January 2022 - Transfer Window

[Deuterz]

Was so shit United was offering £50M.

So many internet experts, evaluating players in the past is easy. The fact that he didn't live up to the projections doesn't change the fact that many, many people - people who actually do this sort of thing for a living, not just type about it on the internet - were projecting a very bright future for him. Like those who wanted to buy him, we believed it enough that we didn't want to lose out by selling him early.

It was the right move at the time. We wanted to win trophies, and Dier was considered an important fixture in the squad by the manager.

But I guess you're all better at evaluating players than Pochettino is, too. Its easy when you're speaking about the past, after all.

That'll be the same United who paid 80m for Harry Maguire, 53m for Fred, 40 for Mkhitaryan based on a season where he benefitted from Dortmund's system, 31m for Schneiderlin and 54 for Martial, right? God you really showed me.

Yeah, except loads of our fans were saying take the money. I remember it. You wanna rewrite history by pretending our entire fanbase was anti it, when plenty of us (including myself) knew Dier was limited. When I saw the money offered I laughed, it was typical United back then offering twice what a player is worth. We should've mugged them off. Just because you didn't see it doesn't mean others didn't.

Dier was replaced in midfield not long after and then became a back up CB. So important. So necessary. I for one am gutted we didn't take 50 mill and invest in a player who isn't a clumsy mess.

Pochettino thought Wanyama was better than Dier. And Wanyama was a limited player too. How much control over transfers do you think he got, with Levy at the helm? With the way he values players, he probably thought Dier was worth 70 and Alli 150. Of course we'll end up moving them both on for a combined fee of about 5 mill in a couple of years, and you'll be talking about hindsight and how nobody could've seen this coming.

 

[MemphisWill]

That'll be the same United who paid 80m for Harry Maguire, 53m for Fred, 40 for Mkhitaryan based on a season where he benefitted from Dortmund's system, 31m for Schneiderlin and 54 for Martial, right? God you really showed me.

Yeah, except loads of our fans were saying take the money. I remember it. You wanna rewrite history by pretending our entire fanbase was anti it, when plenty of us (including myself) knew Dier was limited. When I saw the money offered I laughed, it was typical United back then offering twice what a player is worth. We should've mugged them off. Just because you didn't see it doesn't mean others didn't.

Dier was replaced in midfield not long after and then became a back up CB. So important. So necessary. I for one am gutted we didn't take 50 mill and invest in a player who isn't a clumsy mess.

Pochettino thought Wanyama was better than Dier. And Wanyama was a limited player too. How much control over transfers do you think he got, with Levy at the helm? With the way he values players, he probably thought Dier was worth 70 and Alli 150. Of course we'll end up moving them both on for a combined fee of about 5 mill in a couple of years, and you'll be talking about hindsight and how nobody could've seen this coming.

You're so great at scouting and projecting footballers. Its fucking shocking you're sat on the sofa banging on about it on a random message board, rather than running a club somewhere.

Convenient you "knew he was limited", when there's no evidence of it because you weren't around.

Sure some United buys have been donkies, a good number actually. But you're having a laugh pretending at that time that you wouldn't have been celebrating Maguire, Fred, and/or Mkhitaryan at Spurs at the time.

Pochettino was definitely selecting the players - its a big part of the reason we had barren transfer windows, he was inflexible in the players he demanded.

 

[Deuterz]

todd1882 Is right. If we're going to position ourselves as this sustainable business model club where we spend what we earn, then we need to start working big time on selling players when their value is high, and utilizing the transfer market smartly. Unfortunately we have a chairman who has the ego of an elite club chairman, but not the budget or ambition.

You can't have both. It's not working. Because we kept all our players (without exception till they run down their damn contracts) and now we're at a transition phase and have no money to rebuild unless the club decides to put up some cash, which we all know they absolutely won't.

When we had a functioning system, clubs would buy even just cogs in the wheel for high fees. Now maybe a small handful of our players (at best) would attract decent money. Congratulations, the stubborn refusal to sell and acting like we're a United or Chelsea has really benefitted us. We showed all those elite teams.

 

[Deuterz]

You're so great at scouting and projecting footballers. Its fucking shocking you're sat on the sofa banging on about it on a random message board, rather than running a club somewhere.

Convenient you "knew he was limited", when there's no evidence of it because you weren't around.

Half the fucking football world knew. Go have a look at United boards when they were linked to him, none of them wanted the player for that fee and were shocked at their interest. Nobody rated Dier as a 50 mill player aside from some fans of our club, Levy and a desperate United who were throwing huge fees around at average players for years.

You don't have to be a football scout or analyst to see Dier wasn't worth 50 mill. Not then, not now, not ever. There was nothing to his game that would indicate his value was anywhere close to that. We replaced him with a 12m defensive mid who did the exact same job, and was better at it.

The appeal to authority argument doesn't wash, and never will. By your logic nobody would ever criticise managers or chairmen, ever. It's such a copout way to excuse bad decision making. Levy is obviously far more competent than I, or anyone on here, at many aspects of running a club. But he has an ego the size of a planet and vastly overrates the values of our players, which leads to us struggling to move many on for the right fees and fund a proper rebuild.

You disagree? Fine. But please find a better argument than 'oh so you know better than the chairman?' because it's tiresome as it gets.

 

[Deuterz]

Sure some United buys have been donkies, a good number actually. But you're having a laugh pretending at that time that you wouldn't have been celebrating Maguire, Fred, and/or Mkhitaryan at Spurs at the time.

Pochettino was definitely selecting the players - its a big part of the reason we had barren transfer windows, he was inflexible in the players he demanded.

I would've celebrated signing almost anyone at the time, since we were apparently disinterested in bringing in footballers at all. That doesn't mean they didn't vastly overpay for those players, and other clubs took advantage of their willingness to do so.

And Pochettino may have been demanding but we lost out on a lot of players because of Levy's haggling. We could've had Grealish for example, but wanted him for a ridiculously low fee, and then by the time we tabled a fair one, Villa's financial difficulties were solved. Haggling over small amounts and not being decisive and getting the player in early .. not exactly the actions of an elite club, which Levy tries to pretend we are.

 

[MemphisWill]

I would've celebrated signing almost anyone at the time, since we were apparently disinterested in bringing in footballers at all. That doesn't mean they didn't vastly overpay for those players, and other clubs took advantage of their willingness to do so.

And Pochettino may have been demanding but we lost out on a lot of players because of Levy's haggling. We could've had Grealish for example, but wanted him for a ridiculously low fee, and then by the time we tabled a fair one, Villa's financial difficulties were solved. Haggling over small amounts and not being decisive and getting the player in early .. not exactly the actions of an elite club, which Levy tries to pretend we are.

You bring up United paying inflated fees and being taken advantage of...then slag off Levy for avoiding paying inflated fees. Yes, its unfortunate we didn't get Grealish when we should have. But its fortunate in hindsight we didn't just pay up for the likes of Berahino...so its a bit swings and roundabouts.

Sure, there's a better way to go about things. Its the way Liverpool and Leicester do it, generally. Scout well, and pay the necessary fee. But our scouting is/has been shit, which probably has contributed to Levy being even more gun shy and a stickler for his number.

Which is his biggest failing - not fixing our obviously failing scouting setup. When we have pushed the boat out on transfers, and we have contrary to whats popularly said, we've generally failed. When we've signed cheaper options, we've tended to do better. Again, all this just reinforces Levy's inclination to eschew players at big fees for cheaper options.

Our biggest struggle right now isn't just the knock on of the barren windows. It's that afterwards we tied so much money up in players that haven't lived up to those fees. We simply don't have the finances to swing and miss so much, certainly not without feeling it. And every time we do, it just makes it less likely that we'll swing again.

 

[Deuterz]

You bring up United paying inflated fees and being taken advantage of...then slag off Levy for avoiding paying inflated fees. Yes, its unfortunate we didn't get Grealish when we should have. But its fortunate in hindsight we didn't just pay up for the likes of Berahino...so its a bit swings and roundabouts.

Sure, there's a better way to go about things. Its the way Liverpool and Leicester do it, generally. Scout well, and pay the necessary fee. But our scouting is/has been shit, which probably has contributed to Levy being even more gun shy and a stickler for his number.

Which is his biggest failing - not fixing our obviously failing scouting setup. When we have pushed the boat out on transfers, and we have contrary to whats popularly said, we've generally failed. When we've signed cheaper options, we've tended to do better. Again, all this just reinforces Levy's inclination to eschew players at big fees for cheaper options.

Our biggest struggle right now isn't just the knock on of the barren windows. It's that afterwards we tied so much money up in players that haven't lived up to those fees. We simply don't have the finances to swing and miss so much, certainly not without feeling it. And every time we do, it just makes it less likely that we'll swing again.

You can pay decent fees for players without going down the United route and paying 50m for players like Fred. We offered 3m+ Onomah as an opening bid for Grealish, Villa's best player and a player considered a huge talent by coaches across the country. Then we ended up panicking towards the end and submitting the big offer when it was too late. We were prepared to pay up .. we just played stupid games first.

I agree with the rest of your post. Our scouting department has been an issue for a past, we certainly don't have the hit rate needed to be a club which will sustainably punch above its weight. When we have pulled the trigger (Ndombele, Lo Celso, Sessegnon, Bergwijn, Sanchez etc) it feels like they're failures vs not pulling the trigger on Dias, Grealish, Fernandes etc. Although that may be a flawed perception, I'm sure we've missed out on plenty (yeah, Berahino) who were dodged bullets.

We obviously have to hope Paratici improves things, at the very least he may bring a sense of continuity and an overall strategy which exists across multiple managers. But the scouts at this club are something Levy should be looking closely at, because it's a department we've been sorely lacking in for a long time.

 

[NorseYid]

We have a mountain to climb over the next windows.

And with NUFC and all, it's really difficult to see how.

This neglection of this squad is criminal.

 

[NorseYid]

... But our scouting is/has been shit, which probably has contributed to Levy being even more gun shy and a stickler for his number.

...

The whole system is sick.

Having a chairman overseeing a random collection of scouts (and "consultants" like Pleat) is not a strategy. It's making shit up as they go along.

This club desperately need to hire a football managment office, staffed with football people, and back the board the hell away from football operations.

 

[VirginiaSpur]

Dier was fucking mint in 2016-2017.

I thought he was the next big thing, and was adamantly opposed to selling him to United.

 

[KaneDomBadBoy]

You bring up United paying inflated fees and being taken advantage of...then slag off Levy for avoiding paying inflated fees. Yes, its unfortunate we didn't get Grealish when we should have. But its fortunate in hindsight we didn't just pay up for the likes of Berahino...so its a bit swings and roundabouts.

Sure, there's a better way to go about things. Its the way Liverpool and Leicester do it, generally. Scout well, and pay the necessary fee. But our scouting is/has been shit, which probably has contributed to Levy being even more gun shy and a stickler for his number.

Which is his biggest failing - not fixing our obviously failing scouting setup. When we have pushed the boat out on transfers, and we have contrary to whats popularly said, we've generally failed. When we've signed cheaper options, we've tended to do better. Again, all this just reinforces Levy's inclination to eschew players at big fees for cheaper options.

Our biggest struggle right now isn't just the knock on of the barren windows. It's that afterwards we tied so much money up in players that haven't lived up to those fees. We simply don't have the finances to swing and miss so much, certainly not without feeling it. And every time we do, it just makes it less likely that we'll swing again.

We need to do better than zero net spend

One look at our net spend over the past several years and you'll realize why we aren't competing in the top 4 or 6 for that matter

 

[MemphisWill]

We need to do better than zero net spend

One look at our net spend over the past several years and you'll realize why we aren't competing in the top 4 or 6 for that matter

Man United now have the highest net spend by far of every PL club since the 2017/18 season

Man United now have the highest net spend by far of every PL club since the 2017/18 season

www.givemesport.com

You realize we're not zero net spend, right? Our net spend since 17/18 is actually 9th in the league and outstrips Liverpool. The scouting has been shit and we've wasted the money. But we've spent at a decent clip.

The net spend champions narrative keeps getting dragged out, but its just not true anymore. So at least be objective enough to recognize that you need to criticize Levy for new things, because the old complaints from 5+ years ago are simply no longer valid.

 

[Deuterz]

Dier was fucking mint in 2016-2017.

I thought he was the next big thing, and was adamantly opposed to selling him to United.

I swear 16/17 was the year he was replaced by Wanyama as first choice DM and basically only started as a cb in a 3. So he was our second choice option for defensive midfield, and our third best centre back. Next big thing?

But my memory might be off, sometimes I mix the Poch years up a bit. My main recollection from that season when it comes to Dier is Poch trying to play both him and Wanyama in midfield for a while and it being horrendous.

 

[VirginiaSpur]

I swear 16/17 was the year he was replaced by Wanyama as first choice DM and basically only started as a cb in a 3. So he was our second choice option for defensive midfield, and our third best centre back. Next big thing?

But my memory might be off, sometimes I mix the Poch years up a bit. My main recollection from that season when it comes to Dier is Poch trying to play both him and Wanyama in midfield for a while and it being horrendous.

Sorry, I've got my seasons wrong. Dier was mint in 15-16 when we challenged Leicester for the title.

We played with the triple D's in midfield, Dembele was in his prime, Dele was a breath of fresh air doing nutmegs through opposing player's shoelaces, and Dier anchored the midfield.

You're right though. We signed Wanyama and then Dier got shoehorned into the back three and he's looked confused ever since.

 

[KaneDomBadBoy]

Man United now have the highest net spend by far of every PL club since the 2017/18 season

Man United now have the highest net spend by far of every PL club since the 2017/18 season

www.givemesport.com

You realize we're not zero net spend, right? Our net spend since 17/18 is actually 9th in the league and outstrips Liverpool. The scouting has been shit and we've wasted the money. But we've spent at a decent clip.

The net spend champions narrative keeps getting dragged out, but its just not true anymore. So at least be objective enough to recognize that you need to criticize Levy for new things, because the old complaints from 5+ years ago are simply no longer valid.

In the case of Liverpool, they were already working off a extremely high base, so they could easily spend hundreds of millions over that 5 year span yet still have close to no net spend. I guess it's important to look at both gross spend/purchases AND net spend.

I'm sure in terms of both gross/net spend, we're no more than top 8-10 which is in line with where we're at as a club at this moment in time.

I don't disagree with you though. We definitely need to step up our game as far as scouting goes.

 

[Deuterz]

Man United now have the highest net spend by far of every PL club since the 2017/18 season

Man United now have the highest net spend by far of every PL club since the 2017/18 season

www.givemesport.com

You realize we're not zero net spend, right? Our net spend since 17/18 is actually 9th in the league and outstrips Liverpool. The scouting has been shit and we've wasted the money. But we've spent at a decent clip.

The net spend champions narrative keeps getting dragged out, but its just not true anymore. So at least be objective enough to recognize that you need to criticize Levy for new things, because the old complaints from 5+ years ago are simply no longer valid.

We would be if we were still top 4 and looking to maintain that. But we're a team who have been dislodged and are meant to be part of the chasing pack, so you'd expect spending to go up as the club try and get us back to that position. If that's their aim, anyway .. which they seem to say it is.

Right now we spend like a Europa League side who want to remain a Europa League side. Just we're not spending it particularly well so sides like Leicester and West Ham have usurped us with slightly less spending.

Right now Woolwich are significantly outspending us almost every window, and they're a team in a similar situation with a desire to get back in to the top 6 minimum. Now you can say what they've spent it on is poor, but the ambition is there.

 

[Deuterz]

Sorry, I've got my seasons wrong. Dier was mint in 15-16 when we challenged Leicester for the title.

We played with the triple D's in midfield, Dembele was in his prime, Dele was a breath of fresh air doing nutmegs through opposing player's shoelaces, and Dier anchored the midfield.

You're right though. We signed Wanyama and then Dier got shoehorned into the back three and he's looked confused ever since.

Dier was good in 15/16, but his role was a pretty simple one. Sit and recycle possession simply. Certainly a necessary one in the team, but one worth 50 million in that market? Not for me. Which I think him being phased out for Wanyama demonstrated.

But yes, his versatility killed him a bit. We should probably have just left him as a capable DM and left him to hone his craft, because as a CB he's too error prone. Technically his limitations are obvious as a midfielder though. I thought he looked good in a 3 but then we transitioned back to a 4 where it doesn't work.

Dembele was the gold dust of that midfield. If he was younger/not injury prone, he would have been coveted by all of Europe.

 

[todd1882]

Was so shit United was offering £50M.

Back to repeating the same thing? You know that doesn't make the logic anymore sound, right?

You've been banging on in here but haven't addressed this:
https://thefightingcock.co.uk/forum/threads/january-2022-transfer-window.42620/post-3090922

The fact that he didn't live up to the projections doesn't change the fact that many, many people - people who actually do this sort of thing for a living, not just type about it on the internet - were projecting a very bright future for him.

Wow, appeal to the masses. They are never wrong are they?

But I guess you're all better at evaluating players than Pochettino is, too. Its easy when you're speaking about the past, after all.

Wow, appeal to authority. You are full of logical fallacies today and repeating yourself.

 

[todd1882]

Dier was fucking mint in 2016-2017.

I thought he was the next big thing, and was adamantly opposed to selling him to United.

And what did you learn from that experience? Were you upset that he was replaced by Wanyama the next year? And utilizing MemphisWill 's hindsight have you re-evaluated your position on the player/your projection or have you just couched it as "he's regressed"?

 

[Spaniel]

I can see a club like Liverpool going for him too. Firmino doesn't score enough for them

I think Liverpool are going for Adama, too.