Derby County have emerged as the new favourites to sign Blues striker Martyn Waghorn having matched Boro’s offer for the 28-year-old in a dramatic late twist to the long-running transfer saga.

Earlier this morning the Teessiders, long-time admirers of Waghorn, had an offer accepted by the Blues, which TWTD can confirm is an initial £5 million. Speaking last night, manager Paul Hurst admitted Town would have to accept a fee below their valuation.

Now, the Daily Telegraph is reporting that Derby, who have been Boro’s main rivals for Waghorn for the last few weeks, have matched that bid and last season’s 16-goal top scorer is set to undergo a medical at Pride Park tomorrow.

As with the Boro offer, the deal is likely to include top-up clauses which would eventually boost that figure, probably up towards the £8 million overall total previously reported.

Derby have matched Middlesbrough’s £5m bid for Ipswich striker Martyn Waghorn and are now favourites. Poised for medical tomorrow #dcfc #itfc– John Percy (@JPercyTelegraph) August 5, 2018

Meanwhile, Sheffield United reportedly still haven’t given up hope of landing Waghorn themselves.

According to the Sheffield Star, the Blades are looking into “restructuring” their bid, which was believed to have been a little below £5 million.

However, the Blades, who made that offer more than a month ago, appear to have missed the boat.

TWTD was first to reveal Derby's interest in Waghorn early last month with their first bid coming almost a fortnight ago.

The Rams had looked the favourites to land the former Leicester, Sunderland and Wigan man until the middle of last week but their plans were believed to have suffered a blow when Matej Vydra's sale to Leeds fell through.

That was understood to be a deal they needed to complete if they were to sign Waghorn in order to stay within Financial Fair Play limits. However, it was subsequently reported that that was a red herring, something which now appears to have been confirmed by the Rams' new offer.

Waghorn cost the Blues only £250,000 when he joined from Rangers last August. The Ibrox club will receive 10 per cent of the profit Town make on that deal.

The Blues will use the cash from Waghorn's sale to make additions to their squad before Thursday's deadline with Shrewsbury pair Toto Nsiala and Jon Nolan expected to confirm their moves on Monday.

The Blues are also chasing Blackpool centre-half Curtis Tilt, who was left out of the Seasiders' team yesterday, and Accrington striker Kayden Jackson, while Cardiff's Omar Bogle, another frontman, is a loan target.

Meanwhile, former Blues winger Mustapha Carayol joined Kevin Bru at Apollon Limassol on Friday. Like Bru, Carayol, 29, was released by Town at the end of last season.

Photo: Pagepix

Taricco_Fan added 21:41 - Aug 5 Tell them whoever pays £7m in full gets the player, no top-up clauses.
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BtreeBlueBlood added 21:48 - Aug 5 Flint a defender went to boro for 7mil Waggy top scorer high assists - lower???
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Europablue added 21:48 - Aug 5 Wooly Those academy sales were basically against our will, basically the big clubs are preying on the clubs in the lower divisions. They should be forced to play those players, or risk losing them to the original club.
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raycrawfordswig added 21:49 - Aug 5 Yawn bored now
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Sporall added 21:49 - Aug 5 2000% profit in 12 months isn't enough for some of you? Really??
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chicoazul added 21:50 - Aug 5 5m is an absolutely ridiculous fee. Hurst must really hate Waghorn's guts. To contextualise it it's 2m less than Leeds just signed Bamford for, a player who has scored 12 goals in the last 3 seasons. Marcus Evans continues to be a disastrous Owner of our club and we can only hope Hurst will somehow finagle some money out of him to buy all the League 1 players he is interested in.

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cressi added 21:50 - Aug 5 A player is only worth what a club is prepared to pay like a house.Hurst wants a rebuild so here goes I said a week ago 2 out .Five in it could be more. .Let's see where we are Thursday.
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chicoazul added 21:51 - Aug 5 Wow yeah Sporall you're right we should all care more about ROI on players than if they are any good or not.
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mark24 added 21:54 - Aug 5 Don't know why we are struggling on deals so much as we had the Webster money plus all the wages saved from the players realeased why we can't make them pay the going rate for our players
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ztaylor005 added 22:04 - Aug 5 Ffs I think clubs know we're a soft touch when it comes to negotiating. How come we've accepted under our valuation for Waggy, yet we've had to meet everyone else's (Shrewsbury and Blackpool)... if we fork out +2m for Jackson then it's all a bit desperate IMO. That said I am excited for Nolan, Nsiala and hopefully Tilt
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GiveusaWave added 22:13 - Aug 5 This isn't great news...we now lost our two best outfield players (Webster and Waghorn) during this transfer window... The only small light is that this money should help a few other transfers cross the line. Small light indeed...because right now it's difficult to see who is going to be our 16-20 goal striker this season. Harrison? Might make a few but nowhere near. Sears? No. Garner? Wouldn't surprise me if he leaves now also? Morris or Folami? Nowhere near. The guy from Accrington Stanley (if we sig him) managed that amount in League 2 but at Championship level? (We all saw how Moore scored for fun in league 1 then struggled in the championship). She many our talking about how this is an exciting time for our club...sorry, but just can't see it.

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GiveusaWave added 22:15 - Aug 5 Sorry about the typos above ...typing on a phone....
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Cloddyseedbed added 22:15 - Aug 5 Am I the only one who's not excited by Nsiala? I was not impressed by him in the play off final one bit. Seemed outclassed in the league below us.
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toxtethblue added 22:15 - Aug 5 2000% profit in 12 months isn't enough for some of you? Really?? What we paid for him is irrelevant, it's what he's worth now that matters!! Club's fighting over him and rather than play hard ball we roll over and accept 5m a second time!! Pathetic
4

ArnieM added 22:27 - Aug 5 Question: If Town have two , maybe three Clubs in competition for Waghorn's signature WHY that hell are we accepting a fee below our valuation ?????
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itfcbam added 22:29 - Aug 5 Some very nieve. Waggy's agent will be the one with all the details of the bids, I bet he has therefore today has gone to Derby today saying Ipswich have accepted this offer, therefore if you match it I will make sure my client comes to you. (He will probably get a better deal, alledigy) Anyone that doesn't think that sort of conversation has gone on is very more.
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ricardo55555 added 22:30 - Aug 5 When have we ever sold our best striker at the end of a window then had a bad season before?
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jas0999 added 22:32 - Aug 5 So, Shrewsbury won't budge on their valuation. Neither will Blackpool for Tilt. Yet, Evans buckles. Bitterly disappointing, yet, not surprising.
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soclopath added 22:40 - Aug 5 Our response to Derby should have been "Sorry too late" but perhaps the player has been given the choice.Or are wages and add ons preferable to All parties concerned.
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Lathers added 22:46 - Aug 5 We sold Webster for £3.5m, shifted DMs high wages off the books and have only spent £1.5m on Williams and Harrison so far, with another £750k on Donacien. We are spending £2m on the Shrewsbury pair, so that takes us to £4.25m not much over the Webster fee. Do we really need to sell Waggy? So ME won't stump up the cash to bring in Tilt for £1m and fund the loan signing of another striker unless we bring in another £5m... and he wonders why he's never got close to taking us to the Prem in 10 attempts.

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BcarefulwhatUWish4 added 22:48 - Aug 5 So. Norwich sell Maddison for what he's worth. Shrewsbury refuse to budge on their valuation. Blackpool won't negotiate on Tilt. Accrington won't shift in their valuation of Kayden Jackson. But we give in. Nor surprising really. Going to be a huge battle against relegation ahead. Need to watch results from Hull, Millwall, Reading, Blackburn, Rotherham and Bolton with avid interest this season. It'll be more about them not winning than us winning.

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TimmyH added 22:52 - Aug 5 So what happened to all this talk about 'Martyn going back home' and 'he'll be happy' - now suddenly (as if this saga hasn't gone on long enough) another dramatic twist as Derby come in for him again, surely Martyn would rather go to Boro? As stated though £5M...!?! might as well stay here for that amount.
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TimmyH added 22:54 - Aug 5 Cost us around 900K last year...let's get that straight, not sure where people are getting that 200k figure from?
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bedsitfc added 22:58 - Aug 5 Oh maybe Marcus wants to sell him for less so he can claim some sort of tax loss. Lol See if Marcus was such a money grabber that some on here claim surely he would hold out for more!!!!!
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FrankMarshall added 23:01 - Aug 5 Hurst wants to get some new signings in, simple as. To do that, needs the funds. Hurst made it clear from the start that there were some players in the squad who were rated by the club but he just couldn't see it. To build a team, he needs players that he rates. In Hurst We Trust.
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