£1 million for Scott Flinders?

I doubt it like. Yorkie Post think possibility. also, Kell, best passer at the club, going out on loan:

Chelsea trial for Barnsley teenager
Ian Appleyard
BARNSLEY goalkeeper Scott Flinders could be joining Premiership champions Chelsea in a £1m move.
The England Under-20 international is spending the week on trial at Stamford Bridge. If the Rotherham-born youngster impresses it could bring a sizeable cash windfall for League One Barnsley.
Flinders, 19, made his first-team debut for Barnsley 10 months ago after graduating from the club's Academy.
Although currently playing second fiddle to Republic of Ireland international Nick Colgan, Flinders has been tipped for a big future by manager Andy Ritchie.
Ritchie said: "He has got real stature and is a quick learner and while I would be loathe to lose any player of his quality, it would also be wrong to stand in his way if a club like Chelsea is interested."
Leeds United may also be losing highly-rated youngsters to Chelsea. Dan Rose, Michael Woods and Tom Taiwo, all aged 16, have been offered professional contracts at Elland Road, but are stalling amid rumours of interest from Stamford Bridge.
Ritchie, who had a spell in charge of the Leeds Academy before moving to Oakwell two years ago, said: "Both Barnsley and Leeds have benefited immensely from having good youth set-ups. We now have a large number of Academy players in our first team and players like Rory Fallon, Dave Mulligan and Ricky Ravenhill have gone on to play elsewhere."
Ritchie travelled to Belfast last night to check on Northern Ireland international striker Peter Thompson. The 21-year-old postman plays for Irish part-timers Linfield.
Ritchie has offered over £100,000 for Bradford City striker Dean Windass, but the player is unlikely to be leaving Valley Parade for anything less than double that amount.
Scarborough's teenage striker Michael Coulson has joined Barnsley on trial while striker Nathan Jarman is leaving on a temporary basis to gain more first-team experience on loan at Bury.
Barnsley will extend the contract of summer signing Richard Kell until the end of the season, but will allow the former Scnuthorpe United midfield player to go out on loan as part of his rehabilitation from a serious leg injury.

 

If we can get £1 million for him, fantastic. I doubt it though. A deal might add up to that if he plays 100 first team games, gets into the full England side and conquers Macedonia using only a 2B pencil and a flipchart.

 

Amazing..

Good enough for Chelsea, but not good enough to be our first choice...

 

Colgan has been outstanding

dribbling to the edge of the box aside, he's probably our most improved player this season, and absolutely deserves his place in the side. Flinders has some learning to do, he's a fantastic prospect, but we need players now not in 2 or 3 years. Chelsea can afford to wait for him to mature, we need to get out of this pub league before we can start thinking about building a football side. priorities = Windass.

 

I agree..but why then..

have we not already signed the experienced campaigners we need and all we hear is "we've got young lads, they will get better"...when in fact many of them won't

 

RE: Amazing..

Chelsea wouldn't be throwing him straight into the first team

 

Understandably not..

just ironic that he may be good enough for them, but not given a chance this season regardless of Colgan's "form"

 

RE: Understandably not..

Agreed.</p>

I find it difficult to come to terms with the fact that the nation's top Premiership outfit is even interested in the second choice goalkeeper of a modest League One side.</p>

If that's the case then;</p>

1) We need to nurture and hang on to Colgan, as he is obviously something special and</p>

2) If Chelsea really DO want Flinders, then we should demand a lot for him.</p>

 

That justifies having an Academy then.

I know from my contacts within the game that the England coaches rate him as a good prospect. He could only get better with a Premiership club with their coaching resourses.

I will still be gutted to see him go but you can't hold him back.

 

RE: Understandably not..

It's the way the game is going and has been for a while.

The big sides see a young player with potential, but perhaps not yet ready for a break through into first team football, and snap them up for a lot less than if they'd had that first team experience. Then they send them out on loan for a few seasons to get that experience. Then they end up playing for Birmingham (Jermaine Pennant).
The smaller clubs lose out cause they don't have the player for a few years like they used to have and don't get the massive sum for them either but get a fee that they cannot possibly turn down.

Why should the rich clubs like Chelsea have a youth system when they can just cherry pick upcoming players from the small clubs?

 

The diary of the transfer of Richard Kell

June 2005 Sign him with a broken leg
November 2005 Extend his contract to February 2006
January 2006 Makes his one and only first team start for Barnsley
January 2006 Extend his contract to June 2006
January 2006 Send him out on loan
June 2006 Release him

"Best player at the club"

 

RE: Understandably not..

Correct.
I seem to remember Leeds looking at Jonny Parkin a few years back.
The big clubs obviously see that Flinders (like Parkin) has all the attributes. Height, build, technique and they can work on the rest.
They can't lose really, a player such as Flinders wont break the bank and could potentially turn out to be a bit special.

 

It's well within our rights to turn a bid down from Chelsea

 

Also, its far from being a coincidence that...

the only player that is worth owt from the Academy (at the minute) is the only one we have a proper coach for, rather than a physio who will do it cheaply

 

Also, its far from being a coincidence that...

the only player that is worth owt from the Academy (at the minute) is the only one we have a proper coach for, rather than a physio who will do it cheaply

 

RE: It's well within our rights to turn a bid down from Chelsea

But if we were offered £1m (even including incentives) could we really afford to turn that down?
Also, you risk upsetting the player resulting in low morale and a player who doesn't want to be here.

At least we are in a situation where we could refuse Chelsea, unlike the situation with Southampton and Wolcott, as he could just walk out of his contract as a 16 year old.

 

That could all be said if we received a bid for any player

Would I sell him for a £million?
That would depend on whether or not he wanted to go. If he did, then I probably would. At this moment in time Colgan is the more reliable 'keeper, so it wouldn't be like we were losing an essential part of the first team. However, I'd want a decent chunk of that money up front and I'd want it now. A few hundred thousand would allow us to bring in the players to secure promotion. I don't know the exact value of promotion to Barnsley, but I'm willing to bet it's a lot more than £1 million, so in effect the money we received from Flinders' transfer would be much greater.

Of course, we could sell him and use the money to repay debts or buy a bunch of no hopers that would just burden the club with high wages with little reward on the pitch.

 

does this explain....

the sudden appearance of money,

ie 140K bid for windy
and the fact that we also paid our 50K a few weeks back

and that we are supposedly looking at quite a few players, maybe this 1Million has been "in the bag" for a number of weeks?

but then again thats just me talking and I could be way off...

 

We are all assuming Scott will be leaving so

Why not accept money from Chelsea but say we want him on loan for the rest of this season and next?
ff ff ff

 

why not...

every other club seems to do that.

but then again, why would he come back to a club he never gets a game for..

I find this one hard to comment about, as he is a massive talent and prob the brightest since Dave Watson, but 1 M squids is too good to turn down (if true)