from League Two clubs who aren’t willing to pay any wages.

I wonder if we need to let some go before we bring in some players & hence why no signings lately. 

If so we might have to take a haircut (see what I did there) on a few like Tanto & Apter just so we start the season with the players we want. 

We need to bring in signings asap if possible irrespective of letting whoever go or we risk missing out on targets. I'm sure loaning out/selling players before the end of the window will be easier the later into the window we get whereas our targets will be getting a nice pre season with their new clubs.

Maybe the owners don't trust NJ with their money. What would you do if your employee came to you this summer & said "boss, we need another 5 or 6 players as the current ones are no good"..?. Would you hand over another £10m and say..." here you are, spunk that lot up the wall" Or would you question why those players are no good & what the manager was going to do about it ?

Or maybe our owners understand risk, can see the full picture and recognise that the £10m budget they gave him achieved the goal they set.

jose

Back in the day when the u21’s played at what is now Cray Valley Paper Mills you couldn’t get a fag paper between Umerah, Hanlan and Grant.
All have made a career in the game with Grant gold, Hanlan silver and Umerah bronze.

scruffle

Grant and Redmond on free's would be great deals if sticking with 4231 or 433, and their injury problems are behind them (big IF), and as long as all of our budget is spent on 2 decent midfield anchors, that would be transformative tbh. But only if we supplement the freebies with top CM options

AberystwythAddick

Scoham said:

AberystwythAddick said:

NabySarr said:

AberystwythAddick said:

NabySarr said:

AberystwythAddick said:

1 in 1 out might make this a very very slow window. I wonder if the owners will tell NJ he has to stick with Apter and Olafe as he only bought them last season. 

I’d be furious if it was my money that had been wasted like that. 

If they expected every expensive signing to go well then they were very naive in the first place. One look at pretty much every teams transfer business each season would tell them that this isn’t uncommon 

But in this case it was every expensive signing, going poorly. 

You can’t say that you would be happy with the situation if it was your money. 

Olaofe was what £1.5m? Apter rumoured at £2m+. That’s really not much in the grand scheme of things and the money the owners have put into the club over the past few years 

Look at any championship club and they’ll have signed players for more that have flopped. I’m sure we will have more flops in future years if we stay at this level. I know we aren’t used to spending money so it maybe feels worse to us, but this is normal and if the owners have a huge problem with it then they probably shouldn’t own a championship football club 

Other clubs are irrelevant in this situation. So are hypotheticals on what we could spend. 

It is what we have spent and they are two of our most expensive signings of the last 10 years. Certainly the two most expensive of the owners tenure. The money was paid because they were told that these were the players we needed to progress. 6 months later those players are back in league one, 12 months later we are seemingly trying to either sell them or loan them out again. 

That’s is unacceptable, there’s no spin you can put on it that changes that. 

We have one of the lowest budgets in the league those fees were huge for us. 

We paid more for Kelman, and Knibbs and Sichenje cost more than Olaofe going on the rumoured fees.

That makes it okay then 

Crispywood

Grant in Olaofe out makes us a better team, it’s not a glamorous signing but don’t see why we would be skeptical about upgrading positions 

ShootersHillGuru

Let’s be honest. We desperately need to bring in a striker and if the rumours about our budget are true and I suspect being third or fourth lowest are correct then someone like Grant without a fee is probably good business. Has the experience we need and his age is good. Injuries to his hamstring are a concern but we are where we are in terms of who we can afford to get in. I’ll be honest I don’t know enough about Redmond to reach a verdict but I have loosely followed Grants career since he left us. Without the club blasting upwards of £8 million on a striker I’d be interested to see who the critics would have us sign ?

NabySarr

The injury issues are the only real downside of the Grant deal if it’s true. He has a lot of championship experience, we saw last season how important that is, but also players that are proven at this level are something that’s quite difficult to add on our budget so it’s a good deal imo 

I still hope to see us go back to the 3-5-2/4-2-3-1 hybrid system that worked so well for us in league 1 and early in the championship season. Grant and TC as the 2 options for the LW/ST hybrid is better than Olaofe and TC which is what we had last season. 

So that’s an upgrade, we’ve also improved left sided defensive depth which is what really cost us last season. If we can bring in a RWB similar to the level of Bree/Clarke and then upgrade in midfield we will undoubtedly have a better squad than last season which is what we need 

TheHerminator

NabySarr said:

The injury issues are the only real downside of the Grant deal if it’s true. He has a lot of championship experience, we saw last season how important that is, but also players that are proven at this level are something that’s quite difficult to add on our budget so it’s a good deal imo 

I still hope to see us go back to the 3-5-2/4-2-3-1 hybrid system that worked so well for us in league 1 and early in the championship season. Grant and TC as the 2 options for the LW/ST hybrid is better than Olaofe and TC which is what we had last season. 

So that’s an upgrade, we’ve also improved left sided defensive depth which is what really cost us last season. If we can bring in a RWB similar to the level of Bree/Clarke and then upgrade in midfield we will undoubtedly have a better squad than last season which is what we need 

Nice summary. Fully agree 

Ferryman

dicktracey said:

Big signing on the cards .... he'll be the mane attraction .... just sorting out the fringe benefits with Nath.

As long as he ain't pony

fenaddick

arny23394 said:

fenaddick said:

Redmond I’d be ok with I think, Grant less so but we need Championship experience and they both have it

You’d prefer the bloke that made 6 appearances in half a season for the worst team in championship history over Grant?

We’ve seen how hard it can be to come in as a free agent, fitness can be hard to gain etc. He hasn’t had injury issues (that I’m aware of), is clearly keen to play and looked sharp so far in pre season and would bring a wealth of experience for our youngsters to learn from. Grant is clearly a good player but has had injury issues and hasn’t hit double figures for the last four seasons. He’s only scored more than seven in a season twice since he left us. It feels like a lot of money for potentially not a lot of upside 

king addick

No issue with Grant signing. Has more championship experience than all of them bar Godden. 
Always use Lyle Taylor as an example. Goal record coming to us wasn't amazing but he turned out okay on that front...just a wanker off the field! 

cafc_se7

Is Grant an upgrade on Oloafe? Yes.

Does he have unfinished business with us? Absolutely yes.

Unknown

This content has been removed.

ElfsborgAddick

ShootersHillGuru said:

Let’s be honest. We desperately need to bring in a striker and if the rumours about our budget are true and I suspect being third or fourth lowest are correct then someone like Grant without a fee is probably good business. Has the experience we need and his age is good. Injuries to his hamstring are a concern but we are where we are in terms of who we can afford to get in. I’ll be honest I don’t know enough about Redmond to reach a verdict but I have loosely followed Grants career since he left us. Without the club blasting upwards of £8 million on a striker I’d be interested to see who the critics would have us sign ?

Ahearne-Grant may come in on a free but I cannot see him being on less than 15k a week.  He'd have been on big dough at West Brom.
The board have dug deep here.

TheHerminator

ValleyLocal said:

Besides the budget. Would anyone decent want to play for Jones? 

I wouldn't. 

I wondered why you hadn’t signed yet. 

You holding out for a prem move? 

fenaddick

ValleyLocal said:

Besides the budget. Would anyone decent want to play for Jones? 

I wouldn't. 

Are you a decent footballer though?

fenaddick

ElfsborgAddick said:

ShootersHillGuru said:

Let’s be honest. We desperately need to bring in a striker and if the rumours about our budget are true and I suspect being third or fourth lowest are correct then someone like Grant without a fee is probably good business. Has the experience we need and his age is good. Injuries to his hamstring are a concern but we are where we are in terms of who we can afford to get in. I’ll be honest I don’t know enough about Redmond to reach a verdict but I have loosely followed Grants career since he left us. Without the club blasting upwards of £8 million on a striker I’d be interested to see who the critics would have us sign ?

Ahearne-Grant may come in on a free but I cannot see him being on less than 15k a week.  He'd have been on big dough at West Brom.
The board have dug deep here.

He dropped the Ahearne an age ago, would be good to respect that I think 

ShootersHillGuru

ValleyLocal said:

Besides the budget. Would anyone decent want to play for Jones? 

I wouldn't. 

I wish you’d posted this earlier. Could change our whole transfer strategy. Bet Nathan’s devastated you’re ruling yourself out.

NabySarr

ValleyLocal said:

Besides the budget. Would anyone decent want to play for Jones? 

I wouldn't. 

I mean plenty of his players are on record saying they absolutely love playing for him, and a few of them keep signing for him. So yes I think players do want to play for Jones 

Covered_End_Lad

I’m really not convinced there is anything in the Grant rumour, it all seems to have stemmed from one Facebook post.

TheHerminator

ShootersHillGuru said:

ValleyLocal said:

Besides the budget. Would anyone decent want to play for Jones? 

I wouldn't. 

I wish you’d posted this earlier. Could change our whole transfer strategy. Bet Nathan’s devastated you’re ruling yourself out.

“So some bad news guys, ValleyLocal’s agent has been in touch, he doesn’t want to play for a Nathan Jones side.
We need to make sure the media don’t get hold of this, otherwise we’ll have no chance of signing anyone this year”

SouthLincsAddick

AberystwythAddick said:

NabySarr said:

AberystwythAddick said:

NabySarr said:

AberystwythAddick said:

1 in 1 out might make this a very very slow window. I wonder if the owners will tell NJ he has to stick with Apter and Olafe as he only bought them last season. 

I’d be furious if it was my money that had been wasted like that. 

If they expected every expensive signing to go well then they were very naive in the first place. One look at pretty much every teams transfer business each season would tell them that this isn’t uncommon 

But in this case it was every expensive signing, going poorly. 

You can’t say that you would be happy with the situation if it was your money. 

Olaofe was what £1.5m? Apter rumoured at £2m+. That’s really not much in the grand scheme of things and the money the owners have put into the club over the past few years 

Look at any championship club and they’ll have signed players for more that have flopped. I’m sure we will have more flops in future years if we stay at this level. I know we aren’t used to spending money so it maybe feels worse to us, but this is normal and if the owners have a huge problem with it then they probably shouldn’t own a championship football club 

Other clubs are irrelevant in this situation. So are hypotheticals on what we could spend. 

It is what we have spent and they are two of our most expensive signings of the last 10 years. Certainly the two most expensive of the owners tenure. The money was paid because they were told that these were the players we needed to progress. 6 months later those players are back in league one, 12 months later we are seemingly trying to either sell them or loan them out again. 

That’s is unacceptable, there’s no spin you can put on it that changes that. 

We have one of the lowest budgets in the league those fees were huge for us. 

  I don’t think people can grasp how difficult it was to recruit for such a competitive league with the 3rd worst budget (or they don’t want to understand), especially when we had to overhaul most of the L1 squad. We would’ve been at the back of the queue for all signings, not being able to offer wages remotely close to the rest of the league. Our only choice would’ve been high risk signings, L1 players who maybe could make the step up and experienced championship players with dodgy injury records. Had we been relegated then there might been some merit to the criticism, but we were never in a relegation scrap and were ultimately successful. There was a high wastage in the recruitment but I believe that would have been part of the plan. What do you want, a no risk recruitment policy and a return to L1, I don’t?

Perhaps what you find ‘unacceptable’ is the financial disadvantage we are under, in which case you should direct your frustration at the owners. Personally, I think they’ve been outstanding, to me they building a sustainable future for the club. We have come a long way since they arrived.