StarkMallard

I'm glad he didn't join the franchise, and him going to L1 softens the blow somewhat. Sometimes you can improve the team as a unit even when you lose a quality player, and that's what we've got to do.

Great turnout from Notts! Very surreal but cool to see so much black and white in my adopted home. Make no mistake, Darmstadt absolutely murdered us to death in the first half. They just played through us. They looked like a proper team who were ready for the season, we looked like a pub team. They looked like scoring every time they came forward, which was often, and we couldn't handle Hornby at all. But then of course the team we fielded in the first half was essentially a second eleven with some trialists thrown in, plus we're earlier in our pre-season preparations than Darmstadt so they'll naturally look sharper. We were a lot more competitive in the second half, limited the home side to a couple of chances and had one or two ourselves. Reynolds had some good moments. @True Magpie, I think Matt Hall was the goalkeeper in the first half. I don't think either goalkeeper embarrassed himself, but we need an experienced man between the sticks. Overall, a great evening out and a useful workout for the team, but there's clearly some way still to go before we're really ready. By the way, Darmstadt have one of Germany's most cheesy stadium hymns...

This is going to fuel rumours isn't it? Especially the mardy statement by his agent blaming the club. I wouldn't be too quick to blame the club here, the authorities that deal with foreigners here are hopelessly understaffed and it's very conceivable that they wouldn't have got a tourist visa through in a month. But it's still incredibly frustrating for Jatta and the team. We're playing three games in Germany, so he'll miss a significant part of our pre-season preparations. MP won't get to work with him either.

I think I'll wait for the home kit. Surely we're due a good one.

Wedo have plenty of wide players already to be fair. I think a central attacking midfielder, a goalkeeper and at least one striker should be our priorities now.

Nearly a month on and Notts have teased the new away kit. You don't see much, but it's definitely green and it's not plain either. I've always fancied a green away kit. Still nothing on the home kit, but I've noticed the club's graphics on Facebook have started using a background where the white stripes are slightly broader than the black. Maybe a hint?

Our second pre-season game and the first of our European tour is upon us, so as the local boy I thought I'd open a match thread (feel free to merge if another one is scheduled)! Darmstadt will be tough opposition - they're a solid Bundesliga 2 side and are also further along in their preparations than we are. Their new signings include centre half Patric Pfeiffer - rejoining the club after helping them to promotion to the Bundesliga during his last spell, while another man to watch is big striker Fraser Hornby, who came through the youth ranks at Northampton and Everton and has played for Scotland up to under-21 level. Expect them to play an attacking style with a high defensive line. The home side started their pre-season with a 24-0 win against the mighty force that is SV Traisa, and at the weekend they beat Viktoria Aschaffenburg (fourth division) 4-1. As for Notts, it'll be interesting to see which of the Alfreton trialists make the trip and whether there are any new faces. It'll also be Barry Cotter's first appearance in a Notts shirt. It'll be interesting to see how MP intends to play, but realistically it's about getting minutes in legs at this stage. I've no idea whether there will be a live stream yet, but if they do it'll probably be on the Lilies' official YouTube page.

As I didn't see the Alfreton game I can't comment on Sawyers' performance. He's got pedigree alright, but he also hasn't played a lot of football in the last couple of years. I hope he isn't anothe one with a lengthy injury record. Returning to Grant, he's got potential but he wasn't able to make the ball "stick" in advanced positions like Crowley could. He's one of a number of players who could benefit from a full pre-season and surprise us next season though.

@Ash, the talk about his strengths and weaknesses reminds me of when we signed Nemane. He was L2 quality at best in my view, but we could definitely have done with him at times last season. I'm looking forward to seeing Cotter play and making my own mind up!

Interesting reading @TheSkipper, thanks for sharing. Judging by that, his main problem is the stepovers. Barnsley isn't the kind of place that appreciates stepovers. It sounds like he's another wide player whose strengths are going forward rather than defending. I hope we can get the most out of his strengths - maybe he'll be a wizard on the wing for us? He also knows Martin Paterson (and Connor Grant) from Barnsley and seems keen to work with him again. That's a plus as well.

Sounds interesting, seems to split opinion at Barnsley but he played 40 games for them last season. Maybe starting games rather than being a sub will do him good. Hope he's a magical signing!

How absolutely tragic. He got married less than two weeks ago too. My thoughts go out to his family.

What a great message, he's a class act. Hope to see him in football again soon.

What a crazy time that was. It was so obviously dodgy in hindsight, but at the time I was desperate for it to be real but also somehow wholesome and above board. If it had been real, it would have broken my heart to see us turn into the kind of soulless club Man City have become. I wanted us to become a Fulham, to play the big boys but hold on to our identity. All moot now anyway. That's putting it lightly. According to a podcast about the saga, he sat Sven in a restaurant in Qatar or somewhere and arranged for a bloke to come in dressed as the king while all the waiters stood and clapped! It was Ray Trew who ultimately paid for it all. That season could have ended the club, but instead we had a fantastic season with excellent players with our next owner footing the bill. Shame we ultimately squandered it.

I hope you're proven right @Robbie and we can have a good laugh at this thread once the season's over! Selling players on for a profit can be a risky strategy as it puts pressure on the club to recruit equally high-quality replacements for less money. I hope we've got some good irons in the fire.

Interesting post @piedestrian. I agree that Jatta was brought in to replace Langstaff, who everyone knew would be leaving sooner rather than later. I think Jatta's form tailed off because he was overplayed and we had no alternative to him, but that's a separate issue. I don't think we replaced Crowley adequately, but maybe Jarvis or Grant can step up after a full pre-season. However, the Bass sale is a bit different. By the board's admission the offer came out of the blue, so now we're suddenly looking for a new number 1. It clearly won't be Griff, but we'd do well to get an upgrade on Bass. We have started pre-season training with one striker and no senior goalkeeper and an awful lot of work to do. Talk of asset stripping is way OTT though. The club is a long way short of breaking even and is dependent on yearly funding from the owners. If they wanted to cut their losses, they'd sell up.

A couple of hours after my last post here I suddenly came round to @ARLukomski's thinking. As I said yesterday, we'll have to see what rabbits RG can pull out of the hat but I'm not feeling very confident so far. And now we've sold the best keeper in the league and are suddenly looking for a replacement just when teams are reporting back for pre-season training. This doesn't look like the carefully planned recruitment that was sold to us. Also, signing players is never an exact science, sometimes players just don't settle at the club. The more gaps we have to plug, the more likely it becomes.

That's a good tip @Piethagoram! I'd never heard of Tranzer before but it's a good idea. Deutsche Bahn should really offer one-month tickets but there you go. For anyone else who's got a Deutschlandticket subscription (so pretty much anything apart from Tranzer), just remember to cancel before we play Darmstadt and you're good to go. The ticket is then still valid for July. I should have mentioned the Quer durchs Land ticket, which can really pay off of you're in a group, but it's only valid for a day.

In struggling with the heat too - yesterday it was 35, today it'll be 36 and tomorrow it'll be 38. It's still 26 or 27 outside when I go to bed. We've got shutters outside our windows, so that helps keep the heat off a bit, but the evenings are still uncomfortable. Luckily it'll be cooler from Thursday onwards (cooler being the high 20s). I hate these conditions. It's OK when you're on holiday with a pool and an air conditioned room, but it's crap if you actually have to do stuff. I much prefer autumn.

I can sympathise, I've also been messed about with holiday requests in the past (which is even more annoying when you've got flights to book). But I can recommend visiting this corner of Germany even without football, there are some beautiful places here. It's nice to be able to drink beer in the stands, but many clubs only serve light beer (2.5%) inside the stadium. I can't remember whether Darmstadt are one of them.

Reading the story again, it looks like we're aiming to recruit a replacement for Alex Bass and then a further goalkeeper later in the window. Looks like Griffiths is considered one for the future then. I'm still not happy. It opens up another completely unnecessary gap in the squad.

Here I am trying to be Mr Balanced, meanwhile the club sells the best goalkeeper we've had since Bart and replaces him with a youngster without a single senior appearance to his name! Absolutely crazy. And then Gagliardi talks about having competition. Good luck at our club Harry, and remember the disappointment at this decision is no reflection on you.

That's a good signing for them. He didn't always catch the eye for us, but we looked a better side with him in the team.

Some interesting points in this thread. I don't know whether Paterson was truly the first choice (although he may have been first choice following the interviews). From the board's point of view, RG is chiefly responsible for assembling the squad while the head coach's duties don't start until the players report in for pre-season training, so there was no rush. However, I wonder if our lack of a head coach caused us to miss out on transfer targets. If I were a player, I'd ideally want to know who's going to coach me. So that bugs me. We have some serious quality to replace and we haven't done it yet. However, there's a month to go and what truly matters is the squad we have in August. I'm a bit nervous too but it's too early to write MP and RG off. Regarding coaches, coaching players who played in a different position to you is part of the job. Our last three head coaches didn't even play professionally. A lot of talk about coaches from fans is just conjecture because from the outside you just don't know. There are former players unable to elicit more than a grunt, and there are people who never played at all who have excellent tactical knowledge. What matters is what happens on the pitch, and we haven't kicked a ball yet.

Playing really well too, but we've missed some good chances to double our lead. We know how this ends. Germany's coach looks like a cross between Like Williams and Pierluigu Collini! PS GOAL!