At this point I basically support some merchandise, a couple of upmarket bakeries and the colour blue.
At this point I basically support some merchandise, a couple of upmarket bakeries and the colour blue.
5 gamesOriginally Posted by Danny
2 trophies
Modern day robin hood this kids. Stuck up PSG, robbed the saudis and now back to the favela.
It sounds like they’re getting disasi on a ‘dry loan’ which would be absurd. Helping a team below you by 1 point because why not. He’d fit in well there as they would use him how he’s supposed to
Also managed to inadvertently ruin Barcelona as a viable going concern.
That 2014 world cup quarter final was a real sliding doors moment. Funny at the time to see his dreams ruined, but, in the cool reflection of hindsight a really bad outcome and a bit of a tragedy for everyone.
Was that the knee to the spine?
Yeah, the Colombia game. Was that quarter final or last 16? Either way, the temporary elation of seeing his ego and the hope of a nation collapse in on itself was retrospectively quite a bad day for football.
I'm sure Man Utd dropping £30m on an inexperienced left-back from relegation-threatened Lecce will not backfire on them at all.
Dorgu? He’s meant to be insanely good if you believe the hype from people who cover Italy.
Would be another FM dub as well
Signing a left back to play at left back. Seems sensible enough.
At least the fee is not extortionate. If United had saved their comedy Ten Hag fees and paid the same to be rinsed buying proven premier league players they'd likely be a lot better off.
I have no view on the player as I have never seen him play, but I do somewhat take issue with the idea that £30m for a 20 year old with 50-odd senior appearances to his name isn't a bit extortionate.
Zirkzee had exactly the same number of Serie A appearances when signed it would seem.
£30m is hardly loose change when times are tight.
Could always go either way though. Maybe he's a 'generational talent'. How much did Spurs pay for Udogie? How much do Bournemouth want for Kerkez?
It's not 2006 anymore, granddad.
£30m is also the total amount spent by Manchester city council on homelessness each year.
The transfer isn't actually agreed yet.
That said, I think people still just haven't got used to the fact that "that's just wot players cost, mate".
Any young player showing remotely decent potential will be £30m+.
City have just paid over £30m for a player who was signed from a team in the second tier of the mighty Belarussian league by Lens 18 months ago. They've also paid around £30m for a 19 year old directly from Brazil.
Yes, City are in a much better position financially to throw money around, but players don't become cheaper just because you're short on cash.
Still counting peoples money.
How much would someone like Kerkez or Robinson cost?
Yeah, but at the same time they do come cheap, as demonstrated by the fact that I could have probably bought the City guy and this Dorgu chap for the fees they commanded 18 months ago, instead of buying a derelict house. I know it's not how things work but I just find it a bit mad that that's the way things seem to operate now, although that has been the case for a long while.
I'm also struck, due to my relative indifference to it all now, when I see the pissant clubs spend as much as they do on players - Wolves shelling out £45m for Cunha for example was a bit of an eye-opener for me and even the €18m Bournemouth apparently spent on Kerkez. To answer the how much for Kerkez I quickly googled it and apparently £86m
How much does any player cost in January from a Premier League club who doesn't want to sell? (A lot)
Is a left back from Lecce £30m of actual money (not pretend transfer money) better than a left back from the academy? He is not, which is why people question it. The transfer market inflated lunacy does not necessarily have to be respected in discussing these things.
Is he not? How do you know? The hit rate for academy players actually being good enough is very low. Even many of the most highly-rated ones end up in the lower leagues, nevermind making it at one of the "big clubs" (lololol United aren't a big club).
Last edited by randomlegend; 28-01-2025 at 02:09 PM.
Yeah you cannot just say he's in Lecce he must be shit.
If United is buying him though, he probably is shit lololol.
Oh right, thanks for clearing that up. In that case I'm sure we'll pull out.
Not really sure why we aren't still playing Brandon Williams as our left back week-in-week-out now I think about it. Lads from the academy are just as good as anyone else after all.
Still remember when they wanted £15m for him or whatever it was.
Isn't the point more that there are actually loads of professional footballers, and many of them are probably capable of providing United with adequate leftback services, and so going and trying to sign the next Roberto Carlos is probably more likely to end in failure than not, and, given that, you may as well take a punt on a youngster for 6 months and/or do some actual scouting rather than basically taking a punt on a youngster but pay £30m for the privilege? Probably makes more sense from a Chelsea perspective as they have had untold riches come through and largely be ignored from their academy.
Like I said, I make no judgment as to this player, maybe he's amazing.
People just find the idea of spending £30 million on a punt stupid, which is because it objectively is when you have an understanding of the value of money, as opposed to an understanding of the current transfer market bubble. Spending £80 million on a superstar is arguably much more explicable because that person will probably deliver that back in revenue.
How much better is this guy than Gillingham's left back? A fair bit better. Five massive houses in central London better? I dunno. This isn't really a criticism of United, who are just following the current market, it's a criticism of football in general.
Last edited by Jimmy Floyd; 28-01-2025 at 03:41 PM.
Rebuilding the training ground is only costing them £50 million.
Lecce or no Lecce, he has represented Denmark. Definitely not a punt.
If you could go out and guarantee you were buying a superstar for £80m, then yeah. But the players who are genuinely "superstars" will either already be at clubs who have no need or want to ever sell them, or have completely prohibitive prices put on them. What genuine "superstar" in world football do you think you could go out and buy with £80m?
This kid could go to Brighton for £30m and be absolutely brilliant. What would Brighton then be asking for him next summer? The first signs of a young player looking really good in the Premier League and they get a £100m price tag stuck on them. And they're not even anywhere near "superstar" at that point. Teams were getting quoted £100m for Evan Ferguson a year or so ago. Everton wanted £80m+ for Branthwaite in the summer. Relatively unproven players.
Even the richest clubs can no longer afford to just buy the "sure thing" players. They are being forced to try to cut out the middleman clubs.
Liverpool after Jamie Gittens for £86m.
£86 million is what the UK spends each year in overseas aid to Ethiopia.
According to The Athletic, Man Red owe £319m on players they have already signed. £154m of which is due in the next twelve months.
I was going to put this in the book thread, but here seems just as apposite. I've been reading L'Etranger and have been getting strong Jimmy vibes off the main dude.
What's the deal with £86m anyway? Is that €100m [or dollars]? Seems to be the number doing the rounds on a lot of fronts.
Last edited by niko_cee; 28-01-2025 at 04:49 PM.
It is the sum that the AI deemed optimal.
United are poaching another youth of The Arsenal.
I've never been closer
I tried to understand
Oh god, he's 18, bit ruined.
Teenager Heaven sounds like a website you have to declare you're over 18 to view.
Or on a register.
Lewis Skelly red turned over.PGMOL shit down their leg for 3 days to try pretend they hadn’t fucked up. What was the point. Just say you got something wrong and get better.
Meanwhile there's police protection outside Michael Oliver's house. Probably time for a couple of rounds to be played under TV blackout and behind closed doors, force everyone to cool down a bit.
So odd that none of this stuff was released when it actually happened but after an active fuck up where they’re trying to cover their arses.
Dorgu agreed for £25 (+4)m.
Look forward to him being called a "£45m star" for the next 4 years.
Does this mean the official end of Luke Shaw? Or is he into the back three?
I mean Shaw is just perma-broken regardless of who we do or don't sign in his position.
When fit he's genuinely excellent as both a left back and a left centre back. Not sure if he's good enough going forward to be the wing back.
His career is such a massive shame to be honest. Prior to the leg break he looked like he was going to be absolutely class, and even after that he's great whenever he manages to get a run in the team (aside from when Mourinho was bullying him).
Mourinho was right to bully him. For every goal he had a hand in going forward he cost at the other end ball-watching.
Lewis has it right he’s painfully average and wouldn’t have lasted 5 minutes under Ferguson.
He wasn't right, because a big part of a manager's job is to get the most out of players and all he achieved with Shaw was alienating him and making him worse. Ferguson - since he's been brought up - was an absolute master of recognising that different players need different approaches. Shaw was never going to respond well to Mourinho quite literally publicly calling him a retard. Manager's like Mourinho can cry all they want about players being soft but Ferguson would never have treated Shaw like that.
Shaw is not "painfully average". When fit he's a better player than Mourinho is manager nowadays.
We’ve had two of the more mental takes in the same day on this thread
Whatever his wider flaws and unsuitability Mourinho had all of the United melts bang to rights.
A starting point for a good player is always availability and he’s never fucking fit. The most Premier League games he’s played in a season is 32 and he’s played less than 20 games in a season in 7 seasons since he joined.
You can be Maldini, Roberto Carlos and Marcelo all rolled into one as a left-back but if you can’t play in most the of the games you may as well stick Brandon Williams there.
He suffers from that thing of not playing that much so he seems fucking brilliant then, you see him play for a few weeks and turns out he’s not quite as good as everyone thinks.
As for Ferguson he wouldn’t have called him a cunt in public. But you can guarantee he’d have called him a cunt to his face for turning up every pre-season looking like a beached whale.
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