The Daily ITK Discussion Thread - POST MORTEM - 1st February 2022

[Dakes]

What they said in the Athletic:

“The closest and most significant of the latter was Luis Diaz, whom The Athletic can reveal Tottenham had a signed agreement in place with Porto for him to join. The deal was believed to be for €45 million (£37.6 million) plus €15 million (£12.5 million) in add-ons, with terms also agreed with Diaz himself.

However, Diaz being away on international duty meant that the agreement wasn’t yet signed by the time it was essentially thought to have been vetoed by his Colombian agent. The representative in question is said by sources to have objected when it became apparent that Jorge Mendes had the mandate from Porto to oversee the Tottenham move. Liverpool, who were not using Mendes as an intermediary, pounced and agreed a deal at more or less the same price. The Athletic has contacted the Colombian agent for comment.

Spurs chairman Daniel Levy, who did everything he could to pull off the deal, was raging at the turn of events. Diaz had been enthusiastic at the prospect of joining Spurs, and some believe it would have been a better move for him given the stage of his career, but ultimately, he too was seduced by the prospect of Champions League football and working with Jurgen Klopp. Sources have indicated that Barcelona were also in for the winger and prepared to pay €5 million (£4.2 million) upfront followed by €50 million (£41.8 million) in the summer.”

Fascinating. Wonder why Mendes was intermediary between us and Porto but not Liverpool and Porto. Why could we not exclude Mendes in order to please Diaz's agent?

 

[Wsussexspur]

Fascinating. Wonder Mendes was intermediary between us and Porto but not Liverpool and Porto? Why could we exclude Mendes in order to please Diaz's agent?

Because him and Paratici are like this ??!

 

[Tucker]

I haven't read the whole article yet but there's a bit more on Diaz in it I have just posted. The article is huge and I haven't read it yet. Aggregators are going to have a field day twisting the negatives out of it. Might be a day to avoid Twitter!

I’ve given up completely on twitter. It’s toxic, but right now Spurs twitter is hyper toxic.

 

[Trix]

I haven't read the whole article yet but there's a bit more on Diaz in it I have just posted. The article is huge and I haven't read it yet. Aggregators are going to have a field day twisting the negatives out of it. Might be a day to avoid Twitter!

Everyone at the club seems happy with the window as a whole, and that's all that really matters mate. The aggregators will only be twisting things to what suits them best.

 

[cider spurs]

I haven't read the whole article yet but there's a bit more on Diaz in it I have just posted. The article is huge and I haven't read it yet. Aggregators are going to have a field day twisting the negatives out of it. Might be a day to avoid Twitter!

Everyday is a day to avoid twitter.

 

[Tucker]

Everyone at the club seems happy with the window as a whole, and that's all that really matters mate. The aggregators will only be twisting things to what suits them best.

Aggregators will know that they likely get more engagement when their posts are negative.

 

[Trix]

Aggregators will know that they likely get more engagement when their posts are negative.

AFTV syndrome!

 

[spursfan77]

Everyone at the club seems happy with the window as a whole, and that's all that really matters mate. The aggregators will only be twisting things to what suits them best.

Yeah I know and good to hear that the club are happy where we are at the moment. Dealing with transfers for clubs just seems like a horrendous necessity.

I mentioned back in the summer the damage I thought aggregators were doing to our fanbase online and its intensified this month. They thrive on the negativity and it creeps in here. They are basically our Twitter AFTV version. It's just a frustration of mine towards the unnecessary anger that seems to permeate around the club. Fortunately the wider fanbase isn't on there.

 

[PCozzie]

What they said in the Athletic:

“The closest and most significant of the latter was Luis Diaz, whom The Athletic can reveal Tottenham had a signed agreement in place with Porto for him to join. The deal was believed to be for €45 million (£37.6 million) plus €15 million (£12.5 million) in add-ons, with terms also agreed with Diaz himself.

However, Diaz being away on international duty meant that the agreement wasn’t yet signed by the time it was essentially thought to have been vetoed by his Colombian agent. The representative in question is said by sources to have objected when it became apparent that Jorge Mendes had the mandate from Porto to oversee the Tottenham move. Liverpool, who were not using Mendes as an intermediary, pounced and agreed a deal at more or less the same price. The Athletic has contacted the Colombian agent for comment.

Spurs chairman Daniel Levy, who did everything he could to pull off the deal, was raging at the turn of events. Diaz had been enthusiastic at the prospect of joining Spurs, and some believe it would have been a better move for him given the stage of his career, but ultimately, he too was seduced by the prospect of Champions League football and working with Jurgen Klopp. Sources have indicated that Barcelona were also in for the winger and prepared to pay €5 million (£4.2 million) upfront followed by €50 million (£41.8 million) in the summer.”

Struggling to understand why Mendes needed to 'oversee' the transfer when Diaz already has an agent who presumably dealt with Liverpool when they made their offer. What sort of a hold does this bloke have over clubs? I (half) jokingly referred to it as a protection racket elsewhere earlier in the window. I'm not sure I should have been joking now.

 

[Timberwolf]

While the Diaz news is disappointing, I don't see why it would be a cause of massive outrage or anything.

We've done the dirty on other clubs before, while clubs have done the dirty on us *cough* Willian *cough*. Whether you like it or not, that's simply a part of football and something we begrudgingly have to accept, especially if we're willing to get into bed with Mendes.

I don't think it reflects badly on Levy or Paratici, though. Seems like they did everything they could to do the deal (including working with Mendes to get it over the line) and were simply gazumped by a club with more pulling power.

On top of that, Diaz's best position is exactly the same as Son, so at least Kulusevski makes sense from a team-building perspective. We've seen how Son looks on the right and he's just not the same player, so I was always a little sceptical about how wise it was to spend 45m on a player who is exclusively a left winger, regardless of their talents.

 

[FibreOpticJesus]

I know I said I'd post my window synopsis yesterday, but to be honest I was both waiting to see what the general mood was as well as bits still being drip fed out regarding what happened on Monday. I thought it best to wait until the dust settled in order to give more comprehensive view, and so here we are. I'm glad to see how many of you are looking at the window as having both positives and negatives(which is exactly what it was), even some of you that were so incredibly pessimistic throughout @Aphex .

It was exactly that tbh, many issues addressed but many others still to do. Diaz in the end was the only big strike and miss, and saying that if that see's the end of us dealing with a certain super agent it will ultimately be a big plus imo. It's one thing being gazumped(all's fair etc), but we believe there was more to it than that, with Liverpool knowing exactly what we had offered, the entire package to both club and player, and things were just all a bit to convenient.

Dembele there was never any interest in.
Eriksen was briefly looked at but not a risk worth taking
Traore as JJ has already alluded to, we definitely wanted but was never seen as ideal for the long term. We would have done it but only really on our terms.

DK has been high on the list for months. He was linked by Italian media prior to the window even being open. Obviously Diaz became the focus when we believed we could get him because if a player of that quality is available you have to try, right. Doesn't mean for one minute we hadn't had a plan in place all along and that DK wasn't part of that plan.

Bentancur I'm still not 100% sure on how long we've been interested and maybe that'll come out in the next couple of weeks if it was always part of the plan or was opportunistic once Vlahovic moved to Juve and they needed money in to help pay for it.

For those saying there was no plan in place...............


This was the plan I was told prior to the window opening and posted at the beginning of the window. Besides a couple of the personnel AC wanted out changing due to performances. Dav and Stevie being the main ones. It went almost exactly to plan.
As far as GLC.......AC wants players who want to play want to listen and want to work to achieve his goals. What he doesn't want is players who when they are told they aren't in the team to just basically shrug their shoulders and walk off after the meeting all happy and jovial. That was what I'm told made his mind up regarding GLC. If you are just told you aren't in the side you should want to know why, and what you can do to be selected. Not planning what you are doing with your weekend off in front of the coaching staff.


Apart from that things happened exactly as expected, and we are set nicely for what happens in the Summer which was always the primary goal. I'm told we already know who we want and the next few months will be spent working towards achieving that. Those saying we are kicking the can down the road with TN and GLC maybe so but we've seen numerous times now how clubs are forced to just release players for free to shift them, this is bad for so many reasons, and it's only to be done as a last resort. If we can't sell them we loan them hope they perform and we can shift them in the future. Will we get 65 mil for TN in the Summer? Very doubtful, but if he does well the hope is Lyon may come back and say he's not worth that but for example 30-40mil looks like a win for them when the deal originally was for much higher.

Just want to say again thanks to @Rob, @Archibald&Crooks, and especially this window to @Stoof and @chrissivad for policing the ITK thread through the last couple of days. I think it's shown beyond doubt the lax approach in regards rules that many posters were asking for was a disaster, and the way A&C has been doing it for years is a clearly a necessity if we want it to continue.

Thanks for the update Trix. Really informative. Really appreciated you and the other ITK’s for the intel and views.
Your comments on the misuse of the transfer section were bang on and I hope that it is sorted for the summer. Give those that just want to rabbit shit a link of their own and have a zero tolerance on the main itk thread.
The big plus for me was Hugo staying. Sent out such a big message of the direction the club is travelling.
COYS

 

[Dakes]

I know I said I'd post my window synopsis yesterday, but to be honest I was both waiting to see what the general mood was as well as bits still being drip fed out regarding what happened on Monday. I thought it best to wait until the dust settled in order to give more comprehensive view, and so here we are. I'm glad to see how many of you are looking at the window as having both positives and negatives(which is exactly what it was), even some of you that were so incredibly pessimistic throughout @Aphex .

It was exactly that tbh, many issues addressed but many others still to do. Diaz in the end was the only big strike and miss, and saying that if that see's the end of us dealing with a certain super agent it will ultimately be a big plus imo. It's one thing being gazumped(all's fair etc), but we believe there was more to it than that, with Liverpool knowing exactly what we had offered, the entire package to both club and player, and things were just all a bit to convenient.

Dembele there was never any interest in.
Eriksen was briefly looked at but not a risk worth taking
Traore as JJ has already alluded to, we definitely wanted but was never seen as ideal for the long term. We would have done it but only really on our terms.

DK has been high on the list for months. He was linked by Italian media prior to the window even being open. Obviously Diaz became the focus when we believed we could get him because if a player of that quality is available you have to try, right. Doesn't mean for one minute we hadn't had a plan in place all along and that DK wasn't part of that plan.

Bentancur I'm still not 100% sure on how long we've been interested and maybe that'll come out in the next couple of weeks if it was always part of the plan or was opportunistic once Vlahovic moved to Juve and they needed money in to help pay for it.

For those saying there was no plan in place...............


This was the plan I was told prior to the window opening and posted at the beginning of the window. Besides a couple of the personnel AC wanted out changing due to performances. Dav and Stevie being the main ones. It went almost exactly to plan.
As far as GLC.......AC wants players who want to play want to listen and want to work to achieve his goals. What he doesn't want is players who when they are told they aren't in the team to just basically shrug their shoulders and walk off after the meeting all happy and jovial. That was what I'm told made his mind up regarding GLC. If you are just told you aren't in the side you should want to know why, and what you can do to be selected. Not planning what you are doing with your weekend off in front of the coaching staff.


Apart from that things happened exactly as expected, and we are set nicely for what happens in the Summer which was always the primary goal. I'm told we already know who we want and the next few months will be spent working towards achieving that. Those saying we are kicking the can down the road with TN and GLC maybe so but we've seen numerous times now how clubs are forced to just release players for free to shift them, this is bad for so many reasons, and it's only to be done as a last resort. If we can't sell them we loan them hope they perform and we can shift them in the future. Will we get 65 mil for TN in the Summer? Very doubtful, but if he does well the hope is Lyon may come back and say he's not worth that but for example 30-40mil looks like a win for them when the deal originally was for much higher.

Just want to say again thanks to @Rob, @Archibald&Crooks, and especially this window to @Stoof and @chrissivad for policing the ITK thread through the last couple of days. I think it's shown beyond doubt the lax approach in regards rules that many posters were asking for was a disaster, and the way A&C has been doing it for years is a clearly a necessity if we want it to continue.

Great insight, much appreciated.

 

[shelfstandspur]

Thanks, Trix, JJ and all the ITKs and Mods.

As Trix said if the Diaz situation shows I us not to be in bed with Mendes then there is a positive to come out of the situation. I read the part of the article posted and it says FP was crushed; again this may wean him off Mendes.

There is the question of why Mendes was involved in the first place? Did FP tell him we were in for Diaz and Mendes offered his services to Porto? Quite possibly the Columbian agent saw what should have been his big payday going to Mendes and unsurprisingly pulled the plug on the deal.

The two new guys may not be Diaz but I am very happy to see them join and help the team progress. I think Conte will be happy to see that he is the man; and that renewed happiness and energy could be the real difference in getting us into the top four and having a great summer transfer window.

Many reasons to be positive with new signings, bad attitudes gone, key players coming back to fitness, etc. COYS!

 

[Trix]

Thanks for the update Trix. Really informative. Really appreciated you and the other ITK’s for the intel and views.
Your comments on the misuse of the transfer section were bang on and I hope that it is sorted for the summer. Give those that just want to rabbit shit a link of their own and have a zero tolerance on the main itk thread.
The big plus for me was Hugo staying. Sent out such a big message of the direction the club is travelling.
COYS

I can completely understand why it was done though. I can imagine A&C has far better things to do than to constantly police it, You'd hope people now understand what happens once the rules are relaxed, and it becomes barely readable and certainly no fun at all.

 

[SpartanSpur]

Everyone at the club seems happy with the window as a whole, and that's all that really matters mate. The aggregators will only be twisting things to what suits them best.

It's all about the summer now. Paratici and Levy have to nail it. I'm sure Paratici has been somewhat knocked back by how easily deals can slip away from us (compared to his time Juve). Hopefully he can dust it off and find a way to lock things down a bit better going forward (us getting CL would no doubt help massively). His old contacts got him out of a hole for now.

As others have said there are so many good players that have contracts ending in summer 2022 or 2023, more than the elite clubs can all snap up.

I'm actually quite encouraged by how much we wanted to make a statement deal like Diaz, and how pissed off we are that it fell through. Will a lesson be learned to try and wrap a deal up more quickly now? Hopefully we can make a couple of big signings in the ilk of Diaz in the summer ?

 

[Wick3d]

Hopefully this ends our close association with Mendes. We got done on the Diaz deal.

 

[SpartanSpur]

While the Diaz news is disappointing, I don't see why it would be a cause of massive outrage or anything.

We've done the dirty on other clubs before, while clubs have done the dirty on us *cough* Willian *cough*. Whether you like it or not, that's simply a part of football and something we begrudgingly have to accept, especially if we're willing to get into bed with Mendes.

I don't think it reflects badly on Levy or Paratici, though. Seems like they did everything they could to do the deal (including working with Mendes to get it over the line) and were simply gazumped by a club with more pulling power.

On top of that, Diaz's best position is exactly the same as Son, so at least Kulusevski makes sense from a team-building perspective. We've seen how Son looks on the right and he's just not the same player, so I was always a little sceptical about how wise it was to spend 45m on a player who is exclusively a left winger, regardless of their talents.

Yeah the frustration seems weird really. Didn't we poach Toby from Southampton on a legal loophole?! That's football.

Guess it shows how keen they were to get a big signing for Conte.

Hopefully Kulu makes himself a fixture in the first team. The deals we got in were very good cash flow wise. Hopefully the Diaz money can be used for an early summer move or two.

 

[Rob]

I can completely understand why it was done though. I can imagine A&C has far better things to do than to constantly police it, You'd hope people now understand what happens once the rules are relaxed, and it becomes barely readable and certainly no fun at all.

It was basically to show all the complainers that the grass isn't always greener and in fact that way we'd been doing it for the past 10 years was the correct way. The abuse people gave A&C for policing the thread strictly was out of order and getting worse. Every person removed would waste days PMing us to complain and whine and others would complain about how unfair it is. By relaxing it I think everyone saw just how bad it could be without him and soon you were all begging for his ban stick.

He's now unbearably smug so hope you're all happy!

 

[YB123]

There isn’t one

Ali Gold said there is, just not sure how much.

 

[BedfordshireSpud]

Hopefully this ends our close association with Mendes. We got done on the Diaz deal.

There were slimy people like Mendes when I worked in contracting, we always said that to do the dirty once was down to him but to do it twice was down to us. It’s the clubs like Wolves I feel sorry for. They may do reasonably in the short term but they will always be his feeder club.