This sums it up perfectly, majority of football fans (many of us here included) are pretty clueless and get it wrong all the time.
Safe to say this one will be wrapped up in the next week. As I said before, he would hand in a transfer request and it will be an undisclosed fee. Transfer request handed in. Aberdeen look “strong” in rejecting our offer, and his request. The fans turn against him, they back the board when they sell as “he wanted out” and “no player is bigger than the club.” Fee is undisclosed, their fans believe they got the £4mil they were looking for. We believe we got him for £2.5-3mil and life goes on.
Asked some scouts I know about him: Scout 1: I find him meh. Was offered to Norwich and they said no in 2 seconds flat. Scout 2: He can go B2B but he would be a back up at best not ready for Prem League - he’s got bite and tenacity, limited on the ball but has energy. Tbf i think he’s a middle of the road Championship player. Put him into Middlesbrough, Blackburn let him go give you 6-7/10 every week job done Scout 3: Good championship player, watched Ferguson alot as we liked. Never a PL player.
Ok. Have you seen him play, and if so is he better than what we have? . I’d suggest if he can’t get in the Scottish squad, he isnt better than what we have
Got to give the Pozzo's credit for forward thinking here. He'll do a job in the Championship in 22/23 by the sounds of it.
Hard working B2B midfielder So a typical Dyche Burnley signing.... which is probably no bad thing However, we don't usually do our business in the public like this, so can equally see it being total carp and nothing to do with us
If he was over 23, you’d have to wonder what we’re seeing. But how many 21 year old midfielders are there who’d be a consistent 7ish/10 in a mid table championship side? And how much would they cost? He’s got a lot of football in his tank for a young player but his trajectory appears to have stagnated a little bit over the last year or so; a little bit like Hughes when he joined us (though he was far more vaunted).
No I haven't seen him ever and I don't give judgement on somebody I've not seen. But currently we have a midfield who are prone to getting knocks so I'd be happy with promising youngsters coming in.
If Gino has any sense he’ll offer £749,950 and make it clear he’s charging them £50 for wasting his time.
This is interesting and along with a couple of other things has made me wonder whether football recruitment works how I've always assumed it did. The classic notion (particularly applied to the Pozzos) is that it's all about scouting and that clubs go out, identify who they want and then pursue them, sometimes going down their list of targets until they get one. But I'm wondering in the modern game if that is only one side of it and the other is players (and managers) being punted around until someone bites. Obbi Oulare was the first time this occurred to me, there's no way we scouted him extensively - surely his agent approached us and pulled the wool over our eyes? I'd have thought the same would've been true about the likes of Ibarbo and Diamanti - their agents were casting around for a loan opportunity and we took a gamble that they might be able to offer something rather than us scouting them and thinking they were the players we needed. Similarly, I remember reading that Ivic's representatives approached us about him taking over rather than us having identified him as the man to lead us forward. I now have a vision that the main targets that cost a lot are the ones that have been extensively scouted and identified as players that can really add something to the first eleven and the squad fillers are just whoever we think is the best value of those being hawked around by their agents. Is that how it works these days?
Certainly has in the past, leading to us signing such talents as Chris Eagles Mark Falco-n Perry-grine Digweed Neal Buzz-Ardley Gifton-Owl--Williams And of course Harry-er Hornet.
I’m sure I’ve read somewhere before there is a website most clubs subscribe to where players are actively advertised for sale or loan by their clubs along with the fee etc.
Some good things have been said about this lad, but shouldn't we be looking for players that can hit the ground running at PL level, rather than looking to the future just yet. Because the future we will be looking at if we just buy players with future potential is in The Championship not the PL. What we need next season are players that have been there and done it at PL level to help get us established back in the PL, not young lads who are not quite ready for the PL yet. We need to bring in some experienced PL players who are possibly past their best, which would make them more affordable, but still good enough to see us through a season or two consolidating in the PL. As for this lad and the lad Baah, if we are going to bring in experienced PL players as well, and not be expecting those two young lads to be regulars in our side next season, then all well and good. Then hopefully if we do manage to establish ourselves as a PL side over the next couple of seasons, those two lads will probably be ready to step up and replace those ageing PL veterans as they will hopefully have matured into genuine PL players themselves and learned their trade from those PL veterans over those one or two seasons.
Maybe he feels he should be in the Scottish squad but recognises that by not playing for one of the 2 Auld Firm clubs, he needs to move south of the border to be recognised? You ask if he’s better than what we have - Hughes, Chalobah? Unlikely. Cleverley? Perhaps, maybe not yet but it’s not inconceivable and time is on his side. But he’s very likely better than the U23s who featured on the bench and in the squad. Zinckernagel could be pushed into his more natural positions and Sanchez has left. Really don’t get the issue with our interest at all. Not every signing is going to be a regular first team player - but they will all be signed with the scope to be.
I like the approach so far this transfer window, bringing in UK talent that are pushing for places in the 1st team. With better players around him Ferguson could turn into a real talent. This kind of deal works go financially and I’d be shocked if we spend over 5-6 million on 1 player. We are as like many other football clubs are in a delicate financial state since the pandemic and need to be very shrewd in the market, with the possibility of relegation always a threat to newly promoted teams.
That does seem a ridiculously low offer. We are basically tel £1.2m and £1.20001m? Aberdeen are shouting about it to try to get someone else bidding. If they do, it will work and he will go elsewhere for more. If it doesn’t, it means no one else considers him good enough to bid for, so we should steer clear.
Yes no big issues with the signing if made. Midfield may be an area we feel doesn’t need to be improved quality wise but we need some depth and legs. My concern is that he may not get much game time to improve, and end up another played loaned out. Would rather we spend on areas that need improvement, but the fee and presumably wages would be low.
This would be both bizarre and kind of sensible. Would seem weird to have a fee on there. Do you swipe left to sign them?
@reids might know more, but I’m sure I read about it on here. Edit: I don’t know if this is the one or just one of many but it’s along these lines: https://www.playerlens.com/
This is true, but there also isn't too much shame in him not getting in to the squad yet when you consider his age and that all the midfielders selected have either got significant game time in the Premier League or for Celtic. Even if he was somehow good enough he might not have gotten picked ahead of the more established players. Midfielders: Stuart Armstrong (Southampton), Ryan Christie (Celtic), John Fleck (Sheffield United), Billy Gilmour (Chelsea), John McGinn (Aston Villa), Callum McGregor (Celtic), Scott McTominay (Manchester United), David Turnbull (Celtic) What I find more concerning are the opinions of the scouts reids mentions. It seems pretty clear to me though that we'd be bringing him in as a squad backup option though, to take the place of Sanchez and/or Gosling and with the additional hope that he'll develop as a player going forwards. I'm fine with that so long as we still do also bring in at least one, but ideally two, additional central midfielders who are upgrades on our starters. It's still early in the window.
This is a debate that’s been had numerous times over the past week or two so no point going over it again.
Yeah me too. Taking a team which was relegated 2 years ago, selling anyone who could be sold abd then replacing them with cheap, Championship standard players sounds like a sure fire winner.