Peter O'Rourke says

he’s a funny player is Philips. Anonymous for yonks but then premier league finishing, premier league assisting.

I think he will continue to get good stats in the championship hence why I think the figure needs to be towards 5, not 2m

 

im not actually saying that though am I??
Im saying he brings the same positives that hignett did to our team.

once again im slightly mental thanks.

 

Be uproar if he went for that mate and you know it ha

 

He’s not been great though this season, I’ve defended him in the past but he does go missing.
We never hold out for big fees( Kitching being the exception),always seem to let em go cheaply.

 

This is just completely wrong of this board. We do hold out. We turned down God knows how many bids for Styles until we got we wanted, we even said to him if he wanted to go on loan, he'd have to extend his contract so we wouldn't lose value. Kitching we got unbelievable money for. Mads Andersen, 1 year left on contract, loads of money for him.

Cole, Kane, Williams & Cadden - we could have sold them all, especially Kane, Williams & certainly Cole in January when he was on fire, in January, but we didn't, because we wanted promotion instead. There's no chance you can accuse this board of selling cheaply.

 

I dont see Preston paying Kitching sized fees for our players, Swansea a bit more likely when they were in or sniffing around the Prem, but they seem to have bottomed out.

If he goes it’ll probably be the good old ‘undisclosed’

I like Phillips, but no one knows if he’s regular championship quality. Obvious that he scores and assists some great goals, and a lot of that is down to his ability to find space and read play. Can he do it at a higher level? Would he be expected to be more involved generally at a higher level?

 

Hignett did significantly more off the ball, with the ball and pretty much everything else than Phillips.

There’s absolutely no comparison.

 

The board have the opportunity to lay down a marker here no rush to sell so we should be quoting clubs silly money and see if the want to put their money were their mouth is. If they really want him make the buggers sweat. It's better to start with £10 million and get £7.5 million than start at £5 million and get £3 million. If they want the player make em pay if they won't we have a good player until at least the summer.

 

Agree 100%. I like Phillips, he’s been a very good player for us but Hignett was a different level altogether. We were playing at the top end of the Championship then and Hignett was our stand out player. He’s rightly a club legend.

 

I always feel he's caught between 2 positions, he's not quite a 10 and I don't think his game is typical CM breaking up play strong in the tackle etc despite him playing there, somewhere in between with a knack of getting into good positions

 

Issue is we'd get nowhere near 10/7/5m I hear what you are saying and ideally yes, but, it's January and transfer fee deals, even in the summer are down in comparison to a few years ago.
The owners may look at the defecit we face every summer and an offer of 2-2.5m would do it and probably give DC a few more options in who we can bring in up top and replace Phillips probably with a loan deal, that's reality of the situation and where we are financially.
We just aren't unfortunately in a position to turn down offers of 2m etc, clubs see that and won't have there hand forced.

 

Hignett is the most ‘talented’ player I’ve seen play for us. I’d been watching 10 years before he arrived. It’s over 20 years since he was here. That’s how good he was, to me. A truly gifted individual. I’ve not seen anyone similar here. And he didn’t really have a set position.

Phillips is also a pretty unique player. He doesn’t play centre mid and he’s not a winger. It’s somewhere in between. His movement off the ball is incredible, some of his passing is as good as I’ve seen. And in the last two seasons (league games only) he’s made 17 (22/23 season) and 18 goal contributions (23/24 season). He’s already on 12 this season. That’s 27 goals and 20 assists. There’s a handful more if you include cup games. In just over a hundred games. Under three different coaches. Unbelievable consistency regardless of conditions or teammates.

A nominal fee from Morecambe. Still only 26. Two and half years on his deal remaining. If Carlsberg did recruitment…

PS - I love Phillips, but I wouldn’t put him anywhere near Hignett. I wouldn’t have O’Connell, Hourihane, Howard, Mowatt or Butterfield anywhere near either, even though they were all my favourites at their respective times here. Only Redfearn defeats him. The best all-round player I’ve ever seen. Goals, assists, tackles, leadership, the lot. There should be a Redders statue at Oakwell, with a Danny Wilson and Eric Winstanley one either side.

F****** hell, I don’t half bang on.

 

Considering the stick he gets on here at times, those numbers still baffle me. Absolutely incredible numbers for any league from his position.