Football: 'Let's talk about six, baby'

[ljkeane]

1 hour ago, Tywin et al. said:

So does the forum do anything for the Women’s World Cup?

I think we had a thread for it last time. 

The depth of women’s football seems to be improving year on year so hopefully it’s a good one.

Double penalty VAR drama in the Nations League!

[Iskaral Pust]

It will be interesting to see how much Chelsea and Spurs can get in transfer fees for Hazard and Eriksen with just a year left on contracts.  Both have made clear they intend to depart, both have name-checked Real Madrid in their interviews.  You would think all the bargaining power lies with Madrid, but time value is a funny thing.  Madrid will be impatient to start their rebuild now even if it would be financially smarter to wait a year, and they don't want to miss out on a year of the players' prime.  

Eriksen didn't help his case by saying he might consider signing a new Spurs contract if a good move doesn't materialize.  That's a big invitation to Levy to play hardball and then have him sign a new contract when the deal falls through.  Not unlike what United did with DeGea years ago.  Hazard has been more resolute that he won't sign another contract.

On the Liverpool side: departures of Sturridge, Moreno and Mignolet will reduce the wage bill quite a lot.  Those were the worst value for money wages at the club, alongside Lallana who just said he intends to stay for his final year.  We already gave bumper contracts to Salah, Mane and Firmino a year ago so the wage bill will still be very high.  Milner and Matip are to be offered extensions, and it sounds like Origi is too.  VVD has apparently told the club he would be happy to sign an extension too.

[A Horse Named Stranger]

WRT Chelski. Apparently Odoi had a change of heart and is now willing to sign an extension, so the Bayern move is dead.

[Consigliere]

Yet another Ronaldo hattrick. 

[Mark Antony]

Fuck sake Ronaldo chill out. Guy is just different level 

[Iskaral Pust]

48 minutes ago, A Horse Named Stranger said:

WRT Chelski. Apparently Odoi had a change of heart and is now willing to sign an extension, so the Bayern move is dead.

Yeah I saw that.  Good news for Chelsea.  I wonder if Odoi is more willing because he knows Hazard (and possibly Sarri) is departing and that creates more playing time for him.

I was surprised by some of the mooted transfer fees that Bayern will be paying this summer, starting with Lucas Hernandez.  Maybe it's just not possible for them to pay top fees for every position, but they do need to replace Ribery and Robben and that won't be cheap even if they look elsewhere than Odoi.

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

2 hours ago, BigFatCoward said:

I dont think so, but this time round it seems to be getting a lot more press coverage, especially in the UK. Though that might only be because this is the first time we've been going in as one of the favourites. 

It doesn't hurt that the tournament is playing close by either. It is nice to see that the game is expanding though. 

[Corvinus85]

If anyone watched the Portugal-Switzerland game in the Nations' League, you would have seen one of the most ironic moments in football. Ref calls a penalty for Portugal (correct call), but has to verify with VAR an incident at the other end, where a Swiss player looked like he had been fouled, a moment which started Portugal's counter-attack that led to the penalty call. Sure enough, VAR showed a clipping (really a soft foul in the end) and the ref reverses the call and awards Switzerland with a penalty. 

[Jordan La Cabra]

11 hours ago, Iskaral Pust said:

Yeah I saw that.  Good news for Chelsea.  I wonder if Odoi is more willing because he knows Hazard (and possibly Sarri) is departing and that creates more playing time for him.

I'd say those play a part. CHO was getting a lot more game time before his injury, as well. He actually finished the season with 24 appearances in all competitions, which is a decent tally for a player of his age in their breakthrough season. 

There will be a massive void to fill with Hazard departing, and I really don't think going out and splashing big money on an already established player to replace him would be wise, even if we could make signings. Hazard, in my opinion, is the best player of his type in world football. No player we could possibly sign would be able to replace him. I think it is much wiser to give CHO the chance to take his place and grow into the role with experience. We have Pulisic arriving, also. Ideally, once CHO is fit again, we would have CHO as our left winger and Pulisic on the right.

[Rorshach]

7 hours ago, Corvinus said:

If anyone watched the Portugal-Switzerland game in the Nations' League, you would have seen one of the most ironic moments in football. Ref calls a penalty for Portugal (correct call), but has to verify with VAR an incident at the other end, where a Swiss player looked like he had been fouled, a moment which started Portugal's counter-attack that led to the penalty call. Sure enough, VAR showed a clipping (really a soft foul in the end) and the ref reverses the call and awards Switzerland with a penalty. 

Wouldn't call it soft, tbh. Unlucky, absolutely, but he's clipping the Swiss player's leg from behind. That's a foul anywhere, and a penalty all day.

[Consigliere]

 

 

 

ETA. Matt Law is reporting that the deal is worth up to £130m (£88m initial fee + £42m in add-ons). If true, that's a fantastic piece of negotiation on the part of Chelsea. A lot more than I thought they could get.

 

[ljkeane]

1 hour ago, Consigliere said:

ETA. Matt Law is reporting that the deal is worth up to £130m (£88m initial fee + £42m in add-ons). If true, that's a fantastic piece of negotiation on the part of Chelsea. A lot more than I thought they could get.

It kind of depends what the add ons are though. Still, nearly £90 million to buy a player out of one year of his is very good business regardless. 

Apparently United are going to sign Daniel James for around £15 million. I can't say I can remember seeing him play but he's supposed to be rated quite highly by a lot of people who have seen more of him.

[Consigliere]

Just now, ljkeane said:

It kind of depends what the add ons are though. Still, nearly £90 million to buy a player out of one year of his is very good business regardless. 

In his article in The Telegraph, Matt law mentions that the bonuses are easily achievable and that Chelsea are confident of receiving the full £130m. It is a pretty great piece of negotiating by Granovskaia especially considering that Hazard was not renewing and he only had eyes for Real Madrid. There was no competition from other clubs either so it looked like Real held the upper hand.

[ljkeane]

1 minute ago, Consigliere said:

In his article in The Telegraph, Matt law mentions that the bonuses are easily achievable and that Chelsea are confident of receiving the full £130m. It is a pretty great piece of negotiating by Granovskaia especially considering that Hazard was not renewing and he only had eyes for Real Madrid. There was no competition from other clubs either so it looked like Real held the upper hand.

Yeah, I don't know. I'd be very surprised if a lot of them aren't stuff like winning league titles and Champions Leagues so how achievable or not they are will probably depend on how well or not this rebuild Real Madrid are doing goes. But, again, £88.5 million as a starting point is still fantastic for a player with one year left on his contract who clearly wanted to leave. 

[Jordan La Cabra]

From a Chelsea perspective, no fee is really going to seem great for Hazard, considering how important he is to Chelsea, but given that he wanted to move, Marina Granovskaia has done really well with this piece of business. As Consigliere points out, Real Madrid were the only club Hazard wanted to go to, and they appeared to be the only club who were truly trying to sign him, too. To manage to get a starting fee of £88m which could potentially rise to £130m from Real Madrid is really quite impressive work.

Hazard has been an absolute joy to watch at Chelsea over the past seven seasons. In my time of following Chelsea, he is quite easily the most talented player I have ever seen play for the club. In a way, it's a shame that he didn't get to play for a Chelsea side that were competitive in the CL, but he still leaves having won 6 major trophies in his 7 seasons at the club, which is still an impressive haul. 

 

[Iskaral Pust]

Crazy money paid by RM.  I’m pretty sure Hazard will do great for them, and not incur a Coutinho-like regret, but that’s too much.  They’re basically paying 130 million for one year of Hazard.  Even after I posted yesterday about RM’s impatience and not losing a year of Hazard’s prime, that still feels like they overpaid by a large amount.

[A Horse Named Stranger]

18 hours ago, Iskaral Pust said:

I was surprised by some of the mooted transfer fees that Bayern will be paying this summer, starting with Lucas Hernandez.  Maybe it's just not possible for them to pay top fees for every position, but they do need to replace Ribery and Robben and that won't be cheap even if they look elsewhere than Odoi.

Well, they could cough up the 100m for Sane. They are operating on a sound financial basis for over 40 years, with a pretty consistent annual CL appearence (they missed out once in the mid or late nineties, when they won the UEFA cup instead, oh, and also one season in the early 90s when they finished tenth after losing their entire defense to Italian clubs). I thin even their bloody stadium is paid in full (but I am not sure about that, find a Bayern fan they might know).

This is more a German caution thing. So Bayern and other Bundesliga clubs are looking at the money that is being spent (primarily by English clubs), and that just doesn't feel like a healthy or sound business model. A bit like Italy's Serie A in the 1990s. So for Bayern, they might withdraw money from their term account (to borrow a phrase from Hoeneß) once in a while, but they won't be doing it on a regular bases. Their attitude is really down to we are running a football club here, and not playing a game of monopoly.

Other Bundesliga clubs don't have that problem, as in they simply lack the financial resources to even consider a 100m fee.

[Rorshach]

1 hour ago, Iskaral Pust said:

Crazy money paid by RM.  I’m pretty sure Hazard will do great for them, and not incur a Coutinho-like regret, but that’s too much.  They’re basically paying 130 million for one year of Hazard.  Even after I posted yesterday about RM’s impatience and not losing a year of Hazard’s prime, that still feels like they overpaid by a large amount.

Probably more related to Zidane wanting the player, and RM underperforming this season (and being impatient about fixing it) than any economic analysis.

[ljkeane]

Southgate isn't starting any of the players from the Champions League final, which is probably fair enough given how knackered they all looked, but the midfield of Rice, Barkley and Delph is a bit of a concern.

Koeman is playing van Dijk and Wijnaldum, which also isn't too much of a surprise, but I'm a bit surprised van de Beek's on the bench.

[A Horse Named Stranger]

Am I the only one who really isn't arsed to watch this NL shenanigans at all?

I mean I really need a break from watching football, it's really become a bit too much. Felt the same way last year with the World Cup.