Pompey out of their minds?

Has Portsmouth boss Harry Redknapp got a screw loose? He’s always been, shall we say, eccentric, but selling a player after just a month and a handful of games would be a new record of some kind, surely. It’s always been managers who have traditionally seen short stays at a club but this time it could be a player as the club has admitted David Nugent is on the block with Derby County interested as they attempt to sign Nicolas Anelka from Bolton before the transfer window closes.

Nugent was signed from Preston during the summer and scored his first goal for the club in a Carling Cup win against woeful Leeds United. Selling him to Preston would link the player back up with his former manager Billy Davies.

"Sometimes when you are trying to raise money you have to sell someone you don't really want to sell. That could be David but it could be others. What we need is somebody who can get us 15 to 20 goals a season and if we can do some good business and improve the team we will." –Redknapp

Sorry, ‘arry, but this would not be an example of good business. First off, what message do you send to future young players you want to sign? Second, Pompey don’t seem lacking in goal scoring, 6 goals in their first 4 games is as good as anyone else in the Premiership. Their problem is that they have leaked 5. They should have never conceded in the 84th minute against Derby and if they didn’t, would be sitting on 7 points and a spot in the top 5.

If you sign a young player, he deserves a chance. Nugent is not some girl at a bar you toss off because a cuter one walks by. Harry Redknapp, for all of his ability to make a great deal would become nothing more than a cut-throat shark in my mind. I gave him a pass on his come-go-return to Pompey a few seasons ago when he left for and then left Southampton, but it would change my view on that. Redknapp would become no more than another opportunist in a world already full of them.