Summer Transfers

[Tucker]

I know everyone in the next manager thread is shitting themselves over the lack of transfer funds, but I feel like we are probably a little bloated anyways and even without selling Kane could still make £100m ish just selling those we don't need. Kane leaving whilst sad, represents another good chunk of spending that we could do with.

So yeah, I'm not trying to derail the thread, just stating that we can generate funds and could stand to lose a few players.

I agree with this to an extent. I don’t think we will raise as much money as you think we will selling on our deadwood, but sell it we must. We can’t afford to pile more players on top of the ones we have already, like you say certain positions in the squad are unbalanced. We have way too many wing forwards for example.

I will be quite content if we move on the likes of Lucas, Lamela, Winks, Sissoko, Dier, Sanchez, Aurier etc. We won’t necessarily need to replace all of them, so long as we bring in one or two quality players and supplememt the squad with youngsters.

 

[guy]

Ramsdale ranked 10th in save percentage last season.

ahead of:

Sam Johnstone
Edouard Mendy
Martin Dúbravka
Łukasz Fabiański
Bernd Leno
Rui Patrício
David de Gea
Karl Darlow
Kasper Schmeichel
Alex McCarthy
Vicente Guaita



I would take Ramsdale ahead of Hart, all day, every day.

Definitely, but not as a Hugo replacement

 

[Spursss03]

Hopefully we can add as many of:

Skriniar
Botman
Demiral
Milenkovic
Hakimi
L Martinez
McKennie
Kulusevski
Kessie
Gravenberch
Koopmeiners
Neuhaus
Thuram

As possible. Preferably all of them
They are all realistically achievable signings in my opinion.

I rate the players on your list mate but out of them only Botman, McKennie and Thuram are marginally realistic rn. We're legitimately skint from the sounds of it and need to sell to buy so I honestly expect us to have a negative net spend with more outs than ins.

 

[JayB]

I can’t claim to follow MLS closely — it’s basically the European Super League but with mostly shit players. A soulless bastardization of the sport.

So I could be mistaken, but I believe that many MLS clubs have made it a point to target top South American prospects in recent years. The best prospects in the Western Hemisphere are mostly coming out of South America and they’re often available for peanuts and can be sold on at massive profits, so it makes perfect sense from both a footballing and financial perspective.

If they’d been 10-15 years younger the likes of Suarez, Cavani or James may very well have found themselves in MLS at the beginning of their careers. I wouldn’t write Rossi off based purely on the club he plays for.

 

[Spursss03]

I can’t claim to follow MLS closely — it’s basically the European Super League but with mostly shit players. A soulless bastardization of the sport.

So I could be mistaken, but I believe that many MLS clubs have made it a point to target top South American prospects in recent years. The best prospects in the Western Hemisphere are mostly coming out of South America and they’re often available for peanuts and can be sold on at massive profits, so it makes perfect sense from both a footballing and financial perspective.

If they’d been 10-15 years younger the likes of Suarez, Cavani or James may very well have found themselves in MLS at the beginning of their careers. I wouldn’t write Rossi off based purely on the club he plays for.

MLS clubs have been doing this for a good few years now and how many South American players have actually moved from MLS to Europe since then? The only one I can think of is Almiron who was absolutely amazing in the MLS but is now an average at best Prem player.

If you look at the promising young Americans in Europe atm too, most of them never played in MLS for a significant period and went straight to European academies.

 

[JayB]

MLS clubs have been doing this for a good few years now and how many South American players have actually moved from MLS to Europe since then? The only one I can think of is Almiron who was absolutely amazing in the MLS but is now an average at best Prem player.

Atlanta basically pioneered the practice with Almiron beginning in 2017, and it took the rest of the league a good few years to begin copying it. I don't think nearly enough time has passed to suggest that it won't eventually result in at least some top-quality players going through the South America --> MLS --> Europe route.

I frankly can't wrap my head around the tendency to judge individuals by collective characteristics to begin with. Loads of people turned their noses up at Grealish when we were linked with him because he was a lowly Championship player, how did that work out for the club? Most of the players coming out of the Polish league are shit but that says precisely fuck all about someone like, say, Lewandowski. The same could be said of people generally disregarding managers from Serie A -- did Chelsea go wrong by appointing Conte? Individuals deserve the dignity to be judged on their own individual merits, not based on some crude and lazy generalization made about people who share some common aspect of their background.

It's admittedly hard to judge players from shit leagues but that's why we have scouts. It's by no means outside of the realm of possibility that MLS clubs will pluck players who go on to be genuine quality from the academies of South America.

 

[Spursss03]

Atlanta basically pioneered the practice with Almiron beginning in 2017, and it took the rest of the league a good few years to begin copying it. I don't think nearly enough time has passed to suggest that it won't eventually result in at least some top-quality players going through the South America --> MLS --> Europe route.

I frankly can't wrap my head around the tendency to judge individuals by collective characteristics to begin with. Loads of people turned their noses up at Grealish when we were linked with him because he was a lowly Championship player, how did that work out for the club? Most of the players coming out of the Polish league are shit but that says precisely fuck all about someone like, say, Lewandowski. The same could be said of people generally disregarding managers from Serie A -- did Chelsea go wrong by appointing Conte? Individuals deserve the dignity to be judged on their own individual merits, not based on some crude and lazy generalization made about people who share some common aspect of their background.

It's admittedly hard to judge players from shit leagues but that's why we have scouts. It's by no means outside of the realm of possibility that MLS clubs will pluck players who go on to be genuine quality from the academies of the South America.

Yeah I think eventually it will happen more often for sure as the quality of MLS improves. All I'm saying is atm the quality of the league suggests that a player would need to be dominating in it (as Grealish was in the championship) for them to have the ability to be a top player in Europe. Not saying it can't happen at all because some very good players have played in the MLS, but realistically thats the level you'd need to be at I feel.

Vela is a recent very good example of what I mean. A very decent top 5 league player in Europe who then went to MLS in his prime and absolutely dominated for a bit.

 

[JayB]

Yeah I think eventually it will happen more often for sure as the quality of MLS improves. All I'm saying is atm the quality of the league suggests that a player would need to be dominating in it (as Grealish was in the championship) for them to have the ability to be a top player in Europe. Not saying it can't happen at all because some very good players have played in the MLS, but realistically thats the level you'd need to be at I feel.

Vela is a recent very good example of what I mean. A very decent top 5 league player in Europe who then went to MLS in his prime and absolutely dominated.

No doubt that the quality of the league is very poor and that you’d expect that only the very best players would have much hope of making it at a higher level. But FBref has Rossi down as being in the 99th percentile for non-penalty goals per 90 minutes played over the past year, so his stats do put him among the best in the league. I can’t claim to have watched him personally, all I’m saying is we shouldn’t reflexively write him off based on his current club.

 

[robertgoulet]

I think you’re seeing some clubs take advantage of a market inefficiency wrt players coming up through MLS academies. They can generally be had for cheap, relative to players from other countries, and they’re proving (Weston McKennie, Alphonso Davies, Tyler Adams, Chris Richards, Bryan Reynolds, etc) that the quality of player coming through North America right now is on the rise and there are bargains to be had if you’re willing to scout it.

 

[Spursss03]

Villarreal have 'already' taken up option to buy on Foyth after successful loan

Juan Foyth spent this season on loan at Villarreal and the Argentine's future has now been decided ahead of his scheduled return following the conclusion of his loan deal

www.football.london

Haven't seen anyone mention it but seems like Vilarreal have decided to sign Foyth. Probably positive news in balance since he never seemed to settle in the Prem and we need the 15m for transfers.

 

[cookiemonster]

Key word linked, most likely agent talk and will end up at Watford or somewhere

He will be much cheaper than the alternatives like Pope Henderson etc

A little midget bargain basement buy

 

[mr ashley]

Ramsdale ranked 10th in save percentage last season.

ahead of:

Sam Johnstone
Edouard Mendy
Martin Dúbravka
Łukasz Fabiański
Bernd Leno
Rui Patrício
David de Gea
Karl Darlow
Kasper Schmeichel
Alex McCarthy
Vicente Guaita



I would take Ramsdale ahead of Hart, all day, every day.

Would you take ramsdale over any of these other listed keepers?
for me, maybe Alex McCarthy is about the same level.
sadly I don’t think these stats paint the full picture
one of my concerns about ramsdale is that he often spills the ball/ parties it back into play. Not sure if that would be accounted for in the stats used here.
But each to their own

anyway, it’s a surprising/ underwhelming link. Mostly because we don’t need a backup keeper. And if Lloris leaves, replacing him with ramsdale is not a good move.

 

[spids]

If we sign Thuram I thinks it’s to play as a RWF. Might suggest Bale is not returning after the Euros. He could replace Lamela, Moura and Bale to free up space and funds.

 

[mr ashley]

He will be much cheaper than the alternatives like Pope Henderson etc

A little midget bargain basement buy

There’s a good reason why he’d be cheaper!

 

[big_bear_jol]

Think that if we are going for any English keeper that is likely to come to us, I would go with Sam Johnstone. Been really impressed with him

 

[Hakkz]

If we sign Thuram I thinks it’s to play as a RWF. Might suggest Bale is not returning after the Euros. He could replace Lamela, Moura and Bale to free up space and funds.

Thuram plays as a striker or LWF so that would be a weird move.

 

[Seoulman]

Thuram plays as a striker or LWF so that would be a weird move.

Unless Sonny is leaving too.....

 

[spids]

Thuram plays as a striker or LWF so that would be a weird move.

And yet I’ve seen him score and assist a lot from the right as a WF cutting in on his left foot. He can play anywhere across the front 3, and he offers something Moura, Lamela and Bergwijn don’t - goals and assists. Yes, he predominantly has started on the left for BM, but a WF can play either side, just as Son played on the RW for us a lot when he first joined.

 

[Cochise]

I've been playing a game of "if I were Patrici" and looking over our squad to try to see where the money comes from.

Players clubs want that we'd sell
Foyth - 13m
Aurier - 10m
Moura - 10m

Players clubs might want that we want to keep
Kane - 120-140m
Skipp - 20-30m
Bergwijn - 20m
N'Dombele - 30m
Lloris - 5m

Players we'd like to sell but might struggle to
Winks - 15m
Davies - 8m
Dier - 15m
Sanchez - 20m
Sissoko - 5m
Lamela - 5m
Toby - 2m
Dele - 30m

So we've got 33m ish from three likely sales. That's nothing really when you consider we likely need 120-150m worth of investment into the squad. Even if we sold all of the last category, we'd still be short of the total.

This is why we have to think about selling players from the second category. Selling Kane solves a lot of issues and probably allows us to go for a Ben White or Dybala as opposed to lesser options.

 

[Gbspurs]

Disappointing if true, there's a real player in there

He's definitely shown flashes, my worry for Bergwijn is that he doesn't really do anything great. Maybe he must needs a bit of time but could you see him kicking on to Son's levels?