True...did we buy them just to sell them for a profit? Neither seemed to get a good run in the team. And, if anyone's interested, I have just unfollowed on twitter the school I work in ...I let you know if this gets me a 20k a week payrise
Whoever is making our 'footballing' decisions they are doing an awful lot better on average over the last fifteen years than those making them for Aston Villa, Leeds, Newcastle and Everton who were clubs with similar resources at the start of the Levy period and better than Liverpool too who have declined rather than risen with respect to us despite being much better off financially.
I've managed to find the stat! this is what it should have been: "over the last 5 seasons we have missed out on CL by an average of 4.8 points, while dropping 5.6 points from our first four fixtures".
Probably more like we didn't get Poch's targets and they were the next best thing from Levy. It's looking like Yedlin is another whose been bought for shirt sales in america. signing Trippier made me thing we'd be getting rid of Walker, and having Trippier and Yedlin as RB's. But that doesn't appeat to be the case. So is it fair to say Yedlin is the next Khumalo? But it could be better. Look at the rise of saints since their decline a few years back. And swansea. - they are both hot on our heels and have progressed much faster. Clearly someone has put a plan in place at both clubs. If these clubs decide to invest the TV money and we dont, we could find ourselves being overtaken.
It is true in every walk off life that selling things tends to be profitable and buying them loss making. It doesn't matter how good our scouting is we can't expect to get a competitive advantage out of signing established players. Its just a fact that the selling club knows more about them than we do and will only sell if we pay above their valuation. We can improve our team but only by paying over the odds which means that most of them won't be value for money. Its a bit more likely that signing young players will work because the information advantage is smaller because they have a shorter track record so we may be able to see things that others don't. And on your last point if Levy has presided over a disastrous signing policy with disastrous managerial appointments how come we're so much better off than when he started.
reports with quotes from staff at Leverkusen are now stating that they are saddened by the behaviour of Son, as he basically just ****ed off to london without telling anyone. They said he acted incorrectly due to advise/pressure from his father and no one's been able to reach him! Also, certain reporters are now saying that berahino will go to the wire. We're still interested and West Brom will play ball. The signing is in addition to Son. Pochettino Press conference at 12.30 apparently
Unsettling players is a rather unsavoury transfer strategy, wouldn't you say? Why is everything so underhand when it comes to transfer dealings with Levy/Spurs? Sure, he might save a million here or there, but your reputation is getting a hammering.
I realized after I posted it saying Son was less risky is debatable. My reasoning in so far as I have any is that Son has had a few good seasons at the top level, and, more importantly, strikers are dicier. If Son looks good on the field, not scoring won’t be a big deal. That’s never true of a striker.
I don't pretend to understand your logic. We have bought disastrously, we have now been forced to sell players that we bought only 1 or 2 years ago at a considerable loss. That's speaks of only one thing - incompetence! We can improve our team by, firstly hiring competent management and scouting personnel. Which also leads onto, if we had more a competent scouting structure ( which I think might finally be coming in place) we wouldn't be buying overpriced, overhyped players in the first place. Our new owner - ENIC had more resources than the previous owners, so you would expect the club to be doing better - just as Chelsea are doing better with Abramovich's money. We'd be doing a lot better if Levy had kept his nose out of things that he's hopeless at, like hiring managers.
We also need to remember he's got CL experience. That's a big bonus. Son also plays left apparently. versatility is what we lack. Once the opposition figure us out (happened on many occasion) we have no plan b. Some other pacey skillful players who can score will cause a new set of problems for the opposition is more than welcome IMO. it might finally stop our "huffing and puffing".
Saints and West Brom are smaller clubs so if we bid for a player and the clubs reject, we can't be held responsible for the player trying to force a move, that's their call as they clearly want to better their career. Same happened to us with Berba and Modric, will happen every season to a different club.
Southampton and Swansea have done very well over a short period - lets see if they are still near us in five years - I doubt it actually
A good point. Possibly he should take advice. I doubt that many owners are astute enough in football terms to choose the right manager, so seeking professional advice would seem sensible. I should point out that in Levy's case, he's a serial offender!
but forget 5 years from now. what about our last 5 years? we've had time to do what they've done. But instead we've been lucky enough to stand still despite making fools of ourselves in terms of signings and a managerial merry-go-round.
The seven donkeys approach really is the best way to build a team. A few stars with most players working to let them shine makes for a formidable and coherent team. Swansea, in particular, has used it to great effect. Teams with a lot of signings tend to spend great stretches of time scratching their heads and trying to figure out who to start and how to play. A signing is much more likely to be successful if it’s clear he’s going to start. Note how much better a signing Gylfi was for Swansea, twice, than he was with us. It’s not the quality of the signings, it’s their number that’s the critical factor in determining how many flops you have. If the average starter starts for five years, only two spots open up on your team every year. These will be filled by your signings. So you can take the number of your signings, subtract two, and find the number of flops. How many signings have Spurs averaged over the past few years? Six or seven? Of course this is a generalized example, and there are various conceivable ways you can do a bit better, but the principle behind it is valid. In our case, we’ve just moved on, or are moving on, two or three players who never had a good run in the team due to the math problem I’ve described. The obvious solution would to be: sign fewer, sign better. Tbf, it is tricky when any upgrades on a number of our positions don’t want to come here because of no CL. Lloris ___ ____ ____ ____ ___ ____ ____ ____ Chadli, N’Jie, Son, Kane, Eriksen, Rose, Pritchard, Carroll, Townsend, Mason ____ I figure our new lineup of Lloris plus 10 LMs will be unstoppable. But will 10 be enough? We better pray we get Berahino.
Until we reach the stage where the manager and every ex-player in the sought-after position is coming out with 'incredible insights' that Spurs would be 'an excellent club' for player x, and that player x is 'wasting his career' at his current club, I'm not ashamed at all. Compared to the likes of Chelsea, United, Liverpool, City and many of the big clubs abroad, we conduct our transfer business with a lot of dignity and discretion. The whole Berahino saga has been turned into a drama by Pulis' apocalyptic conferences and WBA's PR. The Alderweireld affair was similarly turned into a drama by Athletico's incompetent lawyers, the player's family, and a number of irate Soton officials. Spurs had very little to do with either situation getting so toxic. The seediest thing I can think of that we've done recently was using your well publicised financial predicament to our advantage by buying back Bale's sell-on fee clause for a packet of crisps and a tenner.
You've had several players poached by Liverpool and Man Utd for the past couple of summers, often very publicly, but in your eyes it's Spurs who are the bad guys. I haven't seen a point getting missed so badly since tomw24 graced us with his presence...
