Is he bang average or does he just have a shower of ****e in front of him every game? I do agree though he is a bit of the jumpy sort, always massively over psyched which is what causes the bollockings but also causes him to make rushed, erratic decisions. So a bit like Hugo, just with the bollocking bit.
Just average, I’d say. Type of keeper you'd sign if you're a club looking to solidify themselves as a top half side, not one that wants to crack into/ be a regular in the Champions League. Both Chelsea and Arsenal could've been possible destinations for him over the years as they searched for new number ones on multiple occasions yet neither took up the option to go and get him and I'd rather we followed suit. I'd prefer we go for either a more established high class level of keeper that would be a number one for around 3-4 years like Oblak if he's genuinely gettable, or look at signing a keeper who's already doing well but with scope for improvement, such as Robert Sanchez. Or if we're feeling really ambitious, maybe head to Napoli with a big money offer for Meret, already a top keeper and he'd be number one for a good 8+ years.
Then we must have an amazing record of transfer success or developing youth since four squads cost a lot more than ours.
Di Marzio says we've made a loan with obligation offer to Roma for Zaniolo. €35m is the supposed figure Roma would roughly accept. Can't help but feel it'd be a mistake if this is true, fantastic talent but he's made of glass. Two cruciates and a ton of niggling other injuries...
Absolutely mental as you say. If it is only an option to buy as opposed to an obligation, maybe. But we might as well buy Jack Wilshire.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/64314328. From a PR perspective, this revelation comes at terrible timing. Here we are, apparently quibbling over £8m with Sporting for Pedro Porro. Meanwhile we have moved up to 9th spot in richest clubs in the world, ousting Juventus and opening up a £70m pa revenue gap on Arsenal in the process. As an observation, the problem is so obvious. Financially, we are closer to the top 8 than the next 8. But teams 1-8 operate and function in a totally different stratosphere to ourselves. At the very least, we need to be behaving with far more ambition than the teams below that. I think it was PoweSpurs who recently compared our level in the market to that of Leicester or West Ham. Well, this report makes a nonsense of that theory. Despite only being 6 and 8 places below us, our revenue is over double Leicester's and almost double West Ham's...and they have a free stadium. If anything illustrated how we are caught between two worlds, it is this table.
Lads (and Maggie!), try not to allow CK to read this post but it looks like Trossard’s heading to Arsenal. It’s gonna hit him hard when he does find out and we’re gonna need to be there for him.
I don't see how we are as you say caught between two worlds. We are the 5th richest club in the PL and where are we in the PL? Yes 5th. You could argue we slightly overachieved last season to finish 4th and have done for a number of seasons in recent years. If it shows anything it is how ENIC have successfully raised the stock of THFC and vindicates their actions both with infrastructure and players. Quibbling as you put it is in the business world, which is where the PL is, called negotiations. If you just paid what clubs asked for players we would soon be sliding down the rich club league. The fact that we have 5? players out on loan that we can't sell shows the problems that arise with any transfer because what you can't do is guarantee that it will be a success performance wise, and that applies to all clubs at whatever level.
Think it’s a bit of a strange signing - I don’t see how he fits into our team. I can see the argument for why we’re after him - versatile forward, decent finisher, PL experienced, is used to playing for possession-based teams, adds depth etc. However, he doesn’t strike me as an Arteta type of signing and is a totally different profile to Mudryk.
At the risk of sounding like a broken record, there is clearly no set correlation between wealth and league performance. If that were true, we might as well let Deloitte decide the final league table and pack it all in. Saying 5th wealthiest necessarily equates to 5th in the table is a dangerous path to accepting mediocrity imo. Try telling that to Leicester or West Ham who have both finished above us in recent seasons. Or to Arsenal or Newcastle this season. If Deloitte are correct, Arsenal shouldn't be 14 points above us. The point is once a club has 'enough' money to essentially have the pick of the top percentile of players in the world, which technically we now do, as long as that club's strategy and focus is solid, success should follow. The latter has been lacking in spades here for years now. And unlike the truly massive clubs, we can't or won't spend our way out of poorly conceived strategy. Case in point being Chelsea already spending £400m since Boehly took over and they are now on the brink of dropping another £50m on Moses Caceido.
The weird thing is Runners fans are responding to him being 28 like he's a 34 year old League One journeyman
Sorry CK there very clearly is a correlation between wealth and performance which is why you can point out the exceptions. There are of course always exceptions brought about by fortunate purchasing of players and good management of them. My point is that we have not fallen below expectations in recent years but exceeded them. The gripe with Chelsea and City has been that they could spend beyond their football wealth because of dubious owners breaking the so called fair play code. Until we have such owners we will not be able to compete on a level playing field but I prefer that we don't. It's why, despite my Spurs credentials, I would much rather see Arsenal win the league than City or Chelsea and now Newcastle. The only thing that makes the league interesting are the exceptions otherwise we end up like Germany, Scotland and Spain amongst others where the league is a forgone conclusion because of relative wealth.
Zaniolo Watch Skyte Italia report that we made a loan offer, but Roma rejected it as they wanted an obligation to buy as part of the deal TBH I think we should move on from Zaniolo anyway, as while he may have been a potential game changer 3-4 years ago, his decline in the last year to eighteen months has been comparable to Dele's
