Toby signs for Spurs - official.

Unless we had and they just turned us down...but without coughing up.

 

Truly a burnt bridge.

 

Imagine this scenario on Jeremy Kyle. Lie detector results up next...

 

Was a very strange contract...suggests that we thought we would add value to Toby by him playing in the EPL with Saints.

 

Thanks for the advice which I have followed but it makes no difference I still have a blank message??

 

Sorry I don't know what else to suggest, unless it's something to do with the device you're on or your browser settings.

What you couldn't see was a Twitter link from the Gurdian with a link to this story:
http://www.theguardian.com/football/2015/jul/05/southampton-toby-alderweireld-atletico-madrid?

 

Really don't care about the 'reduced price', and hopefully the Saints hierarchy doesn't, either. If Atletico did make a mess of this and know it, let's not get too cute about this...pay what it takes to get this saga taken care of as quickly as possible, because even the Spurs' mooted price is pretty damned cheap.

 

All bloody hilarious if you ask me, just knowing that Levy is on the end of this spitting feathers!

 

Let's not get too excited until everything pans out - then, hopefully, we can laugh.

 

Most amusing thing to me are Spurs fans claiming that we can't force Toby to sign against his will. As if we would go to all this trouble if the player isn't interested in signing for us. They are so deluded that it's utterly inconceivable to them that Toby might be happy to stay a Saint.

 

Exactly. Toby has said all season about how much he loves it at Southampton. Koeman even said on Monday that Toby want's to stay.

 

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Do you have a tracker blocker enabled, like Ghostery.? Temporarily disabling one of those [or just twitter/facebook blocking elements] will do the trick.

 

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This is the bit I don't get. If both the £1.5m buy out, and the further £3m if sold to someone else this summer clauses exist, then AM may get £11.5m from Spurs, but after paying the clauses only end up with £7m net.

We're obviously happy to buy at the original £6.8m option, but surely we're not just fighting over just £200k difference are we??

Has anyone got any more knowledge of the 2nd clause whereby Atletico sell to someone else, as the first £1.5m buy out seems quite commonly quoted, but the second one less so or certainly not in as much detail?

 

I think AM are basically just trying to get out of the clause. It's not like they've said "oh yeah, just a clerical error. Saints will get their buyout clause money on Monday." They are pretending it doesn't exist.

If they can net the same from us as they do from Spurs, they probably don't care. But that means they need 14m or whatever. So this stalling is an attempt to get us to pay that much. If not, they will take their chances.

Personally, I say we can't let them play that game. Alderweireld is a good player and worth the money, but I also believe at that price we can make do with a lesser option and take the saved money to improve elsewhere. Give them an extra 1m maybe, tops if you absolutely must.

But if we don't take a stand here, every team will just take advantage of us.

 

I'm perfectly okay with getting taken advantage of to the tune of a world class CB for less than we paid for our backup striker.

 

It won't happen like that, though. Assuming we really do have rights under the contract, I do not see a scenario where we get him via higher transfer fee.

If Alderweireld wants to come here, we have the leverage. If he does not, we are screwed. Throw in a bit extra if it means we get Alderweireld in quicker and with less fuss if we must, but it won't get him in if he does not want to be here.

Spuds will do the same thing we do, if they have any balls. They negotiated with AM in good faith, now they might not get their guy because AM misled them.

The remedy for this in court seems clearly to just to enforce the contract and AM pay us whatever, plus maybe a small, non-substantive penalty. This way we are made whole under the contract and Alderweireld does not get his freedom to choose clubs restricted.

From AM's standpoint, that means they get as much from selling to Spuds and paying the penalty as they would selling to us, so they don't care. And Spurs will pay the fee agreed to. No reason for them to pay more because AM screwed up and has to pay a penalty. Not when the alternative is AM still pays us 1.8m and now they are stuck with a hugely unhappy Alderweireld who they will then probably have to offload for less than they sell to Spurs.

I think AM is simply testing everyone here, hoping Alderweireld, U.S., or Spurs will toss them some cash. Or some other club enters the mix. Just dragging it out since they don't need Alderweireld for anything over the next month or so or even beyond. But in the end, they will break because Alderweireld wants to leave. Just a matter of whether he prefers us or Spurs.

 

It would appear that Toby would be happy to be either here or at Spurs; if he had no intention of coming here we wouldn't be pursuing this avenue, because it's a dead end given that we'd still need to agree terms with him. The difficult party here is Atletico, and they'll have a lot of parties to appease; a lawsuit in which they are forced to pay compensation is a black eye, but not nearly as much as a situation where their mistake ends with us getting Toby for a cut-rate price. Being able to save face because we agree to a fee in the ballpark of 10-12m would be a godsend if they believe that we have a case.

 

If we were willing to offer 10m (which I'm sure we are), and AM were happy with it then Alderweireld would already be ours. 10m from us is equal to or better than 11.5m from Spurs because of that "buy out the buy out" clause.

And I don't see why we would not have offered 10m, considering Alderweireld is worth more than that, and prior to July 1 there was a real possibility that AM could buy us out.

They would have sold at 12m, regardless. Even if they feel like the clause we have is no good, it won't matter. They are getting the 12m they want, which is more than Spuds offered. They are not having to pay a1.5 fee they never intended to pay anyway so that is neither good nor bad for them.

I doubt AM just somehow forgot about the clause since it has been widely reported by all the papers and Alderweireld has mentioned it himself.

So I think it is just that Atletico is not all that happy with either our bid or Spurs and is just trying to create a bidding war and draw this saga out. If they fail, Alderweireld goes to us for 7m or Spurs for apparently 7m net so they don't care.