Cole, Behrami and Parker out, Remy, Yakubu and Riquelme in!

Well you can see a certain logic until you take into account the home base player rule in the 25 man squad, unless Sullivan proposes breaching that and saying "See you in court" to the F.A. of course. Basically, the maximum number of home based players we can afford to sell is two, and that will take us down to the bare bones before we start including under 21s in our 25 man squad unnecessarily - and that would be a stupid thing to do. One of Parker or Cole may go, and my money is on Parker, but to sell both would be madness.

The Stoke rumour has resurfaced. They are definitely in search of a striker as the Remy Ryanair flight showed, but I still do not believe that Cole would be willing to join them. Liverpool yes, that would make some sense for a man who has just been recalled to the England squad, but Stoke? No, just can't see Carlton agreeing to go. Of course the Home Based rule can be sidestepped if we were to take a Home Based qualified player in exchange. That's where I think the Keane and Parker swap may come into play. Tottenham have more than enough Home Growns at present, they can afford to move out Crouch and Keane if Remy and Parker are signed.

This Riquelme rumour won't go away either. I don't see that happening and I'm not sure we would want him anyway. He is in the twilight of his career now and was patchy in his form when at the very top of his career. One very good World Cup does not a great player make, as Nicky Butt proves.

What about Yakubu. Well Avram knows him and likes him and the rumours have been very persistent. But, at the end of the day, he will increase the number of non Home Growns which we cannot really afford at this stage unless a "foreign" player is shipped out. We would, no doubt, love to move on McCarthy, but who is going to meet his wage demands?

The Behrami sale is the most logical, especially given his absence from the squad for the Deportivo game. But I still fancy Parker to go ahead of him, once the money from the Milner sale pumps into the system. Only Italian sides seem interested in Behrami, and only the biggest in Italy have any real money to spend. £12m for Parker makes more sense than £6m for Behrami to me, given both can be the midfield dynamo and Behrami is much younger.

We will see. But with the transfer market yet to take off, teams are leaving things very late. Pre season friendlies are meant to be used to bed new players in. Well that chance has now gone. I reckon it would be more sensible to say, let's hold our current hand and see how we do between now and January!