Yep, that's exactly what it said. The story was either/or http://www.standard.co.uk/sport/foo...-as-spurs-look-to-revamp-attack-10417983.html
Bale looked far better in his first five games for Spurs than Lamela has in two seasons. There is absolutely no comparison. Bale was looking awesome and scoring quality goals against top opponents from full back as a 17 or 18 year old fresh into the team. I'm always amazed that people forget this. But even still I'd not sell Lamela for 5m. 10 and it's a deal. Plenty of far better players go for 10.
Bale did look much better in his first five games, but that's largely because he scored in three of them, including that cracking free kick against the scum. I'm by comparison amazed how quickly people forget that he missed the rest of that season through injury, and had a pretty forgettable second season at the club, making 30 appearances in all comps without scoring a single goal. BAE kept him out of the team for basically that entire season. And many of Bale's performances were woeful as he struggled to regain his confidence. Now it could well be argued that Lamela has only been given so many chances because he doesn't have competition for his spot as good as BAE was for Bale, but his second season has probably been marginally more impressive than Bale's was, with 5 goals and a decent amount of assists for a player who doesn't seem to know how to pass. It wasn't until Bale's 3rd season, 2009-10 that he really started to flourish. I think another argument in Lamela's defence is that while Bale was more or less given the freedom of the line-up to play in his strongest position, changing 3 times in 6 years, Lamela has been shoe-horned into a position that probably isn't his strongest - hence the constant collisions with Eriksen. I never thought I'd find myself defending Lamela as many of his performances have been lamentable, but I think that unless a bid in the region of £15m+ comes in, he should be given a 3rd season - like Bale was - to really flourish.
Where the hell did the Standard get that nugget of information? We've raised over £30m in transfers and sell-on fees this summer, which is enough to meet the quoted prices for the two of them - and that's before taking the TV money and other revenue streams into account, or hypothetical fees for Lennon, Adebayor, Chiriches or Soldado. That's the sort of bollocks you're more likely to find in The Sun: "In order to afford Berahino and Bolasie, Spurs should give in to our demands and sell Kane to Man Utd."
I've forgotten nothing Lenny. I am talking of his dip in form after his first games, and his spell of so called 'jinx'. I believe that Lamela needs competition for his position, as did Bale, and Rose. There is a clear comparison. Please name some players who are better than Lamela who we could get for 10m.
The article does also state that Palace have out a £40M valuation on Bolasie and at that price we won't be going anywhere near him
Not convinced - he's got a good goals to games ratio but he doesn't play much so there must be something wrong. Why would someone who can't make it at one of the teams we need to catch be the solution to our problems. Lamela is much younger and has the potential to be much better.
This has been the silliest season of them all. My favorite was the one saying we would ground share with Arsenal (in the wake of Scudamoron’s comments). Can’t see any obstacles to that happening. And what a terrible silly season it’s been for Lamela, who has gone from being sold for 30 million down to 7 without kicking a ball. Maybe there was another picture of him in white leather trousers. I realize Lamela divides opinion, but selling anyone for much less than the market will bear does not seem the likeliest thing for Levy to do. I’d bet on the sun not coming up tomorrow morning first. It may be interesting that if you look at all competitions, Lamela’s goals plus assists are about the same as Chadli’s and Erikson’s (15 total). There’s an end product, in other words, which strikes me as a very important consideration for Pochettino--and why Townsend may go elsewhere. I can see West Brom demanding much more for a 15 goal scorer than 15 million. Someone would pay at least 20, and 25 may not be ridiculous. I am worried that we’ll end up getting priced down into the Veretout much of a muchness range, and buy only to have to off-load in a year or two. I think we should either pay what it takes to bring quality we don’t have into the squad or cross our fingers and hope for the best with our young players--and pick up a decent backup striker. Chadli is an interesting thought as a backup. He certainly has the finishing, but I’m not at all sure he can hold the ball up, or work as hard as Pochettino wants a number 10 to. My fearful forecast is for 2-3 transfers to barely make the deadline. Or barely miss it.
Fearless! That forecast is about as fearless as a man facing a gerbil with an elephant gun. Spurs deals on deadline day is a habit no need for the prediction.
The fearless bit is the predicting it'll happen. We are often chasing on the last few days, but often don't get our man.
I don't think we should even consider going for Bolasie. He catches the eye for Palace because he doesn't have much competition just as Zaha did before his £15 m switch to Manure. He did absolutely nothing there or at Cardiff and ends up back at Palace which is what I would think will happen to Bolasie if he moves to a bigger club. As for the £40 mill, you cannot be serious!
I think the £40m price-tag is put there simply to make it clear that the player isn't for sale. I don't think Palace believe he's worth that.
Pardew was valuing him at £20m a couple of months ago. Since I'm on the subject, and it hasn't been brought up anywhere, is anyone else thinking city getting Delph for £8m seems a little off? We were supposedly offering something around the £4m mark for him in January when he had six months on his contract, he signed a new contract until 2019...and then joins City for £8m a few months later. When you have Man Utd expecting £30m for De Gea when he's got a year left on his contract, or West Brom expecting at least £15m for Berahino who has two, it looks like Villa made a mistake by sanctioning the sale for that fee. On the subject of Villa... Oh please oh please oh please oh please...
Adebayor close to agreeing loan move to Villa. As for the Delph thing, I think that he included an £8m release clause to a CL team in his new contract. Villa weren't really in a position to argue.
Allegedly Adebayor at the Villa training facilities: If we can ship him and Soldado out and replace them with decent signings, then I'd be very pleased. Berahino's the current media favourite, but the journos and ITKs seem to have had all of their leaks plugged recently, so it's all speculative.
