Gary Cahill - January what would you do?

Moses why does Cahill have to be grown up and stay? You dont always get what you want? You do if it is better and offeredto you. This belief that by keeping Cahill we will stay up or that we beat the big boys off by keeping him is all pie in the sky. When you actually come to reality of it we get slaughtered at times with him in the team and it would be only worth keeping him if he could do the job for the whole defence which clearly can't happen. Or the fact that club spending hardly any transfer money and riddled in debt can make a loss or turn any money down for nothing is just madness.

. In terms of replacement that is not my job we have a network of scouts to get good players.

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But its your job to say when we should sell players?

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The argument about us being better with him is totally unfounded and will be tested soon enough. What's your heartfelt defence of coyle going to be after jan. Oh well if we had Cahill we would be ok.

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Seen as he get played every week, I would say he is our best CB, he doesn't get chosen for nothing ....

This belief that by keeping Cahill we will stay up or that we beat the big boys off by keeping him is all pie in the sky. When you actually come to reality of it we get slaughtered at times with him in the team and it would be only worth keeping him if he could do the job for the whole defence which clearly can't happen. Or the fact that club spending hardly any transfer money and riddled in debt can make a loss or turn any money down for nothing is just madness.

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If you can find a comment were I have said we will beat the big boys with Cahill in our team, I'll happly agree with you. He might make the difference against Wigan and all the other teams we will be fighting against.

Is selling Cahill going to solve all our debts? no, we would have needed to invest the majority of the transfer fee in the team with 48 hours left of the window.

Petrrov er I do understand your point but we were never offered thirteen mil or anywhere near it. Arsenal bid 6, spurs bid a little more but some of it was a player swap deal with 'Arry trying to shift a bit of dead wood. Both came far too late in the window to give us any chance of finding a replacement that was even close to like for like and frankly I do not blame the board or owen one little bit. As to tying Gary down to a longer deal we don't know what he was offered or perhaps turned down.

I appreciate that losing him for nothing would be a blow but the fact is that we retain his services at least until January and that can only be a good thing given how woeful the rest of our defence has been in recent weeks. If we keep him all season then as Moses says he might just make the difference in the games against the teams around us like wigan, blackburn, fulham etc. Against the really big guns we'd need four players of his calibre to compete and clubs like ours don't have that.To sum up, Cahill stays till the summer, goes for nothing and we stay up would be far better for the club in the long term than a quick snatch at six mil, no replacement and relegated. Also, so called big boys get the message that if they want someone's best assets now they have to pay for them and pay the proper value. If other clubs follow our lead on this and I suspect a few just might then perhaps we will stop seeing potentially world class players being nicked at bargain basement prices. I'm not saying Cahill IS world class but he's definitely good enough for england and deserves his spot and he's worth a hell of a lot more than lump wenger signed after saying Cahill was too expensive at more than 6 mil.

I really do believe that in a case like this smaller clubs should basically stick to their guns because in the end prem survival is financially too important to keep allowing prized assets to disappear for next to nothing. I'd rather see a player see out his contract and walk for free if it keeps us up and I bet many other smaller club fans would agree with me.

I agree with everything LPP has said.

What difference does having £9m more in the bank make when you have a collection of 4 poor defenders?

I see our defenders like this:

Cahill 8/10: Very mobile and intelligent player. Often caught out of position but this is due to covering players who have wandered out of position. Great in the air and good with the ball at his feet. IF he was in a defence surrounded by better players where Cahill could focus on being a central defender and not a defender who covers everyone else he would be even better.

Wheater 6/10: Tall, clumsy defender. Yet to reach his full potential shown early on in his career that led to an England call up. Very susceptible to receiving cards of both colours and giving away silly fouls. That being said, his positioning and attacking of the ball is a very good. Hopefully he can become an 8/10 aswell.

Knight 5/10: Again, very tall and clumsy defender. Slow and positionally inept, he often leads himself into trouble due to his poor on-pitch intelligence and poor technique. Despite his height he sometimes struggles in the air.

Ricketts 7/10: Very versatille defender. Capable of playing anywhere across the back four and effectively. Good positional sense and very hard working. He is no slouch who is very capable of going forward, having a cross success rate of 43% in the Premier League 2010-2011, he was the best crosser in the league.

Steinsson 5/10: Slow and positionally inept, this right back causes more problems than pleasures when on the field. He rarely checks for his man which leads to him being out of position and them having lots of space to work in. Consistently marks central players rather than the wide ones who he then follows into midfield leaving the defence open at the back often leading to goals. Example, wandering into midfield after 30 seconds of the second half against Arsenal, missing the ball and leaving RVP lots of space to work with to angle a powerful shot in past Jaaskelainen.

Robbo 4/10: Our worst Defender. Full of commitment and passion, but no amount of passion makes up for poor positional sense, slow movement, and late tackles.

Mears 6/10: Despite not making his Wanderers debut yet, he has shown he is a capable player during his career which has mainly been in the championship and occasionally the premier league. Injury has often ruined him when he has a chance in the PL. Quick and agile, unlike Steinsson or Robbo, if he is caught out of position, he has the pace to get back and not be exposed. Good going forward.

Marcos Alonso 6/10: Very raw player, pacey and agile he likes to get forward and get stuck in. Very attacking style player, one which may be open due to Petrov lack of tracking back, however he is more than capable of defending and keeping up with a quick player.

Now due to injuries and Cahill being sold, if we had a defence of Steinsson, Wheater, Knight and Robbo, possibly the slowest ever PL defence, we would have conceded even more than the 21 weve conceded so far.

Not sure how this would go down with some of you but what about this scenario(baring in mind i am not the manager only a suggestion but i hope it happens personally)

Take Wilson on loan in Jan, but also an agreement in place to buy Cahill (you will lose him just when and if you get money or not for him) for a fixed price come the Summer, that way you keep Cahill to keep you up hopefully and get a good young defender in Wilson to help out at the back and gain some valuable first team experience.

Bolton have done wonders in the past with Wilshere and Sturridge on loan, i think this would be a good move for both of us, hopefully some of you will agree with me at least, just depends if you think Wilson is good enough, but i think he has the potentail.

Although none of us are the manager, so what we say doesnt matter, but does that scenario sound appealing or you all going to swear at me lol.

If this doesnt appeal, what about this type of scenario but someone else from another club you fancy, either way you need to keep Cahill untill Summer but hopefully get money for him at the same time and keep you up.

All the ' keep Cahill till the death ' arguments all rally round the assumption that 7,8,9 mill to spend on new players is a false economy if we go down as a result of letting Cahill go in January.

It's a theory, yes ..but that's all it is. Equally plausible is that we;

a) Hold on to Cahill ...and go down anyway. He's fighting for a place in the England team for a big tournament next year - and being forced to play in a team that will probably be in a relegation battle all season - and on the end of a few more good hidings before the season's out too - may push him down the pecking order for England. He's hardly gonna be inspired by that ..and we'll be kickin' ourselves that we'd lost out on a big pot of money that well spent, could have saved us.

b) We sell Cahill, and stay up as well! Why is that seen as pie in the sky? We did it with Anelka, we can do it with Cahill. Funny how some make out that our season depends on Holden ..then when he's out of it, our season depends on Cahill. Why keep classing Bolton as a one man team ( especially as the one man keeps changin', depending on what argument it fits best with )

If I'm to trust that OC knows what he's doin' ...then I trust him to take the money, and buy 1 or 2 players good enough to keep us up. Sounds as if some don't trust him as much, and would rather keep what we've got, and lose out on some transfer monies to buy players ...players that will last far longer than just the end of this season!

lastof |I have never said we were a one man team but in a way you have made a point I wanted to make earlier.

Cahill would not be so crucial to us but for the nightmarishly bad injury list we have with our two arguably best players out until at least march and our most promising new defender out for a similar length of time. In fact my understanding is that as things currently stand we are missing no less than NINE first team possibles through injury and or suspension.

Now while I do not intend to say it's all on Cahill to carry us and I believe that we have some quality other than him even now with our threadbare squad his importance is unquestionably magnified due to the nature of those whom he shares defensive duties with. The sad fact is that he is our ONLY really top class defender. The rest are at best average and at worst plain not good enough and everyone else in the prem knows it. Mears might well have made a big difference to that statement but of course it's a moot point now. Wheater is still suspended after his idiocy which leaves Knight as our only viable CB partner for Gary. Steinsson is decent if slow, Robinson is just plkain slow and clumsy and Alonso has that horrid business in Spain hanging over him so we don't even know if we'll have his services in the new year (unless I missed some news on it I last heard it was still under investigation).

Cahill shouldn't be expected to keep us up single handedly and I for one dont but you can be absolutely certain that without him the job would be a LOT harder. As you say I only the idea no Cahill =relegation is seculation but let's face it it isn't exactly rocket science is it? When you have a team with just one international defender surrounded by a load of journeymen then you don't wanna lose him especially not when your midfield is gutted by injuries, your number one keeper is slightly past his best with an inexperienced and slightly shaky backup and your Mr dependable captain looks worse with every match he plays. We can't afford to lose Cahill now under the circumstances. We might lose him free in the summer but that would be no loss compared to what would happen if he left in jan and we got relegated.

Sorry but for the fee we'd get the risk simply is NOT worth it in my opinion.

According to Bolton news it was a £13m package. Maybe some of you know more than sports journos I don't know. In terms of whether Cahill will make a difference as to if we go down or not that's a bit rich from people on here that claim Moses dad coyle could keep us up regardless cause he is so good.

As I said LPP ..there's a few different scenarios as to the Cahill question .... and it will be interesting to see which option pans out. TBH, I'm glad I'm not the one having to make the decision on which will be the best way to go ...and of course, a lot will depend on whether there's a bid in the first place, or whether everyone will sit tight and then battle for him on a free come the end of the season.

It could be that whoever is closest to him at the club ( which is hopefully OC) will be able to make an informed decision. Holding him against his will could see his form plummet - which would be bad news for us - or maybe we will have a healthy enough stack of points on board by mid-Jan to be able to let him go, safe(ish) in the knowledge we're not going down ......(miracles CAN happen! )

We'll see soon enough