He is playing in a league that is closer to Ligue 1 in quality than the PL, but it could maybe be true. Either way, I think my assessment of the Pozzo's treatment of the two in the Sarr transfer thread over the summer still seems valid: "the consensus on the Pozzos supposedly being shrewd negotiators and dealmakers surely has to be under question now given that we paid £10mil more for Sarr than we received for Lukebakio, when all things considered they're very similar players at very similar stages in their development". http://wfcforums.com/index.php?threads/ismaila-sarr-club-record-fee.55870/page-47#post-2768183
We should have kept this bloke and spent the extra £15m-£20m on defenders Sarr may have potential but he is far too raw to be of much use in our current situation
I don't think there was too much dissent when we sold him for £20m. Lukebakio wasn't really Premier League tough enough, and made enough noise that he didn't want to play for Watford anyway. A parting of the ways made sense. Where we spent that money is another matter though. For what we needed, spending what we did on Sarr, was a huge mistake. He's giving nothing to the side, but has made a huge dent in our transfer budget. Not his fault of course, just one of many mistakes the club made over the summer. I wonder how desperate we'll be by January. It would be interesting to see how the Pozzo's cope with the prospect of their first ever relegation. Will they throw money at it, or will they look to sell players and recoup some money while we're still a Premier League club.
Which makes the decisions around both transfers, absolutely appalling. Whichever way you look at it. (I'm not writing Sarr off yet, as some seem to be).
I didn't want him sold, and I thought that if we did sell him we should be looking for minimum £30mil, preferably £40mil (and ultimately a fee at least the same as anything we bought Sarr for).
Read again what I actually said. I didn't say Bundesliga is Ligue 1 level, I said it is: "a league that is closer to Ligue 1 in quality than the PL" ... which is true. UEFA Coefficient for PL is 77.6, Bundesliga is 61.2, Ligue 1 is 51.8. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UEFA_coefficient
Seems harsh. How do they work that out then? I would say there isn't much difference between the Bundesliga and the EPL. Think the EPL is massively overrated.
It's calculations based on how well the teams from each league do in the Champion's League and Europa League (taking in to account the previous five seasons). There's no particular way to "overrate" or "underrate" leagues based on the system - leagues which have better performing teams will be rated higher than leagues where the teams don't do so well. Also considering how well Watford have performed against Bundesliga clubs in pre-season matches, and having watched a few Hertha Berlin mid-table Bundesliga games last season, it's not much of a surprise.
I know there is less money German football, due to the 50+1 rule. Much more supporter friendly and hasn't completely sold out yet like the EPL. Maybe this has 'held it back' in terms of quality. I thought it was considered to have overtaken Serie A and more on a par with La liga.
If you looked at the coefficients you would have seen that the Bundesliga has, narrowly, overtaken Serie A - at 61.2 vs 60.2. Lack of money in Bundesliga isn't solely due to it not having "sold out" in the same manner as the PL, but also due to its general lower popularity and viewing figures, meaning less money from TV deals.
We could have sold Lukebakio, not signed Sarr, signed some defenders, been a far better team than we are now and still had £15m in the bank.
Totally agree with this. Sarr was not needed. Of course he may turn into a very good player. I can't see it myself, but I'm open to the idea he'll improve over time. He's nowhere near the £40m mark as been quoted, or even around £20m. I'd say from the level he's playing at now, he's no better than Sema to the side. I find it incredible Gino signed off on this transfer for so much money. It beggars belief really.
They probably got spooked by the "Announce Sarr" Tweets the club kept being sent in all sort of articles !
Sarr has played 167 minutes of PL football - that's less than 2 full games. Let's give him a bit of time before writing off the 35m eh?
For c£40m you would hope he'd shown enough in training to warrant more minutes. Really don't understand the rationale for this signing.
Maybe he has but QSF wants to integrate him slowly? Basically we don't know enough to make up a valid opinion on him yet.
I think we've seen enough to recognise he's not ready for the Premier League yet and he's not a £40m player.
2 games? That's harsh. I don't think you can learn very much from that amount of games. He's 21 years old playing in a struggling side that doesn't play wingers currently. Plenty of people have slow starts to their careers.
I agree it has been an underwhelming transfer so far, but a couple of things: Firstly, the fee is unlikely to be quite as high as £40mil. Secondly, it's not an exceptional case - Pepe has looked as poor so far for Arsenal despite being 3 years older and costing twice as much. Saint-Maximin seems a bit livelier for Newcastle so far, but is also yet to score or assist for them.
Not harsh at all. We've played 8 matches, and he's been a bit part in a couple of them. That clearly that shows he's not ready for the Premier League yet. A £40m player should be able to make a big impact, and he's not done so. So again, right now, he's not worth the money we paid for him.
Can people also stop using the £40mil figure just to to try and exaggerate their point about how much of a waste of money he might be? The BBC put the fee at £25million, and The Guardian put the fee at £30mil. The £40mil figure came from SkySports, who we all know can get things wrong and love to sensationalise things. Also, whichever it turns out to be, if any fee does end up being £40mil it will likely only be if he hits all of the no doubt numerous add-on clauses in the deal, which at this rate he won't come close to doing. https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/49283719 https://www.theguardian.com/footbal...-ismaila-sarr-from-rennes-for-club-record-30m https://www.skysports.com/football/...s-winger-ismaila-sarr-for-club-record-40m-fee
As mentioned by others, £40m probably isn't right. Not all players hit the ground running when they start Bergkamp is probably the most obvious. If he had played 8 games and had done nothing we could probably comment but a lot is going against him currently. A team utterly devoid of confidence, not being played where he has been a success in the past, not having a run of games to try and find his feet. I would like to see more of him when some of those issues are hopefully not so prevalent before saying he's not worth it
I think he's a big disappointment and a pretty damning indictment of the recruitment team's efforts in the summer. We somehow managed to drop almost our whole budget on a shy, non-English speaking lad who has no experience of the division or country, who wasn't available to play our first games because of his summer international exploits and has so far shown no capability of hitting the ground running. Of course Sarr's not responsible for the fee paid for him but he doesn't look like record signing material. He has to be strong enough mentally to carry that tag and almost revel in it and, so far, all the messages from the club imply he's not the man for the moment. His performance when he started against Wolves was no where near the right level. He'll probably come good after about 18 months or so but if we go down it won't be in a Watford shirt.
Also, I'm sure the fee paid isn't necessarily indicative of his immediate quality, but also most likely takes into account his potential in the very near future.