I would imagine we are going for a CB with a view to buy in January, which I would be fine with aslong as we don't rush into loaning players. I have no problem with the 3 loans we have currently as if 2 of them go well I'm sure we will get them on a free next season. Luongo looks pretty decent but not sure how realistic it is that we may get him, although I would imagine he would struggle to get into the Spurs team, so you never know!! The problem with this is, which I'm annoyed about is we will be left short over the xmas period because it is only a 93day loan therefore runs out during one of the busiest periods!!! I think all we are is a good CB away from being a decent team, although I still expect this will not completely eradicate the defensive errors because it's just how PJ sets up his teams!! I have to say I like the fact we have been trying to live within our means, it's about time to!! And I don't actually think ME is starving PJ of funds like he did Keane, I think he's just decided to go down a certain route which whoever was here he'd have to stick to. Like I said last summer, I think wages are the main sticking point, it seems that if Jewell identifies a player ME is willing to fund it if they think it's value for money and we can afford their wages i,e Paul Taylor. I do think we probably have played it a little too hard ball here though this year particularly in regard to Davies!!! Unfortunately the PJ outers unless we have an awful season I'd imagine he will be here next season!!
I would imagine so. But surely the manager should always be the highest paid member of staff at the club??
We're only training Luongo, so don't get any big ideas on that one. You say ME's not starving PJ of cash and then go on to say we'll only do a deal if it's on the cheap, hardly something Keane had to deal with.
TBF Warky, Chambers looks a decent signing, he does need a better/more experienced partner along side him, Smith struggled again yesterday. Taylor had a good debut, so long as jewell uses him properly he will be good for us.
I do not revel in mediocrity, I just think we've been mediocre for years therefore it's not going to happen overnight. This club was in a mess after administration and then in a mess after Keane. PJ didn't do himself any favours last season but he was in a difficult position. I think you'll find I was one of the first to call for the sacking of Keane and I got loads of abuse for saying it!!
Was having a chat about our transfer targets this week, how they all seem to stumble on personal terms......Surely clegg should be getting some idea on what a potential target is on before we go in for him.....Boyd is a prime example, if lets say he is already on 10k a week then why the **** are we wasting time putting in a move for him if that sort of money is outside of our wage structure. I know this may seem to be stating the bloody obvious but I don't think this sort of ground work is being done before we start negotiations let alone putting forward a bid...!
You never know with Luongo, he might not get the chance to play in the Spurs team, he's got some good players ahead of him and also Spurs are a big team who buy players alot of the time to come straight into the team. I'm not sure how long AVB will be there. If he has a good year at Ipswich and we have a promising year he may want to stay as he realises he might not get many games at Spurs!! Never say never. I don't think he's starving PJ of cash, we are just being more sensible with our money. He's willing to spend more than £2 million on Boyd and Taylor, hardly starving him of cash. Perhaps he's having conversations with the manager this time unlike under Keane, where Jewell says what he think a player is worth and we stick to it rather than under Keane where he identified a player and left the club to go get him, so we ended up paying stupidly high fees for average players!!! I think in the end ME lost confidence in Keanes transfers and yes did starve him of cash in the end but I don't believe he is doing this with Jewell we have just changed tack due to our past failures and also the new rules coming in!! As I said before the Summer I think if PJ wants a player and we can get him at what we think he's worth ME will back him as long as the wages fit in to our structure which I think has been the case with Taylor. I think we went too far with Davies, because I think we thought that noone else would show an interest in him!!
With the amount of contracts we've paid up from PJ'S freebies I wouldn't be surprised if Evans doesn't have too much confidence in Jewell either.
Most of the contracts which have been paid up weren't PJ signings though!! Although admittedly he did offer Delaney and Healey new contracts but I think that was because we had so many players out of contract he wanted some continuity at the club.
Bowyer, Sonko, Bullard, Ingi, a fair bit of cash gone to waste there. Stevenson in and out again within months. Hardly good business.
can't see what people are moaning about to be honest. It sounds like a good deal for the club, surely its all part of the game ( offer as low as possible and meet somewhere in the middle ). If I was Hyam I wouldn't blame the club but I would definitely be looking for a new agent. For supporters to moan about the club paying too low wages just baffles me, but then most things do.
This whole business of parting ways with players is giving me the raving pip. Ingi, Bullard, Peters, Healy, Delaney, Stevenson (I’ve probably left a few out), all but one of these are players either PJ has signed or re-signed (as in offered a new deal). If you were the CEO or owner how much faith would you have in the manager after that? If it were me it’d be zero. And yet he stays, so it seems to me that for the most part (perhaps Ingi excepted) these actions were less the decisions of an incompetent manager backed into a corner, but board level policy to make room in the wage budget. How many clubs have you ever known that have behaved like this? How many of those players were transfer listed previously, to at least vaguely attempt to get them off the wage budget without having to pay them off first, or to get some money for them, even if it was only three pounds fifty? PJ hasn’t rated Peters since he turned up. Was he transfer listed and touted out? Why can other clubs offload their unwanted players without paying up contracts left right and centre? Then there’s the army of players released at the end of their contracts because they aint good enough (Wright, Sonko etc) or the decent ones that have value leaving for bugger all. There’s something very odd going on about the place. Probably just rank incompetence at CEO and managerial level, but very odd nevertheless. I hope we’re just trailblazing in quite fantastic idiocy, otherwise I shudder to think what might be going on.
I have a feeling it may be because of the FFP rules coming in. We appear to want to stick to our wage structure but not care quite so much about saying spending on transfers or paying up contracts, aslong as we stick to the wage structure!! Maybe also we know most of those players had little chance of getting a fee, so we freed them up so they could go and play some football. But then again alot of those players have found clubs within a few weeks so I don't know why we couldn't just say we'll let this player leave for free?? Perhaps it's more complicated than that!!
a summary of my views on issues brought up in this thread Hyam wages - will take with a pinch of salt - I doubt anyone other than the club/ Hyam and is agent knows this - maybe one of two close friends but it seems strange that this has only come out now. Could be true but it just sounds like the kind of crap I keep reading that somehow proves the club is being killed by idiots (but nobody has any proof off what is really going on) Luongo - talented player - very slim chance of keeping him although I doubt he will be in the Spurs first team in the near future - they have a lot of talent ahead of him. Thinking we are obviously reigning in our budget it makes sense to have a £2m or £3m player here adding to the squad. We just have to ensure its only 1 or 2 deals rather than a team of them as we have to have a squad for ourselves. Releasing players - some make sense (ingi due to his age was unlikely to attract a bid from others, Peters/ Healy/ Stevenson unlikely to get transfer fees for so may as well cut your losses. The likes of Bullard/ Delaney/ Priskin who walked out and then got a new club almost instantly is stupid.
TBH, I should be shocked, but i'm not. Remember the young kid bennett turned us down because we didn't offer enough last season. I would hope that they will at least be giving him 4 times his wage now, if not more with a bonus if he plays a certain amount of 1st team games.
Hyam's Contract - Shout me down for being naive but whatever the contract is, he was happy to sign it. I agree hes earned a new deal and we should be competing with other Clubs to keep hold of him Released Players - Again, i cant profess to know all the ins and outs of the Legal bits of contracts and transfers but i was always under the impression clubs had to pay off contracts and the transfer fee helped to cover that. What my point is that if we came to an agreement with players like Bullard and Delaney who have walked into other clubs, the agreement may have allowed us to pay off less of the owed wages, especially if otherwise we wouldn't have been able to get a transfer fee in time to get them off the wage budget to either free up the wages for other signings (Bullard), or by the time the transfer window closed (Delaney and Stevenson).
