Transfer Rumours The Summer Transfer Rumour Thread 2016

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None of which we'd have gone "wow, wish we had him at the time."

Nobody said "Wow, they've signed Mahrez" the year before. I just think it's all abit easy to say it after they've won the title. I remember people saying how well Newcastle bought last summer.

Let's have a look this summer and make those comments on Sept 2nd.

Isn't that the reason why their recruitment was so good though. The last two seasons they bought players that other Premier clubs weren't interested in and they gelled and the sum was greater than the individuals. They were able to sign relatively inexpensive players who performed really well. Whereas I thought our signings were fairly average apart from from. How can you dispute that?
 
Isn't that the reason why their recruitment was so good though. The last two seasons they bought players that other Premier clubs weren't interested in and they gelled and the sum was greater than the individuals. They were able to sign relatively inexpensive players who performed really well. Whereas I thought our signings were fairly average apart from from. How can you dispute that?
When a team buys players you have never heard of and more importantly no top teams (across Europe) seem very interested in, and they turn out like Mahrez, Kante etc then you have to say they have a very good scouting system (at least for the needs of their particular team).
 
If everybody had heard of them then it isn't even a scouting system that identified the player. Do you think Real Madrid found out about Bale through extensive scouting or because everybody knows about players that are world class. Good scouting isn't about finding players that are already world class, it's about finding players that can be world class.
 
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Isn't that the reason why their recruitment was so good though. The last two seasons they bought players that other Premier clubs weren't interested in and they gelled and the sum was greater than the individuals. They were able to sign relatively inexpensive players who performed really well. Whereas I thought our signings were fairly average apart from from. How can you dispute that?


Well VVD was undoubtedly one of the signings of last summer.
 
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Leicester were either very lucky or very clever with the players bought in, Kante and mahrez are mid 20s yet seemed to have slipped through every other clubs net ( believe we were linked to Kante but could not have 2 short arses in MF) very similar to Payet who has basically just realised he is a very good player. Its hard to say if they were just flashes in a pan or if finally they have found clubs that suit their style. Would be hard to say if they would be as good in another team playing a different style (will find out soon enough with Kante)
With VVD he would walk into (well stroll in like a spaced out cowboy) any team in the PL and be a star
 
I think any time you win a Championship, you need a team that plays well together and is strong in spirit, and thus "greater than the sum of their parts."

But I have to disagree that's the main reason for Leicester's success. That team was as talented as any PL team's starting XI you'd care to name. Not nearly as deep, but fortunately they didn't run into a rash of injuries.

The last 10 games of the season, we were playing our best football and whatever issues there might have been seemed to have been put behind us. We had a spot in Europa to play for, and we've supposedly always been "greater than the sum of our parts." So Leicester should have no advantage over us in that regard. They were still the only team that beat us.
 
Isn't that the reason why their recruitment was so good though. The last two seasons they bought players that other Premier clubs weren't interested in and they gelled and the sum was greater than the individuals. They were able to sign relatively inexpensive players who performed really well. Whereas I thought our signings were fairly average apart from from. How can you dispute that?

Firstly Ashby, I wasn't disputing it. If you read back I asked a genuine question based on your first comment about last summer's signings and most of the players named weren't from then.

Secondly, you've now said last two summers. For that I am not so sure they recruited so much better than us. Forster, Bertrand, Tadic, Long, Pelle, VVD, Toby, Charlie Austin, Romeu.....so maybe now I'll question it :)

The point I am making is it is easy to say with hindsight they recruited well. Show me anyone who thought that at the time. In addition, if you are opening up to the last two summers, how can you judge ours now from last summer? Leicester get a second season to see how they gel and we don't? One could say it took them 9 months to gel before looking anything decent. If we win the league this season (I'm not saying we will), with Clasie, Cedric and VVD being key players, do we then change our mind and say how well we recruited?

Please can we now use this as our reason not to moan at lack of ambition on signings or "poor signings" as it will be ok to have a relegation battle with those players in the hope that we gel the following season ready to win the league. Talk about the club not being able to win!!

For the record, they signed the Japanese striker for the same we paid for Pelle and £9m for the Croatian striker who didn't work out.

Anyway, this has now drifted because we're not sat round a table in a pub where conversation flows fluidly. I originally asked who they had recruited last summer as I genuinely could only think of two who were great but interestingly enough it's opened up a different angle .... We perhaps should give players time to see if they're good.

I can't wait for people to moan when we sign someone like Pied.
 
Mahrez is slightly different as he really did come from nowhere (playing street football or something pretty recently iirc), but if PL teams hadn't heard of the other players that Leicester signed then their scouting team should be fired. Kante had the most interceptions/tackles in Europe the season before he signed for Leicester and I'm sure most teams use stats heavy software in some form when scouting. It will be very very rare imo that a player signs for a club and the other clubs are like "who the **** is that?". It comes down to which teams want to "pull the trigger" on a player and actually sign them, and who knows a whole host of clubs of a similar size to Leicester may have been in for Kante/Mahrez but they opted to sign for Leicester for personal/football reasons.

In fact didn't Koeman say on a MNF where he was a guest that we had known about Kante and he was on our list when Schneiderlin left but we signed Romeu instead? Could've been just to save face when asked the question about whether or not he/Saints knew anything about Kante prior to joining Leicester.
 
I think people underestimate the role of the team / manager/environment. Simplistic to say he was always going to be successful just needed a team to take a risk on him.

Take Villa as an example - Gueye, Amavi, Traore, Okore could all still be stars in the right circumstances . Are people clamouring for their head of recruitment - he'll no, they were awful.

Everton have no idea how Walsh will work with Koeman and to me the interest smacks of both manager and club not having a transfer plan of any sort in place.
 
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I think people underestimate the role of the team / manager/environment. Simplistic to say he was always going to be successful just needed a team to take a risk on him.

Take Villa as an example - Gueye, Amavi, Traore, Okore could all still be stars in the right circumstances . Are people clamouring for their head of recruitment - he'll no, they were awful.

Everton have no idea how Walsh will work with Koeman and to me the interest smacks of both manager and club not having a transfer plan of any sort in place.

As was said by a few in the know when we signed him, don't let Ronald spend the money.

I hope they dither around so long on this there's no time to spend any of this fabled £100m.
 
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