6th on and off the field.
The Fighting Cock is a forum for fans of Tottenham Hotspur Football Club. Here you can discuss Spurs latest matches, our squad, tactics and any transfer news surrounding the club. Registration gives you access to all our forums (including 'Off Topic' discussion) and removes most of the adverts (you can remove them all via an account upgrade). You're here now, you might as well...
Or maybe, show just a little more ambition in the transfer market to give us a fighting chance of reaching the top 4 rather than sacking the manager every time we don't. .
We've showed ambition in the transfer market. We've splashed some cash. Soldado, Lamela, Paulinho all weren't exactly cut price deals. Then there were the likes of Darren Bent, Alan Hutton and David Bentley.
We could go right back to Sergei Rebrov. At times we've shown ambition.
Bale between 5-10mil, Modric roughly 16m, Berbatov around 10m, Lloris was 5-10m Euro, Carrick around 4m. King, free, Kane, free.
Spending large sums on players doesn't guarantee success. Buying the right players is much more important.
We've spent a fortune in recent seasons. Forget net spend, just because you sell £100m worth of players, that doesn't justify spending £150m on incoming players. Refusing the strengthen the squad...fuck me, out squad chops and changes so often it's actually rather frustrating. It'd be nice to see some familiar names cropping up year after year in my opinion.I voted no in the poll. The fact we are the only club alongside Burnley to have no debt makes Levy`s strategy of refusing to strengthen the squad in consistent transfer windows even more difficult to accept. Cunt
Edit: Actually Burnley do have a debt of 8million quid. Cunt.
Re the poll, it's quite interesting just how big a backing ENIC are getting for their transfer strategy. There's an awful lot of Spurs fans it seems, if this poll is an indicator, with the fiasco of the 'Magnificent 7' summer of Bale, and the inactivity of last winter. Absolutely baffling to me, but each to their own, etc.
Most of our purchases were lauded as exceptional at the time. We didn't expect Soldado to dry up, Paulinho to be so lazy, Lamela to get injured...nor did Levy or Baldini. They were unforeseen circumstances that no one would've predicted. It's absolutely baffling to me that our owner (who chooses to sanction transfers in order to keep a handle on the finances of the club - NOT to assess talent) can be apportioned blame for players' bad form, when they were excellent for their previous clubs.In reference to the poll are you happy with the transfer strategy I voted no. While I must commend Levy and the board on the stunning success of our youth policy, the appointment of Poch, the development of out training facilities and pressing ahead the new stadium I cannot say that our recent transfers have been upto standard.
We bought 7 players worth around £100 million and only Eriksen was a genuine success while Chadli and Lamela were ok, the others Capoue, Chirches, Paulinho, Soldado have totally failed, for me whoever is too blame (Baldini or Levy etc) that is not the sign of a good transfer policy. Then of course we have Stambouli and Fazio who were good enough to be squad players but it seem little else.
Vietto, Depay, Lacazette would almost certainly improve us
Clubs don't get their first choice players all the time. What we need to stop doing is (in agreement with you Tomo ) signing the likes of Capoue and Stambouli, who are just a waste of £5-10 million. I'd rather see Carroll given a go than these carefree time wasters that could care less for the club.
I voted yes, by the way. Being debt free, regular European football and a state of the art stadium on the way, we're in excellent shape for the future, whether that be under ENIC or otherwise.
But the thing is that we thought that about Soldado, Paulinho and Lamela too. Yet they did not. Man U probably thought Diego Forlan would improve them. Or Liverpool thought Robbie Keane would improve them.
What I'm trying to say is every transfer is a gamble. And when it comes to gambling I prefer a low risk strategy. Even if this does mean that the rewards we reap aren't as high. We aren't far off the top 4, so a few shrewd signings are what we need rather than throwing around money like it's going out of fashion.
therefore our transfer policy should be on obtaining the highest possible quality even if it comes at a price, we need quality not quantity. In the summer we don't need lots of players, just one or two top one's do me.
I totally agree with this. The point I was trying to make, was that a high price tag does not guarantee quality. Good scouting and finding the players to fit the system is what we need. Too many people seem to associate not spending huge quantities with not showing ambition which is my issue. But clearly that was not what you were saying.
It was spent pre-FFP for the most part. It's also well hidden, since it's on the books of the holding company which owns Chelsea, rather than the club itself. Sort of like the off-balance sheet losses a lot of banks held in 2008.Wow had no idea Chelsea had run up that much debt! How is that possible/allowed?
A lot of clubs in the Championship are in the same boat. The bottom 10 in the Premier League and about 50% of the clubs in the Championship are in very precarious situations financially. FFP has forced a bit of a clean-up, but really came too late for some. QPR especially.Chelsea are in a billion quid debt? absurd they should go into liquidation until at least 80% of this is settled. just shows you the old phrase 'if you owe the bank 10K$ you work for the bank, if you owe the bank a million $ the bank works for you' is spot on.
The FA\UEFA\PL should address this in a stricter way than the fair play laws, this really is unfair to clubs like us who are trying to maintain a stable business and playing it fair.
on a side note: more than 1 season outside of the EPL could get clubs like QPR\wet spam\NUFC\Leicester bankrupt
We will actually quite likely see at least another team "do a Leeds", probably this summer. QPR in particular.I don't disagree at all. My point is that whenever there is a discussion about spending a bit of money someone says oh well we don't want to do a Leeds. It's so asinine considering our situation of having zero debt and also the massive revenue streams that the Premier League has now. It is very unlikely we'll ever see that happen to another team again, let alone one of our size. That doesn't even take into account how well we are run. We could have a +50m net spend this and we wouldn't even be in the same galaxy of "doing a Leeds". But someone will bring it up this summer, I guarantee it.
It's like bringing up Hitler anytime a tin pot third world dictator starts making a bit of trouble.
Yeh money does not always mean quality, that's where good scouting, judgement and even luck come into play. A typical #Spursy summer would be Poch desperately wanting a player who is worth £20 million because he believes he will make a huge difference to the side, then Levy bidding £15 million and pissing off the player and club with the offer and trying to haggle the deal down until it falls apart. Poch then gets given a second rate alternative he doesn't want who will just be competing with the young players, a player we don't need.
That's what I hope we avoid and where the flaws of the haggling over money, buying a cheap not needed alternative and not properly strengthening come into play and that's where my issues with Levy still are to some degree. We need to move away from this.
It kicked. Hence what happened in the January transfer market, and why certain clubs had to pay some big fines/have squad restrictions.So when does Fair Play kick in???? :townhmm:
Show it then.What a crock of shit - we have much more than 0 debt
Fucking LOL - typical ENIC apologist propaganda
He falls down on selling players we don't need as well - refusing to take a loss on players like Bentley and instead just paying them their wages until they leave on a free.
Doesn't make sense, we just need to accept when a transfer has failed and move to damage limitation tactics.
Other than this issue everything is great at the club, I am hoping Levy has learned a lesson on this, if we get offers of £10 million for Bobby bite their hand. It's a bit physiological test for Levy, because we have quite a few failed players and we cannot afford either in terms of rising funds or cutting wages to sit on these players as if they will somehow become more valuable if we sit on them.
That would be pure class if sung at a match!my eyes have seen the glory of the balance sheet at white hart lane ochsulk:it's not as catchy
I was obviously referring to the 2013 figures as already discussed.Show it then.
Absolutely right Tomo. For every Schneiderlin there is a Stambouli out there. Not knocking Stambouli- I don't think the opportunities have been there for him to bed in properly- but it seems reasonably clear that Poch wanted Schneiderlin to slot straight into his team & ended up with a journeyman who struggles to get a game.Yeh money does not always mean quality, that's where good scouting, judgement and even luck come into play. A typical #Spursy summer would be Poch desperately wanting a player who is worth £20 million because he believes he will make a huge difference to the side, then Levy bidding £15 million and pissing off the player and club with the offer and trying to haggle the deal down until it falls apart. Poch then gets given a second rate alternative he doesn't want who will just be competing with the young players, a player we don't need.
That's what I hope we avoid and where the flaws of the haggling over money, buying a cheap not needed alternative and not properly strengthening come into play and that's where my issues with Levy still are to some degree. We need to move away from this.
I think Stambouli may have been a bit of desperation. Pochettino may have known fairly early that his midfield options weren't good enough, but he couldn't get Schneiderlin since Soton wouldn't give him up. Stambouli may have been a quick and dirty substitute, with the long-term goal of trying again for Schneiderlin in the next windows.Absolutely right Tomo. For every Schneiderlin there is a Stambouli out there. Not knocking Stambouli- I don't think the opportunities have been there for him to bed in properly- but it seems reasonably clear that Poch wanted Schneiderlin to slot straight into his team & ended up with a journeyman who struggles to get a game.