Gestade Deal Highly Unusual For Cardiff City

Cardiff City have agreed a deal for powerful French striker Rudy Gestade to join after the youngster impressed while on trial with the Bluebirds - scoring the winner in a 1-0 tour victory over Charlton Athletic. The deal has yet to be formally confirmed on the CCFC website, but terms are agreed and the medical has already taken place and an announcement is expected shortly.

Malky Mackay has only been with the club a matter of weeks, and has already broken with tradition somewhat in signing up a triallist ! The Dave Jones era saw City offer trials to numerous out-of-contract players, though this often turned out to be only to bulk up the squad numbers for training and pre-season tours! The vast majority were then released without being offered a contract.

Wilson Oruma (twice voted 'African footballer-of-the-year!'), Vincent Pericard, Julian Gray and Maros Klimpl are just a few of those who trained with City, and were spoken about by Dave Jones - only to be leave.

Left-back Steven Smith, formerly of Rangers was another prospect - especially since we desperately needed cover in that position while there are obvious comparisons between Gestade and Czech U21 player Daniel Kolar, formerly of Sparta Prague who is of a similar build and style to our new signing.

Perhaps the most intriguing departure was Cypriot winger Costas Charalambides , who enjoyed an impressive and productive pre-season under Dave Jones in 2007. We badly lacked pace and trickery on the wing at that time but opted against a deal for him and he also departed the club.

The above are just a selection of the failed triallists over previous years - and just the ones I can remember! There have almost certainly been many more, but it`s clear that Jones or the club were not keen on signing up triallists. There are probably current or former players who did earn deals on the back of training with the club etc, though few in the normal trial structure utilised by those above and Gestade. Either he is a better player than the others, or this deal suggests a change in transfer policy under new manager Malky Mackay

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