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We spent £110m having lost one of the best players of our generation. We didn't simply add £110m worth of talent to our squad with no outgoings.
Sure it counts, but that was a very unique window in terms of the transfer sums raised from sales and not really comparable to any other team in my view.
When you say strategy, assuming you're referencing the infamous 7 window - I'd be interested to know whether you said at the time that Soldado, Paulinho, Capoue and Lamela were a waste of money, or if this is just hindsight allowing you to make such a judgement - something unfortunately Levy/AVB didn't have?
I like both players, but that's £40m tops. £65m is just mental.£65 million for Firmino and Benteke.
Sometimes you have to wonder. When a person questions a signing or a substitution or formation, they are usually met with "so you think you can do a better job than a qualified PL manager?"
But now I am being asked whether I should have done more homework, and had better judgement than our Chairman, DoF and scouts on the 110 MILLION POUNDS they were willing to spend.
Of course I was happy at the time.
However I wasnt being paid millions of pounds myself to do a little research on the players signed. I had never seen Lamela play. Im fairly sure I wouldnt have sanctioned a 30M transfer if I had though.
There were people at the time saying they didnt rate Paulinho despite one good world cup. I hadnt seen him play....yet even some fans knew he would not fit.
Levy just buys the next "in thing".
That money was spent to make us all forget we had sold Bale. And boy it did.
However, 2 years on, Im still waiting for a justifiable replacement. You can add Parker, Modric, Sandro and Berbatov to that too.
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But it's not really his job to know is it, what are you asking him for? If I need to know how to change a ball-valve in my water tank in the loft I don't go an ask an electrician. That's what Levy/AVB get paid for - he's a manager of a football team ffs. When your team buys a new player what else do you do but support that player, until you eventually realize not much thought went into why they bought that player in the first place.
Exactly
I'm not saying Sammy should have known. What I can't stand, is people now saying how tragic that window was when at the time everyone was waxing lyrical about how great our signings were. Of course it's their job, but they don't have a magic 8-ball. Chairman and managers fuck up signings all the time. That's football. To hit them with the same stick that you were knighting them with 24 months prior is unfair in my opinion.
I don't know what sammy or anyone else was saying that summer because I wasn't here, but I'll reiterate my original point:
When your team buys a new player what else do you do but support that player, until you eventually realize not much thought went into why they bought that player in the first place.
We're all amateurs here - what else do we have but hindsight to judge a player. Youtube videos tell you nothing. My brother and I got quite excited during the summer we bought the magnificent 7. I wasn't overly convinced - there was a hint of desperation about the last minute signings - but then I'm more naturally cynical than him. It turned sour quite early for me when it became obvious, amongst other issues, that we'd bought an international striker but not the kind of creativity or system to get the best out of him. Soldado's career at spurs was a process of slow suffocation.
Buying players isn't an exact science for sure, but if it's your job and you're being paid handsomely to do it at least have some semblance of being quite good at it, especially if you work for a top club. At least give the fans an impression there's some rhyme or reason to what you're trying to achieve.
1. It's not one persons job. Not Levy. Not AVB. Not Mitchell. Not Poch. It's a team effort. Scouts included.
2. To say Levy doesn't show a semblance of being good at transfers is mad, considering our rise in league positions during his tenure and stature of players to have come through the club compared to previous owners.
I certainly wasnt knighting anyone....I was cautiously optimistic.
Stupidly, I had faith we were stronger than when we had Bale.
Stupidly, I assumed the recruitment dept. had researched our targets for more than 5 minutes from the moment when they knew we couldnt keep Bale.
Stupidly, I thought they were players the manager actually wanted.
Whats even more stupid, is that certain quarters are again giving our shit transfer policy a free pass.
Poch was let down this window, and I dont care about what
His quotes all year tell a different story. You cant back Poch, then defend this window. Pick a side.
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Not saying you should be able to do better. If any of my posts were worded as such, apologies. Just annoys me when people complain about the Magic 7 window as if they knew at the time 5 of the 7 would be utter shit in a Spurs shirt. And to be honest, I think all could've been successful if our system was adapted to suit them - unfortunately we're too rigid and after 12/18 months of a player not being in form (Bobby, Lamela), no matter how good the player is I think psychologically they have almost no chance of succeeding, so low their confidence must be.
Those players were certainly fantastic in that system, and agree we haven't replaced any of them. I wouldn't say we haven't tried, mind you. They're very good players to find replacements for, and any of those could have failed if we played the wrong system for their game.
£30m for Lamela was crazy. Simply crazy. I'd love to know how we reached that figure. Aguero and Hazard cost the same. Such a waste.
We should have been stronger than when we had Bale, but the majority of the signings haven't worked out unfortunately. Had Bobby been a success and essentially replaced Bale's goals, I doubt we'd be having this conversation.
I do back Poch, and defend this window (to a point). A striker should have come in, no doubt. But it does seem off that all other teams around us seem to be in the same position. Even City only have 2 strikers. Gone are the days of 4 decent strikers per team. United have Rooney (Martial is not a CF). Woolwich - Giroud. Chelsea - Costa.
Does that justify our lack of options? Probably not. But it does show an interesting pattern in squads these days. We're not the odd one out, we're the norm in that respect.
So what good ol´ Lyall is basically saying, is that Levy had a great window because he missed out on Ings, Martial, Werner and Berahino (among countless others).
We signed one single first teamer in time for the season. Does anyone even anyone remember we signed Wimmer and Trippier....?
Oh yes it was brilliant to sign Njie and Son so late too after dropping needless points.
All I took from that crap was that Spurs have a friend in the media. Probably got a nice new Audi TT for writing that shit.
We signed one single first teamer in time for the season. Does anyone even anyone remember we signed Wimmer and Trippier....?
Oh yes it was brilliant to sign Njie and Son so late too after dropping needless points.
All I took from that crap was that Spurs have a friend in the media. Probably got a nice new Audi TT for writing that shit.
You kind of feel vindicated when you're at polar opposites with that cunt.
Fucking hells bells.
If this guy is a professional sports journalist then we're doomed.
Doomed I tell you! I have just ripped my eyes out, cut my ears off, pulled out my tongue and burnt them all to a frazzle, buried them in concrete then took off into space and nuked them. its the only way I can be sure to never see, hear or speak of this retarded clowncunt ever again.
Seems like you caught up with writing in the blind really fast.
Good on you... Good on you..
Love to have a job where I can fuck up, then fire my underling when it all goes pear shaped.
He also gets to hire them first!
This is hard to put into words so sorry it's long winded....but the reason we improved under ENIC is not better "scouting" or Levy's genius. It was as obvious as simply increasing squad depth. No more, no less.
Between 97 & 03 we had some fantastic first team players, but very poor squad depth. ENIC working to the Lyon model (worth researching that ) simply reduced the top level wages & then spread the money they set aside for more wages across more squad talent. They have done the same ever since. For example our squad has Davies, Trippier, Fazio for 80k as opposed to 1 x premium star on 80k a week.
So to state again, at Spurs there is a low threshold on our top earners and loads of players on middle to lower ( comparative) wages within the squad. The light bulb seemed to go on with Frank Arsensen's appointment. It was immediately a fairly ( fairly ) successful model and had remained as such for a decade.
But like all things the model needs to adapt to retain 5/6 spot. The mid level clubs can now have top level players on big money, but no squad depth ( look at the last Transfer window @ Stoke, Swansea, WBA and others for clear examples ) This current situation is the same as the 90's where the likes of Boro had a few big names and no squads. All they had to do was avoid injuries and luck and bang success followed.
I feel that to adapt now THFC need to do the reverse of what they did 10 years ago and invest again in some top level wages, the tricky part is they also must retain the squad depth otherwise the net result / risk is that Stoke, Swansea,WBA with that bit of luck or better us. However, I don't see any adaption coming soon from ENIC as our investment money for football is not increasing.
A large portion of the TV money & other wider revenue our Club generates is taken by ENIC out of the club holdings & used to increase non football asset, like property in and around the stadium.
When the time is right, and it's already begun, the property will be sold off by ENIC at a huge profit of which our team will not see a penny.
during the next few years ENIC will be borrowing £400 million + to pay for a Stadium we actually don't need ( take a deep breath here...we do not need a 61,000 seater stadium ) except if you do the sums their should be almost no reason to borrow such massive amounts, the money is there three fold already....unless of course it's been spent elsewhere !!!
For example anyone remember the "loan" of 50 million ENIC made to the club a few years ago ? ? ? Anyone able to explain how that works ? A club is debt free, so the owners lend it 50 million at pepper corn rates...at the same time Bulls Crosd cost 50 million funny enough....
The final net result come the new stadium wifi be a huge debt we don't currently. A bang average team due to under investment competitive to the market and a Stadium ENIC are equally happy to rent out to NFL / U2 concerts or God knows what before it's sold off or they make THFC a tenant in their stadium !
Daniel Levy is a Land Economist by the way, not just Mr Buyrite. The property was also the deal. Never the football. The football is a necessary evil.
I also feel we need to clear up the Bale money fallacy as that distorts how good/bad ENIC have been. Real paid a smallish sum up front and the rest of the debt was spread over 5 years ( as Levy himself once said they still owed us Modric money when Bale was sold ) this part payment and then installments Is how 99.9% of transfers work. ( and God Alone knows what Jeremy Pearce's problem was last week )
So we @!THFC would not have "Spent" the Bale money all in 2013. They might have sanctioned a % of the initial payment, but I guarantee the board would both haveeven committed half of the final total of Bale's sale towards first team players ( given there are at least two more big payments left )
It's all Spin designed to stop us noticing that the world is not flat.
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