Stickied League 2 Transfer Rumours/Confirmed Transfers 2023/24

[Casey]

Crawley have signed a keeper on loan from Stoke . Spell check nightmare.

Blondy Nna Noukeu.

Has sat on the bench a couple of times at Stoke (not sure if he has played) and been called up to the Cameroonian national squad.

I have no idea about him but I think we needed another keeper as I don't think our young back up keeper is ready for first team football so if Morris got injured we'd have been in the deep stuff. Seems he knows our keeper coach. I can't believe Stoke have let him come to us to sit on the bench but Glenn Morris has been excellent for us.

Casey

 

[Sestonpoolie]

We're just raiding the NL here, signed Neill Byrne from Halifax on one of those undisclosed jobby deals.

Massivefax fans are gutted,sounds like a very good player.
And we paid a fee,bloody hell,when was the last time that happened?

 

[Conker]

Centre back is he? seems a reasonable signing.

e

Fantastic physical attributes, but really needs a lot of work to become a decent EFL defender, definitely got potential.

At the same time, his *few* performances for Mansfield were abysmal, but Grimsby fans rate him during his short stint playing alongside Hewitt, you’d think if they were visiting the L2 forum they at least be nice to us EFL members!

 

[Conker]

Don’t listen to most of the Mansfield reviews, Walsall fans, he’s very very good

Nobodies said owt ya dafty

Should be sorry Mansfield fans, your loss not ours!

We clearly think we have better and can sign better so he probably would have got a run out in the Pizzacup and that’s it, so makes sense. Nobodies lost.

 

[Chief Rocka]

Massivefax fans are gutted,sounds like a very good player.
And we paid a fee,bloody hell,when was the last time that happened?

Fraser Kerr *spit* by my reckoning.

 

[denzel ecfc]

Lewis Page, who wanted to return to London and to play at a higher level, has obviously joined Harrogate

 

[Valeite]

Crawley have signed a keeper on loan from Stoke . Spell check nightmare.

Blondy Nna Noukeu.

Has sat on the bench a couple of times at Stoke (not sure if he has played) and been called up to the Cameroonian national squad.

I have no idea about him but I think we needed another keeper as I don't think our young back up keeper is ready for first team football so if Morris got injured we'd have been in the deep stuff. Seems he knows our keeper coach. I can't believe Stoke have let him come to us to sit on the bench but Glenn Morris has been excellent for us.

Casey

He likes rushing out of his area and regularly cocks up but is young and may improve if he gets some game time.

Beware though as every time you put his name on a messageboard it will trigger a check from GCHQ.

 

[Moomin]

Lewis Page, who wanted to return to London and to play at a higher level, has obviously joined Harrogate

Footballers really aren’t bright are they!

Grear signing for Harrogate though, assuming he stays fit.

 

[Chris FGR]

Tbf Harrogate to London isn't too bad, just a quick drive down the M1.

 

[pontoonlew]

Nobodies said owt ya dafty




We clearly think we have better and can sign better so he probably would have got a run out in the Pizzacup and that’s it, so makes sense. Nobodies lost.

I’m talking about when we signed him to be told he was dreadful

 

[Moomin]

Tbf Harrogate to London isn't too bad, just a quick drive down the M1.

Yeah it’s practically on London’s doorstep.

 

[loz]

Tbf Harrogate to London isn't too bad, just a quick drive down the M1.

S'pose Harrogate's main shopping street looks a little bit like Knightsbridge except it's a bluddy steep hill.

 

[hellogregory]

Need experience as well, as things stand the average age of our squad is 23 and we only have 1 player over the age of 30 and only 5 players over the age of 24. If that was the age of our squad last season we'd have had the youngest squad in the EFL by a whole year over the second youngest.

Maybe, but I don’t think it’s vital. As long as they have quality I’m not bothered how old they are. Guy, Hayden, Riley etc are all a year older and wiser and are now experienced enough in my opinion. A full season will have done them good. I would like a Bennett replacement, so wouldn’t be against an older player for that position. I would also like another forward, but like I say as long as he gives us the quality we need then I’m not too fussed how old he is.

 

[Sestonpoolie]

Fraser Kerr *spit* by my reckoning.

Felt like someone walked over my grave when I saw that name.

 

[hellogregory]

If Barra have now got that amount of money on top of the players they've already added to their squad then they could be a serious shout for promotion, depending what they do with it but you could replace Quigley twice with that amount.

Zanzala will be an upgrade on Quigley anyway.

I really hope I’m wrong but I think Zanzala could prove to be our biggest fuck up since letting Paddy Madden move to Yeovil. Genuinely expect that with a good preseason behind him followed by regular starts, he will be amongst the top scorers in this league. And all for the sake of an extra year’s contract.

 

[BarraMatt]

Zanzala will be an upgrade on Quigley anyway.

I really hope I’m wrong but I think Zanzala could prove to be our biggest fuck up since letting Paddy Madden move to Yeovil. Genuinely expect that with a good preseason behind him followed by regular starts, he will be amongst the top scorers in this league. And all for the sake of an extra year’s contract.

He won't have a good pre season behind him at the rate we are cancelling our games.

 

[saddler78]

He won't have a good pre season behind him at the rate we are cancelling our games.

Covid again? we have played our youth team in our first two hopefully its the first team tommorow against palace at home.

 

[saddler78]

Fantastic physical attributes, but really needs a lot of work to become a decent EFL defender, definitely got potential.

At the same time, his *few* performances for Mansfield were abysmal, but Grimsby fans rate him during his short stint playing alongside Hewitt, you’d think if they were visiting the L2 forum they at least be nice to us EFL members!

Sounds ok most likely he will be a back up for us anyway looking at the squad we have surprised we have signed another defender when most of our fans agree we need at least one more striker Maynard has been mentioned a few times do you think hes done now or has another decent season in him?

 

[chipmunx]

Covid again? we have played our youth team in our first two hopefully its the first team tommorow against palace at home.

No - we cancelled one midweek as we set up a training camp in Scotland - then we picked up a few injuries in Scotland - so todays was cancelled.
We do have Birmingham City away on Monday or Tuesday, then Bolton at home next Saturday though.

 

[shoddycollins]

Yeah it’s practically on London’s doorstep.

Just goes to show how far out Exeter is. I had a look on Google Maps and while Exeter to London is a shorter drive than Harrogate to London, it's only by 10 minutes and if we're talking trains instead then Harrogate is the marginally closer one.

 

[shoddycollins]

I think that's one of the reasons why the fee was 'undisclosed' - so other clubs don't get the impression we have £150k+ to spend on a new striker. I think we'll dip into the loan market and see what's available in January.

On a side note... bet he's chuffed with the photo the BBC decided to use of him.

 

[shoddycollins]

Sorry Grimsby fans, Rollin Menayese has gone on loan to Walsall untill the end of the season, no Menayese - Hewitt partnership at the Mill.

What's Mansfield's crack? Is it part of the masterplan to sign players you don't plan to use and then loan them out to other L2 clubs until every one of your opponents has a key player or two they can't pick for games against Mansfield.

 

[shoddycollins]

Zanzala will be an upgrade on Quigley anyway.

I really hope I’m wrong but I think Zanzala could prove to be our biggest fuck up since letting Paddy Madden move to Yeovil. Genuinely expect that with a good preseason behind him followed by regular starts, he will be amongst the top scorers in this league. And all for the sake of an extra year’s contract.

I'd say it's already a bigger fuck-up. Paddy Madden did little in his games with us to show he had in it him to score goals in League One. According to Gary Johnson who signed him for Yeovil, that's because we were using him in the wrong system. Probably correct, and kudos for Johnson spotting his potential and kickstarting his career but Madden fitted the system Johnson was already using so it was less of a risk. We'd have been changing our system to suit a 20 year-old who had only just arrived in the Football League despite having more established strikers on the books such as Miller and Zoko who needed no help in scoring goals.

I remember Madden starting (Miller injury I think) in one of the few games we played live on Sky, against Brentford who had a teenage Saido Berahino on loan; and the commentators contrasting the two strikers. Berahino they saw had a big future ahead of him (and he almost did) while they thought Madden looked completely out of his depth (Brentford won 4-0). At that point he was in his second season with us ultimately only score 2 goals in his 32 apperances. Think those commentators would have thought you mad if you'd said the following season Madden would win the golden boot.

Zanzala had already proven himself to be an asset and would be considered a first team player. It doesn't even make a lot of financial sense to offer him a one year deal since he's still young and already proven at this level. You can see him attracting interest from bigger clubs if he has another good goalscoring season and having good young players on one-year deals just means you're not going to get any money for them if and when they do move.

 

[denzel ecfc]

Just goes to show how far out Exeter is. I had a look on Google Maps and while Exeter to London is a shorter drive than Harrogate to London, it's only by 10 minutes and if we're talking trains instead then Harrogate is the marginally closer one.

Dont know what app you've been using. Its 2 hrs 15 from Exeter to Paddington and 2 hrs 45 from Harrogate to Kings Cross.

I don't think that's why he went to Harrogate regardless

 

[hellogregory]

I'd say it's already a bigger fuck-up. Paddy Madden did little in his games with us to show he had in it him to score goals in League One. According to Gary Johnson who signed him for Yeovil, that's because we were using him in the wrong system. Probably correct, and kudos for Johnson spotting his potential and kickstarting his career but Madden fitted the system Johnson was already using so it was less of a risk. We'd have been changing our system to suit a 20 year-old who had only just arrived in the Football League despite having more established strikers on the books such as Miller and Zoko who needed no help in scoring goals.

I remember Madden starting (Miller injury I think) in one of the few games we played live on Sky, against Brentford who had a teenage Saido Berahino on loan; and the commentators contrasting the two strikers. Berahino they saw had a big future ahead of him (and he almost did) while they thought Madden looked completely out of his depth (Brentford won 4-0). At that point he was in his second season with us ultimately only score 2 goals in his 32 apperances. Think those commentators would have thought you mad if you'd said the following season Madden would win the golden boot.

Zanzala had already proven himself to be an asset and would be considered a first team player. It doesn't even make a lot of financial sense to offer him a one year deal since he's still young and already proven at this level. You can see him attracting interest from bigger clubs if he has another good goalscoring season and having good young players on one-year deals just means you're not going to get any money for them if and when they do move.

Fair point. The only reason I think madden was a fuck up was because we initially loaned him to Yeovil, saw him gain confidence, show quality and catapult himself to League 1 top scorer. The ball was then in our court, we could have either brought him back to see if somehow we can get him to produce those numbers for us, or alternatively sell him to a more wealthy club than Yeovil. But no, we decide to let Yeovil take him permanently for next to nothing. Big fuck up. Hopefully Zanzala won’t go on to make us look as incompetent as that, but I have a feeling he will.

Re the one year deal. I agree, for me Zanzala did enough in his half season to have earned that commitment of two years. I can understand not giving Farman two years because he’s older and we have a younger keeper in Norman, so I can accept that and see the point of view.

 

[shoddycollins]

Fair point. The only reason I think madden was a fuck up was because we initially loaned him to Yeovil, saw him gain confidence, show quality and catapult himself to League 1 top scorer. The ball was then in our court, we could have either brought him back to see if somehow we can get him to produce those numbers for us, or alternatively sell him to a more wealthy club than Yeovil. But no, we decide to let Yeovil take him permanently for next to nothing. Big fuck up. Hopefully Zanzala won’t go on to make us look as incompetent as that, but I have a feeling he will.

Re the one year deal. I agree, for me Zanzala did enough in his half season to have earned that commitment of two years. I can understand not giving Farman two years because he’s older and we have a younger keeper in Norman, so I can accept that and see the point of view.

I remember Greg Abbott saying something along the lines of bringing Madden back wouldn't have been possible. Were players allowed to sign pre-contract agreements and talk to other clubs in the last 6 months of their contract back then? Could have been similar to the Cosgrove situation where by the time we rated him his future was already out of our hands. Possible we had a sell-on fee with Madden but since Yeovil ended up releasing him themselves shortly after promotion...

Fuck sake, the strikers we've released... or allowed to go on a free. Throw Nakhi Wells and Glenn Murray in there. You've got to laugh now to think that Greg Abbott had both Wells and Madden at his disposal, yet preferred Craig Curran.

 

[shoddycollins]

Maybe, but I don’t think it’s vital. As long as they have quality I’m not bothered how old they are. Guy, Hayden, Riley etc are all a year older and wiser and are now experienced enough in my opinion. A full season will have done them good. I would like a Bennett replacement, so wouldn’t be against an older player for that position. I would also like another forward, but like I say as long as he gives us the quality we need then I’m not too fussed how old he is.

I think the experience thing becomes an issue when adversity strikes. Something will always not go your way and you'll have a bad run of form, last season it was the covid/postponements that knocked us sideways in January but there'll be something this season you can guarantee. It took us a long long time to get out of that funk and it coincided with Bennett being injured, as well as Dickenson, which saw a lot of experience taken out of the team. Furman, while pretty competent when he did play, wasn't the leader on the pitch I think we hoped we were getting.

Older players are just more likely to have experienced this sort of thing before, know that it comes to an end and motivate the younger players around them. Hopefully though the experience from last season which was a fairly extreme example of a bad patch has been put into the bank by those players you mention as that's what we could do with.

 

[Bone Idle]

Dont know what app you've been using. Its 2 hrs 15 from Exeter to Paddington and 2 hrs 45 from Harrogate to Kings Cross.

I don't think that's why he went to Harrogate regardless

Thats cos GWR have got better and faster trains than LNER.

 

[denzel ecfc]

Thats cos GWR have got better and faster trains than LNER.

You used to be able to get a train to Paddington in 1hrs 59 minutes. Clearly that was far too sensible so they built in delays into the timetable.
Us cheapskates always go to Waterloo anyway ....

 

[Conker]

What's Mansfield's crack? Is it part of the masterplan to sign players you don't plan to use and then loan them out to other L2 clubs until every one of your opponents has a key player or two they can't pick for games against Mansfield.

I mean it’s pretty obvious isn’t it? Clough didn’t sign him, doesn’t want him, but he’s under contract still.

Our squad will be supplemented by youth products again this season, we have two goalies brought in on loan and two defenders out on loan, so don’t really get where your coming from.