I think he wasn’t very keen on coming back after his first loan spell in Germany ? Maybe as he saw that there wouldn’t be many opportunities to play here. Guess it’s another one to file under the “we will never know” banner ?
We also hived off about £30m to other Pozzo teams via Peneranda, Success and Pussetto. Need to include every player to see if we are getting a bad deal or not and fees/arrangements not always available. All I know is our club has large debt after many years of premier league income with one of the lowest wage bills. That’s the fact. It may of course be just because running a premier league club at even a small loss is infeasible anymore. At any rate the Pozzo model doesn’t do us any favours financially. Our total playing asset value is fairly low now as a total. Lots of valueless old players on contracts no other club will give them. And we still have the debt.
A few on here posting that they're not sure why we're signing another winger, though at the start of the window in the Jan transfer window thread I posted: "What we need, in order: CB LB DM FW - either striker or left-wing, capable of more goal threat than King, JP and Cucho Good to have, in order: Goalscoring AM (but might just recall Zinc) RB GK" https://wfcforums.com/index.php?threads/transfer-window-january-2022.59010/#post-3081601 So with signing this guy for left-wing and Kayembe looking solid, we've actually now done near enough the business I was hoping for. With King and Dennis seemingly a bit out of sorts, JP wildly inconsistent and Cucho doing nothing as a starter, another attacking option with some pace and trickery was important - we've gone 7 games now without scoring more than 1 goal in a match, so our attack definitely isn't firing as much as has been earlier in the season and that puts more pressure on our defence again. Having a winger better capable of defending than JP, Cucho and Sema will also be important when we play tougher opponents or ever take the lead, so sounds like this guy will be handy for that as well. It is true that another CB might still be good to have though - when I posted the above I was expecting that any upgrade like Samir would partner Sierralta, rather than Cathcart. As I posted at the start of the season, RB depends on whether Kiko can stay fit. With Foster back I don't think another GK is an issue.
Kalu is a right winger primarily. I think he's here as cover for Sarr. Samuel Kalu - Player profile 21/22 | Transfermarkt
Looking at his clips he seems very comfortable when on either flank. He's also right footed, which in the modern game usually favours the left flank. In a way it doesn't really matter which side winger he is, given Dennis and King are also both very flexible as to which one of the three forward positions they can play and so we have a decent number of options for shuffling things around.
Think it’s far too early to call Kayembe solid after one 7/10 game against an awful team. His stats before he joined us don’t really back up any kind of belief that he’s a defensive midfielder.
Has he been injured? Soccerway has him down as playing 323 minutes all season with only 3 starts which doesn't sound great considering Bordeaux are 2nd from bottom.
I would say we’ ve signed him because in the summer they are planning to sell Sarr or Dennis (or both ). They ve been following him for a while so perhaps we signed him so he can hit the ground running at the start of next season or because another club were interested and they didn’t want to lose him .
He's not mad. He's definitely going this summer, will start to be a rapidly reducing asset as his contract winds down after that.
I'm pleased with the transfer business so far but I'm concerned that by shopping in the same market constantly we are cutting our throats come the next AFCON. I'm not saying all will be going, but if out strongest team consists of mainly African players we are seriously going to weaken ourselves if their relative nations qualify.
If their clubs didn't make money from "player trading" they wouldn't do it. They see the big picture, we don't. There will clearly be more misses than hits numerically on punts and it would be great to not make losses on any players.
Yeah I think that's still the most likely outcome, but I'm hopeful that his injury might make some teams think twice and that we might be able to get him to sign a year or 2 extension. But that's more wishful thinking rather than a prediction!
That isn’t what I posted. The question is what the impact is on our own balance sheet when all is said and done. I don’t care about Udinese or Pozzo. If the player trading just makes Udinese or the owners richer and leaves us with a pile of debt and an unbalanced squad then I’d rather we had a different model.
Sarr is definitely going in the summer. Dennis will go too if we go down, with a small chance he stays if we stay up.
Looks like a quality player and the fee is low. The only problem is, another winger is the last thing we need. Sure it's nice to get an upgrade on Sema but I feel like signing a player that plays in literally any other position would be more important.
It gives us the option of playing a more traditional 4-3-3 while Sarr is out. As good as Pedro is, I still don't see him as an out and out winger Sema is painfully out of his depth so any improvement is greatly welcome
Apparently next AFCON is going to be in the summer. Also if Wengers plan for WC every 2 years comes in there wont be any AFCON /Euros etc
Always good to keep you rbest players, but the flip side would be chances for the other young players to develop and £30-40 mill to spend on rebuilding the defence/midfield.
You're right. Relegation from the prem league can only be down to player trading rather than strengthening the squad. So simple to fix as well.
That's true. But if you look at other positions it doesn't seem as necessary. GK, CB, DM, RB are much more urgent. I would also prefer a creative midfielder over a winger. Arguably LB and ST are more needed (Kamara and King are good, but I'd rather play Cucho/Pedro as a winger than Masina and Fletcher as CB and ST respectively). As I said, it looks like a smart purchase quality and price wise but I would have preferred a player in any other position.
No. It’s a matter of choice. Pull the Pussetto shenanigans and that moves £7m away from us. The player depreciates over time and the bloke actually is busily playing at Udinese. The balance sheet will look how Pozzo chooses it to. Granada’s balance sheet will have looked how they want it to pre-sale and the same will apply to us. The unbalanced squad will look however it looks after Pozzo has concluded his player trading in winger trinkets and midfielder baubles. This will involve Cathcart playing for a decade.
