Given there’s not a right lot to do at present, the games don’t half seem to be coming round quickly, whilst the remit of SAFCBlog is Match Previews & Reviews, (loosely speaking), I should probably write something about the Transfer Window? There’s about 4 days left, once our business is done, I’ll look at the lads that we’ve signed. I mentioned briefly last week that Dobson has gone to Wimbledon, fair enough, he wants to play, he’s not in our current plans, he’s got a chance to impress elsewhere, we’ve had some real shithouses stealing a living over the years, so fair dos George and good luck.

We could do with shifting Danny Graham, in his first spell he didn’t look like he wanted to be here, this time around he doesn’t look good enough to be here. We’ll struggle to move him on though, primarily because football is suspended at National League North level and below? One man who seems destined to go out on loan is Will Grigg, current reports suggest Salford, Shrewsbury and Oxford lead the chase, obviously he won’t be allowed to play against us, but I don’t think he will go to Oxford as they could feature in the promotion mix, the other two would be fine as Shrewsbury are shit and Salford aren’t in our league. Whilst the usual arrangement is for players to be not allowed to play against their parent club, there is perhaps an argument that any deal has a clause that he has to play the full game against us?

Will Grigg – What Went Wrong?

Some signings work out, some don’t. Will Grigg came to Sunderland with a decent reputation and a decent goal scoring level, it hasn’t worked out for him up here. It’s not unusual for players to go through bad patches, respond differently to different managers, not be correctly used etc so what went wrong?

Confidence is massive in football, especially when it comes to strikers, just look at the player Wyke looks with a bit of confidence? It’s not Griggs fault that SD had his leg lifted by Wigan and paid too much for him, although the manager not believing he was worth the fee is not a good starting point for confidence levels.

There’s always lots of speculation about the goings on in the club, I don’t have any connection to the club, I was however told by someone within the club that Will was really struggling with the burden of not getting promotion and he felt almost personally responsible. As aforementioned confidence is massive with strikers?

Sometimes it just doesn’t work out, there can be loads of reasons, ultimately it’s all about results and for strikers it’s all about goals, he hasn’t scored many – it’s the right time to move on.

He remains a Sunderland player, whilst he’d struggle to get in The Dog & Duck Walking Football squad on current form, he remains a SAFC player. The best scenario would be for him to do well somewhere and then take they take him off our hands. Footballers are handsomely paid, (albeit a short career), Grigg has been shite for us, his body language is not the best…. I’m not for one moment suggesting any pro footballer doesn’t try, but looking like you’re not trying is just as bad. It is however Real Life, he will know he’s not been good enough up here, as aforementioned there’s lots of possible reasons for this.

Whilst we will still pay a proportion of his wages, him not being on the payroll will hopefully free up some monies to get someone else in.

Incoming……

I’ll look at the arrivals on Monday, although the early signs are promising. We needed a left back and we’ve got one on loan today, he’s under 21 too so won’t count towards the Salary Cap. The lad from Rangers is reported to have pace, (which we obviously lack), and the Scotch bloke from Ross County is meant to be a half decent striker.