Dodged a bullet with Maddison

Last word on the transfer window.

You have to admire Peterborough chairman Darragh MacAntony who issued a video diary today of his open and honest thoughts of the transfer window. You can watch here, and it gets interesting after about 4 minutes as he discusses Marcus Maddison.

Maddison it seems had no interest at all in coming to us. London was a turn off and he initially refused even to meet Bowyer and Gallen. When he did he demanded too much money like he did to Birmingham and another unnamed Championship club.

Charlton agreed a £1.5m fee (to be paid in stages) plus £500k more after he played 50 games and £500k more if we get promoted, plus a sell-on. The Hull move came late on Friday and MacAnthony was happy to wash his hands of him.

The Posh chairman talks very well of Charlton and not well at all of Maddison, who comes across as a real knob. Looks like we dodged a bullet.

Rich Cawley threw light on other potential options as the clock ticked down on Friday.

Lee Bowyer had long admired John Bostock, who after sprinting onto scene with Palace in 2007 as a 15-year old has since played for 12 clubs including those in Canada, France, Belgium and Turkey. He now belongs to Toulouse but came back to Nottingham Forest on loan in August but has hardly played.

Bowyer saw an opportunity to bring the now 28 Bostock to south London, but after passing a medical, he stayed in London on Thursday night but Gallen got radio silence from Toulouse. Forest signed over the papers but it seems the French club simply ignored the requests happy to take Forest’s loan fee instead. You have to feel for Bostock.

Watford’s 20-year Domingos Quina was another Gallen target with West Brom and Fulham also in the hunt, but the Hornets wanted a big loan fee, and he stayed at Vicarage Road. Talking of West Brom, they were happy for us to take 19-year midfielder Rakeem Harper, but wanted Quina to replace him. Seems they also didn’t want to pay a fee for him.

Rangers’ Greg Docherty seemed a cert, but at some point last week Gallen and Bowyer must have moved on. Docherty eventually made a late loan move to Hibernian. I’m not sure what number on the list Matt Smith was, but looks as if that was a late deal after Man City retrieved the youngster from QPR.

Norwich decided against loaning out striker Adam Idah, wanting to keep him to help in their fight against relegation. The Addicks put a bid in for Bristol Rovers’ striker Jonson Clarke-Harris, but that appeared to die on the vine.

The Addicks also had Tottenham striker Troy Parrott on their wanted list but Spurs blocked any move as a UEFA rule would mean a loan exit would stop them being able to name him as a homegrown player in European competition with Spurs through to the last 16 of the Champions League.