BBC are reporting Bournemouth's Ake on his way to Man City for £40M. That suggests the Cherries are going to be doing some serious rebuilding. They certainly need it.
Or then again, maybe not. Following is from the AFC Bournemouth Accounts 2019: "As at 30 June 2019 the Company owed its parent company A.F.C.B. Enterprises Limited, a company registered in The British Virgin Islands, a non-interest bearing loan with a book and fair value of £99,944,000. The value of the loans are £108,919,000, with discounting adjustments of £8,975,000 relating to an implied equity contribution, resulting in implied FRS 102 interest charged on the loans. This is due to no interest being payable on the loans and hence being below the company's perceived external borrowing costs. The loans are secured over the assets of the Company. The loans are repayable as follows: £33,137,000 on demand, £41,223,000 in August 2020 and £25,584,000 in January 2024." Maybe Ake's sale is to cover the greater part of the £41M repayment to the owner, said to be due this year.
I doubt that, Robbie. The window only opened on Monday and we already have 10 new players in place for the new season. Sørensen can also play as a CB and Ben Gibson from Burnley has also been mentioned at CB. It's also possible that Akin Famewo could break into the first team, having come off the bench at Citeh. Players like Dowell and Gibson who can't quite break into their PL sides are sensible signings or potential signings. Like you, I'd like to see us playing 3 at the back with WBs. I'm also confident that SW is also working on a new GK as well.
Positive sentiments from Everton fans: https://www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/spo.../kieran-dowell-everton-transfer-news-18686994
I was including Famewo in "what we have", Rick. It's all very well pointing out that we've 10 new players and we are only four days into the window, but the fact is that none of them are CBs. Wouldn't you think that, given all the work that has clearly gone into securing those 10, there would be at least one CB among them?
Can see where you are coming from Robbie, but every club will know the we are desperate to improve our central defence and are likely holding out for inflated prices in the hope we are desperate enough to pay over the odds. SW will not pay, or play, that sort of game.
I think it's clear we need to sort our defending out in multiple ways, but I'm not necessarily sure that the need for new CBs is going to be immediately apparent to rivals. On the face of it, we have four CBs who have all won the Championship at least once, and only Klose could be considered past his peak. Whilst Godfrey might well leave for a big fee, I think there's plenty of Championship sides who would swap their defenders for ours. That said, yes, I think we need at least one new CB, and the club probably recognise that too. And rather than stuffing our pipeline with U23 CBs, I'd argue we need a first team CB who is a cut above what we have. So that if we want to use a playing style that frequently exposes our CBs (and I hope we don't), we have a defender with the individual brilliance to make that strategy less risky. To me, that player is probably someone with Championship experience, and won't be all that cheap. Ben Gibson would probably be ideal, but I don't think he'll come cheap, and I imagine Burnley want to make sure they extract every penny of his value. So far, we've got the easy deals done. Youths unwanted at their old clubs, prospects from foreign leagues who are well within our budget/ wage structure. Convincing Burnley to sell Gibson for <£5m, and the player to take wages of <£25k p/w, might not be easy. Or we might be waiting for the Championship play-offs to conclude to see which of the current CBs at the top of the Championship are available. Alfie Mawson for example. I'm not worried if we take til September to bring a CB in, because I think it's probably one of the most tricky deals for us to make.
I agree that defence is a more complicated issue than just adding more CBs. It's noticeable that recently added players are over 6' to strengthen our aerial capabilities. One problem this season has been an abnormal number of injuries, especially CBs, meaning that we've never managed to field a settled partnership over a number of weeks. Simply adding another CB won't make an impact unless he's DF's first choice and becomes part of such a partnership. Another issue is tactics. If another CB is added so we can play 3 at the back with WBs, that makes sense, particularly if one WB hangs back as the other goes forward. Also, Sørensen is said to be comfortable with physical battles while also being able to carry the ball out of defence with good dribbling skills. Similarly, Placheta's pace will prevent opposition defences playing a high line. All of these contribute to better defending.
Heretical as this may be, my main reason for wanting to see us play 3 at the back is to obviate the need to have Tettey in the starting line up. We could do much worse than try to replicate how Wolves play. It is very much as Rick advocates, with one WB (in Wolves' case usually the LWB, Saiss) in a primarily defensive role. This allows licence for both central midfielders (in Wolves' case, Neves and Moutinho) to operate more freely from an attacking point of view, rather than have one of them shackled, Tettey-like, patrolling in front of the back line and slowing down forward movement. Sørensen appears ideal for the more defensive of those two roles, in partnership with a more creative attacking player.
Now 20, Bushiri went on loan to Blackpool but only made 4 appearances so he switched to Sint Truiden in the Dutch Pro League where he made 7 appearances. This year he's been loaned to Mechelen in the Dutch Pro League. Famewo seems to be ahead of him in the pecking order.
I'm not sure Tettey is that 'shackled' all of the time, Robbie, but when he does remain back, it's because the FBs are pushing up. Tettey has to fill any gap Aarons leaves behind and McLean often has to do the same for Lewis, which is a major reason why our central midfielders contribute little to our attacks. In a 3-4-2-1 they'd have more freedom and, IMO, they'd have more goals. This could be true whether it was Tettey or Sørensen, or even both.
Do you think there is possibility of Sorensen being bought to play as the left sided centre back in a three? With Godfrey in the right and Zimbo/Hanley in the middle
I think it's possible and certainly preferable to Lewis moving to CB in a 3. Sørensen could be capable of a range of roles as CB, as a conventional DM with greater ball skills, or even playing alongside Tettey in CM, using both his attacking and defensive qualities. He could well be a key player next season.
The main problem with those defensive injuries the number of them sustained in training. Something, or someone, has to be changed to alleviate this self inflicted problem.
Ha, my apologies. Talking carelessly about Tettey being "shackled" clearly distracted attention from my opening sentence, where I say I'd prefer not to see Tettey in the starting line up at all! An unshackled Tettey? No thank you! It's just arithmetic really. You need 4 players defending at any given time. If you push up both FBs, then two midfielders have to fill in; or, playing 3 at the back with both wing backs pushing up, one midfielder; or only have one wing back pushing up and let your central midfielders push forward. This latter is what I think we should be looking to do, particularly because DF seems to have dropped any pretence of doing what we were so good at last time in the Championship, moving the ball up the touchline with slick, short passing involving FBs, wide, and central midfielders (e.g. Lewis/Aarons, Cantwell/Buendia, Leitner/Stiepermann) to create overloads level with the opposition penalty area (with the other wide midfielder coming across to join in).
Chris Martin available on a free. He could offer a lot of Championship experience and a different option to what we have? Would be good to see him come home.
