Bolanos, the new Pele?

The only first hand review I've heard from the New Zealand game was that we should have scored 4 or 5, played well in patches but abysmally in others; and that the pony tailed trialist Christian Bolanos put in an excellent account of himself. That and the fact that Marcus Bent missed a couple of sitters aswell.

The usually reliable soccerbase has next to no information about the Costa Rican, but I did manage to find a decent article about him on the Guardian's website, which was written back in December 2005. David Pleat claimed:

"A trip to Japan for the Club World Championship allowed me to keep an eye open for foreign players who might make it in the Premiership, and this Costa Rican winger impressed me. I predict he will find a new home for his talents in England or continental Europe after the World Cup"

The rest of the article is here and it's worth a quick read, even if Pleat does make him sound like the second coming of Pele! Still, he surely isn't going to cost too much and his wages aren't going to be a problem when you consider that he only earns £70,000 a year at present.
It looks like he might not be the only player we add to our ranks this week either. BBC Football holds a quote from Glenn Roeder claiming that Newcastle have finally granted permission for 29 year old Amdy Faye to discuss personal terms, and the much talked about transfer of Djimi Traore is allegedly also on the brinks of completion.

Dowie said earlier this week that he was after 5 new faces before next weekend, but then claimed that three of the right quality would do. Whether Traore is the right quality or not will certainly be a subject for debate if we sign him, but he's managed to amass 140 appearances for the five time European Champions, and remained in their squad for 7 years whilst the more talked about names have come and gone. We'll have to reserve judgement until we can see for ourselves.