I would say it’s the first week in June when so many managers and players are on their holidays (Malky Mackay is in Crete currently), so it’s with no surprise whatsoever that I report that there have been no developments in terms of players arriving or leaving in the last seven days – none that has been released by the club for public consumption anyway.
Truth be told, there’s been little in the way of media gossip and speculation either – ex Everton centre back Joseph Yobo has been linked with City and earlier stories regarding Salomon Kalou and Albert Adomah have been revisited, while the names Dirk Kuyt and Bafetimbi Gomis also tend to crop up on regular basis. Who knows whether there’s any truth in any of these rumours, but, with the exception of Adomah, I’d say what they would all have in common if they came to Cardiff is very big wages (by our standards anyway) – there’s certainly not enough evidence yet to suggest we are going down the QPR route rather than the one favoured by, say, Swansea or Norwich, but, if we are, all I’d say is that the character checks for transfer targets that Malky Mackay has made pretty frequent reference to over the past two years become more important than ever.
There has been news of a new recruit to the backroom staff, with Exeter City announcing on theirofficial site that their Under 18′s coach Kevin Nicholson has been recruited by the club. As can be seen from the article, Nicholson (who was an apprentice at Derby and played for Kidderminster after his release by the Rams) has been given what looks to be an important role at Cardiff and I presume he will work closely with Academy Manager Dick Bate.
Regular readers of this blog (there must be one or two of you out there surely!) will have realised by now that this is not the place to go to if you want “inside info” from Cardiff City (I may have referred to “my sources”once or twice in the past four years, but that would have been as a joke!). However, in my role as Cardiff City researcher for the Football Manager series of games I am, very occasionally, privy to some interesting snippets from within the Researcher community and the word is that Kevin Nicholson seems to be pretty highly regarded. At just 27 he certainly has youth on his side and it’s always struck me that, unless you were a good player whose reputation stays with you for decades, it’s probably best to have someone pretty close to the age of the teenagers they are coaching as opposed to some old codger in their late 30′s or 40′s!
While I’m on the subject of the Football Manager researcher community, there was something else I learned this week that, while hardly earth shattering, is pretty interesting in terms of the strides City are making off the pitch. Apparently, the scouting system at the club is in the process of being upgraded – seemingly we now have a full time scout in Argentina and we’ll soon have one who will work in France and Belgium.
Finally, the petition I mentioned last week asking for a return to a blue kit has got to the 5,000 signature mark and beyond – the group behind it, Bluebirds Unite will be holding their first public meeting at 7.00 on Tuesday evening at the Corporation Hotel on Cowbridge Road.