Yep £10 million is ridiculous, we only got £4 million for Silva after a hard fought legal campaign. - https://www.telegraph.co.uk/footbal...watford-compensation-4m-avoid-premier-league/
https://www.hertfordshiremercury.co...tball-news/marco-silva-watford-everton-820964 - Everton were willing to pay £10m-20m (depending on where you believe!) for Silva after barely a few months of him being here, I can't see why £10m from Chelsea is beyond the realms of possibility.
Because the amounts paid historically for coaches to be released from their contracts is still low. £10m for Gracia would be one of the highest payments in history. By comparison, Juventus have been told they need to pay Chelsea £5.6m to release Sarri from his deal. Sarri has just won the EL and qualified for the CL. He also got Napoli to the CL more than once. His CV is better than Gracia’s. It can’t really judged on what Everton were willing to pay for Silva IMO. As I think Everton still don’t have the best perception of value for money and I also think they were offering a premium due to them trying to do a deal so soon into the season. This isn’t me saying he’s a bad manager, far from it. It’s also not me saying he doesn’t have the potential to be good enough for these types of club. But Chelsea would be paying well over the going rate for 99% of all managers to pay that - for someone who isn’t really a name. £10m for one of the best managers in football makes sense, not for Gracia at this point.
Managerial compensation often doesn't make much sense and depends on how much a club wants a particular manager (and likewise the selling club wants to keep him, which in Sarris case is a bit up in the air). Chelsea paid the record (13.3m) for AVB at Porto, yet Real Madrid only paid 6.8m for Mourinho (the 2nd most expensive) after he'd won the CL with Inter Milan. The 3rd biggest amount of compensation paid? Mark ******* Hughes.
I'm not saying Gracia is worth 10 mill, nowhere near it, but why on earth would we accept anything less, especially to begin with? We don't need to get rid of him, we're hardly struggling financially and he isn't crying like a little bitch to the media like Silva was.
You don’t accept compensation because you ‘need to get rid of him’. You accept it because said manager wants to go and it’s financially viable to allow him to. We don’t know how we are doing financially. We hardly spend bucketloads. Agreed, we aren’t struggling but I doubt the coffers are overflowing either. £10m for a manager given historical fees’ for a manager is good business. Gino will be very happy with last season and the reasonable success we had - I doubt it’s changed the idea that managers are largely replaceable though. He’s isn’t crying. And I wouldn’t expect him to. But the season has ended so he hasn’t got a camera shoved in his face every other day - asking him about the Chelsea job which still has an incumbent. There’s no question to even ask him.... I think Chelsea would only approach once they are assured through back-channels that he’d take the job. If that happened, we’d definitely take £10m IMO. As it’s a lot for a manager, and we are in a point of time where he can be replaced with minimal upheaval. (Not saying it would be easy but it’s close-season and not 6-8 games in).
Adam LeventhalVerified account @AdamLeventhal 9m9 minutes ago #WatfordFC latest on Javi Gracia link to Chelsea head coach role My sources have told me... No official approach to Watford No official contact to Gracia representatives £15m release clause figure is inaccurate
But Chelsea only wanted £5 million for a manager who not only got them Champions League football through a third place finish but also won the Europa League final. Derby want £4 million for a a manger who finished 6th and lost the play off final - laughable. Lampard might be a superb manger for Chelsea or the next Geoff Hurst.
As with the Marco Silva Everton saga, Lampard is worth something to Derby, why should they just roll over and let him go?
I’ve never seen Frank drinking Sangria . He’s more of a Peroni (bottle not pint) and possibly a glass of white if he’s out to dinner with the Mrs.
Mid-table in the championship is a good season for us. 17th in the prem is fantastic. To be honest Im more interested in the quality of football than if we come 11th of 17th. Last season's football was the best in the top flight since the 80s. Our 'rivals' West Ham, Wolves, Leicester and Everton all have better and way more valuable first team players than us and much deeper pockets. Almost impossible for us to finish top 10 next season. Palace and Muff will also push us harder next season.
With the squad we have, mid-table in the Championship is way below what we are. And 17th in the PL would not be fantastic. We don’t have the money of others but we should hardly be bereft of finances either. If we sign the required players in defence and the loanees returning are of the standard we are told, a Top 10 finish isn’t impossible. And why would Bournemouth and/or Palace push us hard next season? There’s no evidence as yet to suggest that.
I was talking about who we are as a club. Over the last 40 years mid table championship is a good finish and premier league survival (achieved 9 times) is fantastic. We are massively over achieving at the moment and personally I'm thrilled to bits about that. West Ham and Everton got their **** together in the 2nd half of last season and I'd expect them to be above us. Over the next 1-3 seasons when Vardy fades and Chilwell, Morrison and Maguire leave we could overtake Leicester and no-one knows if Wolves will have 2nd season syndrome or if Jiminez will revert to type. However, it would still be a huge achievement to finish above any of those four clubs. All Palace need to finish above us is a decent striker, Bouremouth had an injury crisis last season but next season their first 11 will probably be better than ours. Having said that I admire your positivity and would be delighted if u r proved right.
Since 1979 we've only been outside of the top two divisions for two seasons. We're an established top 30 club now.
Top 41 - that's why mid table championship is a successful season. We've often finished outside the top 30 since 1979.
As a club now though we are a mid table Premier League team. We are not massively over achieving as looking at the teams who finished below us last season, which of those teams deserve to be above us. Palace look likely to lose their best two players, Bournemouth were defensively dreadful away from home (except us obviously) and we had a cup final on our minds for the last few games, two of which could have had a vastly different outcome had it not been for two sending offs. Everton and West Ham are probably able to attract better players and certainly appear to have the funds but you mention Wolves and Leicester as unknown quantities for the future that we could catch. I would say we are already at their level. The future looks very bright, would be nice to see some players come through from the academy, but looking at the sides who came up last year and the sides we finished above last year, I would say mid table, possibly top 10 is well within our sights and we should be thought of as better than top 30 in the country now
I'm no dreamer thinking this top flight stint will last forever - gravity will get us sooner rather than later I expect. But I'm saying we're a top 30 club now. That's where our expectations should lie in the long term in my opinion. Our PL stint has increased our resources and stature such that, even if we did go down, we should expect to be a top half Championship club as a minimum. Saying mid-table Championship (or top 41) is a success implies so long as we don't get relegated from that level we've done well. I disagree. 38 years out of 40 at Championship level or higher clearly shows that's the bare minimum we should expect. The years we were finishing 15th or whatever were par scores, no more. Success for this club, for me, is staying in the PL in the manner we have in recent seasons. I don't know what generation you're from but I do get the impression people who saw us regularly in the 3rd/4th division find it more difficult to clock quite how much our stock has risen in my lifetime (mid-80s onwards).