Rival watch

  • Please bear with us on the new site integration and fixing any known bugs over the coming days. If you can not log in please try resetting your password and check your spam box. If you have tried these steps and are still struggling email [email protected] with your username/registered email address
  • Log in now to remove adverts - no adverts at all to registered members!
Citizen Kane. said:
It's why part of me does sympathise with Levy. While I think he could've done significantly more to keep us at least on the coattails of these clubs, with a number relatively predictable mistakes contributing to us slipping beyond the horizon, expecting us to match them, City and United without bankrupting the club is fanciful and the entire reason why the stadium is so important to our long-term success.

Abramovich and the Mansours changed football permanently. True, if we'd stretched ourselves last summer and spent £40m on Skriniar instead of £15m on Rodon, we wouldn't have gone bust. We might have even made top 4. But then City would have just spent £60m on Dias and Chelsea similar on Kounde this year and we'd still be exactly where we were previously: hanging onto their coattails.

As others have said, if they just fecked off to a Super League, the premier league would be a much happier place and tbh no less competitive. United, Spurs, Liverpool, Leicester, Villa, Arsenal, Leeds, Everton, Newcastle.

Still the largest global following of any league anywhere in the world and in all honesty would still be the most entertaining, if not more so with a slightly fairer spread of finances.
Click to expand...
That's why I found Chelsea's spending last summer to be particularly disgusting (for want of a better word) as they were exploiting how a vast majority of clubs weren't able to spend the funds they expected to have due to depressed finances caused by this slight case of global pandemic going around, yet there they were chucking loads of Uncle Roman's cash around on Werner, Havertz, Ziyech and Chilwell to cement their position for a good 3-4 years, making them the Martin Shkreli of the Premier League
 
@PleaseNotPoll we're selling Willock to Newcastle. Rumoured to be around £25m. I remember us having a conversation about him not too long ago and you said it'd be silly to sell. Just curious to know if you think it's worth it for this price or whether you maintain it would have been better to keep him.
 
BrunelGunner said:
@PleaseNotPoll we're selling Willock to Newcastle. Rumoured to be around £25m. I remember us having a conversation about him not too long ago and you said it'd be silly to sell. Just curious to know if you think it's worth it for this price or whether you maintain it would have been better to keep him.
Click to expand...

Judging by the current state of your attack, pretty dumb decision. You're overstocked with players comfortable playing as wide attackers but only Aubameyang through the centre.
 
  • Like
Reactions: humanbeingincroydon and PleaseNotPoll
Citizen Kane. said:
Judging by the current state of your attack, pretty dumb decision. You're overstocked with players comfortable playing as wide attackers but only Aubameyang through the centre.
Click to expand...

I only think it's worth selling him if a) there's a sell-on or buy-back clause and b) we sign a player the calibre of Maddison.

Otherwise it's a waste of time.

The fee is a bit low, as I think Willock should have fetched around £30m+, but considering we've struggled to sell our other players, I guess this was seen as a necessity.
 
  • Like
Reactions: PleaseNotPoll
BrunelGunner said:
@PleaseNotPoll we're selling Willock to Newcastle. Rumoured to be around £25m. I remember us having a conversation about him not too long ago and you said it'd be silly to sell. Just curious to know if you think it's worth it for this price or whether you maintain it would have been better to keep him.
Click to expand...

Would keep him. A real game changer off the bench and can run defenders ragged if he starts, pushing a high defence a good 5-10 yards backwards.
 
  • Like
Reactions: humanbeingincroydon and PleaseNotPoll
remembercolinlee said:
Would keep him. A real game changer off the bench and can run defenders ragged if he starts, pushing a high defence a good 5-10 yards backwards.
Click to expand...

I do agree that he's got some great qualities, but he's still a bit raw in other aspects of his game and I don't know if Arteta is the best manager to make him fulfil his potential. But also, we're not in a position to give players lots of time to develop. We need some ready-made players for now who can slot in straight away. So I'm guessing that's where the money for Willock will go toward.
 
  • Like
Reactions: remembercolinlee
BrunelGunner said:
I do agree that he's got some great qualities, but he's still a bit raw in other aspects of his game and I don't know if Arteta is the best manager to make him fulfil his potential. But also, we're not in a position to give players lots of time to develop. We need some ready-made players for now who can slot in straight away. So I'm guessing that's where the money for Willock will go toward.
Click to expand...
Do you trust them to spend it wisely, though? £20m doesn't go very far at the moment, either.
It's hard to tell if Willock, Nelson, Nketiah and the like are going to make it at the required level.
If you're going to replace them with Willian, Elneny and similar signings though, you may as well not bother.
 
PleaseNotPoll said:
Do you trust them to spend it wisely, though? £20m doesn't go very far at the moment, either.
It's hard to tell if Willock, Nelson, Nketiah and the like are going to make it at the required level.
If you're going to replace them with Willian, Elneny and similar signings though, you may as well not bother.
Click to expand...

To be fair, Elneny was signed by Wenger in 2016 and Wenger subsequently gave him a contract extension in 2018, which was utterly foolish.
He's never looked like he's an Arsenal calibre player even back then, so I couldn't understand why this happened.
Therefore I blame Elneny still being here on Wenger <laugh>. What other club will pay him £55k a week?

Nevertheless, I think it's a fair question you raise as we've been very hit and miss with signings. Willian especially was a massive cock-up (another player I never wanted and knew would flop...).

I think the fact we've been able to tie a lot of our promising youth prospects to new deals, as well as signing players like White, Lokonga and Tavares (all 23 or under) suggests that we won't be heading in that direction again.

With that in mind, if (and I know it's a huge 'if' currently) the sales of Willock, Nelson and Nketiah help fund a Maddison/Aouar/Bernardo, I'd say that's a positive IMO.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top Bottom
Back