Everton open talks to sign Jack Grealish

Alan Myers saying they aren’t in talks.

I trust Alan.

Si, The Athletic isn't often wrong, and other Sky Sports writers confirm talks as well.

I think he'd be a brilliant signing, he's looking to make the England squad for the World Cup, so this could be his incentive.

Still don't see this one happening. Probably end up at Spurs.

Let it be

Grealish is the kind of player to get bums off seats, I think he’d be a tremendous signing with lots to prove for the WC next year. He’d upgrade the squad significantly.

As such, I bet he’s snatched from under our noses at the last minute!

Should play ‘10’, not on the left

And will the next Deli Alli please sign in please.

Am just afraid of his relevance to the overall performance of our team.
I can't precisely if he's a quality player or not.
Wishing him the very best, if he can sign for us.

We certainly shouldn’t be paying all his wages. It’s difficult to know capable he is of rediscovering his form but he’s not been great for the last year or two.

Now we have KDH I’m not sure we need him as badly but if he can get anywhere near his level of 3 or 4 years ago he would likely be our best player. Whatever happens I’m confident he’d offer a lot more than Alli did.

Signing players on the downward slope of their career rarely works out. Grealish was great for City two seasons ago, achieving everything he wanted. He has failed to sustain that level suggesting a loss of appetite. A loan deal with City paying two thirds of his wages reduces the risk but I would much prefer we invested in a younger player with his peak years in front of him.

I’ve never been too keen on this one, for all the concerns people (and Pep clearly) have, but it’s all a matter of wages. Hard not to take a punt on him for the right price, but a lot of other clubs probably feel the same way. At 300,000/week, full wages, no way. At half that, for a year, maybe. At a third of that, absolutely, but hard to see Man City going that low.

The concern coming from Pep always seemed to be that he didn’t train hard or well, and he’s had that kind of reputation for a long time. Hard to see how that changes, which is not good for team chemistry, unless he’s that committed to make the WC squad, which is entirely possible.

Pay as you play loan agreement and a reasonable option to buy if all goes well.

NOOOOOO!!!! A thousand times, NOOOOOO!! Complete joke if we are relying on Mr backwards to supply goals or assists. Just say no D M, please! Mind you, if we manage to get a sponsor from Beluga epicure vodka, you know, him holding the £8,500 a punt bottles, then that would pay some of his wages. But who would pick him up off the dock road and take him home?

Get him in asap! Even at £300k per week, who cares? It's not my money.

The wages these lads get are obscene and if grown businessmen are willing to fork it over to them, then so be it!

I couldn't give a monkey's if he was on £1M per week, it's not my dosh… anyone saying No is mental! Do you want Jack Harrisson back instead? Or we'll just keep playing McShite instead, should we?!….

We have become so accustomed to mediocrity or shite that we can't see a good player if he was right in front of us! Get him and Ndiaye either side of Jamie Vardy for fuck's sake!!!

Beto stood on the bloody ball against Man Utd, for fuck's sake!!!ffs! We are going from Jack Harrisson to Jack Grealish and some people are moaning!! You couldn't make it up… I

It's also hilarious that Newcastle can't sign any players as nobody wants to live in such a morbid place. If we get Jacky G, they will all be sick too.

Many teams in the Premier League are getting weaker (Brentford, Newcastle and Villa to name three) as we are getting stronger! That is 3 league positions we should be able to make up from 12th, which would be at least 9th!

Sean 15, that's a point, where would McNeil play? I didn't want McShite, I mean McNeil in the first place. No goals or assists from Burnley.Where is Dewsbury Hall going to play? Who's going to step aside as a bench warmer,, Beto included.

Dewsbury-Hall plays as a No 8 instead of Garner. All day…

Does anyone remember Garner ever scoring for us? Thought so…

Get Dewsbury-Hall next to Gana… Doucoure scored a big portion of our goals and must be replaced. Garner isn't cutting it.

Pickford
O'Brien Tarkowski Branthwaite Mykolenko
Ndiaye Gana Dewsbury-Hall Dibling
Grealish
Vardy

Dibling withdrawn from training, apparently for a move to us after putting in a transfer request.

We are not talking the type of signings that Gazza, Ginola, Eto'o … even James Rodriguez were.

If he comes, we will absolutely love him.

If we've got a spare £300k a week to throw around, then surely for a third of that there must be 2 or 3 decent younger players in positions we need.

Transfer Fee aside, £100k or £150k per week should get you a decent player.

Grealish was good, but even on his best days – and they maybe gone –would he be 2 or 3 times as good as say Dewsbury-Hall or (heaven forbid) Dibling???

How many “decent young players” do we need? I don't care about the future, 5 years from now etc. I care about right now, this season, the first match against Leeds. Grealish walks into the team and shits on everyone we've got except Ndiaye…

Tell you what. Let's get Maupay back to play behind Beto instead… He is best mates with Haaland and wants to stay in the North West.

If anybody hasn't noticed, we are totally shit and bereft of ideas in the final third. This may help that conundrum.

Grealish isn't just a footballer, he's a big name footballer. We need a marquee signing to get us noticed and give other players an incentive to come to Everton.

It's all well & good buying players for the future and all that, but we need to think big to be big. It strikes me that a lot of us still have a small-time mentality when it comes to all things Everton. Due to years of accepting mediocrity.

If you want to achieve big things, you have to think and act big. A signing like this is a signal of intent and will attract both attention and other players.

It's a marketing move as much as a footballing one.

If we pay £50M for Dibling - we've had our pants forcibly pulled down for a grab ankles session.

If we hire Grealish at what ever deal, except maybe pay per play, then we've pulled our own pants down and volunteered for it.

And it's back to Moshiri Walsh Koeman Swansea Siggugson days again.

James and Sean, I don't think anyone on here wants to avoid big-name, world-class skill players. It's first a matter of whether we've chosen the right player to throw that kind of cash at and/or the right player to choose as a big statement signing, and then at what expense.

Obviously playing the which player game is complicated, when you account for transfer and agent fees and the like, and just focus on salary, Jack Grealish is not the one I'm choosing for 300,000/week. And if it comes at the expense of not getting a starter-ready right-back or right-wing, then again, I'm a firm no. So sure, big name and good skill and all that are fine with most of us.

But let's make sure it's the right person and it doesn't leave us weak in areas we could otherwise firm up. Right now ,it seems like we're willing to pay big money for pace at right-wing, regardless of where Grealish ends up.

The right-back position is obviously huge, though, as O'Brien is neither ideal there nor the answer when one of Tarkowski or Branthwaite is injured. So as ever, let's judge when the window is over, but not make any rash decisions that actually set us back in the medium to long term.

Big name players generally speaking won't come to Everton. The market dictates.

If Grealish is open to it and we can strike the right deal with Man City, then Grealish is the right player.

I don't see any other big names lined up or available and I agree with Moyes who said we need elite players to play at our elite stadium. I tend to agree with the manager over any supporter on a forum and would suggest he and the club know what they're doing and have a plan in place.

We can all argue the toss all we like but we only have one thing between us and that's an opinion.

James, what sensible person on here either a) isn't here in some part for (hopefully friendly) argument and debate? and b) thinks others aren't entitled to an opinion? Those are both pretty much the entire point of a fan site like ToffeeWeb.

No one should claim to know any better than Moyes and whoever is calling the shots on transfers, but we're all sure as hell going to keep offering up our amateur opinions.

I don't quite understand your seeming disdain for some supporter on a forum — what if said person was arguing 10 years ago that Walsh, Kenwright and Moshiri were making fucking awful decisions? Would you simply say, I'll trust them more than some supporter on ToffeeWeb?

Sometimes, we have valid points of view.

Talk of adding Grealish and Luiz to the half dozen or more midfield that we already have reminds me of the story when we signed Ernie Hunt from Coventry on what seemed the basis of a distinctive free kick against us.

His first game was away to Fulham (I was there, 1968) where he was played as a deep centre forward and it was said that when walking off at halftime he turned to Alan Ball and said that he wasn't really a striker but more of a midfielder to which Bally reportedly replied, "You're a midfielder, that makes eight of us and I was here before you!"

I know, it's a squad game and a lot faster than it has been but how many put in the running in a game that Alan Ball did. Still a ball playing right back and right winger and we could become the Everton Globetrotters.

Jonathan, haven't seen you post since you got back from Chicago.

Hope you and your son had a good time. Fill me in.

Alan, sorry to be a pedant, but we signed Ernie Hunt from Wolves. He may have come to Harry Catterick's attention during two FA Cup ties we had against them in 1967.

He didn't stay with us long, and his free-kick goal for Coventry came after that short spell.

It was a curious signing for us as we had no need for a player of his type when Harry bought him, and he never really fitted in.

Your post is a good reminder that players need to be right for the system the manager wants to play, a lesson we have sometimes failed to heed in the subsequent (almost) 60 years.

£300,000 a week? This is Everton not PSG. The sort of thing you only consider when you are guaranteed Champions League money, or play Footie Manager for real in the Middle East.

Not even Dumb and Dumber would have considered that.

I'd love Grealish but not for a fee and not for wages beyond our current top earner. Anything we spend now hampers us building in the future. Newcastle and Villa are finding that out now – we used to complain about a glass ceiling, well now it's reinforced, bullet-proof glass.

If we could somehow bring in Dibling and McAtee, then maybe Fellows and Maitland-Niles (going off the more realistic links) then we'd have a talented, young squad that Moyes could mould the way he wanted but could also grow and grow into the future.

Sean; "Doucoure scored a big portion of our goals"...

I must pay more attention at the game as I seem to have missed most that 'big portion'!

Doucoure scored 19 Premier League goals for us in 5 seasons, average of 4 per season.

If that is considered a big portion, it's because our goals scored total is so low, 42 last season.

Impoverished Everton owes a big debt of gratitude to Doucoure for his work rate, discipline and some very important goals.

Now the era of extreme austerity is over, we can do a lot better.

Maddison out for the season with an ACL.

Will Spurs look to either Grealish or Dibling as a replacement?

Grealish doesn't seem to be a Moyes type of player to me, he's a flamboyant individual who reminds me of someone like Frank Worthington — out on the lash before the game, turning up worse-for-wear, then offering a few moments of genius before being subbed with extreme dehydration on the 70-minute mark.

So it leaves me to wonder whether this is a Moyes signing or a TFG statement signing?

I've also got uncomfortable visions of Dele Alli. Yes, I know all visions of Dele Alli are uncomfortable.

So, ultimately, I wouldn't be too disappointed if we gave Grealish a wide berth.

From what I read of Grealish, he seems too much of a piss artist. If he couldn't behave himself at Man City, I doubt he's likely to do here.

So it's a definite No for me.

Mike 29,

I commented once or twice on a thread last week about how the only positives from our trip were what a wonderful bonding experience it was with my kid; that Tarkowski was back; that Armstrong was looking like he could hold his own; and that, thanks to your encouragement, I believe, I'd made the decision to go on the Lake Michigan cruise the night before the match. I say all that because we were such crap in the actual match — but of course that's nothing new in my 9 or so years of being an Evertonian!

The cruise was just perfect. Beautiful night, great vibes, a few too many drinks, and I didn't realize Leighton, Seamus and Inchy would all be on the boat. My kid, Isaac, got to meet all 3 but, for him and me, it wasn't them signing his jersey that mattered; it was that each took the time to really engage with him (and everyone else).

I realized as the line to meet Seamus was so slow-moving that it was because he was taking as long as each supporter wanted to talk to them. I don't ever care about meeting famous people, but I think that comes from feeling that most of them are so jaded and cynical about people wanting to meet them.

Seamus truly seemed to appreciate what each fan across the world means to our club, and that's something I'll never forget. I told him how much Everton has been a part of my life as a dad, and how much he has meant to the club.

He was already an absolute legend, but it was cemented that night — which was important to me, because the fear is always that those guys will harm their reputation when you meet them.

Though, to be fair, I think European footballers are often different than American sports stars, because they get how they're part of a club whose true owners are the supporters, built over decades and centuries.

To bring it back to Grealish, he may be quite the footballer, but just doesn't seem like a potential Evertonian legend to me. I don't think that's small-club thinking, but maybe I'll just never be a fan of prima donnas.

Peter (#30);

Probably, as I couldn't remember which way around it was, Wolves or Coventry via Everton, but I remember the free kick with, let's say I think, Willie Carr lifting the free kick with both feet and flicking it out for Hunt to volley.

But I seem to remember other pedants arguing that the goal should have been disallowed as Carr using both feet must have touched it twice but then again I was also fairly sure we signed him in '68 as I was still with BluFlu.

Anyway, the Ball story, true or not, was doing the rounds and I was using the story as, the way we are signing players, we could theoretically start at Leeds with an 0-9-1 line-up.

Although it probably means somebody might not be happy and young Armstrong being loaned out rather than getting a chance to show what he can do with us.

We might even have a bench of 2 keepers, 3 full backs, 2 central defenders and a fight between the remaining midfield, 2 strikers and, heaven forbid, any kids deemed too good to be loaned out. Makes you wonder if any injuries might be considered a bright side.

Anyway, what price a cheeky offer to Dominic Calvert-Lewin as few if any seem interested… or is 4 strikers over the top? And does anyone know where the other players out of contract went as I've heard only of Maupay and Holgate?

Having not been in Grealish's company, I wouldn't be in a position to judge whether he's a prima donna or not, and I'm still undecided as to the merits of him joining us.

But one thing I have noticed about him is that he always really engages with matchday mascots, and he was noticeably the only player who bothered to shake the hand and speak to a young blind girl on the podium when he was getting a losers medal – everyone else ignored her.

That, plus he's been very tender in talking about his younger brother dying of cot death, and his love for his sister who has cerebral palsy – he's been through it and appears to me, at least, to be a decent, genuine, warm-hearted guy.

And a pisshead, too, of course. Which is no bad thing in my book.

Jake 41, thanks for all of that.

I don't mean to conflate anything he's done in training or on the pitch or out on the town with him not being a compassionate, empathetic person. And truth is, I don't know any of it… which goes to show maybe I shouldn't comment at all.

Just concerning that Pep has repeatedly alluded to his standards for the club not being up to par, that it's his efforts that have held him back, not his skill.

Two years ago, Grealish was at his peak, winning Premier League and European Champions League medals. Then he got drunk, failed to maintain his standard, was left out of the England squad for the Euros in 2024, and the Man City squad for this summer's World Club Championship.

If he lacks the ambition to perform at City with some of the greatest players in world football, under one of the most successful managers of all time, I doubt he will rediscover himself playing for a team outside the Elite 6 and not in a European competition.

Don't worry, Jonathan, I wasn't having a poke - it was literally just going through my mind this afternoon and I thought it opportune to put it out there.

As a player – yes, turning up to training still pissed is a huge no no, and maybe Moyes might have to recruit Alex Ferguson's famed spy network if he joins us.

As a human being, we have a lot in common. I'd happily go on a sesh with him.

If Grealish comes we will not be paying 300K/week. City will have to underwrite any loan deal. Doku and Savhinho are the two main reasons why Grealish got so little game time last season.

I would love to see him in an Everton shirt. I was impressed by his loyalty to Villa when they were crap. He stayed until they got a new manager and achieved safety.

Jake #41,

Thanks for sharing that, I believe Jack has quality, but he picked the ball up from deep at Villa, and he played most of his football under Pep on the left, which was puzzling to me.

Jonathan #42, glad you guys had fun (except for the game itself).

How was the pizza?

Alan #40,

I was at that Coventry game and the goal was exactly as you described. It was later outlawed by the FA as the ball didn't turn its own circumference on the ground before being touched by another player... or something like that.

Mike 47, pizza was delicious. I was hoping for something other than Giordano's, because I'd had it twice before, but it was the closest to my sister's place. Most importantly, my kid enjoyed it pre-game, post-game, and for breakfast the next morning!

As for the match, despite it being 80% Manure supporters, it was still a great environment having a few Everton sections, plus people from around the globe enjoying the beautiful game, even in the rain for the second match, and without security and fences having to divide us all by team affiliation!

I can't really see this one coming off to be honest.

The more I've ready between the lines it seems the wages would be a massive issue here, he's on a ridiculous amount of money.

It has a feel to it this in my view of when we moved for Steve McManaman in 2003, then at Real Madrid, only to baulk at the wage and deal he wanted to structure himself, a player probably past his peak years albeit I still think Grealish has much to offer.

I just can't quite see this happening for would at best be one season probably.

Jimmy@37, not all visions of Delle Ali are uncomfortable, he never became the player we hoped he would be but that 45mins against Crystal Palace were priceless and more than payed us back for whatever the club invested in him

Good stuff Jake, thanks for that. It was really just the hairband that got on my tits.

Paddy Boyland of The Athletic has weighed in tonight on the Grealish debate with a quite balanced commentary, including his own views as an Everton fan:

Would Grealish to Everton be an unwelcome throwback or a signing befitting a new stadium?

I was in a Chicago bar packed full of Everton fans last week. [Mike's note: This would almost certainly be AJ Hudson's on the North Side, owned by occasional TW poster Jamie Lenard.] Unsurprisingly, talk of new signings, and in particular Manchester City’s Jack Grealish, dominated discussions.

There have long been whispers of Everton’s interest in the England international, with the club having kept close tabs on his situation at the Etihad Stadium throughout the summer. As reported by The Athletic on Wednesday, formal talks have been held this week over a potential loan move, which would almost certainly require City to subsidise a decent chunk of Grealish’s £300,000 ($400,000) weekly wage.

That is a new development and an escalation, even if this remains far from a done deal. Everton could pay maybe two-thirds of his current salary at a stretch — and even that would see Grealish, who turns 30 next month, become comfortably their highest-paid player. The finances are challenging, others have been at the table, and City are right to look to recoup as much as they can. A permanent deal would almost certainly suit them better, but so far there has seemingly been little interest in that.

These latest developments had me recalling some of those conversations with supporters both from the U.S. and closer to home. At that stage, there did not really appear to be a consensus on whether Grealish was a good idea.

For every person who told me he’d comfortably be Everton’s best creative player, and that we shouldn’t focus on the money — disclaimer: we absolutely should — there was another who worried the midfielder’s signature felt like the kind of profile the club would have targeted under former owner Farhad Moshiri’s ill-fated tenure.

What did I think? Well, in rather typical fashion, I fudged it. Even now, I go back and forth on it all.

I understand the need for more depth in attacking areas. Much more, in fact, given how goal-shy Everton have been in recent seasons. And the Grealish of old — or anything approaching it — would be a big improvement, adding star quality to a largely functional squad.

I’m also aware that it would help to have someone of his profile at the club as they embark on a new chapter at the state-of-the-art, near-53,000 capacity Hill Dickinson Stadium. For what it’s worth, the women’s team have been looking to make a similar splash, by potentially recruiting an England international, ahead of their move to Goodison Park this season. In both cases, of course, there are no guarantees.

But there are other things to consider. Where, for example, does Grealish fit into David Moyes’ setup? Whether playing in the centre or on the flanks, Grealish has a tendency to drift to the left. Iliman Ndiaye, Everton’s best attacker last season, usually occupies similar spaces, albeit more out-to-in. Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall, the new £25m signing, is another who is at their best in that left inside channel. At some point, Everton will need to focus on the right wing too.

Again, some will say: not our problem.

Then there is the message it sends to the dressing room and the market. The package for the season would likely sit north of £10million. Do Everton want to be considered a club that pays high wages and would current senior players want to see that reflected in their own salaries? The club’s key decision-makers, such as Moyes and CEO Angus Kinnear, will need to weigh up those factors and more.

But my biggest question is this: which Grealish would Everton even be getting?

It feels a little odd to say this about one of the league’s established players, and someone with 39 England caps under his belt, but the modern-day Grealish is now something of an unknown quantity. His influence has significantly diminished for club and country in recent seasons.

He played more than 2,000 league minutes for City in the 2022-23 campaign. That was more than halved the following campaign, and last season he played just 715 minutes in the top flight. That’s a small enough sample size to make The Athletic’s data team wince. At the very least, it makes you wonder where exactly he is in his career.

There is a chance that Grealish still has much to give. But there are no guarantees. The consideration for players who have already been at the top level but are on the way down is whether the fire still burns inside them.

What is the motivation now? Would he be inspired by the prospect of playing for England, again, for example?

Too many of the players signed under Moshiri — most, it must be said, lacking the pedigree of Grealish — seemed to have lost that appetite. Fairly or not, I call it the Morgan Schneiderlin complex. James Rodriguez, another ‘Hollywood signing’ from that era, shone brightly for a brief moment before succumbing to injuries. His salary ended up being a millstone around the club’s neck.

Coming at a key early juncture, Grealish would be a bellwether signing for the new Everton hierarchy. In these kinds of deals, there is rarely a middle ground. It is nearly always sink or swim.

The idea of Grealish, headband on, socks rolled down, driving Everton on in their new waterfront stadium feels enticing. Exciting, even.

If a deal got over the line and was successful, it could give The Friedkin Group and the club the momentum they need. It may even show the rest of the European game that Everton are back.

But there are few certainties in football. And certainly not with this version of Grealish. Romance or pragmatism: pick your poison.

***

My first reaction was an explosion of laughter at Boyland's identification of the "Morgan Schneiderlin Syndrome" -- perfectly portrays how I feel about that bum.

Thoughts from the congregation?

Mike, I feel very similarly to Paddy. I’m on the fence. I particularly identified with this paragraph:

“For every person who told me he’d comfortably be Everton’s best creative player, and that we shouldn’t focus on the money — disclaimer: we absolutely should — there was another who worried the midfielder’s signature felt like the kind of profile the club would have targeted under former owner Farhad Moshiri’s ill-fated tenure.”

Now we have KDH I think the need for Grealish is less obvious. It’s a good point that he makes about his wages upsetting our whole wage structure potentially and the whole idea just feels a little Moshiri-esque. Though I think Grealish has more to offer than the likes of Alli did.

If Grealish was a right winger or even a number 6 or right back (these are the positions I cannot believe we have not reinforced yet) then I’d be more keen but he plays in the same positions as Ndiaye, McNeill, Alcaraz and KDH (who I don’t believe should be used in a double pivot with Gana). Obviously he’s too expensive for a depth piece and I worry we will end up moving people out of their best positions to accommodate him. Though it’s difficult to say until we see how Moyes plan to set up the team when all new players have arrived.

I think that’s probably right Sam.

With KDH and Alcaraz we already have two players for the attacking midfield role - with Gueye and Garner behind.

Grealish could be excellent but pushes two other new signings down the pecking order. Shades of Klassen and Sugurdsson and Vlasic etc?

If we’re to do a big loan - Gallagher would make more sense as more defensive. Less exciting but probably benefits the team more.

Can see us getting both Grealish and Dibbling. They are similar plsyers, so perhaps it's one for now and a trainee below him?

It would solve the creativity problem, with a 5 way shoot out of Ndiaye, Alcaraz, Grealish, Dibbling and Mcneil for 3 slots. Alcaraz and Mcneil possibly able to drop back - or perhaps Mcneil is the first to be sold?

Probably lacks an overlapping right back with inverted wingers system, and would still need another defensive midfielder. Possibly an upgrade on Chermiti as 3rd choice also.

A big couple of weeks.

Cracking piece Mike, on the money.

A complete gamble of what you're getting. Moyes needs to look him in the eyes and see if there's fire still in the belly. The 700 odd minutes of a fractured Pep relationship is too hard to judge.

The stories of him living it up after the treble, diving around, can all be countered that he has a great reputation as a human being and he won't accept being kicked around a football pitch - and would fight the Everton corner with refs & rival teams. Not since Rooney has a player done that. Too long Everton are a soft touch.

My feeling is that Boyland somewhat overrates 2 risks of Grealish.

One is that he’s duplicative. Moyes isn’t Koeman and I don’t think he’ll be after Grealish if he hasn’t got a plan to fit him in. And I would also point out that Ndiaye is currently starting at right wing for the # 18 national team in the world, and he has also played second striker.

And the other is about Grealish’s salary. Even if the loan turns out to be a mistake, it’s only for one season, and therefore not an ongoing chain around Everton’s neck.

So while I won’t be brokenhearted if it doesn’t happen, I am marginally in favor of this dice roll. I view the potential upside as greater than the downside.

Money is the only problem here. Grealish would fit perfectly at no.10. I’m also not concerned about his attitude or ‘antics’. I think he’d have a lot to prove, a World Cup to play for and he’s at the absolute business end of his career.

Alcaraz would be the only loser and even then he’d still get plenty of game time. Most Premier League teams use 5-6 players in the ‘3’ behind a striker per match. It’s the position that most substitutions take place in and the position where matches can be won by a fresh player coming off the bench. Dewsbury-Hall is best used as an ‘8’, deeper than Grealish.

Some people are talking as if we need to think carefully about the ‘11’ we put out. This isn’t the case; we’ll be putting out 15/16 every week and those extra 4/5 from the bench will often be the most important.

We need 6 players for those ‘creative’ attacking positions, we currently have 3, so we absolutely need to make the signings (I’m just worried that we’ll ‘only’ sign 2 and use central midfielders in the ‘10’ role like we did with Doucoure). My main issue with Grealish is that part of me would rather sign McAtee as a safer, long-term prospect. However, there’s no doubt that a top-form Grealish brings more to a team than McAtee.

Like so many of these deals, I want it done but it has to be on the right terms that allows us to continue building next year and the year after.

Jake@ 43, that is an excellent observation. These things count and are shades of what makes the man.

I think we are still under-estimating the depth and experience we need in the squad to compete at a higher level. Grealish would be the most talented player at the club if he signed.

He is fit, adaptable and able to play on the left, the right or as a No.10. He knows what it takes to win trophies and will be popular in the dressing-room.

Despite his reputation as a lad who likes to enjoy himself in his downtime, I have never seen a single article claiming that he missed training, trained badly or turned up to training worse for wear due to his lifestyle.

He is mainly the victim of Guardiola's change of system from a false 9 to a more direct attack to accommodate Harland. There is less interchange between the forwards, the ball goes forward quicker and they are more direct given they have a target man. We have just about the slowest squad in the premier league so Grealish won't struggle for pace here.

We are not buying him, simply loaning him with likely City paying a proportion of his wages. That is considerably less risky than offering 45 million for a 19 year old who may be highly talented but has achieved little in the game to date.

Ideally, I would like them both and I am sure Moyes would agree. My concern is we will get neither and waste another 1-2 weeks in futile activity.

Steve, I think transfers are one of those things in life where futile activity is inevitable. You need to be in touch with 3-4 players at once for the same role in order to negotiate.

I’m pretty confident we’ll get the 4 players I think we need, but that will involve dead-ends, false-starts and blind alleys. Short of spending like Chelsea or Man City, that’s the only way of getting the players you want at a price you can accept.

If we have the opportunity to get it done, I've always said do it.

He may well not be the pacy priority we need, and I still think this side needs pace more than anything else at all but Grealish is a quality football player, and surely we've been starved of those at this club now for many years.