Written by: @Samizgould

We are rightly excited at the recent arrival of Pablo Fornals to the club. It’s a great piece of early business and he represents exactly the sort of player the fans have been begging the club to make for years. Young, talented with huge potential, low wages and the technical player that Pellegrini looks for. Huge ticks all around for Husillos’s recruitment plans so far with such a quiet and professional approach from the club. A world different from what we’ve come to expect. While many fans have been worried this means Manuel Lanzini will move on, Fornals appears more likely to be the replacement for Samir Nasri and perhaps may limit Robert Snodgrass’s game time with Fornals playing both centrally and on the right in the past two season for Villarreal.

Without wanting to kill the excitement of our new arrival we now have more foreign players than we have squad places for. So, sales now must become the focus if we want to continue adding quality young players to the squad for next season. With a limited budget we have continually been guided to expect sales to boost the budget but also to make room in the squad for the new arrivals. We will have to see in the coming weeks what sort of salesman Husillos can be to move on players that don’t fit into the managers plans for this upcoming season.

Moving on players is the hardest task for Managers, Directors and Technical staff and the most frustrating wait for fans. As has been proven so far with only Perez and Edimilson sold. The fringe players at the club have however been priced to move if the reports of their current valuations are correct. While we would love to get more for these players its more important to get them off the books quickly to enable us to push for incomings as soon as possible to help Pellegrini plan and mould the team he wants come the start of the season. This tactic has the added bonus of reducing the wage bill by removing large wages that we would otherwise be paying till much later in the window and making some savings.

Thankfully we are starting to see reports of likely moves soon for Reece Oxford to the Championship with Slaven Bilic being linked with a move for his former bright talent. Sam Byram is consistently linked with many clubs in England’s second tier as well but Jordan Hugill may prove harder to find a new home for. Moving all of these players on will of course improve the budget but in fee and wages but the major issue of foreign players number and squad numbers won’t be affected by these moves so more sales will be required.

As we’ve been hearing for some time from ExWHuEmployee: Pedro Obiang and Javier Hernandez are the most likely first team players to leave. Pedro has been desperate to move back to Italy to be closer to his family with Roma, Sampdoria and Fiorentina all being linked with him. The birth Of Chicharito’s baby will likely see his plans to move to Spain speed up as he’d been uncontactable while waiting for his child to arrive. Valencia’s interest in Maxi Gomex is unlikely to stop a move for Chich as they seem intent on selling other strikers to make way for him. And our hard push for the managers target seems to progress day by day which highlights we have good money available for a striker at least if not more than we may have thought.

But other sales may well happen for players who aren’t certain starters if Husillos believes he can replace them with better quality options. This approach has seen reports of interest in Ogbonna, Antonio and perhaps even Arnautovic as well. Thankfully though the club sees an opportunity to take advantage of the unrest at multiple top six clubs and have put up a not for sale sign on our key players like Decaln Rice, Issa Diop and others. Because while we may get large fees for them we need them to push up the ladder as replacements will need time to settle. If Husillos continues to play this window with the diligence he has shown so far, and make some smart sales we could yet see further quality young talent with huge potential added to the squad in the style that Fornals arrival has brought. Things aren’t done yet and there could be plenty of interesting moves for us to get excited about. We just need a few sales to help move things on.

Written by @Samizgould