12 Million for Little Bent - No Way

With Sheffield Wednesday apparently holding on for £3 million, for once in a while we appear to have forced the price to our advantage as 24-year-old Algerian international Madjid Bougherra finally arrives at the Valley for £2.5m. We'll have to wait and see if its money well spent but after the trouble that we've had with the fitness of some of our recent purchases its encouraging that Bougherra, who made his name with French side Gueugnon, has not missed a game this season.

So with Magic Madrij at last on board there's now only three days left to repel any boarders as they try to prise Darren Bent away from us. The independent reported this morning that "West Ham are expected to inquire about Bent but are not believed to be confident that their former manager, Alan Pardew, will sell to them at any price. Pardew has ruled out parting with his captain, who is injured, and West Ham are understood to have blocked a move to The Valley for Teddy Sheringham.
West Ham had planned to bid £12m for Bent. Some sources at Charlton believe they may sell if a club were to table £17m, although no clubs are expected to go that high for the England international. "

With the Hammers remaining one of key rivals, its pretty obvious that it would be madness to sell our biggest asset to them as any price.

Looking ahead to Wednesday's game against Bolton, the statisticans were proved right once again. Any team conceding heavily, as they did last weekend at Middlesbro to the tune of 5-1, usually recovers they say and gets something from the next game. Lucky for us they had to play the Arse yesterday in London and seems they were lucky not to win in a 1-1 draw.

The papers tell us that Bolton were surprisingly firm. And for those of us hoping that Israeli centre-back Tal Ben Haim, who supposedly missed a match with a calf injury, would be on his way out of the Reebok this week and leave a big hole in their defence can think again as the Guardian encouragingly reported "that their centre-halves yesterday gave the impression that they would repel every threat. In the end they could not quite do so but Arsenal know how redoubtable Bolton will be at the Reebok." Roll on Wednesday then.

And it seems that we are not the only London club having problems up in Lancashire, to the Arse the Reebok Stadium has apparently become a torture chamber with only 1 win in their last 8 games against Bolton. The key player yesterday seems to have been our old friend Kevin Davies who apparently was superior in the air and a major influence, "until a blow on the foot needed a painkilling injection and it appeared to limit his leap thereafter." We can only asume that Pards has taken a careful note of which foot we are talking about.

The independent reports that the "bustling presence up front of Bolton's Kevin Davies and the formidable aerial threat he poses were evident as early as the second minute. But, if they ( the Arse) are to reach their fifth final in the last seven attempts, they know that they will have to tame the terror that is Bolton".

Makes our trip into the Forbidden Zone on Wednesday seem like a visit to see a horror movie. But with all midweek Bonus games - as Pards calls it - maybe we'll see a Bolton tired from visiting the Smoke that will take their foot off the pedal, especially Mr Davies, and allow us to sneak a point or three.

The Bolton team, if Pards needs any reminding, was a 4-3-3 formation of: Jussi Jaaskelainen; Nicky Hunt, Abdoulaye Meite, Abdoulaye Diagne-Faye, Ricardo Gardner (Henrik Pedersen); Ivan Campo, Kevin Nolan, Gary Speed; Stelios Giannakopoulos (Ricardo Vaz Te), Nicolas Anelka and Kevin Davies.