That's the thing, if we're to push on, we really do need a "marquee" signing. Utd spent £24m on a 29 year old, do you think they care of his sell on value in the next 2-3 years, of course not, RVP is maintaining his great form and I think Levy for a change (and just this once - I don't want us to become a Pompey/ Leeds) needs to looks past sell on factors and just buy someone to do the business NOW. The likes of Willian & Moutinho (and Damiao according to reports/ media) are these types of players and I think we just need to go for it. I know it's a risk but the big clubs make these risks and 9 times out of 10 they pay off. Free up wages from sales of deadwood (god how many times have I said that ) such as Gomes, Bentley, Jenas and perhaps Huddlestone and straight away that's surely more than £100k a week worth of wages we can put towards someone. I'll take my hat off to him if we maintain our position & form with the squad we have. Although I do think the squad is good enough to get top 4 - I said that at the start of the season - it's clear that we CAN strengthen and push on to not only just aim for top 4 but give City and Utd a little tap on the shoulder and let 'em know we're doing our best to push them all the way and who knows...
I get what youre saying but I tend to agree with Roo. The Willian and Damiao stories are just press speculation, if you read the comments, as I posted earlier, there is no suggestion we are in the market for either player. In addition sometimes the addition of a marquee player is the last thing a club needs, it can upset the balance and make the ones that are proven in the team lower their performance. I think Willian and Damaio can make it in the PL, however they are both risks, not in terms of money or sell on value, but in terms of can the get up and running quickly, which is what Jan transfers are meant to do. I have less concerns in this area with Moutinho, who looks like the kind of player we need and I perceive him to be quite a determined character. I just hope we didn't burn bridges there in the last window. I do hope we make one or two signings in January, but if players aren't available that can take us to the next level, I think we are OK with the current squad. All this depends on what strengthening those around us do. Arsenal will be in the market, as will Chelsea and potentially Liverpool. As I said in a previous post, I do think its good we are playing our cards close to our chest on transfer targets.
have we signed anyone yet? have we signed anyone yet? have we signed anyone yet? have we signed anyone yet? have we signed anyone yet? have we signed anyone yet? have we signed anyone yet? have we signed anyone yet? have we signed anyone yet? have we signed anyone yet?
99% of transfer stories are press speculation though, they always stem from a manager saying "this guy's a good player" to then suddenly a deal being close or an offer being made, their scenario's aren't any different to the recent speculation of Eriksen, Moutinho, Remy and so on. We never truly know who we're after until SSN snaps them at the training ground or the play themself speaks out. In recent years we haven't had a marquee signing, so it's hard to judge whether it'll be a positive or negative on the team. The likes of Bale and Modric were raw talents who developed under us and Berbatov didn't come with the biggest of reputations, after the two seasons with us he was arguably one of the most recognised strikers in Europe. Ideally, I want us to be the club to buy the end product of a Modric/ Berbatov and not the one to create/ develop them. I mentioned before that my only concern with Moutinho (even though I'm positive he'll be a success) is that at 26, why hasn't he already been snapped up by one of the teams in the top leagues already? With all due respect, the Portuguese league isn't the best of standards, or at least not on the same leave as the Prem, La Liga, Serie A and Bundesliga. That said, it could coincide with my previous point in that we'll (hopefully) be getting Moutinho at his peak rather than needing to develop him. There's many ways to look at it. AVB clearly believes he's the man that we NEED and I trust his judgement on this, he knows the player more than anyone, so if he still believes Moutinho is what this team needs then I hope Levy backs him. I agree with you that if we can't get players that'll improve the squad, we'll still be OK. On paper we have the 3rd/ 4th best squad in the league in my opinion, It's a great time to be a Spurs fan at the moment what with aspirations of a CL finish and a team that (normally) plays great football but me personally, I've always been one to aim a little higher (que the Bill Nick quote! ) and deep down I think most Spurs fans, AVB, the board and players probably feel the same, therefore by adding that extra bit of quality, we can really start to truly believe and even achieve these aims.
I don't disagree with any of that mate, but I just don't see Levy going for it. If we're spending 20mill + (which we never have btw), Levy will be looking to get about 10m of that back, when that player is about 30. He's just a shrewd businessman and I do respect him for that. Unfortunately there's a fine line between being shrewd and tight. sometimes we shoot ourselves in the foot and need to just go for it, like you say. ps.. 100k p/w for those "dead wood" players? i'd have thought it'd be about £200-250 for those, surely? isn't Bentley on about 50k p/w alone? see this is where I disagree with you both. - the squad. I don't think we have enough in the squad to remain confident of a top 4 finish. We're at that point in the season where niggling injuries occur and players are sidelined for 2,3,4 weeks at a time. Some might say that we've already had our fair share of injuries, but that's meant that other players have played a lot more games than normal, without a rest. Vertonghen, Bale, Defoe, Sandro and lennon have been overplayed IMO, and whilst I wouldn't necessarily say we should have rested them (as they've been outstanding), they are the prime examples of players who we could see face these injury problems, due to fatigue perhaps. This is where the "squad" element comes into it. I don't think the squad is good enough to deal with a couple of these players being out for a few weeks. We'vemanaged to get away with it against the likes of Reading where Bale served a 1 match ban, but with no disrespect to reading, they are at the bottom of the table and we were at home. what about a string of games which could include some teams at the top? we were only saying yesterday how without bale we lose our balance on the wings, which is vital to our game. For me, the "Bench" doesn't have 1 game changer amongst it. Whilst those players could come in and do a job temporarily (1 game), or for 20 mins at the end of a game perhaps, if we had to make a change of any period of time, I think we'd have some serious problems. This is the business end of the season. - If those around us strengthen, it only adds even more of a threat to our position. We've not bought the quality we've needed in the past and we've suffered come may as a result of this.
I think that was the point I was making though Roo. It all depends on how others strengthen. If all remains level we will be OK as were. OK is not an endorsement saying the squad is in a great position. We all know its light for cover in certain areas. However talk of removing deadwood such as Huddlestone (not my words) means if we don't get the big names in that could take us to the next level, we would be buying squad players, that would turn in to those new players being deadwood that we could struggle to move on. I would love to make one or two transfers in during the Jan window. I just don't want us to chase numbers. If they aren't better than we have then keep Thudds, keep Dawson. Obviously Gomez has to go, as should Bentley and Jenas if anybody will buy them. I don't think we should panic buy either as there isn't a crisis here
Like the "are we there yet?" kid in a car i know, but i'm still impatient. We need a striker early if Ade buggers off to ACON
If Defoe gets injured and we're left with just Dempsey (who, imo, is not an out and out striker) then we might be in a bit of a pickle
whether others strengthen is just one of the factors I used as an example though mate. what I'm saying, is that even if they don't strengthen, and nor do we, I still wouldn't feel confident. We've played everyone once now and other clubs now have the knowledge of how to deal with us, having been able to see the highlights of 18 other games where we played the rest of the league, as well as the one game against themselves. players like Bale and Lennon (for example) will be targeted and man marked, thus being nullified from the game. We saw it on various occasions last year. We ended up looking clueless as to how we could break down those stubborn sides. Without any game changers (IMO) I tink we could encounter this problem again, when it's most important. Obviously Bale and Lennon are two players who are extremely hard to have direct replacements for, but what I'm saying is that we don't have any other natural players who can come in and play even a remotely similar game. - Falque is about the only one, and doesn't get a look in. Both Sig and Dempsey drift inside too much. Our biggest strength is the space we create in the centre due to our wide men. we end up pulling defences apart. With out Bale and/or Lennon, the shape goes instantly.
I understand the logic behind your thinking Roo, but I'm not sure that I agree with your conclusions. Other sides have had time to assess our tactics and system, but we've also had time to gel and get players back from injury or up to speed, fitness wise. Our opposition seem to be having more difficulty dealing with us in recent weeks, not less. Lloris is now fully integrated, the Dembele/Sandro partnership seems extremely strong and Lennon's offering as much down the right as Bale does down the left. The back four appear to have a decent grasp of what Villas-Boas wants from them and have been strong in recent games, despite regular changes to the personnel. I agree about lacking direct replacements out wide, but only because the likes of Towsend and Falque have fallen down the pecking order. Dempsey was very effective playing in off the left from Fulham last season, but he probably needs Assou-Ekotto in the side to flourish from that position. Sigurdsson had a decent game for us against Reading, but he was in the centre a lot and Naughton simply doesn't overlap, though he appears to have added more of an attacking threat to his game coming inside. Do we have anyone that can do Lennon's job if he's out? Probably not.
This is where Bale, Lennon and Dembele are so important all three are very difficult to man mark out of a game indvidually and if you try the other two have the potential to hurt you. Incidentally Dembele is so strong on the ball that's it's more a case of what he does with it rather than will he, a huge asset IMO.
can i say, Cudicini has been a great pro for us and hope he does well at Galaxy...i think he knows he is onto a good thing with being a footballer and just gets on with it.
I thought Townsend did a fine job impersonating Lennon when he came on the other week and Sigurdsson looked comfortable playing out there a couple of times this season. I would like us to sign another winger but for me getting someone who can cover Dembele's position and further forward should be the only priority at the moment. We are so ****ed if Dembele gets injured and given that he's so often getting subbed I think it's something AVB's aware of too. The additional potential with a new playmaker like Moutinho is that you can move them out to the wing to switch things up during games, we have the pace and overlapping of our fullbacks that mean they can still play their considered game without losing our threat down the flanks. Who knows we might not even need a new winger afterall.
Yeah, never spoke out about not getting in the team and put in some good performances for us when called upon. Right move at the right time for both him and the club.
Hi PNP. I was trying not to go into too much detail with this because it is all hypothetical at the end of the day. What I was trying to get at, is there's problems we've experienced in the past due to poor January window's, where we've not helped ourselves when the signs have been obvious. Having now witnessed this over the last couple of seasons, I am just trying to pre-empt the problems that could well occur. I know we're getting back to full fitness like you say, but the knock on effect is that those who have had to cover for long periods when there were others out, could well be facing their own problems in the second half of a season. what I'm trying to say, is where is the cover for that? do we really have any players that can step up at a very important time? Also, you say about the opposition finding us more difficult, but who have we played since arsenal who we realistically shouldn't have beaten? probably only Everton, who we lost to. Even the "tougher" games amongst that set of fixtures have been at home, such as Stoke, Liverpool and West Ham. We've still got everyone to play a second time round and I just don't see how there's the cover. If dembele has a recurrence of his hip problem, Lennon gets another ankle issue, or bale suffers from a hamstring problem again, I certainly wouldn't feel confident in the replacements. - Especially in the centre of the park. Any of this is possible, so what I was getting at is that we need to deal with it and not let something which is very likely to occur, ruin our season. I can just see us all sat here writing comments in thfc6061's future match threads saying the same old things. The biggest concern for me right now, is the lack of quality on the bench. - With the exception of Parker. he's the only man IMO who can come in and be a direct replacement. - for Sandro obviously.
