Doncaster Rovers chairman John Ryan says he expects Town owner and chairman Marcus Evans to return with new offers for striker Billy Sharp and midfielder James Coppinger. Yesterday, Ryan revealed that his club had rejected bids of £2.3 million for Sharp and £300,000 for Coppinger, the latter a figure he describes as “laughable”.

Ryan has told Town they will be wasting their time if they return with a new proposal: “They did say they would [come back with another offer] but I said to Marcus Evans not to bother. We’re trying to build a team for next season like he’s trying to build a team.

“We want it to be a powerful squad and I reckon Billy Sharp is good for 25 goals a season if he stays fit and James has had the best season of his career and is very optimistic that he can do even better. Even he can weigh in with 10 goals but mainly create the bullets for Billy to fire.”

The Rovers chief says the Blues are well short in their £300,000 valuation of Coppinger, who like Sharp has two years left on his contract: “It’s laughable, isn’t it? It was explained to me that he’s 30 and he’ll be worth nothing at the end of his contract, but that was an easy one to turn down. It wouldn’t have mattered if it was a million, we would still have turned it down.”

Ryan has spoken to both players and says they are in no hurry to move on: “The nice thing is that Billy indicated that he wasn’t really bothered about going and Copps is quite happy to stay as well, which is a big influence because if players want to go it’s very difficult to hang on to them.

“But the situation is that we’ve said there’s no way we would accept these offers and everyone agreed. We’ve told Ipswich that we don’t want to sell, we’re very pleased that you rate our players but as far as we’re concerned we don’t want to sell.

“[Manager] Sean O’Driscoll is trying to build a squad for next season to try and be at the upper end of the league and the last thing we want to do is lose players like Billy and Copps.”

Photo: Action Images

maximoalex added 14:53 - May 15 Oopsy. Had to get that spelling right. Didn't want to get into trouble for it
0

adamisablue added 15:13 - May 15 think im starting to understand where cleggs "we wont be held to ransom" comments came from. think about it, we get a big money owner in (whos acutaly a shrewd bussiness man) and all of the pound signs light up. a player who's worth a million on £5000's and week all of a sudden becomes worth 2 million and £15000's a week. even if the deal is struck, the moneys bags appear in the agents eyes aswell. also, the whole torres/carrol saga has upped the anti on transfer dealings aswell. although clegg and evens have no experince in footballs inner workings, i feel pretty confident they know what they are doing to ensure the stabilty of this club (going into admin by giving out silly contracts will set us back another 10 years) we're going in the right direction, the players we need will come for the right price, you watch!

0

ShefTractor added 17:32 - May 15 I still think our problems lie in the middle of the park; both Priskin AND Scotland are proven scorers at this level in previous teams and you don't lose that ability overnight. Wickham needs someone to work WITH, he's a Rooney-type player who isn't just after the goals, he will thrive off the play and get some assists in there too. Priskin, in my eyes, hasn't seen a fair run in the side - in the same way that Martin hasn't really. We played one up top pretty much all year despite the fact none of our strikers are that kind of player. We have a surplus of midfielders, none of whom really did much for us this year (Norris the exception as he got on the scoresheet a lot) and that's why we didn't score many, because there was NO SUPPLY. Sort the midfield out first, give the strikers a good run and the potential to develop a partnership then surely we'll start to see some improvement.

0

radiogaga added 17:35 - May 15 Churchmans- what an absolute prat. Adding a player to the deal would reduce the emphasis for offering as much money as we are at the moment. They could get in a good striker at the same time as losing a very good one, plus a million squid if neccesary. And no, £2.6m plus a player would not happen. Haven't you seen player and cash transfers happen before??? Players add value to the transfer so that the fees don't have to. And you think Scotland/ Priskin are worth £2.4m between them? Jeez, get a grip. Obviously a very poor deluded soul if he believes Nugent would even consider coming here, since he thinks the PR crowd "has it in for me" in his own words.

0

radiogaga added 17:39 - May 15 And Nugent is out of contract this summer so why would we pay £2million for him anyway???? Tell you what Churchmans, what a plumb you are
0

Tillz9 added 17:44 - May 15 Churchmans , you plumb !!
0

fourth added 18:44 - May 15 He needs to be 6 foot 4 Vicious Creating havoc in the box But with a keen SOH. Pol Pot and his silver hammer is no longer available But Dominic Strauss Kahn is looking around For his pants. If he can't find them, sign him up. Now is the time!
0

churchmans added 19:16 - May 15 RADIOGAGA YOU are the PRAT dont know what you reading i never said anything about scotland/priskin or what there worth and i didnt know that nugent was a free so get your effin facts right son you village idiot........ and maximolex yes i did get out of the wrong side of bed. RADIOGAGA you are the plumb and prat and god i wish i was standing face to face with you now!!! you must of been reading someone elses comments. redkneck kunt

0

dommyboyblue added 19:20 - May 15 Everybody calm down! Were all on the same side and lets hope we get some decent players in over the summer and push in the right direction, we have started off the summer with intent and that is good.
0

churchmans added 19:25 - May 15 your right dommy blue sorry just annoying when people say things you never mentioned. come on town!!!
0

marshallmania added 21:05 - May 15 Dont know about Coppinger, lets stick a cheeky bid in for Danns and Ambrose at Palace. Another 200k will get Sharp!
0

radiogaga added 22:00 - May 15 Alright keyboard warrior, calm it down. I am perfectly entitled to make an opinion on this comments tab. If someone comes on here laying into me and contesting my view, with any facts of their own to hand, they should probably button it a bit. Some of our fans are truly ridiculous. Let's just hope town can pull off a deal for Sharp at least. We'd give anything for a prolific goalscorer up here!

0

radiogaga added 22:01 - May 15 Alright keyboard warrior, calm it down. I am perfectly entitled to make an opinion on this comments tab. If someone comes on here laying into me and contesting my view, with any facts of their own to hand, they should probably button it a bit. Some of our fans are truly ridiculous. Let's just hope town can pull off a deal for Sharp at least. We'd give anything for a prolific goalscorer up here!

0

radiogaga added 22:02 - May 15 *without
0

radiogaga added 22:02 - May 15 *without
0

Keaneish added 23:59 - May 15 Nice idea Marshallmania but without those two Palace have no attacking threat. No chance Freedman is letting them two go.
0

GTRKing added 00:32 - May 16 1st off sharp 2.6ml Coppinger 600k so 3.2ml then if they say no leave it. 1st off we need a solid defense to stop other teams scoring when that done do midfield then do attack and 1 good goalkeeper will do. Also keep some youth players strikers midfield & defense so they can get better. Also get bullard thats then done. Now we thinking 2nd/6th place maybe 1st.
0

Blogs 297 bloggers

Ipswich Town Polls