Town boss Paul Jewell says he’s trying to spend the money the club received for striker Connor Wickham but at the moment no one seems to want to take it. The Blues received an initial fee of £8.1 million, rising to more than £12 million after various clauses are triggered, for the England U21 international, cash the Blues manager says he has been trying to use to strengthen his squad.
Jewell has in particular targeted central defenders but with Premier League clubs keen to wait until they know the look of their squads at the end of the transfer window, his search goes on, although he says deals such as the two mystery offers revealed yesterday could potentially happen at a later date: "It’s not as if we’re not trying to spend that money, those bids have been made and we’ve tried to do that business as quietly and correctly as possible and they haven’t come out.
"Whether something will happen later on, I don’t know. It’s not as if the money from Connor has gone in the bank or into the owner’s pocket and he’s said we’re not spending it.”
The Blues boss says that although he’s got funds to spend, he’s not got the levels of cash of some Championship clubs: "Leicester spent £5 million on a centre-half [Matthew Mills] who was on the bench the other night. That’s what we’re up against, that’s the league we’re in.
"We haven’t got [that kind of] money. Sometimes you have to be careful what you wish for. This is a great club which will move in the right direction eventually, albeit a bit slower than we’d like.
"We have bid for players, both from the Championship and the Premier League. But there is a lack of quality centre-halves about, every manager is looking for them. I spoke to [Southampton manager] Nigel Adkins and they are looking to improve in that department and they’re top of the league. It’s really, really difficult and frustrating.”
But Jewell warns that splashing large sums doesn’t necessarily get a club into the Premier League: "There is no guarantee when you spend money, it does help, it does give you an advantage. We would have liked to have taken Matthew Mills but he went to Leicester over Wolves, a Premier League club.
"We tried to get Sean St Ledger, so there are a couple of players at Leicester we were in the market for and we can’t compete with that sort of money.
"We spoke to West Brom about Pablo Ibáñez and we’d like to take him, but there are a few clubs in for him, so we end up getting into a bit of an auction — this club have offered this, so what are you going to offer? It’s very frustrating.
"We bid £3 million for Jay Rodriguez at Burnley earlier in the summer and I think Southampton have gone in for him and that’s been turned down. As I say, we have tried to spend the money.”
The Town manager says he has targeted players overseas but similarly with no luck: "We have looked abroad and again we haven’t been successful. We went for a lad at Copenhagen but they wouldn’t sell him.
"We’ve exhausted the market, although there are players who might possibly come in [when the window shuts] and if I were a Premier League manager I’d want to see exactly what I’d got before I let people go, I fully understand that. But that’s the frustrating part of the window.”
TWTD’s Danish football expert sees no obvious targets in the FC Copenhagen squad, while Jewell confirmed that there has been contact with former Reading and Stoke man Ibrahima Sonko.
The Blues boss joked: "His agent keeps on ringing and he keeps tweeting, so I’ve tweeted him back a ‘maybe’! He’s been training at Reading I think, and it’s something we might have a look at.
"We’ve got lots of things going on and what’s really frustrating because it’s often a case that if that one thing happens, then another will happen. It’s really frustrating.”
It’s not all been doom and gloom on the transfer front though with eight permanent and loan signings having come in. Jewell believes one of them is the bargain of the summer and that other new additions are already showing their worth: "I’m the type of manager who if I think that it’s right to spend, I will. I think we’ve got the deal of the season in getting Michael Chopra for £1 million.
"Aaron Cresswell’s come in and I bet people weren’t jumping up and down when we signed Cressy but he’s shown in the short period of time since he’s been here that he can develop into a good player.
"I think we’ve got other players who will come to the fore as well, a bit of youth, a bit of experience, but it’s going to take time for the team to settle down.”