I can see why he wants more. Imo he’s the best centre back in the league and probably top 5 in Europe. I can also see why Spurs can’t afford the £180k a week. That said this is make or break, we either pay the big money and take a risk financially or accept we can’t keep hold of top off players.
or accept we cannot keep hold of mercs who are easily tempted by PL clubs with more money (overseas clubs I have no issue with - WHEN they deal with the club with courtesy) .
If reports are to be believed, our first offer was £100k which would have put him on parity with Verts, but he said Saltypool are paying van Dijk £180k Our second offer was reportedly £130k, putting him on parity with Kane, Eriksen and Lloris, but he wouldn't budge
Jan is more deserving of a bigger contract. In two of the three seasons Toby has been with us, he's missed chunks of the season through injury. No doubting he's a fantastic player but he doesn't warrant £180k a week. The £130k we offered was more than generous. He's just a merc, unfortunately.
We need to speculate to accumulate, Poch's reign thus far suggests it will pay dividends. He is right, we need to be brave
The latest player to be linked to us is Christian Pulisic of Dortmund. Obviously any player linked to us we need to take with a pinch of salt, but if there are any incoming attackers, you’d have to feel it’s the end of the road for Lamela. Can’t see Eriksen, Dele, Son, or Lucas being sold for different reasons, which only leaves Lamela. To me, it’s glaringly obvious where we need replacements, so it’s strange to see so many links to attacking MF’s, when it’s the one area we’re probably most stocked. A couple of CM’s, CB, and a Llorente replacement should be our top priority, IMO.
I liked the look of that Julian Weigl when he played against us for Dortmund. His skill set looked like it was a level above Winks. Think he's a DM by trade...but he was passing the ball around like a playmaker and supporting attacks
Agreed. Someone from midfield who moves the ball faster and forward much more often than our current options. We are just too slow. I sat at Wembley on Sunday and saw us pick the wrong pass over and over again. Always safe and never utilising the wide open space on the opposite side. Dropping Eriksen back would be an option. Liverpool have dispensed with Coutinho and the standard idea of a number 10. They play a midfield that simply gets the ball forward to their forwards as soon as possible. Alternatively, we could drop Dele deeper. It's where he played for MK and he looked really good there against Liverpool at Wembley. He's got everything to play there. If we did that and went and spent £100m on a forward with real pace, like Pulisic? Whatever, we need to up the speed of thought and creation deeper in the team. I've a feeling it's where Foyth might end up. He moves with the ball so well and he's not a functioning PL centre back right now. Maybe that's the bravery? Stop buying a number of player each summer within £70 - 100m and blow the lot on one game changer and sort the wage issue to make it work and re-shuffle the pack.
If the manager was Fergie, I could go with that. Purely because his iron will made the meh players in his squad sufficiently good to be of use in winning the PL. As Pochettino currently seems incapable of doing this, then IMHO we need a squad with a lot more better than meh players.
It's not something that we've tried. Each summer we've bought 4 or 5, from which we're getting increasingly limited returns. In the last 2 transfer windows only Big Vic and Davinson Sanchez have made the team regularly and to beneficial results. How many players that we buy with £100m, if we buy 4 or so, will make a difference? If the answer is only one, then we might as well make that difference a big one and forget the ballast. We've got a decent sized player pool but are coming up short and likely to do so increasingly as others around us spend more. Mauricio Pochettino knows we have financial constraints. I cannot imagine that he's suggesting that we spend hundreds of millions, Citeh fashion, but going 'all in' on one or maybe two, could make that difference, where buying more isn't working? It's what top sides do. Buy in one or two really great players each summer to refresh and try to improve. If that's what he wants, I'd support him in trying it. If we don't give him the chance, how will we ever know? To Dare is To Do.
Over the weekend we were being linked with Middlesbrough winger Adama Traore, and that's only intensified since Middlesbrough dropped out of the playoffs. Do the hacks realise we've got plenty of wingers these days?
He's Zaha-Lite.......Spurs wanted Zaha and won't spend £70m on him. It's 2+2 but there's a logic at work. Unfortunately for them, he's not French and called 'N'Traore' or they'd be spot on.
Tottenham Hotspur are set to lose highly rated prospect Keanan Bennetts to the Bundesliga. According to reports, the winger who can operate down either the right or left flank has agreed a move to Borussia Mönchengladbach said to be in the region of £2 million. Apparently the player has already cleared out his locker at the Spurs training ground. It would be quite terrible. He is a huge talent.
You sure, I don't remember Alderweireld having an injury until this season? Vertonghen has had more injury time - Wimmer came to the fore during one of them.
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The previous season to last, he had that freak injury when Jan kicked him in the away game at WBA and damaged a nerve in his leg. He was out for a fair while but it was a one-off occurrence and wouldn't point to any issue with injury.
Joe Pritchard's supposedly posted a farewell message on his Instagram...but since his Instagram is private there's no way to be sure without first having an Instagram account and secondly having a follow request accepted. That doesn't make FootballDotLondon sound potentially stalkerish, does it? Anyway, given he was on trial at Cheltenham a few weeks ago, he'll probably be signing with them
Yeah mate, 100%. Jan got the injury in the 15/16 season. Last season, I was at the Hawthorns when Toby got his injury, nowhere near as long as this season but he missed about 2 months of football including Prem and CL games.
