Summer 2013 Transfer Rumour Thread - Mk4

I've seen this quoted a lot that he scored over 20 goals this season, people always forget to mention that this is in 64 games which makes it look a lot less impressive than other strikers. 8 goals in the league is very disappointing for a £50m striker. Here he is compared to other strikers in goals per games in the season

Torres - 22 in 64 - 0.34 gpg
Benteke - 23 in 39 - 0.59 gpg
Lukaku - 17 in 38 - 0.45 gpg
Hernandez - 18 in 36 - 0.5 gpg
Rooney (who was considered to have a poor season) - 16 in 37 - 0.43 gpg
Van Persie - 30 in 48 - 0.63 gpg
Lambert - 15 in 38 - 0.39 gpg

Looking at this, he really doesn't match up with the best.

 

Still disagree, and at 21 Caulker's no finished product.

 

At least he excelled in Europe, unlike Man City.

 

The thing is Cardiff probably need a finished product. Unless Caulker has massively improved over the summer, I don't think he's going to do much to help keep them up.

 

I think he hit the bar earlier too.

 

Same could be said about Cornelius, but Cardiff appears willing to roll the dice on young, talented players. More prosaic choices might give them a better chance of being in the Prem next year, but one gets the sense that they're gambling on scraping survival with youth in the hopes that they'll have a nucleus that can stick around for much longer.

 

He didn't take many penalties (not that he would have scored them!). I'd be very happy with him as long as his wages weren't silly, plus he can speak to Pochettino.

 

I remember him helping Swansea to comfortable safety in their 1st season and was impressive. He is now 2 years older and experienced playing in a talented spurs side.

 

I think they probably would have had no problem staying up without him.

 

Kind of like we did you mean? Rodriguez, Ramirez and Gazzaniga were hardly prosaic choices were they? Even Clyne and Boruc were gambles to an extent.

 

Had the chance to chat to Drew Surman once after his move to Norwich. Really nice guy, said he was gutted about the timing of the takeover and that he only left because the club needed the cash; he loved it here.

Top guy and had always hoped he'd come back here but a couple of seasons on the bench with Norwich have put the brakes on his development. Him in front of Shaw would have been interesting!

 

Exactly what we did, though I'd argue that we started from a better base. Said a few times that I have no problem with what Cardiff's been trying to do; it's a gamble -- as we found out when we were in the relegation race late despite the outlay -- but I'll never criticize a PL newcomer for buying players with upside rather than going with vets, and thus riding the lower-table treadmill to anonymity.

 

Our most important players last season were arguably Schneiderlin, Cork and Lambert though. I don't think Cardiff have such a solid spine. They'll be taking far more of a gamble than we did if they only sign young players in this window.

 

I guess the upside (as it was for us) is if they are relegated, they're not paying anyone silly money.

 

But you could also argue that they come to the premiership with more players with premiership experience than we did (Bellamy, Whittingham, Marshall, Campbell, Smith, Taylor etc and therefore to spend money on quality youngsters is not a bad policy.

Anyway, shows how little rumours there are about saints at the moment that we are all discussing Cardiff city, Gareth Barry and Torres!

 

Whittingham's pretty good, but he's the only one in that list who I think can definitely cut it in this league. I wouldn't necessarily advocate bringing in "mercenaries" (though I don't think that's as bad a strategy as many make it out to be), but I think they could do with some solid players who are in or around their prime now. Not old necessarily, but over 23 would be good.

 

Sordell has joined Charlton on loan from Bolton.

 

Was just skimming through, but did someone really say they thought Caulker was on a similar level to Fonte and Yoshida?

For 8/9 million would've taken him over Lovren

 

One of the most overrated players Sordell. Always played for England U21s under Pearce and always disappointed. Had a good half season at Watford then got sold to Bolton who were relegated in the same season.

 

Remember when Sordell was the 'next big teenager...'

In other news, anyone seen Nile Ranger recently...