I pray the reason we havnt signed any Wide Guys yet is that, the European window doesnt open until July 1st, where as the British window opened on June 1st Im hoping ( AND I SUSPECT ) this means our priorities are Mata,Cazorla,Jeffren,Hazard and not Downing,as if we wanted to sign Downing we could have signed him already,surely its better to get your signings done asap.As Comolli suggested when we bought Henderson I suspect this means that Enrique and Clichy arnt our priorities at Left Back either, would like Coentrao, but suspect he will go to Madrid and would be too expensive for a LB anyway,perhaps Sissoko And really hope we dont sign either Gago or Adam, suspect Gago is agent talk , but I fear we will sign Adam, who couldnt make the Rangers side for 4 years,would love it if United signed him.If we get another CM it should be Banega or Javi Martinez and offload Raul M( 28yo ,while we can still get £12m + for him )
Very wishful thinking, like your optimism! There is sense to what you're saying for sure. Problem is everyone gets so excited by the transfer window, and because we haven't signed all of our players before we can even register them, people then get angry and depressed, even though nothing has changed. Virtually none of the top players available have signed elsewhere yet, so we should try not to panic. The fact we've signed someone like Henderson, who was somewhat out of the blue and perhaps not a key position we felt needed strengthening, suggests we're going to have significant movement this summer. I'm expecting 2-3 signings from England by July 1st, then an overseas signing or two, and then we will just see what players become available at a bargain price over the rest of the window, and maybe nab one guy we hadn't planned to buy. That's how i see it going, whether we do get a cheeky deadline deal or not who knows but i think that'll be our approach. We certainly won't be scrabbling around like we used to on deadline day. Downing is probably being held up by Villa's managerial situation, and also these negotiations take time. What seems to be becoming clear is that Comolli makes his first offer very low, and then haggles hard from there. A few million vs signing a week or two earlier when the squad isn't even together, no training sessions etc is an easy choice. I'd happily have Adam. No coincidence Blackpool scored the most goals from corners last season. With Carroll, who i think is the biggest aerial threat in the league, could be a great option in itself. Also if there's one thing about Adam, he gets forward, and tries the ambitious passes. We've lacked the killer instinct against the smaller teams since the second half of the season we finished 2nd, and i feel with Adam he would at least make sure we're always on the front foot.
I think everything is getting sorted behind closed doors. We might be working very hard to get the likes of Mata (I hope so!) but we don't know about it yet. I trust everybody involved in the transfers to get the players the club wants.
I've come to the same conclusion. Aston Villa are looking for far too much for Downing.£20 million is ludicrous.Okay spending that much on Henderson(£16 million up front) was clever as he's only 20.But £20 million for a 26 year old.Come on. I reckon seeing as the English market is over-priced when it comes to wide players,then I reckon this is where Damien Comolli steps in.They will explore options home and abroad and will have a set number of targets.
i think that it is wishful thinking also. 1. ok the club may have negotitated early with some clubs/agents who knows... but these days agents can't be trusted and gob to the press to stir more omeny for themselves. 2. value in the transfer market is not determined by age. simply put businesses are taught that value = price+ quality. it is simple if you get a quality player for 20mil thats value. especially if you can sell said player in two years time for 25mil... or even 20mil again. however if you look at mr carroll at 35million i simply cannot see the value proposition unless he scores 20 gaols for england in short order, scores 30+ goals for us for two years and cheslea come a sniffing as per usual. Bascially if he holds his own in our side and we go to sell him say in 3 years whatever we would only get 20mil max... ergo no value unless he shows amazing quality. If jorden henderson on the other hand plays for the england senior team he'll be worth the 20mil all day fot he week... ergo shows the quality we easily expect then pirce is no problem... the same can be said for jones these days and smalling and young. if they all jsut play for england i nthe next 5 years they will be worth more than their clubs paid for them. or in other words look at villa, they got value out of milner, barry, agbonlahor, will get it for yuong, downing etc. they've done well.
Spending that amount on Henderson will only be clever if he becomes a very good player in the next 3 years. Only time will tell if he will be a good buy.
RVF. Let the lad play a few games for Liverpool before making such a remark.Henry and Bergkamp didn't exactly set the world alight in their first few games for Arsenal and look how they turned out.
I ain't being harsh, just saying that nobody can call him a success or a failure at this point in his liverpool career. I hope he becomes a good player so that it benefits England in all honesty.
People clearly still struggle to grasp the Carroll deal, but i think most of us fans look at it differently than John Henry and co. who actually invested their money from a business perspective. 1. Carroll was our number 1 attacking target for the summer (Commoli outright said this after he signed) so we would be bidding for him now anyway, and he would still be costing us around £15-20mil even if Phil Jones, Jordan Henderson etc weren't inflating the market. 2. We used the Carroll situation to adjust Torres' fee. Chelsea wanted Torres and we said that we effectively wanted Andy Carroll +£15mil (John Henry i believe said this at the time). So in some ways Carroll costing more was a good thing- we rinsed Chelsea or more money, inflated the prices of forwards having just signed 2 and it didn't actually cost us any more than we valued him at. Torres i would say was probably worth £30million but his fee was inflated by Newcastle's price for Carroll and the fact it was January. If we were to adjust Carroll's fee in the same way then relatively it is the same as us selling Torres for £30mil and buying Carroll for £15mill. 3. By making a bold move we avoided the risk of an auction now, ensured he will be having a full preseason with us, and he has had time to settle in a season that was pretty much a write-off anyway. 4. Carroll is unique. Is there any striker around that has the build of Carroll with the aggression of a working class Geordie lad? Keegan says he is the best header of a ball he has ever seen. On his day he is unplayable, and when it's not his day he's still a huge handful for defenders. If we can get the best out of him we will have a threat that no other team in the league will probably have for 8-10 years. 5. Our owners are not working to outdated football principles. They are actually bearing resale value in mind when signing. Given the home grown rules there's no way Andy Carroll's value will drop below £15mil over the next 5 years (unless his contract runs down of course). So if we sell him then our net gain from his and Torres' transfer is the £30mil Torres was worth. Not to mention probably £50k a week less wages than the incredible sulk. It's easy to dismiss this as a red-tinted way of looking at Carroll's transfer, but i can assure you that the shrewd businessmen we have running our club will have looked at it from an investment point of view, Dalglish from a week-in week-out footballing view, and Comolli from a scouting/potential point of view and they all went for the deal with great conviction.
Interesting post. I totally agree with your point 1. The majority of moves at the moment had already been arranged before the end of the season. For the most part we have speculation and promotional talk from agents. Next we will see the house chain effect come into play - sale agree but only if the selling club can realise their targets. On Point 2 I think it is a little more complex than value = price + quality. You also have to take into acount neccesity and scarcity. Now having sold Torres, it was clear that Liverpool desperately needed another striker to support Suarez. That was clear to Liverpool AND every club who may have sold one to us. Our need was part of the price evluation. Taking the Carroll issue a little further. The price paid can be amortised over the 5 year term of the contract. Hence in purely financial terms, the yearly outlay is more than bearable.
I think people need to remember that a lot of youth players are in Denmark and a lot of senior players are on holiday. While a few deals can be done here and there clubs know that it's best to wait until the player is back from holiday so a deal can be done and dusted quickly instead of bidding on a player, having the bid accepted, waiting for the player to come back from holiday to sort out terms meanwhile the accepting team leaks the bid to the press, rival team puts in a better bid to nab the player now they know that he is availible and at what price then player comes back from holiday and signs for rival. is if the player is back form holiday then it's contact the club, contact the player - Done in a day!
In 1992,Kenny was laughed at for paying £3.5 million for a non prolific Southampton striker.He was the same build as Andy Carroll,only scored the same amount of goals.How did that turn out exactly.What was his name again? If players want to play for the club thats all we can ask for,if they are dedicated then,what about the price,the price is none of our business as long as they perform,and performaces equal success.
Mata,Cazorla,Jeffren,Hazard???? Dear Me. Champions League. Not in it, not going to get that level of Player without it. Get used to it,.
I have a feelin that in a few weeks , that will have made youself look very silly when we sign 1 or maybe more of those names!!!
You do realise Jeffren came out and said he is flattered Liverpool have approached him, implying he wouldn't mind playing for them, despite the fact he's a squad player in the current best team in the world.
We'll see. But when you are outside of the Champions League looking in, you will find it hard to convince the highest level of Player to lower themselves. And the way you will convince them, as Mad Citeh and Chelski before them have demonstrated, is to pay them way over the odds in terms of Salary, and their current Clubs way over the odds in terms of Transfer Fee to take other more successful(currentley)Clubs out of the market for the Player and deny them a chance to speak with the Player.
