It has been the case since the transfer window was introduced and loan players coming into clubs in our division has been as common as seeing a new car registration on the road in the early days of this month.
Last year saw Delroy Facey, Gareth Farrelly and Andy Todd come in and all make their debuts at Stoke and the talk at the Turf on Monday was that there would be at least two new players in the squad by the time Dario G gets here a week on Saturday with his Crewe.
It has been fuelled somewhat by the club themselves, Steve Cotterill has said that he needed his players to get to the end of August and chairman Barry Kilby claimed that he would be sitting down with the manager to look at ways of boosting the squad.
Mind you it was the chairman who told us there would be nine new players in the summer of 2003 and then claimed that we would have eight new players for the start of this season.
All sorts of names have been mentioned, far too many to list here, although I do believe that there is no truth in the rumour that we are keeping a close watch on the situation at Real Madrid should either Beckham or Owen not make the first team.
One player who has been mentioned is Portsmouth Gary O’Neil who could well be on his way out of
O’Neil, captain of the England Under 21s is being linked with loan moves to
Steve Cotterill is a friend of Harry Redknapp and was close to joining
Redknapp said, “I’m sure there are plenty of teams who want to take Gary O’Neil. I’ve had several onto me about him already.
“I won’t let him go, not until Amdy Faye and Aliou Cisse are fit. Then I’ll make a decision. It could do him good to have a spell away on loan to get some games under his belt.”
O’Neil has made 78 league appearances for Pompey, including four in the Premiership, since making his debut as a 16-year-old back in January 2000. He has played just once against us for
He also spent a month on loan with
With no games this weekend it was never expected that anyone would be coming in this week. We will have to wait and see whether there are any new faces in the squad in a weeks time.