I see they've been linked with Lautaro Martinez, how much would he be? Surely he wouldn't come cheap!
I know where it came from but I still can’t see we paid £50m for him in 2019. That would be about €60m and that’s about double what every source, English or French, suggests the fee was. It would also make it one of the top 20 transfers by fee in the world that summer. It just doesn’t pass the sniff test for me.
Has the £50m come from the total spend on transfers in the accounts? Is it possible that a few other transfers were more expensive than reported? Or some add-ons on transfers from a few years back? I just can't see us, or anyone paying £50m for Sarr based off 8 goals in 35 games in France, it just doesn't make sense.
Would that figure for total outgoings that summer include payments we made on transfers from previous years? I suspect Pussetto was £15m, but even so, it does seem on the steep side
This is what the article (by the reliable Dean Jones of Eurosport) actually says: “SARR STAYING PUT? Watford are hoping to force Ismaila Sarr out of the market as Spurs become the latest club to consider a move. Over the past two years he has attracted the attention of many top clubs, including Manchester United and Liverpool. Yet as Spurs now begin to look into the player’s potential availability, Watford are keen to ensure he does not leave just as their Premier League return begins. Sources are indicating that Sarr is not for sale - and that any club asking about his valuation will be told offers need to be well north of £50million.” I would be surprised if Levy doesn’t look elsewhere and if Spurs’ interest goes anywhere beyond “well north of £50m you say, I think we’ll look elsewhere thanks” particularly if they’re shelling out £60m+ for Lauturo. Spurs aren’t in great financial shape, remember, because they built the most expensive stadium in the world banking on massive match day revenues that evaporated due to covid.
I think Pussetto was itemised at £7m as it was inter group so it’s not that. It’s possible Dawson was more than £4m but that would be equally grim news. It’s a good point on add-ons being crystallised. But even if they are £7m and Dawson was actually £7m rather than £4m we’d still be left with £40m for Sarr, so you’d think that is lowest he cost.
I think some of the figure could be add-ons being crystallised as mentioned by another poster (not 100% sure how they are treated in year of purchase though). Not Pussetto as he was itemised. Instalments are not a factor.
You can also capitalise agent fees so thinking about it that could be quite sizeable for the Sarr deal.
Yeah it's an interesting one. I'm trying to think if any big purchases reaches appearance/goal milstones that year, that could have triggered a major add on
Respect your maths but we can’t have paid that much for Sarr can we ? I mean we just can’t ? We know how tight Pozzos are with fees and how they only speculate with very low value punts. I can’t believe they would have paid more than £30m/£35m max and risked £50m on such a young prospect. The opportunity to make a profit on resale would be very very high risk. There has got to be another explanation surely ?
Yeah I reckon it’s agents fees and add ons from other players. Not hard to imagine that figure could be substantial.
I thought i read that we spent (which presumably includes the ability to capitalise) £2m on agents fees in the year to Feb21 as all this info is published. Palace as an example spent £7m -and they only paid £12m for players in the year to June 20 so maybe some of this relates to spend post 30/6/20. I know i have done this to death previously but our operating expenses (called football related costs) in 2020 were £30m after £38m in 2019. By comparison Palace spent £41m on other expenses also called "football related costs" in those 2 years. £27m more
The fee agreed for Pedro could rise to nearly £10m according to various articles published around the time Liverpool were allegedly trying to hijack his move to us. But the up front commitment was £3m ish. Which amount would be reflected in the accounts for that year? Could that explain some of the gap?
I’m not sure how you treat add ons in terms of asset value. Whether you put maximum in up front and then impair the value if they do not happen, or whether you have them as additions to player carrying amount in the period they crystallise. Would be interesting if anyone knows.
The cost capitalised, like any fixed asset, should include all the direct costs of the purchase. So if we paid an agents fee of £5m to sign Sarr that should be capitalised as part of his "asset cost". If we paid a general £8m a year to a specific agent and it's not related to specific acquisitions, then I suspect it would just be written off rather than allocated between any deals he happened to bring in. Can't capitalise any costs unless the deal is confirmed. At least that's my take. The big question would be what you do about contingent costs eg an extra £5m if we don't get relegated. Not sure if you have to make a best guess assumption at the date of acquisition or only add at a later date if conditions are met.
Treat it as some type 're-capitalisation', as per significantly upgrading the spec of industrial equipment?
'Watford are keen to ensure he does not leave just as their premier league return begins.' So it does raise this question about whether the club are effectively raising a white flag for this season with a view of building a squad for next season, with an acceptance that in all probability that will be in the championship. If this is the case, then surely we effectively snap their hands off for anything that could raise a profit on Sarr because he's unlikely to be here next year either way. If not, then why have we had such a mediocre to poor transfer window...
Just sell him ffs. He's not gonna make a difference about whether we go down or not. Just pay off some of our debts and let's go down with the shyte we deserve.
Liverpool apparently preparing another 40million euro bid. He might have been worth that a year ago chaps but after his performance on Saturday you will need to stump up at least another 20 on top to even have a sniff. Bearing in mind that we will want the money up front I think we can call this paper talk!
Doubt there's anything in this, if they are interested, they've left it far too late in the window. As an aside, every club should charge a premium for Liverpool. Whenever they want to get rid of some failed transfer or youth prospect that hasn't quite cut it, they demand £20m+. So if they want to come back in for Sarr next summer, north of £60m should be the starting point.
This would be classic Liverpool, if they’ve left it late in the window it will be deliberately so, and the amount will be lower than market value. They rely on their status unsettling the player and getting the deal done. Meanwhile any of their players that are surplus to requirements they expect to command top dollar for, simply because they once played for Liverpool.
40 million? Euros?? **** off. £50m to start talks and if has another blinder on Saturday then it goes up to £60m.
I would say the bidding starts at £60m already. They've missed the £40m boat now we're back in the Premier League.
I think it the payment structure is preferable, that £50m might still get him. That said, we would have to have some idea how we would be spending it pretty quickly (as per Villa did with Grealish money). I don’t think we would be that pro-active. I think it’s too close to the end of the window now for us to even contemplate selling him. I think it would throw us into disarray somewhat.
I imagine we would find a like-for-like replacement for a much smaller sum and never see the rest of the money. I hope we would go for someone like Danjuma, but even he may be seen as too expensive.
I hope not. Again he looked unplayable first half. Agree with @Burnsy it's far too late into the window to even contemplate selling. He alone could well be the difference in staying up.
