@lorddulaarsenal wrote:

I recon big Stan’s going to authorise a blockbuster move for Grealish in the summer

As much as I'd love him here the time to do so was last summer before he signed a new deal at Villa.

If we're going to spend that kind of money I'd rather have Maddison I think.

Maddy’s so good. Leicester would rinse us though. Given their track record on Mahrez, Maguire, Chilwell, Kante, Drinkwater, etc. The list is endless.

Our biggest sale Overmars was over 20 years ago and in nominal terms is only as much as their 4th biggest deal. Jon Rudkin’s been their DoF these past 7 years. Doesn’t get enough credit. All those big sales? Except Mahrez, replaced for much cheaper.

Claudius wrote:

Maddy’s so good. Leicester would rinse us though. Given their track record on Mahrez, Maguire, Chilwell, Kante, Drinkwater, etc. The list is endless.

Our biggest sale Overmars was over 20 years ago and in nominal terms is only as much as their 4th biggest deal. Jon Rudkin’s been their DoF these past 7 years. Doesn’t get enough credit. All those big sales? Except Mahrez, replaced for much cheaper.

Shows you how undesirable our players are. No one's willing to pay anything for them. 

Our ownership has been inept. We constantly throw away the chance to make to make money. We can allegedly make money on Nketiah now and could’ve made money on AMN last summer. Together that could be £40-45m. I bet together they never sell for more than that in the future. We are poor at timing sales and creating a market for our players. We will also lose Xhaka, Laca and Mustafi for probably a combined £30-40m at best when we should’ve made 2-3x that by selling them a lot earlier. Ozil, Sanchez, Ramsey. Just value evaporating everywhere.

The purchase are a different story. They’re only wasteful because there is no overall plan. I highly doubt that this Garlick solves this. It will probably be more dicking around as we have been since Law took over from Dein

Sancho might be gettable particularly if Dortmund would entertain Pepe in part exchange

And they’ll do that because?

tell us, Dules
same agent as Balogun, Nelson, Nketiah and our defender from Spurs btw

Dortmund would need a replacement and could revive Pepe. He is talented.

@lorddulaarsenal wrote:

Dortmund would need a replacement and could revive Pepe.  He is talented.

Dortmund are the ultimate speculators. What spread do you think they would need between Sancho and Pépé - £50m?

Claudius wrote:

Our ownership has been inept. We constantly throw away the chance to make to make money.

I think you're missing the point slightly though Claude. Our main function isn't to make money off player sales, it's to win trophies. I'm sure we could get decently paid for Saka, Tierney and Martinelli right now for instance, but we don't want to sell those players, do we. Leicester get picked clean by the big teams every time they have a good season and the anticipation of it has become their main revenue stream. A sign of a big club is that they don't need to haul their good players.

Clrnc wrote:

You have a point but we haven't been acting like big club for a long time now.

We've won four FA Cups in, what, the last 6 years? That's more than Leicester have won since they were founded 136 years ago.

Clrnc wrote:

You talk about Leicester but they have been keeping whoever they want and only sell for really over valued bids because they are replacing them easily without any drop off in quality.

They won the league and within 12 months half of the team was gone. They keep selling players for high value and pick up smart signings like Soyuncu and Maddison and Tielemans because they know they're going to sell them too for a high market price, not because they're going to use them to win the league again. This is what keeps them in the upper half of the table.

Klaus wrote:

Claudius wrote:

Our ownership has been inept. We constantly throw away the chance to make to make money.

I think you're missing the point slightly though Claude. Our main function isn't to make money off player sales, it's to win trophies. I'm sure we could get decently paid for Saka, Tierney and Martinelli right now for instance, but we don't want to sell those players, do we. Leicester get picked clean by the big teams every time they have a good season and the anticipation of it has become their main revenue stream. A sign of a big club is that they don't need to haul their good players.

Actually, no. 
Notice that nowhere have I said sell Saka, Martinelli, ESR and Tierney. 

Our main objective is to build a squad that is capable of winning trophies! That means having a very good squad plan that clearly articulates the playing ethos and the qualities required for each position, and then employing the best possible players for those positions. Beyond that, we should be looking to keep squad value high by selling superfluous players - over-the-hill veterans and non-essential academy graduates. That is what I want. 

Claudius wrote:

Klaus wrote:

I think you're missing the point slightly though Claude. Our main function isn't to make money off player sales, it's to win trophies. I'm sure we could get decently paid for Saka, Tierney and Martinelli right now for instance, but we don't want to sell those players, do we. Leicester get picked clean by the big teams every time they have a good season and the anticipation of it has become their main revenue stream. A sign of a big club is that they don't need to haul their good players.

Actually, no. 
Notice that nowhere have I said sell Saka, Martinelli, ESR and Tierney.

You're talking about getting big money for players. The reason we don't is because we - generally - don't sell the ones that are worth big money. Don't you think Leicester would rather have kept their best players if they could? Instead they've seen Kante, Mahrez and Drinkwater win the league for other clubs, and Maguire looks like he might do it at United this year. Only Vardy is left because he decided to play for a statue outside King Power Stadium.

This is like people being envious of Dortmund for collecting all that youth talent, when an investment scheme is all they're ever going to be as a club.

Klaus wrote:

Claudius wrote:

Actually, no. 
Notice that nowhere have I said sell Saka, Martinelli, ESR and Tierney.

 

You're talking about getting big money for players. The reason we don't is because we - generally - don't sell the ones that are worth big money. Don't you think Leicester would rather have kept their best players if they could? Instead they've seen Kante, Mahrez and Drinkwater win the league for other clubs, and Maguire looks like he might do it at United this year. Only Vardy is left because he decided to play for a statue outside King Power Stadium.

Please do not misrepresent what I said. 
I mentioned selling Nketiah and AMN. And then also Lacazette, Mustafi, and Xhaka. These are players who I do not think are going to add value to our project going forward. I'm happy to sell them. 

Here's the thing. We both mentioned Martinelli, Tierney, and Saka. Because they are super quality. Worth building around. The reality is that just as in any other profession, in football there are a few players who are extremely valuable and worth building around. And then everybody else is relatively exchangeable. If I walk into any top organisation, I could probably go into the market and easily replace the bottom 80% of staff. It's the top 20% that you will struggle to improve on. And this is where we need to focus on. Getting the best possible top 20%. Because these are the guys who move the needle. Your AMNs and Mustafis will easily come again next year whether by our academy or from the Bundesliga. If we can make money from them sooner, we should so we can build up the kitty to get more Tierneys

You can't force these sales. Wolves were the only ones who wanted Maitland-Niles and they refused to go over £15m. There's no point saying we should have sold him for £25.

The reality is the players who can't get in the side of a mid table team are not high on the agenda.

Claudius wrote:

Please do not misrepresent what I said.

You said: "Our biggest sale Overmars was over 20 years ago and in nominal terms is only as much as their 4th biggest deal."

I'm just commenting on why we don't generally sell players for big money. The rest is semantics and I don't really care for it.

Klaus wrote:

Claudius wrote:

Please do not misrepresent what I said.

You said: "Our biggest sale Overmars was over 20 years ago and in nominal terms is only as much as their 4th biggest deal."

I'm just commenting on why we don't generally sell players for big money. The rest is semantics and I don't really care for it.

Oh. That is just a reflection of the fact that we sell extremely badly. That’s all. We spend a lot of money acquiring players. Yet don’t sell players for a lot of money. Simple example: Xhaka, Lacazette and Mustafi are 3 terrible buys we acquired for over £110m. We will be lucky to get half of that for the 3 of them when they each leave at least 2 years too late.
And then there’s Ramsey and Sanchez who left for balls.

I assume you adjusted for inflation, because if not Overmars is not our biggest sale.

Clrnc wrote:

Klaus wrote:

We've won four FA Cups in, what, the last 6 years? That's more than Leicester have won since they were founded 136 years ago.

4 FA Cup or winning the league? Anyway its not about winning but how we are acting in the market. It's not even about Leicester, but rather what we are doing in comparison to Liverpool, Mancs etc past few years. No doubts we are improving though in incoming, but outgoing is nowhere near smart enough.

We are not cash rich, and we are throwing money away like this without building squad value.

Klaus wrote:

They won the league and within 12 months half of the team was gone. They keep selling players for high value and pick up smart signings like Soyuncu and Maddison and Tielemans because they know they're going to sell them too for a high market price, not because they're going to use them to win the league again. This is what keeps them in the upper half of the table.

You are saying like those "smart" signings won't improve our squad, they are signings that are not only smart, but also quality and have value. At that same time we were signing Sokratis and co who we know have no resale value and is not even quality players.

I'd argue that to get back into top 4, the quickest way is to either pump money into the team to buy more quality players or do what Dortmund and Leicester is doing. Building squad value to get better players are the only way to improve the squad. Leicester's league win was arguably once in a life time, but them constantly finishing close or in top 4 after is not lucky.

Agreed, Clrnc.
You see it. Leicester keep doing smart things and end up high in the table. We keep doing daft shit and sinking. 
But, never mind, both things are probably just down to pure luck!! 

So what are you guys saying? We shouldn't be signing guys like Aouar and Partey and should instead look to look to buy at the lower end of the market?

I'm not saying we can't be smarter and grab ourselves bargains, £72m on Pepe was always stupid or at the very least a massive gamble, but part of wanting a top team involves buying players who are not necessarily great value for money.

Clrnc wrote:

Klaus wrote:

They won the league and within 12 months half of the team was gone. They keep selling players for high value and pick up smart signings like Soyuncu and Maddison and Tielemans because they know they're going to sell them too for a high market price, not because they're going to use them to win the league again. This is what keeps them in the upper half of the table.

You are saying like those "smart" signings won't improve our squad, they are signings that are not only smart, but also quality and have value.

No, I'm saying that the main purpose of Leicester's signings isn't to win things but to give a great return on investment. That's the deciding factor. They'll sell them when they can get the most money for them whereas our first option would naturally be to try and keep a great player in his prime. I'm not criticising them for it by the way, I'm just saying there's a fundamental difference in how we operate and which goals we'll set for the club.

Some people seem to think we're lower than we've been in decades, but this horror period still includes 4 FA Cups in 6 years, two Community Shields and a European cup final. Our 'worst' is as good as things have ever gotten for most of these clubs. I think some perspective is needed here. It's not like we don't make good signings or guide through good talents either; we absolutely do. Just look at the guys we've signed over the last few years. For every Sokratis there's also a Tierney, for every Luiz a Gabriel; even a Mari who, at £5 million, looks like the best centreback bargain anyone has made in yonks. You're being revisionistic here.

Clrnc wrote:

That we should be smarter with wheeling dealing. Nobody have any problems with signing big players, its what big clubs does. I don't think people had any problems even with Pepe for 72m, just look back at the transfer thread for all the delights. The numbers he had in Ligue 1 was really special, it happens. We just need to be quick to cut loss on him this summer. Lets see what we gonna do. What me and Claude is saying is that, don't repeat the same bloody mistakes past decade. Don't let Pepe run down his contract and go on a free. Don't run down Nketiah and co value and sell them while they have suitors for good money. Use the money to buy better players with value, rinse and repeat.

First, I'm going to use the bolded bit for a bit of an 'I told you so' session:

goon wrote:

I have to agree. I don’t think he’d maintain anywhere near those numbers here either. But who knows.

goon wrote:

Claudius wrote:

Different beasts. Pepe just blows past fullbacks and creates for himself and sets others up. The dynamism he will add to our attack will lift us several levels. I'm comfortable with the additional money versus Ndombele because attackers cost significantly more than central midfielders. Just the state of the world.

Meh, that's probably how Barca justified Dembele and Coutinho. Instead that's 1/4 billion riding the bench often enough. The risk that these guys won't work out has to be taken into account and Pepe is anything but a sure thing.

goon wrote:

You're right, you have to assess it on a case by case basis really, but generally speaking if a 10-20m gamble doesn't work out, you'll probably be able to recoup most if not all of that, so the actual loss wouldn't be significant. If an £80m purchase turns out to be shit, someone somewhere will still be willing to pay 30m for him maybe, but that's still 50m lost compared to just 5-10m.

You also have to consider that the higher the profile the more you're simply paying for hype rather than anything tangible.

Ahead of the game.

Generally I agree with you guys, I'm just saying there's no point comparing us to Leicester or Dortmund. Different model, different objectives, different market.

It not only the signings.

You need a coherent plan when signing players. Bergkamp in his prime would be the most talented player in the club. Would he shine in this formation though?

Where exactly would he play?

In attacking midfield? Too deep.

On the the wing? Not what is needed.

Why did Wenger buy Lacazette and Aubameyang, when he has never played with two out and out strikers? Sometimes we didn’t field one!

Why buy Giroud, when we needed someone to get in behind. Giroud in front of Alexis and Ozil

Some of players haven’t been necessarily bad, although our opinions will vary. What is not in dispute is that money has been pissed up the wall without seemingly any thought.

It is why I was ecstatic with Gabriel and Partey. They fit the shape of the team. If it doesn’t work, then fair enough, but you can see where they fit.

This needs to be the overriding factor, not price tag, nor experience. Simply, sign players who absolutely fit the vision of how you want to play.

ohboy!!! wrote:

It not only the signings.

You need a coherent plan when signing players. 

snip

Agree with your post completely. This is why I wanted to stick with Arteta even during the massive downturn. We need someone to build a team from start to finish.

goon wrote:

Clrnc wrote:

That we should be smarter with wheeling dealing. Nobody have any problems with signing big players, its what big clubs does. I don't think people had any problems even with Pepe for 72m, just look back at the transfer thread for all the delights. The numbers he had in Ligue 1 was really special, it happens. We just need to be quick to cut loss on him this summer. Lets see what we gonna do. What me and Claude is saying is that, don't repeat the same bloody mistakes past decade. Don't let Pepe run down his contract and go on a free. Don't run down Nketiah and co value and sell them while they have suitors for good money. Use the money to buy better players with value, rinse and repeat.

First, I'm going to use the bolded bit for a bit of an 'I told you so' session:

goon wrote:

I have to agree. I don’t think he’d maintain anywhere near those numbers here either. But who knows.

goon wrote:

Meh, that's probably how Barca justified Dembele and Coutinho. Instead that's 1/4 billion riding the bench often enough. The risk that these guys won't work out has to be taken into account and Pepe is anything but a sure thing.

goon wrote:

You're right, you have to assess it on a case by case basis really, but generally speaking if a 10-20m gamble doesn't work out, you'll probably be able to recoup most if not all of that, so the actual loss wouldn't be significant. If an £80m purchase turns out to be shit, someone somewhere will still be willing to pay 30m for him maybe, but that's still 50m lost compared to just 5-10m.

You also have to consider that the higher the profile the more you're simply paying for hype rather than anything tangible.

Ahead of the game.

Generally I agree with you guys, I'm just saying there's no point comparing us to Leicester or Dortmund. Different model, different objectives, different market.

Goon.
I was excited about the Pépé signing. And I would have us do it again at the time.
I think the biggest problem with that signing has basically been that it was done in the period of biggest flux when so much is changing, so he’s had to adjust to multiple managers and philosophies and we haven’t been able to take advantage of what made him great in France. And remember what I always say about these deals. Once you’ve done a deal, it’s done. You now need focus on doing the best that you can going forward based on your team philosophy and resources. Don’t get married to players if, given chances, they don’t work work out

The comparisons to Dortmund and Leicester are great. Liverpool are doing pretty much the same thing. They just have access to more funds to investments and revenues

In what way are Liverpool doing anything remotely similar to Dortmund and Leicester?

In fact I'd say Liverpool are doing exactly what we're doing, but the ratio of their successes when buying has been a lot better than ours, including their manager. You guys talk as if Liverpool get loads wrong in the market and but sell well and try again.

Here's the reality of their signings since Klopp signed:

Mane
Wijnaldum
Salah
Ox
Robertson
VVD
Alison
Keita
Fabinho
Shaqiri
Minamino
Jota
Thiago

Every single on of their buys is still a part of the squad today. They've not done a load of wheeling and dealing and then finally settled on one that works.

The idea that it's fine as long as you write off that £50m loss on an expensive buy simply isn't true. It's a massive waste of time and money. Liverpool haven't gotten rid of their bad buys quickly either btw, Keita is still there and Ox is still there too.

goon wrote:

In what way are Liverpool doing anything remotely similar to Dortmund and Leicester?

In fact I'd say Liverpool are doing exactly what we're doing, but the ratio of their successes when buying has been a lot better than ours, including their manager. You guys talk as if Liverpool get loads wrong in the market and but sell well and try again.

Here's the reality of their signings since Klopp signed:

Mane
Wijnaldum
Salah
Ox
Robertson
VVD
Alison
Keita
Fabinho
Shaqiri
Minamino
Jota
Thiago

Every single on of their buys is still a part of the squad today. They've not done a load of wheeling and dealing and then finally settled on one that works.

The idea that it's fine as long as you write off that £50m loss on an expensive buy simply isn't true. It's a massive waste of time and money. Liverpool haven't gotten rid of their bad buys quickly either btw, Keita is still there and Ox is still there too.

It's the same. A football club does not exist to trade players. The end objective of a football club is to win as many games as it can given the resources it has at its disposal. 

Player trading is just one lever for squad building along with invested capital, loans, revenue or player trading. 

• Leicester and Dortmund - have revenue disadvantages (Leicester no Champions League, Dortmund no Premier League), so constant player trading is critical 

• Liverpool - have more revenue sources but they went into an 'investment super cycle' from 2016-2018 to build a team that could challenge for 5-6 years. The player age profiles illustrate this. In these 3 summers, they spent £440m on their big stars (Salah, Mane, Allison etc) but recovered £320m in sales. They sold a lot of starters and youth players during this period, and built the best team in Europe. 

In what way is this similar to us? Here is how we differ 

• While we also spend a lot of money, we recover much less 

• Our player age profiles are inverted. Lots of kids and elders. Few peak 

• Expensive redundant players in squad 

The things we do are predictive of future bad performance. We are not performing badly by accident. 

Klopp didn’t sell anyone he signed though, that’s the point I’m making. In fact the first of his real signings that looks like he’s going to leave is Wijnaldum and he’s going to Barca on a free. Big teams don’t want to sell their best players. Suarez and Coutinho forced the issue and in the case of the latter Liverpool lucked out big time with Barcelona’s idiocy. Yeah, we probably should have sold Sanchez but if we spent our money with anything close to Liverpool’s level of success I’m fairly certain we wouldn’t care.

The main difference between us and Liverpool is that they have a good manager with a good idea of the squad he wants and the players he needs. We’ve had 4 or 5 different people with different ideas in charge or with an input into recruitment since 2018. It’s crazy.

goon wrote:

Klopp didn’t sell anyone he signed though, that’s the point I’m making. In fact the first of his real signings that looks like he’s going to leave is Wijnaldum and he’s going to Barca on a free. Big teams don’t want to sell their best players. Suarez and Coutinho forced the issue and in the case of the latter Liverpool lucked out big time with Barcelona’s idiocy. Yeah, we probably should have sold Sanchez but if we spent our money with anything close to Liverpool’s level of success I’m fairly certain we wouldn’t care.

The main difference between us and Liverpool is that they have a good manager with a good idea of the squad he wants and the players he needs. We’ve had 4 or 5 different people with different ideas in charge or with an input into recruitment since 2018. It’s crazy.

He isn't selling his key players because as I said he is in an investment super cycle. He bought a group of players who can compete for 4 or 5 years together. 

Over the next 1-2 years, he will likely start selling these players. Guys like Firmino and maybe even one of the other 2 forwards will start to clear out so they can retool. the fact that they raised over £300m in 3 summers and still ended up winning thee Champions League and the League is incredible. 

We don't have a track record resembles the thoughtfulness of what Pool are doing. Hopefully, Edu, Dick and Mikel fix this quickly. 

Claudius wrote:

Our ownership has been inept. We constantly throw away the chance to make to make money. We can allegedly make money on Nketiah now and could’ve made money on AMN last summer. Together that could be £40-45m. I bet together they never sell for more than that in the future. We are poor at timing sales and creating a market for our players. We will also lose Xhaka, Laca and Mustafi for probably a combined £30-40m at best when we should’ve made 2-3x that by selling them a lot earlier. Ozil, Sanchez, Ramsey. Just value evaporating everywhere.

The purchase are a different story. They’re only wasteful because there is no overall plan. I highly doubt that this Garlick solves this. It will probably be more dicking around as we have been since Law took over from Dein

It's not just KSE & I mostly blame AW for his willingness to compromise on everything about our transfers other than technical ability and his philosophy regarding contracts and wages.

We can agree the fundamental difference to senior squad player trading between a big6/UCL club and the rest is primarily football ambition v revenue streams.  CFC are slightly different in they have used player trading outside their senior squad to replace Abramovich's revenue to comply with FFP. Big6 will look to build in order to win - LFC, MC & CFC being typical. The 'rest' will sell to build towards becoming established in UEFA as their priority in the short term, and then adjust towards looking to win as the opportunities present.

The 'issue' at AFC is we are neither one thing nor the other because of AW's stated approach to give players 3 seasons (to adapt to new positions or roles) before he would make a decision on their suitability, let alone their future.  Similarly he had said he would not make any decision on a player's future until they had turned 23, as this was when in his opinion he considered players to be fully developed technically and physically, and able to repay selection on merit.  So far as market activity went he would always prioritise keeping what he had & internal options to positions/roles.  He would only look to the market for players who were available and those to improve the quality as starting players, or as bench options to provide experience and/or depth.

The next core issue regarding our recruiting/trading is it is also incomplete, and as such it means we do not have a team that is balanced, let alone fit for purpose in terms of quality re top4/UCL.  IMO we have not have a team that has been fit for purpose / balanced since 07/08.  Again this was part of AW's philosophy regarding the composition of both the team and the 25 man squad, and his ideology to develop players via playing time so as to develop player intuition amongst the team.

All of this worked for the most part until the latter years of his tenure after the TV deals.  The issue then was the strategy didn't change - just the price/cost of the players we signed in terms of fees and wages.  

The current issue is we have not as yet replaced AW's strategies/policy/philosophy, and will continue on this cycle until such time as the club determines what it wants - not just some vague outline but also provides the drive in terms of KERs & KPIs, let alone financial support in relation to time frames.

Sooooo, any news on the Wise Man Solomon?

Asterix wrote:

Sooooo, any news on the Wise Man Solomon?

hope the news is we ain't actually in for him. Enough underwhelming stuff.

goon wrote:

ohboy!!! wrote:

It not only the signings.

You need a coherent plan when signing players. 

snip

Agree with your post completely. This is why I wanted to stick with Arteta even during the massive downturn. We need someone to build a team from start to finish.

The problem with that is that if you do it with the wrong manager you spend years building something thats broken from the start. I wouldn't be backing Arteta in the market at the moment, he's shown some worrying traits in player evaluation, particularly in his preference for experience.

Qwiss! wrote:

goon wrote:

Agree with your post completely. This is why I wanted to stick with Arteta even during the massive downturn. We need someone to build a team from start to finish.

The problem with that is that if you do it with the wrong manager you spend years building something thats broken from the start. I wouldn't be backing Arteta in the market at the moment, he's shown some worrying traits in player evaluation, particularly in his preference for experience.

On the other hand he also signed Gabriel, Partey and Mari who all look great. Even Cedric looked good tonight.

Everyone is allowed to have a Willian.