I saw my mate again tonight who has given me some ITK information lately, here is a few bits he said tonight (Tuesday) as he is seeing the Albion fella on a weekly basis.
Foster left for playing and money reasons, and not training was nothing to do with personal stuff, he just didnt want to risk getting injured and wasnt happy with the club.
Apparently he wanted to move as soon as it was confirmed we were down, however he wanted somewhere where he could commute daily and also where he was number 1 which ruled out the likes of Man United and Liverpool who had expressed interest in going as a backup.
He felt he had a couple of years playing left in him top flight but would of stayed at Albion rather than go and be a number 2 somewhere else, however Albion said they were looking to sign a new keeper and he could go once they had one in, apparently that rubbed Foster up the wrong way (along with he didnt like his mates being released) as he wanted the reassurance that if no club came in for him to be the number 1, he could stay at the Albion, The club were having none of it and needed to plan forward (and rightly so in my book)
By all accounts he is also on a lot more money at Watford than he has ever been at Albion and a quite a few of the players were quite shocked he made those comments about wanting to stay, etc as they knew he was looking at moving on.
Also Big Dave has had a major cull of backroom staff over the last couple of weeks, a lot of analysts, sports science people, etc have gone, apparently although he felt they were good at their jobs, over the last few years we have taken on more and more in these roles and he felt that we were heavily over stocked and they wasnt needed and he could use the budget elsewhere.
Dawson had indicated he was happy to stay but has been got at and knows he can earn a lot more money elsewhere and has had a change of heart, i didnt get chance to ask about his portugal no show.
Also Big Dave spoke with Chadli before the world cup and got the impression Chadli wasnt looked to kick up a fuss and seemed happy to stay, apparently Big Dave regarded this as a major coup but with the world cup Chadli has had he now accepts he will move on.
Nothing to do with budget stuff but Big Dave really wants more of the youngsters involved in the first team and is putting a big emphasis on that rather than wanting to sign a whole new squad, it seems if he could keep most of the squad as it is right now, with a couple of additions to replace Dawson and McClean he would be more than happy.
However the problem lies with the likes of Chadli, Livermore, Phillips, Rodriguez, Rondon, Hegazi, if they go they will be replaced but if none of those go then we will probably only be signing a couple more players to replace Dawson and McClean.
Again as per previous not that much revolutionary info and it could all be rubbish but what been told so far seems to of happened so assume its pretty on the ball.