I did strongly suspect there was a permanent deal to be done here given his contract situation and city signing phillips and having rodri Leaves open a loan slot for McAtee or Delap. Hopefully we are still also in for a big striker signing as well
Looks very much a deep playing CM, who is happy to sit in front of the CBs. Are we maybe contemplating a change away from 4-2-2-2?
Looks like it. Importantly, he has good vision so can play balls over the top for KWP and Perraud and the strikers to run onto. He could be an absolute revelation for us. In fact he reminds me a lot of Schneiderlin.
I quite like the way we worked with Chelsea last year and City this year. With loan rules getting tighter we could really take advantage of good relationships with these clubs. More than happy to be the club that hoover up all the frustrated youth that want to prove themselves in the first team but are finding it difficult to oust world class players at their existing clubs. Probably a little easier to get picked ahead of Romeu or Redmond rather than Rodri or De Bruyne!
For every Tino there's a Thierry Small. As always Tom, your endorsement of a player that you've never seen play is admirable, and no doubt he will be a great player in a couple of years. But, what I'm saying is, 10m is a lot to spend on a player who likely won't be first team quality for a while. Unless of course, Dragan is planning on spending lots more money this summer. In which case, happy days. We need first team quality players though.
I don't get the age thing being a problem though, if you're good enough and all that. Any signing could struggle, regardless of age. It's always a gamble for a club of our size when it comes to transfers.
Why do you say he isn't first team quality? How exactly do you know that? Even if he isn't quite ready he won't be far away and we still have JWP, Romeu and Diallo. But the odds are he'll be another Tino, rather than a Small or Simeu. The 10mill fee suggests we feel he is first team ready. And why he chose us over Leeds.
I’d hope that the permanent one is a higher value one like the Kalajdzic. I guess what I am saying is that if our striker additions are a Delap loan and Adamu then it might be slightly different underwhelming. But if it is Kalajdzic (or someone like that) and one of the other two then that would make sense (and be what I would expect) Also it would be good to agree an option to buy with a fee agreed. The player still has to agree after all
Tom is endorsing a player he hasn’t seen play. You appear to be writing one off for the same reason / with the same information. Or at least writing him off for the first team
This. No I haven't seen him play. But I'm basing my argument on several things: 1. City rate him very highly - this has been reported. 2. City's academy and facilities are unbelievable. 3. The 10mill fee suggests to me we feel he can play at PL level straight away. If you're good enough, you're old enough at the end of the day.
It completely blows my mind that there seem to be people out there (mainly on SulkWeb) who would rather us sign Ben Mee than Levi Colwill. And presumably Jack Cork over Lavia (there was a post suggesting something 6 of Burnley’s team would “walk”’ into ours although I don’t think cork was one )
Agreed. But the fact is not many 18 year olds are "good enough" to excel in the premier league, so the chance that 3 or 4 of them will be is slim. Also, as well as the actual age itself, the fact some of them have never actually played mens football is also a risk. But the point we both make, is that all transfers carry risk, especially for clubs with limited budgets such as ourselves. If our options were to spend £25m on 1 experienced quality player, or bring in 3 highly rated youngsters, you could argue the signing of one more established player carries more risk.
I know there's a lot of "we need to sign experience" going on, but isn't that what JWP and Romeu are for?
The difference then was we were trying to use players like Gillet and James which was never going to work out. We did have 1 bright talent who we spent all our money on, a certain Mr Schneiderlin! So the moral of the story is, spend the money on youngsters and they will be quality, use your own youngsters and you will get relegated!
I can see both sides with this argument. Theres a lot of potential upside in quality and future value with these sorts of signings. But it is a lot to expect of young lads to step up to the level of PL, plus all the fanfare and money that comes with it, while also keeping a level head and bring the right mentality to the team. And yes we do have the likes of JWP and Romeu who in theory are the experienced heads that can help guide them. But then again, our existing mentality within the team has been weak for a long time even with these players, so adding just young prospects is unlikely to change that. Shame Eriksen is out of our reach because we need someone of his quality and the experience and mentality he brings would be huge in a team like ours.
