The club has just announced that we have reached an agreement with Southend United to convert Ryan Hall’s loand deal into a permanent transfer, which will be rubber-stamped as soon as the window opens in five days time.

24-year-old Hall joined on loan from Southend earlier in the season, but has only made five appearances so far. It’s a bit of a surprise that Neil Warnock has made him the first permanent signing, as he obviously prefers Jerome Thomas on the left flank, but maybe this move indicates that WBA are unwilling to sell Thomas to us permanently.

Leeds and Southend have agreed an undisclosed fee for Hall, who has signed a two-and-a-half-year deal at Elland Road. Warnock told the official website: "When we brought Ryan in I said 'I believe he is a player with potential for a big future.'

"I'm sure during the length of his contract Ryan will have the opportunity to establish himself at this level, and you can see that from his contribution at Huddersfield a few weeks ago. It's not just experienced players we are looking for to add to the squad, and if we feel there are youngsters like him available at the right prices we will look to the future as well."

This talk of a promising youngster seems a bit odd for a player who will be 25 in January, especially when Warnock offloaded the player earlier in his career when he was manager of Crystal Palace. I wish him well in his time at Leeds, but given that he’s not currently our top choice for the first team, I think we may need players of a higher quality to boost our promotion challenge.

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