I really hope we don't get him. He's a proper twat. If we get this centreback in, plus Barkley and perhaps a good winger, I'll be happy.
SSN reporting that Stoke are making enquiries about Janssen. Had a little think about any potential player swaps I'd be interested in but hit a dead end. Their squad is frighteningly ****.
Marca are reporting we're "very close" to signing Pape Cheikh Diop, which sounds more like a challenge than anything else. Meanwhile, The Mirror are reporting we had a £25m offer for Ryan Sessegnon rejected by Fulham - which is annoying, since I was going to suggest we make a January bid & loan back for him instead.
Is Balde a winger? Many of us seem to be suggesting how we need this type of attacking player, but despite it seeming like quite an obvious position we need to reinforce, I haven't seen any rumours of anyone to fit the mould, surprisingly.
Several of us thought that a buy + immediate loan-back would be a very smart "land grab" by Spurs, given how young Sessegnon is.
Despite the fact that Janssen simply hasn't scored goals, which is obviously the main point of a striker, it'd be impossible to see who we could replace him with that would be affordable in terms of fee and wages. Probably the most difficult position for any team, and borderline impossible for us right now. Cannot let him go, IMO.
Perhaps an offer of £10 mill now and immediate loan back for one season followed by whatever Levy can get away with next July. Having seen what MP has done for Dele however, all lower division clubs will be upping their prices for anyone we ask about.
Which is fair enough - within reason. Sometimes tis difficult to know whether a kid is already a "rough diamond" (as Bale and Alli were) , or is far from the finished product. So these clubs cannot be too silly with their attempted demands.
That's why Fleetwood only charged £1.7m for Jamie Vardy. They knew Leicester would only get one season out of him.
The big change since last Jan was of course Danny Rose appointing himself DOF. Makes perfect sense that we're now hunting for young LB's as long term successors as the clock is very much ticking on his time at Spurs.
I was hoping that agent Defoe was going to lubricate a movement for King in our direction. He's be a great signing for us. Looks like he's staying put at Bournemouth though. In fact when, I look at the list of players that Levy and co. have tried to get, it does make a powerful squad. Shame that us being in the champions league hasn't created this groundswell of players wanting to join us. It's a weird one.
The problem is whilst most players would probably be enticed to play CL football, those who would actually improve what we already have can earn far higher wages elsewhere. It's the catch 22 of our wage structure - we have the finances of a EL club but reach CL targets. Won't change until the new stadium starts to turn over some serious profit.
Theres a lot of media outlets saying the Pape Cheik Diop deal is pretty much done. Only seen a few cips on youtube and read reports about him. He is supposed to be a Dele Alli type box to box midfielder, Powerer, good pace and technically excellent. Its said that Poch is a real fan of his and pushed the club to sign him. If he does indeed sign he will obviously need to be integrated into our first team squad slowly. As he plays in a similar position to Barkley it will be interesting to see if we still sign the Everton man aswell.
Not really. There are only so many CL games playable in a season for starters, compared to the league. And if you are not the squad best in your position, then unless those above you get serious injury, you are going to have long stints of bench-warming. And on Levy wages too. Not a great incentive for new players other than for the young/ambitious.
Could be a "know your place" warning shot to Rose (never likely to happen - Fulham know the kid has great kerching potential etc) .
The thing is, I want the Levy wage regime to remain even in the new WHL era. What can change for the contract renewals is that the jump in wages could be a lot more than is currently so. So still meritocratic but much more competitive with rivals.
