Summer Window 2026 - Rumours and Discussion

LittleAddick said:

ct_addick said:

Gilbert ran the show for Boro v us at the Valley last season 

Must say I don't remember that happening 

ShootersHillGuru said:

ElfsborgAddick said:

ShootersHillGuru said:

I really like the fact we’ve targeted Europe for players but it also scares me. It’s such a huge gamble. 

It could be a lot cheaper, plus if you bring players in from a similar culture like Scandinavia, Holland or Germany then moving and settling in could be less stressful.

It’s not just about that though. Plucking someone from the Slovenian league or elsewhere and plonking them into one of the most competitive leagues in the world is a big hope. Many will make the cut but many won’t. That’s not a criticism of our two (three with Sichenje) lads, it’s just such a big gamble. I fully understand why we’re doing it and physically and in terms of athleticism those three look the part but I’d still say maybe one more this window might be enough. Proven Championship players saved our season in January and I think it’s going to make or break us this coming season too.

Neil01 said:

And see were linked with lundstrum from hull - decent player too but better than doc ??

Neil01 said:

And see were linked with lundstrum from hull - decent player too but better than doc ??

charltonbob said:

fenaddick said:

charltonbob said:

fenaddick said:

charltonbob said:

fenaddick said:

charltonbob said:

cabbles said:

Southbank said:

I think all of our midfielders are good enough for a relegation struggle, as they showed last season, but even that depended on Coady being brought in.
I don,'t think any of our current midfield, individually or collectively, are good enough to be regulars in a successful Champ side.  That for me is the dilemma facing NJ. Where are the quality players coming from?

Completely agree.  

We really need to see at least one player who is a real threat on the ball and the type the opposition back off when he has it.  TC hasn’t proven if he’s capable of delivering at this level yet (yes, I know he plays off the striker as opposed to midfield, but he’s the only player in our team who comes close to fitting that mould), so we can’t say for certain he’s that pacey/creative outlet.  

Carey’s goals were priceless, but for me he faded well before the end of the season, and take away his goals, he can be anonymous.  Knibbs, no idea whether or not he will deliver based on how little we saw of him last season and his injury.  Docherty is a great pro and he put in a shift last season, but if he’s starting regularly, are we really kicking on?  Obviously Coventry is the deepest lying of the midfielders and I would like to see an upgrade, but with regards to his role, it’s that pacy unit needed who can get about, break up play and move the ball to start attacks quickly 

after that we’re in the peripherals.  JRC, technically solid and showed some glimpses, but not that attacking force we require.  Anderson, I just don’t think he’s able to step up to this level unfortunately.  Fullah shows promise, but this is without any sort of football league loan under his belt, and Mwamba although highly rated, is further back than Fullah in terms of experience 

You have me worried now cabbles  ............... sadly I agree with all you say. With regards to TC he's certainly pacy, unfortunately just not very creative or a natural goal scorer. We need to get very lucky in this transfer window or we'll find ourselves back in the third division. We have to hope that Jones & Ramsay sign new deals to at least keep our defence relatively strong

Why do we need to get lucky? Why can’t we be smart?

fenaddick said:

charltonbob said:

cabbles said:

Southbank said:

I think all of our midfielders are good enough for a relegation struggle, as they showed last season, but even that depended on Coady being brought in.
I don,'t think any of our current midfield, individually or collectively, are good enough to be regulars in a successful Champ side.  That for me is the dilemma facing NJ. Where are the quality players coming from?

Completely agree.  

We really need to see at least one player who is a real threat on the ball and the type the opposition back off when he has it.  TC hasn’t proven if he’s capable of delivering at this level yet (yes, I know he plays off the striker as opposed to midfield, but he’s the only player in our team who comes close to fitting that mould), so we can’t say for certain he’s that pacey/creative outlet.  

Carey’s goals were priceless, but for me he faded well before the end of the season, and take away his goals, he can be anonymous.  Knibbs, no idea whether or not he will deliver based on how little we saw of him last season and his injury.  Docherty is a great pro and he put in a shift last season, but if he’s starting regularly, are we really kicking on?  Obviously Coventry is the deepest lying of the midfielders and I would like to see an upgrade, but with regards to his role, it’s that pacy unit needed who can get about, break up play and move the ball to start attacks quickly 

after that we’re in the peripherals.  JRC, technically solid and showed some glimpses, but not that attacking force we require.  Anderson, I just don’t think he’s able to step up to this level unfortunately.  Fullah shows promise, but this is without any sort of football league loan under his belt, and Mwamba although highly rated, is further back than Fullah in terms of experience 

You have me worried now cabbles  ............... sadly I agree with all you say. With regards to TC he's certainly pacy, unfortunately just not very creative or a natural goal scorer. We need to get very lucky in this transfer window or we'll find ourselves back in the third division. We have to hope that Jones & Ramsay sign new deals to at least keep our defence relatively strong

Why do we need to get lucky? Why can’t we be smart?

That would be great but I'm thinking of our transfer business last summer. How smart do you think we were then ?

I’d say Carey was smart. Bell was smart. Bree was smart. Then on top of that I think every signing in January was smart too. We just had a window where every single signing was a success to some degree. That is so rare 

Rob Apter, Harvey Knibbs, Isaac Olaofe, Joe Rankin-Costello, Reece Burke, + Jerome Roussillon & Onel Hernandez, 2 free agents who joined after the summer window closed. How many of those would you consider to be smart signings ? Carey scored important goals for sure but fairly soon seemed to fade out of games, Bell was smart unlike NJ who thought he could play him as LWB when he got injured every time he played there. Bree started well but faded (Although I understand he was carrying an injury that prevented him taking free kicks i.e. kicking the ball, WTF was he doing in the team if his kicking was impaired?) I would agree as I've mentioned before, the January window was very good & without those incomings, most notably Conor Coady I think we would have been relegated. However, the January window can't be considered the summer which as per my post was the window I was referring to.

So you agree we've got smarter since last summer but think we'd be lucky if we did well this summer?

I don't know the circumstances surrounding the signing of Dykes & Coady so I couldn't say if we were smart or lucky? What I do know is NJ signed Rob Apter, Harvey Knibbs, Isaac Olaofe, Joe Rankin-Costello, Reece Burke, Jerome Roussillon & Onel Hernandez because I assume he saw some value of having them in our squad. That worked well didn't it ? Come the end of August we'll have a better idea of whether we have been smart or not.

NabySarr said:

charltonbob said:

fenaddick said:

charltonbob said:

fenaddick said:

charltonbob said:

fenaddick said:

charltonbob said:

cabbles said:

Southbank said:

I think all of our midfielders are good enough for a relegation struggle, as they showed last season, but even that depended on Coady being brought in.
I don,'t think any of our current midfield, individually or collectively, are good enough to be regulars in a successful Champ side.  That for me is the dilemma facing NJ. Where are the quality players coming from?

Completely agree.  

We really need to see at least one player who is a real threat on the ball and the type the opposition back off when he has it.  TC hasn’t proven if he’s capable of delivering at this level yet (yes, I know he plays off the striker as opposed to midfield, but he’s the only player in our team who comes close to fitting that mould), so we can’t say for certain he’s that pacey/creative outlet.  

Carey’s goals were priceless, but for me he faded well before the end of the season, and take away his goals, he can be anonymous.  Knibbs, no idea whether or not he will deliver based on how little we saw of him last season and his injury.  Docherty is a great pro and he put in a shift last season, but if he’s starting regularly, are we really kicking on?  Obviously Coventry is the deepest lying of the midfielders and I would like to see an upgrade, but with regards to his role, it’s that pacy unit needed who can get about, break up play and move the ball to start attacks quickly 

after that we’re in the peripherals.  JRC, technically solid and showed some glimpses, but not that attacking force we require.  Anderson, I just don’t think he’s able to step up to this level unfortunately.  Fullah shows promise, but this is without any sort of football league loan under his belt, and Mwamba although highly rated, is further back than Fullah in terms of experience 

You have me worried now cabbles  ............... sadly I agree with all you say. With regards to TC he's certainly pacy, unfortunately just not very creative or a natural goal scorer. We need to get very lucky in this transfer window or we'll find ourselves back in the third division. We have to hope that Jones & Ramsay sign new deals to at least keep our defence relatively strong

Why do we need to get lucky? Why can’t we be smart?

fenaddick said:

charltonbob said:

cabbles said:

Southbank said:

I think all of our midfielders are good enough for a relegation struggle, as they showed last season, but even that depended on Coady being brought in.
I don,'t think any of our current midfield, individually or collectively, are good enough to be regulars in a successful Champ side.  That for me is the dilemma facing NJ. Where are the quality players coming from?

Completely agree.  

We really need to see at least one player who is a real threat on the ball and the type the opposition back off when he has it.  TC hasn’t proven if he’s capable of delivering at this level yet (yes, I know he plays off the striker as opposed to midfield, but he’s the only player in our team who comes close to fitting that mould), so we can’t say for certain he’s that pacey/creative outlet.  

Carey’s goals were priceless, but for me he faded well before the end of the season, and take away his goals, he can be anonymous.  Knibbs, no idea whether or not he will deliver based on how little we saw of him last season and his injury.  Docherty is a great pro and he put in a shift last season, but if he’s starting regularly, are we really kicking on?  Obviously Coventry is the deepest lying of the midfielders and I would like to see an upgrade, but with regards to his role, it’s that pacy unit needed who can get about, break up play and move the ball to start attacks quickly 

after that we’re in the peripherals.  JRC, technically solid and showed some glimpses, but not that attacking force we require.  Anderson, I just don’t think he’s able to step up to this level unfortunately.  Fullah shows promise, but this is without any sort of football league loan under his belt, and Mwamba although highly rated, is further back than Fullah in terms of experience 

You have me worried now cabbles  ............... sadly I agree with all you say. With regards to TC he's certainly pacy, unfortunately just not very creative or a natural goal scorer. We need to get very lucky in this transfer window or we'll find ourselves back in the third division. We have to hope that Jones & Ramsay sign new deals to at least keep our defence relatively strong

Why do we need to get lucky? Why can’t we be smart?

That would be great but I'm thinking of our transfer business last summer. How smart do you think we were then ?

I’d say Carey was smart. Bell was smart. Bree was smart. Then on top of that I think every signing in January was smart too. We just had a window where every single signing was a success to some degree. That is so rare 

Rob Apter, Harvey Knibbs, Isaac Olaofe, Joe Rankin-Costello, Reece Burke, + Jerome Roussillon & Onel Hernandez, 2 free agents who joined after the summer window closed. How many of those would you consider to be smart signings ? Carey scored important goals for sure but fairly soon seemed to fade out of games, Bell was smart unlike NJ who thought he could play him as LWB when he got injured every time he played there. Bree started well but faded (Although I understand he was carrying an injury that prevented him taking free kicks i.e. kicking the ball, WTF was he doing in the team if his kicking was impaired?) I would agree as I've mentioned before, the January window was very good & without those incomings, most notably Conor Coady I think we would have been relegated. However, the January window can't be considered the summer which as per my post was the window I was referring to.

So you agree we've got smarter since last summer but think we'd be lucky if we did well this summer?

I don't know the circumstances surrounding the signing of Dykes & Coady so I couldn't say if we were smart or lucky? What I do know is NJ signed Rob Apter, Harvey Knibbs, Isaac Olaofe, Joe Rankin-Costello, Reece Burke, Jerome Roussillon & Onel Hernandez because I assume he saw some value of having them in our squad. That worked well didn't it ? Come the end of August we'll have a better idea of whether we have been smart or not.

Going up through the play offs and then having to recruit for a division higher made last summer very difficult. I think given the circumstances we did pretty well which is why we didn’t get relegated 

We made some great signings, we made some alright signings and we made some bad signings. I’m sure we will do the same again this summer, as will every team in the country. Since Jones has taken over we’ve got more right than we’ve got wrong which is why we are now in the championship when we were looking over our shoulders in league 1 before that. You can’t make that kind of progress without good recruitment, and a few poor signings last summer when we had to rush things doesn’t change that 

Mendonca In Asdas said:

TheAddicks4Ever said:

Loan players are going to be key for us this year.  Unfortunately they are likely to come late in the transfer window due to distractions of the World Cup for many prem clubs and when they have to submit their squad. We did bring in some solid loan last season so hopefully a little better this year and clubs will want to work with us especially as we played loan players in most games 

Just out of interest, how many loan players, did we bring in last season?

DamoNorthStand said:

fenaddick said:

Mendonca In Asdas said:

TheAddicks4Ever said:

Loan players are going to be key for us this year.  Unfortunately they are likely to come late in the transfer window due to distractions of the World Cup for many prem clubs and when they have to submit their squad. We did bring in some solid loan last season so hopefully a little better this year and clubs will want to work with us especially as we played loan players in most games 

Just out of interest, how many loan players, did we bring in last season?

1 in the summer (Bree) and 4 in January (Clarke, Fevrier, Chambers, Coady)

Definitely need to make better use of the loan system. The right players (Cullen, Gallagher etc) can have a huge impact and save transfer budget that can be spent elsewhere.