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I texted my Pompey-supporting mate on tuesday to tell him Guy Whittingham, Ian Woan and Steve Cotterill were all at the game. He replied by saying that they're looking to offload Nugent in January as he's one of the highest earners.

me putting 2 + 2 together and coming up with 23, deduced that they might be watching Austin? or Asinyah? Whittingham has been to watch us quite a lot this season.

Hull had a scout watcing Austin as well. To be honest with our crap form and position I imagine there's probably most of the Championship and some Premiership clubs coming to watch Austin as they'll think he won't want to stick around in a relegation battle and think they might be able to get him with a cheeky bid.

agreed, but seemed odd that Whittingham, Woan and Cotterill were all there. It's one thing sending scouts, another thing bring the whole management team.

There is of course a possibility that they were watching their own player in Matt Richie.

doubt all three would go to see him again, they've seen him in action, and in games.

Didn't unhandy Andy Andronikou say that they made or were going to make a £1M bid for Austin last transfer window?

So the interest is perhaps not suprising now they are out of Admin'.


Aaah, yes, here it is. Fitton called BS.

http://www.thisisswindontownfc.co.uk/news/headlines/8377137.Swindon_chairman_Fitton_hits_out_at_Pompey_for_claims_over___1million_Austin_bid/ (http://www.thisisswindontownfc.co.uk/news/headlines/8377137.Swindon_chairman_Fitton_hits_out_at_Pompey_for_claims_over___1million_Austin_bid/)

I'd imagine every club in the top two divisions has had a look at Austin by now, either sending a scout or looking at video.

The only thing that does surprise me is the lack of genuine interest so far. Only a matter of time though and unless we're pushing for the playoffs come January he'll be gone in sixty seconds.

There's been rumours floating round on some of the Pompey boards that they're hoping to do a swap deal Austin for Ritchie. Obviously I'd imagine if there's any truth in that, it would be Ritchie + cash, but it may well be bollocks. We should send Charlie a picture of Andronikou to put him off the idea, just in case

Do you really think PORTSMOUTH have a million? They are still only paying creditors 20p in the pound.

Fucking hate pompey.

Austin isn't that stupid I reckon, but who knows, they might be throwing stupid money around they don't have and racking up a few millions debt again with no intention of ever being able to pay it off.

I guess eventually the banks will stop lending to football clubs? probably already have most of them

and it will be Swindon getting shat on by Portsmouth and possibly only getting 20p in the £ (if not less)
If all boards stopped doing business with clubs like portsmouth they would not be able to cheat

Hull are in deep shit and Pompey are just coming out of the financial shit, even though they've still got our old mate AA there as the administration supervisor.

Of course, it is one thing trying to offload Nugent....they've still got to find someone to take him off their hands.

A bit like Hull with all their players, especially Jimmy Bullard, where they didn't put relegation clauses into the players contracts, so Bullard is still picking up £50k a week.

i thought all football related debt had to be paid in full?

Correct, or they don't get their 'football share' back.

pompey are not going to get charlie, but another club will, its just a matter of when. With our current form its odds on for january

I'd imagine this is why we're interested in Campbell...we survived the sale of Cox..we'll survive the sale of Austin.

did we ?

can we ?

answer ;

no

and

no

Erm, we did survive the sale of Cox, didn't we? As is evidenced by the fact we're still here?

...and got to within 90 mins of winning promotion to the Championship.

Dont remind me.....please.

here ?

here at this moment in time is not really a place I am enjoying to be.

Survived ?

yes

Moved on ?

Certainly not

Make your bloody mind up! :)

all depends on the context doesnt it

Survived financially or survived footballing wise

Well, either way, really. We're in the same place we were.

If we did sell Austin in Jan there is no doubt in my mind that we would be relegated.....most of you will probably disagree but there is not enough goals in the rest of the team to cover the loss of him.

its ok mate, we got Vinnie

oh and Dossevi

Oh I'll sleep easy tonight now, I'm sure O'Brien will get into double figures from the wing as well.

sweet dreams

That could be our worst forward line since I started watching Town!

freddy krueger probably has glos_robin now.

Of course we'll fucking survive, one player doesn't make a team (However good they are).

We had the same doom laden twats saying the same things when Cox left, then we went on to have our most successful season in years.

Yes, we're not playing well at the moment, but to start talking about relegation is bollocks (Whether Austin goes or not).

23 league goals this season. Austin has scored 6 of them.

As usual your post is incorrect.

That's the only good thing about our season so far, we're seeing a few players chipping in with goals from all over the pitch - even at our end (to bring it back down to reality).

It's true though isn't it.

EVERY time our star forward moves the same "well that's it, we're doomed" stuff emerges. Even Rory Fallon stepped up when Sam Parkin left! Sadly the rest of the side did not.

I believe the only position we've only genuinely struggled to adequately replace (as I've mentioned in the past) was Fraser Digby in goal.

Keepers in general seem much more fragile these days though.  All that punching and flapping seems to have created shot stoppers only.  I watched The NY Red Bulls vs San Jose and the latter team had a keeper who seemed pretty much on the old style mould of English keepers, and that got me thinking that some of the best right now are yanks.  They seem bulkier, more inklined to clear the box out in order to get the ball etc

Austin can be replaced, it would be hard though and it may take a few punts on players before the next 20+ goalscorer is found.

Will people expect too much of Campbell if we sign him?

As it stands, I imagine that there will be pressure on any Town signing to make an instint impact.

However, I'd expect Wilson to treat any Non-League signing the same as he brought Austin into professional football. Give them a month to get used to being a professional then start bringing them in.

If they score 4 minutes into the full league debut then brilliant.

I would. If the cunt didn't score 2 minutes into his debut I would be right on his back.

Without Austin we'd have no frontline striker ..... With Austin we're struggling badly, without him I dread to imagine. For what it's worth I don't think we'd be stupid enough to sell him in January as we'd face the possibility of a Dossevi and Pericard strikeforce on a regular basis which is a god awful thought. Add to that the fact that none of the other players in our squad have a history of scoring on a regular basis I fail to see how you can't be more than a little concerned.

We got lucky with Austin in that we took a punt and replaced Cox within a few months, judging by this season we've yet to replace Paynter and to try and replace Austin as well is asking a hell of a lot.

Also can't see the club selling Austin in January, it's not as if we're looking at the prospect of him walking away for free in the summer and if, as is looking increasingly likely, we're going to be looking to steer clear of the bottom end of the table rather than pushing for a playoff spot, it makes more sense to keep him.

Funny how its just 'luck' that we got Austin, rather than good scouting/management, but when the troubles strike, its bad purchases and bad management.....

It was just luck. If Bournemouth weren't in the shit we'd have missed out on him. Plus we'd had opportunities in the past to get him which we didn't follow up on. Double plus even Wilson didn't have a clue he'd play that well at this level. Triple plus Wilson only threw him in to the action because our other strikers were so shit he was fucking desperate and it couldn't be any worse.

Well it's true isn't it, not all punts will come off for every Charie Austin there are 3 or 4 Charlie Griffin's. In the past we've taken punts on players like Griffin, Kaid Mohammed, Lloyd Opara, Darren Dykes to name a few and they haven't come off. Austin was a calculated gamble that came off but you can't expect that to always happen

I think the key is to not go for players with stupid names. Darren Dykes? He was never gonna be a footballer.

I totally agree with this, but unless we're pushing up around the play off positions in January, I don't think we've got a hope in hell of keeping him here.  It's all very well saying we always manage to get good replacements when we've lost strikers in the past, but if Wilson has struggled to find anyone decent to replace Paynter, I can't see him finding a replacement for Austin particularly easy.  In my opinion Austin is not just a goalscorer, he's a far better all round player than Paynter was.

Eh? ??? I think there's every chance he will stay personally. I think you're being way too pessimistic.

I'd like to think I am being pessimistic, I'd love him to stay forever  :D I just can't see if we're floating around mid table and a decent championship or even premierhsip side come in with a good offer both him and club wouldn't be tempted?

The dreamer in me likes to think that he's eternally grateful for the 2nd chance that was presented to him here at STFC and that he loves the adulation from us so much that he wants to stay and right the wrongs of May.