The bidding begins Woke up this morning to find the follow headline on one of the Dutch news websites: 'Fiorentina bids for Jordy Clasie'. My first thought: here we go, the circus begins. Every year around March and April the preliminary bidding rounds start to shake up the Dutch football market. The transfer season is still 2 to 3 months away but the tugging and pulling from foreign clubs on youngsters usually starts in early spring. Hot prospects, young talents and players playing in international squads are tempted by clubs from all over the world to play for them. Now Jordy Clasie is on of the hot prospects in combination with the international squad. Dutch Team coach Louis van Gaal has selected him a couple of time since the disastrous EURO 2012 and so far he has done extremely well for both Feyenoord and the Dutch national team. So no wonder Fiorentina is keen on picking up the 21 year old midfielder. Now this is just one case. Rumours and bids will start to come in the next few weeks and most of the deals will fall through. The early round of bidding and poking around is crucial for the clubs to see what the value of the youngsters, prospects and top class players will be in the summer.To set an example, last year VFL Wolfsburg, a club from the Bundesliga, bought Bas Dost from Heerenveen in May after a series of bids from other clubs in March and April. The next couple of weeks will be vital for the Eredivisie youngsters as the way the clubs start bidding usually is the tone for the Transfer Market in the Summer. In the past couple of years the Eredivisie has seen mild bidding, clubs were not aggressive in their bidding and not many talents were sold in the summers afterwards. But now with most prospects in the Eredivisie reaching the age of 23/24, the likelihood that a flood of Eredivisie players will move to other leagues is quite big this year. So here is a list of prospects that clubs will likely bid on in the next few weeks or in the summer: Club: Name(age) Ajax: Siem de Jong(24), Toby Alderweireld(24), Kenneth Vermeer(27), Viktor Fischer(18), Christian Eriksen(21), Daley Blind(23), AZ: Jozi Altidore(23), Adam Maher(19) FC Twente: Leroy Fer(23), Dusan Tadic(24, Nikolai Mikhailov(24), Nacer Chadli(24) FC Utrecht: Jacob Mulenga(29), Nana Asare(26) Feyenoord: Erwin Mulder(24), Stefan de Vrij(21), Bruno martins Indi(21), Jordy Clasie(21), Jean Paul Boëtius(18 on 22nd of March) Tonny Trindade de Vilhena(18), Graziano Pellè(27) SC Heerenveen: Filip Djuricic(21), Alfred Finnbogason(24), Jeffrey Gouweleeuw(21) PSV Eindhoven: Jeremain Lens(25), Dries Mertens(25), Kevin Strootman(23), Ola Toivonen(26), Erik Pieters(24) Vitesse Arnhem: Wilfred Bony(24), Jonathan Reis(23), Renato Ibarra(22) Now these names should cover about 80% of the bids and transfer rumours for the next couple of weeks in the circus of the players market.
Thanks for the scouting report. Not familiar with too many of those players though I see perennial almost-Saint Jeremain Lens is going to be a hot ticket once again. It'll be interesting to see what happens with Altidore. He's a physically gifted player who has always looked like he's going to be good but his career seemed to be stalling out a bit before he had that great season at AZ. And he's always disappointed for the national side. Part of that is because he's often starved for service, but the other part is a mystery. He's scored some nice goals and had flashes of brilliance that keep everyone believing a breakthrough is coming but so far the results just aren't quite there.
The few times I have seen Indi play he has been class, was it just them few games or is he really that good?
We do that on occasion with cork, spider and Davis but I think Davis is our weakest link. It would be great to strengthen this area against injuries and increased competition.
FC Twente have been weak since the start of the year, Fer in particular. But since the last two games he seems to be picking up the pace and performance.
I'll take two Mahers and a de Vrij; holding out on a PSV group discount for Lens/Strootman/Mertens. Do you do online checkout?
Bony would be great, as much as I hate to say it - I do think we need to replace Lambert if we're going to be pushing for Europe.
Altidore and Chadli can stay where they are :s, however Viktor Fischer would be a great addition. Anyone think Lovren would be a good addition if we could persuade him to come?
