Stuff

• Today was a bizarrely news-heavy day for the club. We seemed to fit a fortnight's worth of announcements (kit notwithstanding) into one afternoon. Had our Press Office just been closed for the last few days?

• Two players' departures from the club were announced. Sun Jihai has gone to Sheffield United and Andreas Isaksson to PSV Eindhoven. Neither player made a number of appearances in keeping with their respective abilities.

• We're going to be on TV. There has been a deal done with ITV to show our home UEFA Cup games, starting with the EB/Streymun game at Oakwell on 31st July. The Celtic friendly (Wednesday 6th August) will also be on Setanta Sports: they have a list of the pre-season friendlies they're showing here which includes this game but not the AC Milan one, unfortunately.
  

• Apparently the first day of training was today. From what I can glean from Hughes' interview on mcfctv.com Corluka and Fernandes weren't there because of the Euros and I think Caicedo may also have been given a pass. I'd love to know if Bozhinov was involved: anyone know? The biggest news to come out of it, though, is Stephen Ireland's new hair. It's all gone. See pics here.
  

• Slightly more serious: Hughes talked about three other players in the Jo press conference today. Apparently the Richard Dunne deal is 'as good as done' (if I see 'Dunne Deal' in the papers tomorrow I will literally cry), which is obviously a good thing. He may be our third best defender, but he's a great captain and has years of experience at the club. Given the instability at the club for the past twelve months we need people like him around. Joe Hart is not as close to finalisation, but Spurs' purchase of Gomes from PSV, and our allowing the Dutch champions to replace him with Isaksson suggests it's more likely than not. (Is the fact that Johnson is not being discussed in the same way a very good or a very bad thing?). Finally, Hughes dealt with the Ronaldinho issue. I was pleased to hear him talk of the potential deal so enthusiastically (I had feared it was being imposed on him by Thaksin), but I'm still sceptical he'll join us. But this guy knows more than I do about it.

• Hughes did say that the squad is unbalanced (it is) and needs balancing (it does). But when asked if there was more money to spend after Jo and potentially Ronaldinho, he was rather evasive. Taken together, does this mean that we're going to have to sell to buy? We do really need a right winger, an experienced holding midfielder and someone who can play left back and centre half. And maybe even another centre forward. £3m for Samaras, £2m for Isaksson and even £6m for Bianchi just won't do it.