Goldy’s Logic: Wolves and the £14m Fletcher buy – greed or hard bargaining?

Jake salutes the golden prose

NB. Stop Press: Have we, haven’t we? A tweet which may or may not have been a spoof suggested he was ours, or nearly, Wolves having accepted a ludicrously high bid of £14m for Steven Fletcher – good player, no fault of his that football is bonkers but that would make him worth almost as much as PSG paid for Ibrahimovic. It may be complete nonsense, of course. Much dust has still to settle …

Every club will get away with it as long as they can. Sunderland were happy enough to take megabucks for Jordan Henderson, good player and excellent longer-term prospect that he is. Spurs are past masters of the art of extracting ridiculous money for players they sense the would-be buyer wants more than they need to sell. Even so, the Steven Fletcher saga is extraordinary. Wolves have held out for a world-beater fee, with the risk of getting nothing, for a useful player most would value at £5-7m. Before the questionable rumours suggesting we had got what we wanted and so had they, Stephen Goldsmith, a known admirer, had chatted about it to Thomas from the Wolves Blog

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The road to glory (2): Liverpool, Wolves close gap on Aston Villa

Jake has prizes for the best answers

Part one of our report on the judges’ decision in our annual ”Who are You?” awards, in which Salut! Sunderland rewards supporters of opposing sides who offered the best entertainment, insight or wisdom in their responses to the pre-match questionnaire, ended with the leaders lining up like this:

Stuart Jinks (aka Jinksy, Aston Villa fan) 10pts; Michael Hudson (Newcastle) and Jim White (Swansea) five; Richard Hulme (Stoke City) and Clemency Burton-Hill (Arsenal) three and Andy and Jo Nicholls (Wolves) and Keith Conneely (Liverpool) two. See part one by clicking here

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Jody Craddock: is Wolves, was Sunderland, gets all our support

An example of Jody's art

How much can a parent take? You’d think Jody Craddock and his wife Shelley had taken enough when their baby son died while Jody was a Sunderland player. Now another of their children, Toby, just two-and-a-half years old, has been diagnosed as suffering from lymphoblastic leukaemia.

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Muted welcomes for Reading and Southampton; mixed outlook for Wigan and Blackburn

Sixer by Jake (the Soapbox is hidden)

The only certainty among the four clubs mentioned above is Reading, promoted thanks to the 1-0 win over Forest. Southampton look set to join them but may still have a little work to do while Wigan’s sensational recent wins have not yet ensured survival. Pete Sixsmith looks at the likely comings and goings and shamelessly allows his preferences to be dictated by geography, politics and beer …

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Soapbox: Wolves have home fans howling as easy prey gets away

With the opposition firmly ensconced at the bottom of the league, a team that had lost seven consecutive games and hadn’t kept a clean sheet in the league since August 27th, Pete Sixsmith travelled to the Stadium of Light in high spirits. Here was a great opportunity to cement that push for a top eight finish. By the end he was fantasising about non PC seventies sitcoms and the latest equivalent of Watney’s Red Barrel …

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Sunderland v Wolves Who are You?: ‘au revoir, Premier League’

Jake puts Andy and Jo on the spot

Even before last night’s heavy home defeat, Wolves seemed long gone. Sunderland desperately need to bounce back from a woeful display at Goodison. So what will happen on Saturday? We haven’t exactly covered ourselves in glory in recent encounters but surely this one must be won if we serious about a top 10 finish. Salut! Sunderland turned to two familiar characters, Andy and Jo Nicholls*, for this week’s ”Who are You?”. He’s a Wolfie – and has a big input at the http://www.molineuxmix.co.uk/ fan site – but is married to a lass from Silksworth and knows Sunderland well. Both think we’ll win …

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