Transfer Rumours transfer thread fact and fiction

Absolutely. If the big twat with the ridiculous hair can fetch £90m, Dele would surely break the £100m barrier.

Realistically, we aren't going to sell to a rival and both the French and Italian leagues represent a step down in quality and publicity. That leaves the two Spanish clubs and Bayern as the only 3 potential destinations for our star players.

 

Hopefully he's getting good advice off-pitch....... that constantly seems to be the biggest problem with very young and phenomenally rich 'stars'.

There is an edge to his game that is a key to his success, but that can still potentially damage his reputation - but he does seem to be a genuinely nice lad with his head screwed on and his feet on the floor.

The worlds his lobster, Rodney!!

 

Since we're rapidly approaching the period where tabloids convince themselves that Daniel Levy's default response when one of our key players is linked with a move is to bend over and ask the other club to be gentle, which I prefer to call ****ing stupid season, I thought I'd take a look at our squad and see what could or should be addressed during the summer.

So without further ado...

GOALKEEPER
Starter: Hugo Lloris
Backup: Michel Vorm, Pau Lopez
Prospects: Luke McGee, Thomas Glover, Jonathan de Bie, Alfie Whiteman
Players linked: Jordan Pickford (Sunderland), Nick Weegink (ATC '65)

On paper this is the most straightforward area of the team to address during the summer: Lopez's loan becomes a permanent, Vorm likely sees out the final year of his contract, and the youngsters continue to develop. Based on Poch's approach to loans we may see McGee leave the club if the right offer comes in, but other than that it looks like things will remain as they are.

FULL BACK
Starters: Kyle Walker, Danny Rose
Backup: Kieran Trippier, Ben Davies
Prospects: Kyle Walker-Peters
Players linked: Ryan Sessegnon (Fulham), Guilherme Arana (Sao Paulo), Sead Kolasinac (Schalke), Luke Shaw (Man Utd)

Full back is another position that looks more than set, with Walker and Rose firmly established while Trippier and Davies offering more than capable backup (even though the papers' response to them starting games is to link them with a move to a club that can guarantee them first team football...), although it does have to be said that KWP was expected to make a breakthrough this season yet he clearly has not.

In terms with the players linked, it's telling that Sessegnon, Arana and Kolasinac are all like-for-like with Danny Rose, while Luke Shaw is like-for-like with the Danny Rose of the AVB/Sherwood era who regularly irritated Not606 regulars with his defensive lapses. If we want to run the rule over those linked, Shaw simply wouldn't be welcome as he'd be expected to take a 50% pay cut (at least) if he wanted to understudy Rose while Kolasinac appears to be his agent playing chicken with Schalke's board, letting his contract wind down while various clubs are linked with him. This leaves us with either Sessegnon or Arana being drafted in as Rose's understudy, which does beg the question as to Davies' future - and with Sessegnon signing a professional contract recently, his value's probably north of £15m based on a combination of potential and his passport.

CENTRE BACK
Starters: Toby Alderweireld, Jan Vertonghen, Eric Dier
Backup: Kevin Wimmer, Ben Davies, Federico Fazio*
Prospects: Cameron Carter-Vickers
Players linked: Harry Maguire (Hull), Ben Gibson (Middlesbrough), Issa Diop (Toulouse)
(* - reports say Roma want to make his loan permanent, but this is not confirmed yet)

The first choice Alderweireld/Vertonghen/Dier trio are certainly formidable and offer so many different facets to our game, be it Verts playing the ball out of defence to Toby and Dier's chipped passes from the back launching rapid counters - although it needs to be said we are ill-equipped to deal with any long-term injuries, especially with the combination of Wimmer falling out of favour (or, at the very least, having difficulty adapting to playing in a back three) while CCV is clearly nowhere near the finished article and probably won't be a reliable option for another season or two at the very least.

Maguire seems like a perfect option to address this issue as he's proven to be a capable centre back both when Hull were up a certain creek without a paddle as well as during their recent revival, and as a ball-playing centre back he can slot into the back line (and with just a year left on his contract he won't break the bank), while Ben Davies playing in the back three for Wales means he should not be discounted as a potential option there if we do bring in one of Sessegnon/Arana. On the other hand, while Ben Gibson clearly has quality, unless we plan on having him in the starting lineup we shouldn't make a move as it would be wasteful...and I hope that didn't sound like I was insulting Hull fans.

As for the out pile, not only has Fazio been firmly entrenched there since last summer, it does appear that Roma are helping us out in that regard. Does that count as making up for inflicting Franco Baldini on us?

CENTRAL MIDFIELD
Starters: Vincent Wanyama, Mousa Dembele, Harry Winks
Backup: Eric Dier, Moussa Sissoko
Prospects: Dylan Duncan
Players linked: Youri Tielemans (Anderlecht), Leon Goretzka (Schalke), Marcelo Brozovic (Inter), Franck Kessie (Atalanta), Ross Barkley (Everton), Naby Keita (Taurine FC Leipzig), Adrien Rabiot (PSG), Karol Linetty (Sampdoria), Philip Billing (Huddersfield)

Here's the one area of the team that needs to be addressed: Wanyama's been immense this season, Dembele is an important piece of our team even though the press constantly overlook him in favour of Eriksen or Alli, while Winks was a revelation prior to his injury. After that, though, it's not pleasant reading...

Alright, let's address the elephant in the room: Sissoko's been such a waste of space this season that for the first time in almost two years Fazio isn't the player the majority of Spurs fans await the day they see the back of him with the sort of near-orgasmic anticipation. Hopefully there's something to the rumours of Marseilles, both Milan clubs and even Chelsea being interested in a summer move, because if we somehow manage to get a bidding war going we might somehow get some benefit from his Spurs stint.

Looking past Sissoko (for the love of Cthulhu, can we look past Sissoko?) it becomes clear how bare the options in central midfield are: Dembele does seem to have settled back into his routine of picking up every niggling injury it's possible to pick up, Winks' season-ending ankle injury obvious creates fears of how long before he's back in the team, which is especially unfortunate given how comfortable he was looking even though this is his debut season, and after that the only real option is Dier slotting into midfield like he did against Burnley's krav maga specialists at the weekend. This means we need to add some degree of depth.

Obviously this is where my year-long Tielemans love-in comes into play, but there's a reason for it: because he genuinely looks like a player who, in another season or two, can step into Dembele's key position in the team. That's the sort of player we need, especially as Dembele turns thirty this summer. And I have to say, while we may be heavily linked with Barkley, given he's stagnated for the past couple of seasons I can't see Poch playing fixer-upper, not after the Sissoko farce this season.

Having someone who can cover Wanyama, who has played a hell of a lot more football this season than we expected and was clearly missed against Swansea the other night, is just as important. Based on that, the two obvious options in this regard are Kessie and Goretzka: three months ago it looked as if Kessie was headed for whoever bid the most money, but since then every club with more money than sense has been camped at Monaco to monitor Tiemoue Bakayoko, so there could be a window of opportunity to sign him. Meanwhile there's Goretzka, who normally I'd think was out of our reach, but as he's another Schalke player whose agent is playing chicken as he heads towards the final year of his contract, I wouldn't rule anything out in that regard - but I do have to say that rewarding Wanyama for a superb season by signing a player in direct competition for his place who would be expecting first team football doesn't seem to be something we'd do, while the idea of a Wanyama/Goretzka pivot obviously begs the question about where Dembele et al would be playing.

ATTACKING MIDFIELD
Starters: Dele Alli, Christian Eriksen, Son Heung-min, Erik Lamela
Backup: Georges-Kevin N'Koudou, Clinton N'Jie*, Josh Onomah, Moussa Sissoko
Prospects: Marcus Edwards, Samuel Shashoua
Players linked: Isco, Mateo Kovacic (both Los Ladrones do Madrid), Max Meyer (Schalke), Ante Coric (Dinamo Zagreb), Wilfried Zaha (Crystal Palace), Nadiem Amiri (Hoffenheim), Joao Carvalho (Benfica), Bruma (Galatasaray)
(* - reports say Marseilles want to make his loan permanent, but this is not confirmed yet)

To be honest we're overstocked in attacking midfield as we have four players who can all rightly expect game time and all offer different things to the team: Alli has goals and an aerial threat; Eriksen has creativity and set pieces...at least he did three seasons ago; Son has goals and an injection of pace and direct play; Lamela presses from the front and has the knack for getting goals and assists nobody else will try.

Realistically there's only two types of player we should consider adding to that selection: a youngster with a high ceiling, or a game-changing addition.

Coric sits comfortably in the former category, especially as his style of play is routinely compared to Luka Modric - i.e. the exact sort of player we've needed for the past five years - and having him as an option could well serve to motivate Eriksen to perform more consistently in a similar manner to how Trippier and Davies give Walker and Rose respectively the incentive to keep up their level of performance. Meyer could fit into this category, but as with Goretzka he comes across as a player who'd expect regular starts while Coric is a work in progress.

In the latter category there's Isco, routinely linked with us for the past year and he's entering the final year of his contract at the Santiago Burgerbun and appears to be resisting media pressure to sign a new contract...almost as if Marca have yet to figure out it's hard to tap up a Los Ladrones player to sign for Los Ladrones. There's no denying that an Isco signing would be on the same level of Van Der Vaart or even Klinsmann, a player who can walk into the team and instantly lift the team with his quality, and if Football Manager is correct he would fit into our wage structure very nicely indeed. Yes, there's the obvious point that he'd fit into last season's system better than the one we're currently using as that had 50% starting places available, and that's the real test.

On the out pile, I may have already mentioned that Sissoko can (depending on where he winds up) va te faire foutre/vaffanculo, Onomah's been lacking something when he's featured this season and has certainly paled in comparison to Winks, N'Koudou's more of a meme than an option from the bench at the moment while N'Jie is at Marseilles and it appears the two are LARPing Single White Female, while we've yet to see the Marcus Edwards hype train leave the station.

STRIKER
Starter: Harry Kane
Backup: Vincent Janssen, Son Heung-min
Prospects: Kaziah Sterling
Players linked: Marcus Rashford, Anthony Martial (both Man Utd), Kylian Mbappe (Monaco), Domenico Berardi (Sassuolo), Patrik Schick (Sampdoria), Andrea Pinamonti (Inter)

At first it's quite easy: Harry Kane is not just our top scorer (not bad for a one season wonder...) but also the team's talisman, so there's no replacing that. Yet this is where last summer became so difficult, because it's easy to sign a player to go straight into your team - not so easy to sign an understudy.

Yet after a period of uncertainty, we might be working out this understudy lark after all: Son's still a reliable option from the bench, albeit less reliable starting every game, but more importantly we've recently seen Janssen start to come out of his shell and begin to contribute to the team. It's still baby steps, of course, but he's certainly showing that he's earned a second season. Meanwhile, Poch has recently started that Kaziah Sterling will begin training with the first team from next season, which is a good indication that Poch believes there's a place for him. This is where the list of strikers we've been linked with is also difficult...other than Mbappe, as he's being groomed as this summer's most sought-after player with a transfer fee to match, so we can write off any chance of signing him as a result.

 

Ideally, I'd love Arana, Maguire, Telemans, Isco and Rashford. However, Sissoko leaving and someone with pace and a knack for putting the ball in the net would do. I'd take Gabriel Jesus and nothing else quite happily.

 

Keane at Burnley and Lascalles at Newcastle are both young English CBs who we should be considering if we're looking to make additions in that area of the squad.

Further forward, I'm a massive fan of Peresic at Inter, but realistically I think we'd be outbid if he was known to be up for sale.

I think we're most likely to sign a CM, a CB and a LB. Most likely to sell (apart from Fazio and Clint, who I'm assuming are as good as gone) Sissoko, Wimmer, and maybe one of the youngsters like Onomah.

 

Today, a number of papers are running the "Hugo Lloris to United" line. A couple suggest there could be a tug of war with PSG for our goalkeeper and Captain.

There is no suggestion that he might want to stay or we might want to keep him. Oh well......

 

He definitely won't come to United. Romero, Sam Johnstone and Joel Periera are already more than adequate cover for de Gea and 2 of them would be capable of taking his place if he left

 

Have they decided that De Gea's already joined Real Madrid, then?

 

Oh yes, With some suggestion that we're taking Keylor Mavis. Never sign anyone called Mavis!

 

Is that two of them at the same time?

 

For me:

IN
Sessegnon (buy and loan back for a year)
Mawson (I've been really impressed by the youngster in his breakthrough season. Never easy playing in a ****e team for a succession of ****e managers, but he is so comfortable on the ball and would fit our system nicely)
Tielemans (though not sure if he is as suited to the Dembele role as HBIC suggests. Seems more of a cross between Alli and Son. Either way, we urgently need more depth in CM especially with Bentaleb on his way out.
Zaha (he has been really, really good this season and is getting better year on year. The fact that he has done this despite playing for a frankly dreadful side is impressive.)
Defoe (just ****ing sign him. Easily has another year in the tank, is a legend of a man and has bags of experience to share with our youngsters).
Josh King (if Defoe is deemed too old)

None of these signings will break the bank, especially if Zaha refuses to extend his contract there.

OUT

Fazio
Wimmer
Sissoko
Onomah
Njie
Nkoudou

 

I've just looked that up. Us or Arsenal, where he'll replace Petr Cech, who's going... somewhere?
Not putting a lot of effort into this stuff, are they?

 

"Ooh, I don't really know!!"

 

Cough - Isco - cough.....

 

The world class Pete Cech? I questioned his ranking by Gooners as 'world class' earlier this season. I suggested only De Gea in the PL deserved that epiphet. I got dog's abuse. Now? Not so much.

If I was that way inclined, I might indulge in some gloatage. However, compared with the good old days of "Bale's only had 2 good games and Theo's better than him", they're only out by a billion miles.

 

I still think that Cech's a very good keeper, but he looks worse at Arsenal because of other problems at the club.
Their defence isn't organised enough, especially on set-pieces, and they lack any suitable cover from midfield.
I'd also question their coaching, as all of their keepers seem to suffer from the same issues, going back years.

One goalkeeper playing poorly is probably down to the player. All goalkeepers playing poorly probably isn't.

 

The coughs being the last of gasps of life from you as I impose
a summary death sentence for the very mention of his name.

 

Other than Rashford, what other young England talent should we looking
at to join Spurs so Pochettino can work his coaching magic on them ??

 

In January I was desperate to bring him in. But since then, Alli and Son in particular have hit another level, Eriksen has found some consistency and our switch to a wing back system has helped immensely in the age old problem of getting past parked buses.

AM is the one position we're massively over-stocked in, given the form of our main men and that all the noise about Lamela suggests that he has a future at the club. Unless we get rid of all of:
Sissoko
Onomah
Njie
Nkoudou

I don't see the point in bringing in yet another AM, as good as Isco is.
To my mind, cover at CB, CM and a 3rd option up front (or at least more pace in the final third) are our immediate priorities. Get those right and I can honestly see us winning the league without Isco.