Transfer thread for 2016-17 season

...was exactly my first thought.
14 players a season used to be enough once upon a time

 

Haha! I knew someone would bring up the money we got for selling the other 5!

But if the 30% figure is about right then only 30% of the purchases made with that money will be any good. We made losses (some substantial) on all the players from the Magnificent 7 that we sold apart from Chadli. So with the remaining, let's say 53m, that we got from selling all that dross I could just as well say that we bought Stambouli, N'Jie, Fazio...

Must say though, that this time last year I was praising our recruitment policy to the skies as Dier (in particular) and Alli looked to be strokes of genius plus Toby looked exactly what we needed, Wimmer ditto. I reckon the 30% hit rate is somewhat low nowadays.

EDIT - looking at the past two seasons I'd say we've had 2/7 successes year before last and 2/5 successes last year. So maybe the 30% figure is still roughly accurate. Seems a bit harsh to label players like Davies (in particular) and N'Jie not successes. But you know what I mean. Not becoming a solid starter or generally central part of the match-day squad.

 

I'm focussing on the "if" part of that for now. I mean I'm hearing that Son is off and then hearing that Poch has said that he's central to our plans...If Mason and Son and N'Jie all leave then yeah - we surely must be bringing more in. Surely. And if N'Koudou is wandering round Spurs Lodge and taking photos and doing training it might be an idea to sign him since he seems to think he's already a Spurs player. If those three leave and we get N'Koudou in I'd like to see at least one more come in.

 

Two issues but it comes down to quality in depth:

We're not playing in the EL. If we put out a team containing very young inexperienced Academy graduates in the CL, we are risking getting spanked. If we play the first team too much then injury and exhaustion follows as it seemed to do at the end of last season.

All we need is 3 or 4 injuries or suspensions to our midfield and it looks very thin. To my mind we're GKN and 2 more players light on where we ought to be.

 

Who at this point in time would take:
Mason, Son, N'Jie out
GKN & Dembele competition in
?

I think i would

 

Nacer Chadli....wish you all the best sir and thanks for the memories.

Lots of love

Spurlock

Xxx

 

The one modicum of hope is that the Champions League fixture list is nowhere near as strenuous as the Europa League one, and we've been fairly lucky with fixtures (Moscow being the only longish haul). Poch will feel more comfortable playing first teamers in the CL than he was in the EL.

 

It's too late to get rid of son now, IMO.
But yes, competition for/ another dembele type is a must for me. Fingers crossed

 

A certain Spanish footballer at Madrid Airport travelling to London.....According to Tottenham Hotspur Blog News

 

We were lucky that we had barely any injuries last season, too. It was a miracle that Kane stayed fit and Dembele didn't have any problems. Be very lucky to have another season like that, IMO.

 

Big thing, as TFTB points out, we need to have a clearly stronger squad to cope with the CL as opposed to the EL. If the above happened we've lost four potentially handy AMs (counting Pritch and Chadli) and brought in one.

On Pritch - he's possibly the sale I most regret. Really wanted to see what he could do in the Prem for us. At least have a look.

 

From 2013 apparently.

 

That's a long ****ing flight. Remind me not to use that airline.

 

Absolutely.

 

<fixed>

 

I was just about to look up the history of that photo. Bollocks.

 

Just jizzed myself a tad, oops.

 

Go away Roo.

 

That was a waste of underpants.

 

With the optimism I bring to the table?!