Didn’t he have some personal/behavioral issues? Spurs are a remarkably decent and well behaved bunch of very young millionaires, and I wonder about adding someone who may be a little iffy. He would also force a choice between starting him and changing the formation or not starting him and making him unhappy (which he’d have a right to be, as a 15 goal scorer last year). Don’t get me wrong, the plusses are enough I’d certainly rather have him, on balance, but the perfect solution would be a first rate right RM who could also be a decent back up striker (Martial, maybe), or a first rate RM and a good backup striker. (That ideal backup would almost have to be old, like Lambert, or, preferably, young, like Werner.) This time round the idea seems to be not just to get a good player at a good price, but to get the right good player at a good price. I gather people seem to think Austin isn’t a lone striker. He also forces that difficult choice that Berahino does. "Nothing would surprise me, as a Spurs fan," are words of wisdom. But if I had to guess, it would be that we’d end up with a flurry of late activity which seems notably well judged, but results in a player or two too many, as we now have defending. I’ll guess Yarmolenko, Werner and Kramer. We’d be stupid not to pay 15 for Yarmolenko, IMO, but we have Rebrov in our corner, so hopefully it’s under control.
Kramer would be an audacious statement signing but I've seen nor heard nothing on him for ages, although that clearly means nothing at all!! I see what you're saying about Berahino's issues, wasn't it drink driving or speeding he was done for? Poch seems good with the youngsters though and Berahino doesn't seem a true troublemaker like Tarrabt or Morrison, more the kind who has made the odd bad decision. A new environment with plenty of young, (seemingly) well-behaved colleagues who are having success with their hard work might sort him out, you'd hope. If we signed him I think we'd find a way of getting him game time and the competition between him and Kane would only be a good thing.
Yarmolenko played a full game for Kiev today. He scored an injury time goal to kill it off after they'd taken a late lead. Finished 2-0.
I agree on balance. The two players I can think of who got attention for one drinking binge are Gio and Vlad, so that may not bode well. It would be great to have the two best young England strikers, but because he is young and English I think City or someone else will pay silly money for him. N’jie seems to be using Spurs as a negotiating ploy, always a popular tactic, though he seems to be a good fit as well, with the only question being whether he’s really good enough--which is also the question with Werner. On the face of it Kramer is unlikely, but I’m hopeful we’ll either get him or someone else we’d be happy to get.
Less than a week until kick off and so far, we've only bought defenders. Yet that famous Spurs soft centre appears to still be the case and our strike force will look mightily thin if Solda-dud and Ade-buy-out finally walk through the exit door. Is Levy doing another last minute panic buy scenario later this month? We never learn.
It didn't work out brilliantly last time we splashed 100million so a bit of caution is to be expected and welcomed IMO.
It's also woth mentioning that if Pritchard and Alli/Onomah feature fairly regularly then they will be like new signings too. Still think we need to add some quality to centre midfield and upfront though, and to do that we will have to pay. Until that happens we need to pray that Kane and Bentaleb stay fit.
If we sell Soldado, we're going to be hearing about a £10-15m "loss", aren't we? The fact we paid £13m for him doesn't fit into the narrative.
According to this site, we paid a a bit more than that Year 1 - €13m = £11.36m Year 2 - €4m = £3.19m Year 3 - €4m = £2.82m Year 4 - €4m = £2.82m (assuming todays rates) Total Fee - €27m = £20. 99m http://tottenhamhotspur.blogspot.co.uk/2015/08/spurs-to-lose-less-than-9m-on-soldado.html No idea whether this is more reliable than your figures?
In related good news http://www.expressandstar.com/sport...8/03/double-boost-in-villas-player-ambitions/ Double boost in Villa's player ambitions Striker Emmanuel Adebayor looks set to sign his season-long loan deal at Aston Villa today - as defender Ciaran Clark prepares to commit his future to the club.
Soldado was always going to lose us money if we sold him on as he was getting towards the end of his career when we signed him so would have little sell on value. Even with the £27m valuation you would only expect him to be worth about £15m at this stage of his contract. So if we can get almost that for him it would be a good deal as it implies Villareal think he is worth essentially what we paid for him.
I think Bender will turn out to be the thirtieth player who has used us as a bargaining chip in contract negotiations. It may be just as well. An established player with fitness issues is not our m.o. this year. We could solve the problem of him being hurt half the time by getting his twin brother as well, but one player for the price of two doesn’t seem like a Levy thing to do, either.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/33757749 Fer and Austin were without question QPR's only two positives from last season. They also happen to be two players who play in positions that we're in need of strengthening. Could we go in for a double swoop?
Actually we haven't, as the add-ons were tied in to the number of goals he'd score - and I'm going out on a limb here to suggest that seven league goals over two seasons isn't fulfilling the criteria to activate those clauses.
I still would love us to make a move for Cambiasso to beef up our midfield. Was a revelation for Leicester last year and their player of the season. Has proved he can still do it at this level and would be a great role model to the younger players. Are you reading this Levy?
