One thing that I can't recall being touched on but is a certainty is that we'll be letting a few of the U23s leave this summer - but the question is how many Kazaiah Sterling and Shilow Tracey were suggested as likely departures a couple of months ago, and I wouldn't be surprised if Anthony Georgiou was also on the list, but there's certainly a few other players who are on the bubble considering that they haven't come close to breaking into the first team while younger prospects like Harvey White or Dennis Cirkin are getting fast tracked past them who are likely to be looking for new clubs soon
I can’t really say much on Castagne as up until about three or so weeks ago I’d never really heard of him. I’ve got no qualms if the club takes punt although as I said in a previous post, there isn’t really a superb standout option for me, fullbacks and in particular right backs seem to be quite sparse in terms of genuine elite quality. It’s either going for Aarons and hoping that in x amount of years he can turn out similar to Walker or going for a guy like Castagne who’s a bit more established but still not someone who’d be coming in with a reputation of being a genuine top class player (yet). Our records with Belgians has certainly been impressive in recent years though so should he join, here’s hoping he follows suit.
I know a lot of people are latching onto Nelson Semedo, which definitely has nothing to do with the shirt he wears and nothing else, but would he really be the improvement upon and/or consistent alternative to Aurier that we need in the attacking RB role? And, more importantly, why are Barca supposedly keen to get him off the books this summer? Similar can be said of the other Barca player we're perpetually linked with, Samuel Umtiti
I actually think perreira of leicester is a top notch defender as well as amazing going forward. He would cost a fair bit though. We have reece james as development and hes looked good and we dont like our left backs but if we didnt have reece i would rather chelsea took perreira than chilwell
Semedo seems like one of those with blistering pace and that alone can always come in handy. I wouldn’t say no to him if the fee wasn’t silly. Umtiti’s a brilliant player but has struggled with injuries so it’s a risky move for anyone interested. He’s better than what we’ve got but it’s pointless if he misses a portion of the season, we’ve had enough of that with key players in recent years as it is.
That's the problem with putting uppity fans' getting butthurt over the team Walker leaving left us with a choice, either a Big Name™ who would step into the Kyle Walker-shaped hole in our team or we go for the prospect with a high ceiling who wouldn't immediately go into the team but would potentially do so a year or two later, and we went with the former as it would placate the fans by saying we signed a RB that Man Utd and Arsenal had been linked with a few months prior who also had experience of Winning Things instead og the one that would have led to several dozen "Cheapskate Levy" tweets by people with as much knowledge of football as they do maybe waiting for something to happen before assuming catastrophic failure The thing is, this was the wrong choice not because of Aurier, but because of the balance of the team: before that the RB situation was Walker was the starter and Trippier the understudy who could grow, but by the time Walker left Trippier had grown to the point he was in the England squad so buying a direct replacement for Walker was actually the worst choice, and realistically we should have gone into the season with Trippier as first-choice with Pereira in the understudy role, because the odds are at this point our team would have Pereira starting at RB with either Foyth or KWP as the understudy and, just as importantly, Pereira had a £15m release clause the summer we signed Aurier so we'd have saved £8m upfront to spend elsewhere that could have come in handy either that window or a window or two down the line
Do you actually think we signed Aurier to placate fans? Obviously we knew Aurier had some well documented off field problems when we got him in, what we perhaps didn’t foresee, or was missed by scouts, was the extent of his inconsistency, particularly in defence. In hindsight of course Pereira would have been the better signing but I’m fairly confident that Levy and whoever else is involved in pulling the trigger on transfers didn’t take fan reaction into account when deciding between the two.
We've got 4 divisions.Surely there must be one or two r.b's more reliable than Aurier we could get!!?
Yeah I'd agree with this. Fan opinion would very rarely matter in decision making on transfers, if at all. At least from a buying perspective anyway. I think Pereira was actually the one wanted by Spurs fans too, it was just a case that Aurier became available and the club seemed to turn its attention to him. On paper I suppose it looked great, Ligue 1 winning RB who'd made the Ligue 1 TOTY on multiple occasions... Pity that some times 'on paper' doesn't dictate the real story, lol.
A link that's flashed up on twitter a couple times is a potential swap deal of Lamela for Perisic. I mean it's no doubt bollocks and not happening... But yes please! Another one is a move for Porto's winger, Luis Diaz. Winger links really aren't going away when you factor in Fraser and Willian's stories a few weeks back. Does make me wonder if we're looking to offload at least one, possibly both of Lamela and Lucas. I think Lucas is doubtful as Jose and him seem to have a good relationship and Lucas keeps mentioning about how he wants to win something next season but it is a little odd that wingers seem to be dominating the transfer front for us more so than RBs or DMs when currently we have Son, Bergwijn, Lamela, Lucas and also Sessegnon too.
It is odd, isn’t it. We won’t know the truth of it until it happens or doesn’t, ultimately. I can’t see us getting rid of Lamela or Lucas though, Jose seems to like them and I don’t see a buyer in this market, especially for Lamela. He’d be a big risk for any club and funds are limited for most.
I think Jose likes Lucas, both as a player and a person. Not sure he has the same sentiment towards Lamela. Certainly likes him as a person as he's spoken before about Lamela's commitment and willingness to play through injury but he barely featured in the final few games, didn't even come on against Palace and I think Jose's sort of realised that whilst Lamela would take a bullet for the club, he just lacks the consistency and quality to be heavily relied upon. Finding a buyer though is definitely gonna be the problem.
I remember when Jose started at Chelsea he stated that a club needs 2 players in each position to get through a season, I don't think that he sees Lamela as a winger I think that he forms a '2' with Lo Celso, therefore we currently have 3 wingers and require a fourth.
Yeah one thing I always liked about Jose was everyone in his squad had a role to play and wasn’t just making up the numbers, his backup/breakthrough players seemed to be happy with their roles and more times than not did the business when called upon. I wouldn’t be against a ruthless summer with clearing out 5-6 and bringing in 5-6 (as long as the manager wants them)
There's certainly a few examples of moves by the club being motivated by the expectation of how the fans would react instead of common sense, most obviously the appointment of Jacques Santini even though Frank Arnesen recommended Martin Jol, while in terms of player recruitment there's definitely been times where we adopt a policy of "Look, we're spending" most obviously with The Baldini Splurge
I refuse to believe a club the size of Spurs (in fact any PL club) would sign players or appoint managers just to appease fans
Clubs way bigger than us sign players solely to appease fans, most obviously Los Ladrones during the Galacticos period (which, ironically, has made their fans a bunch of entitled twats when they merely sign Eden Hazard) but Man Utd are certainly guilty of doing so both in terms of players, case in point the summer when they brought in both Pogba and Ibrahimovic, and they certainly brought in managers to appease the fans - and have a blatant example of that sat in the dugout right now
