Safety all but secured.
No more back room mumblings or movement.
Time to crank out the ol'rumour mill!
As we've come to expect from the media, they tend to start their annual transfer ritual by digging up ancient rumours and try to pass them off as something exciting and new. Unfortunately for them most football fans are more intelligent than they think and actually have memories, and so therefore we tend to notice that they're just feeding us the same old crap.
Notice example number one - Leon Osman and Michael Tonge have AGAIN been mentioned as possible signings in local media outlets this week, after seemingly being on the agenda for the last year. Osman is still waiting to sign a new contract at Everton whilst Tonge would come for £1.5m if rumours are true.
Meanwhile, the number one favourite subject - Yakubu - is back in action. Middlesbrough, of course, are interested. The price hasn't budged since this time last year either, standing as it does at a steady £7m. A move to Birmingham City, one of the most laughable rumours of the January transfer window, has also got an airing on a couple of websites.
In fact there's a whole massive web of a story set to develop. You see apparently we might be in for Mikael Forssell from Chelsea, which I reckon would be a good deal. Milan himself has actually said he hopes to get something done on that front which just goes to show we haven't learn from past experience that it's best to keep our mouths shut about transfers, but that's by the by.
Anyway, apparently we're going to get in a bidding war for Forssell with Birmingham - where he spent time on loan last season - but if they don't get him, they're going to go for Yakubu instead. But according to some articles we're swapping Yakubu for Smertin AND Forssell. So I presume that leaves Birmingham empty handed. Apart from Heskey, of course. Ha!
Smertin coming back would be nice though. I'll be happier once rumours about defenders and right sided midfielders start though because that's certainly an area where we could do with back-up.