Transfer thread for 2016-17 season

me too. Always been a fan of his style, even when he wasn't at the level he's at now.

 

He certainly has the ability, but rarely the inclination. He dreams of playing champions league football while churning out championship performances. He wanted to play for "the beautiful Arsenal" and that it would be his dream move. Now he's signed for you, you might have an inkling into what his mentality is like.

Good luck with him, I normally don't dislike players who leave us, but in most black and white eyes, he's a bone idle, self centred mercenary.

Good luck for the season anyway gents.

 

Sissoko will do as the other players do and knuckle down. He wants his Champions League glory moment. He wants to perform at the top level. Here is his chance. Poch will not tolerate laziness.

I'd have been happy if we got him a few seasons back as he's looked like steel that we've needed with some skill and drive, so I can be happy now. It's only the fee that irks me, but that's football these days. He is an international player at his peak and we have silly money floating around the premier league.

The upside is we now have an unquestionably solid midfield, with options. Imagine Dier, Dembele and Sissoko in a three with N'koudou, Kane, and Lamela up top.

I decent alternative top draw alternative to Eriksen was all that was missing from this window, and that would have silenced the doubt over this fella. There is always Isco in January I guess.

 

I think there's a lot as fans that we can learn from this window, and the transfer market in general. Things just appear to have changed, and it's been more noticeable in this window than ever.

"Normal" fees, in the region of £8-15m or so, only seem to get you certain types of player now. For example, relatively unknown players (GKN for example), players who play for small-ish European clubs who see that fee as something they can't turn down (Janssen and Alkmaar) , players who are approaching the end of a contract, or mediocre/average english players who have an inflated fee because they are english. (Mason).

Anyone that doesn't fall into these categories seems to just automatically command a fee of £25m+ nowadays. - maybe because their an international, or have been on show in a big league, as two examples. It's also largely down to the TV money, and statistics that came out today showed that PL clubs had spend at least £500m more than the next biggest league in a chart showing 4 or 5 of the other "big" leagues in Europe. - Staggering.

There's no longer 5 or 6 teams who can bully smaller premier league clubs because "it's an offer they can't turn down". The playing field has levelled out dramatically, which is why we saw 13 PL clubs break their transfer record in this window. They have enough money that they don't have to say "yes" to an offer, as they have the cash to go and purchase their targets before selling what they already have. - Which I think is brilliant for football.

Levy found this out yesterday with Sissoko. It was known all summer that they wanted a hefty fee for him, but despite his best efforts to "Levy" them on deadline day, they didn't budge from the stance they held all summer. Then another club met the fee and Daniel's old negotiation tactics were blown out of the water. Levy may well have said to poch "I'll get Sissoko if that's who you want, but I'm going to wait until deadline day to get the best deal I can, because what they're asking for is quite substantial". - Fair enough. But in the end, it didn't work.

Therefore I hope Levy takes note of this in the next window, because we've paid them what they wanted. I can't remember a time that Levy has ever done that. Levy got Levy'd. If Sissoko was who poch sent levy out to get, the next "Sissoko" may as well be signed earlier in the window, because there was no benefit of signing him late on. - And that's where things are changing. Deadline day is actually starting to become "rip off day", rather than a day for the "bullies".

I'm not saying that we should be spending that sort of money on all of our signings, but we need to be prepared for it if there's a top player we want, and realise that the end of the window approach isn't what it used to be.

 

Top post. The world has changed and we need to adjust. It's been coming but this year has indicated that traditionally 'feeder' PL clubs are now financial powerhouses in the terms of world football. I'd rather that we'd have learned it before going through last night's agonies but we got the player that we wanted. Maybe we delayed because there was a real possibility of Isco coming?

Was Mauricio Pochettino on holiday because he would have strangled Levy when things were not going our way? Does he not want to do the 'Range Rover Interview'? Did he meet with Isco's dad? Was he so confident that he felt comfortable going off to the sun? We'll never know but we completed a balanced looking squad and that's a nice feeling.

It feels like the day after your wedding(s) - it's too late to back out now, so you have to make the best of it!

 

Overall it's been a superb window for us, I think probably our best in a while as we've got the targets we desperately wanted and then added others to boost the squad as bonuses. For me this has to be graded an A, kudos to Daniel Levy and co.

Wanyama looks like he's been here for a while, slotted in brilliantly and scored the winner on his home debut, can't ask for much more. A great addition as competition for Dier at DM.

Janssen's work rate is something Poch will love, he has fluffed a couple of glorious chances but the goals will come, I'm confident of that, think he'll push Kane well all the way to the end of the season.

Nkoudou comes with a promising reputation, we've not had a real pacey player in the side for a while so hopefully he can showcase and excite the fans with his speed and skill.

Lopez is a bit of a weird signing but perhaps Poch has spoken to him of future plans and where he sees him fitting in down the line, I can't see him playing much (if at all) this season but I think a year in the country to learn the lingo, study the game, get to know team mates and learn from two top keepers will persuade us to purchase him if he looks the part and then we'll go from there. At 21 he's a baby, especially in goalkeepers terms so with Vorm reaching his peak and Hugo turning 30 this year (still young in keepers terms tbh), Lopez could be seen as our long term successor in the number 1 role.

Sissoko is a man that's got us all talking, not necessarily for the best of reasons but we all agree that while he puts on the Spurs shirt, he gets our 100% backing. NUFC fans have summed up our worries, he does seem inconsistent and has a bit of the "Adebayor's" about him but he should've known before joining us that Poch takes no **** from anyone and demands 100% all of the time, so if Sissoko brings that France and big game form to us on a regular basis, £30m will have been well spent. He's the closest thing we've got in the squad to Dembele as he's powerful and direct so I think it's safe to say the lack of Dembele cover can now be put to bed.

Isco was about to sign but Ronaldo two-footed him as he was on his way to sign the contract for his dream move, it now means he'll have to wait 'til January .

As for the outgoings, it was gutting to see Ry go, one of our own and was the first "Poch player", he was pivotal in our re-jigging of the first team. I hope he has an immense career at Hull Hotspur.
Nabs is similar, he got his chance under Sherwood but it was Poch that made him a star in the 14/15 season. Schalke have got themselves a real player if he steers clear of injury, if they purchase him for £17m then it'll be money well spent for them. I hope he smashes it in Germany.
Nacer was also tough to see go, great finisher a got a number of important goals (Arsenal away, Chelsea on New Years, finished off Palace etc). WBA have got themselves a fine player, could be lethal alongside Berahino and Rondon.
Pritch and Yedlin were guys with potential but for different reasons just weren't going to make it here, as much as we'd liked to have seen the former do so having come from the academy. Hope both do well in the Championship and get into the Prem at some point.
Fazio didn't work out here but he's a good defender in the right league, hopefully his Roma stint goes well and he earns a perm deal there or elsewhere from it.

 

There's a couple of stats about Lopez that keeps popping up since yesterday: last season he made more saves than any U21 keeper in Europe's top five leagues and he was #3 for saving long range shots in La Liga, which means...something, I guess.

Meanwhile, Zenit's dicking over of Juve gets worse: Witsel was at Juve's training ground since 9am yesterday - so to spend the whole day waiting for the deal to be signed off, then having Zenit pull the plug with half an hour of the window left, is not going to make him too pleased between now and January.

 

Well, we certainly have a tough team and should continue where we left off last year and have a good defensive record. Just need to work on scoring more goals which I believe will happen. Spurs are not good at breaking down teams that "park the bus", so hopefully they will batter them down but not to the extent they did against Chelsea last season!

A good transfer window and it demonstrates Levy backing MP...good on him.

 

Good luck with Sissoko - you'll need it. The only defence he has (as to why he consistently went missing in most games for us) was that he was directed up here first by Pardew and then McClaren. A player of his vast brilliance isn't going to take much notice of either of those two individuals.

But if Sissoko's managed well, you might see more of the Euro games performances he played in, rather than his domestic game; which frankly were hugely disappointing. My guess is that he will continue to help to you 5-1 defeats - though you won't have to play the likes of us for at least a season

IMO the irony of player valuations in this case is that if you asked any Toon fan which was the highest value player between Andros Townsend and Sissoko, we'd all say the former - in our opinion a much better player who we were sad to lose to that small South London outfit.

But good luck with the season Spurs fans.

 

You've hit the nail on the head, there. Two terrible managers that you wouldn't wish upon any club, let alone the same club back to back. Ouch.

He's clearly got talent, as we saw at the Euro's. So therefore a decent manager should help him produce those performances week in, week out.

 

We may need a new thread - 'Moussa Sissoko ****ed My Premier League Place' for Geordies to come and vent their disappointment and hatred for our new signing.

Currently, it's sounding a bit like the girlfriends of a wronged young lady:

"He was such a ****. She's better off without him"

"A real wrong 'un. A right lazy bastard."

"He was always on the look out for someone better and he'd say he was off home to play international football. I knew something was up when he made that Euro squad thing."

The first sign of a Geordie who claims he knocked them up and gave them anal gonorrhoea and never called them afterwards and I'm off.

 

Ha ha, be careful what you wish for ...

It's probably apt for you to have a new thread "How are we going to finish above Leicester" mind

 

Don't fret, it'll clear up if you keep taking the tablets. I loved Dimitar Berbatov once. He never rings me any more, not even when he was at Fulham.

 

L'Equipe are reporting the Chavs met with Sissoko's representatives yesterday - but the talks broke down, alerting both us and Everton.

In other words, we gazumped two sets of blues at once.

 

He'll get considerable game time at Spurs, so ignoring the fee, which have all gone crazy, it's a decent buy.

We actually had a net spend this window? Un-****ing-believable!

 

Right, not sure how truthful this is but this was taken from a screen shot on Twitter, apparently from a guardian article:

"Sissoko was valued at £30million and Tottenham finally agreed to meet that price, although the structure of the payments means Newcastle would receive the full fee - in five instalments of £6m - only if he stays for the duration of his five year contract."

Not sure how accurate it is but if legit, it's now turned into a great deal I'd say. Although I do question it to be honest, say he's **** this season and we decide we don't want him next year and we sell him, that'll mean we would've only paid NUFC £6m or £12m (£6m for signing him last night and then £6m next June/ July/ August), surely NUFC wouldn't have agreed to something like that? Then again, we have Daniel Levy.

 

if true, it's nice to give Chelsea a taste of their own medicine!

 

It's quite enjoyable reading this thread and seeing you try and make out like Sissoko for 30m is anything other than a complete car crash of a transfer.

If he hadn't played okay for a side that lost a game a few months ago then he wouldn't have gone for more than 5m.

 

with the TV money and CL, and a stadium that is supposedly funded, I don't think Levy could get away with it this time! We had to make the most of this opportunity.

We've given ourselves just about the best chance to do as well as last season, despite the changes at other clubs. We're not in transition anymore and there's no reason why we shouldn't do as well now the squad has been strengthened in just about all areas. - Certainly in the PL campaign, anyway.

The CL should just be something for the players to enjoy and see how far we can get. COYS

 

At £30m we all have reservations but.....

He did make Pogba look very ordinary in the Euros, so I'd suggest at his best, he's better than just okay.

Car crash of a transfer? Mmm, might be a bit too far, but either way we'll see won't we?