He was on 5Live (in September I think) and he made the point that it is the way of the world. In his advertising days they would work on a project for months but it would be a mad rush right through the night on the final day. Football is no different particularly as clubs like Palace tend to have to wait until some of the bigger moves take place

Only other clubs do deals earlier, whereas we make the mistake of leaving positions with 1 squad member in till the last minute. It changes when the manager makes it change.

COYP

Funnily enough, when I was bemoaning the whole Benteke transfer saga a scout I know said that we are in the toughest place to be transfer wise. If we were looking at unproven and, to a degree, unknown talent like the newly promoted clubs or those on a very small budget then we'd get most business done early doors. The same applies at the top end of the market albeit the prices become highly inflated e.g. Van Dijk.

Where we at is in that middle ground where we are looking at back up players from the big boys or relatively known ones from across Europe. If we put an acceptable bid in their agents will often simply go around the rest of the Clubs in a similar situation & try to squeeze every last £ for their client (& themselves, of course). If nobody bites then we might get our man but if they do then it's either a bidding war or we lose out - either way it protracts the whole thing.

I do wonder whether it would be worth putting a short time limit on any bid/offer we put in, say, sign in 48 hours or we move on to our next target...

Will this be five? It's gonna be five! It IS five!

You're clueless.

COYP

All negotiations depend on leverage.

If you don't have much, you won't get a good deal.

If you don't have a decent player in a position you will nearly always have to pay an inflated fee as everyone knows you are desperate (eg Carroll to Liverpool for £35m).

Liverpool didn't particularly need Benteke and Sakho but didn't need to sell either. They would wait to hope we panic and pay an outrageous price. Particularly, when there is a chance of the buyer being out bid.

When the clock looks like it's about to run out, they might start to think they would prefer £25m in the bank to a bit part player costing them £500k a month. That might stop them trying to bleed the buying club dry. By then it's unlikely another buyer will come in and you will have at least some leverage.

There's always a risk to the seller that if they wait the buyer might go elsewhere, but the market is pretty transparent with regards to what players are attainable - so that doesn't put the buyer in a much better position.

I don't think Benteke was carried over the threshold early in proceedings. In fact, the only times I can recollect us getting the January transfer business done reasonably early was last year and before under Pulis' reign.

Denial is not just a river in Egypt