A Horse Named Stranger Posted July 19, 2019 Author Share Posted July 19, 2019 6 hours ago, Consigliere said: It was the Neymar transfer that plunged the transfer market into madness. Pogba's fee was a minor increase over other record purchases (€94m paid for Ronaldo, €101m paid for Bale and €105m paid for Pogba). The Neymar fee more than doubled any of those. ETA. Then there was the fallout of the Neymar transfer with Barca paying stupid money for Dembele and Coutinho. And of course PSG then followed up the ridiculousness of the Neymar fee with €180m for Mbappe. Yes, and no. But up to that point the ludicrous transfer fees to give the fans a brand new toy was almost exlcusive to Los Galacticos. What was the highest fee paid by United for a player before Pogba? 5 hours ago, Iskaral Pust said: But the PL and CL money probably won’t increase again by a similar magnitude, and PSG seem chastened by their galactico shopping. Even United, who must be desperate for improvement, are wary of paying these new prices. Arsenal have basically opted out, Chelsea accepted a transfer ban (a good time to sit out), Spurs signed no-one for two windows, and Liverpool are sitting out this window. They’re all reluctant to chase up the prices any further. Different reasons. PSG has been spending this window though. Just not on one fancy superstar. As for United, well the 80m for Maguire is still not out of the world. Arsenal is suffering from Kroenke not wanting to invest in his sport teams, but being satisfied with skimming money off his investment. So they simply lack the financial power to make a marque signing. Chelsea has, as you mentioned the transfer ban. And Roman does not seem that interested in his toy, if he can't get into the country to, well, play with it. Spurs had a lot of their finances tied up in their new stadium, if I am not mistaken. Now that their new stadium is actually there, they will be more active on market. Liverpool. Well, that's more down to Klopp being quite happy with what he has. If they felt there was one player they absolutely wanted/needed, they'd spend heavily again. No doubt about that. But like I said previously. They had their Christmas shopping done last year. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Consigliere Posted July 19, 2019 Share Posted July 19, 2019 6 hours ago, A Horse Named Stranger said: Yes, and no. Yes, and yes. It's undeniable that it was the Neymar transfer (and not Pogba) that led to the current inflation in the transfer market. The knock-on effects previously mentioned as a direct result of Neymar's transfer cannot be ignored. 6 hours ago, A Horse Named Stranger said: But up to that point the ludicrous transfer fees to give the fans a brand new toy was almost exlcusive to Los Galacticos. What was the highest fee paid by United for a player before Pogba? €75m for Di Maria. And don't forget about Barca. They paid around €88m for Neymar and €80m for Suarez. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
polishgenius Posted July 19, 2019 Share Posted July 19, 2019 41 minutes ago, Soylent Brown said: Both of whom were miles better than Pogba though. That certainly wasn't true at the time we got Pogba, especially compared to Neymar who was obviously incredibly promising but coming straight from Brazil (86mil is a monster fee from a player from outside UEFA - the only other two fees in the top 100 transfers were for Vinicius Junior and Rodrygo to Madrid, both of which have only happened since the transfer market balooned like it has and are still only half what Barca paid). Whatever you think of what's happened since and why, we were paying for a player who'd been helping Juve run Italy and get to the CL final. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rorshach Posted July 19, 2019 Share Posted July 19, 2019 Sooo... no-one accusing us of overpaying with £8,5 mill for Delph? Good, then. Assuming he stays healty (probably not, right?), I think it's a good deal. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Consigliere Posted July 19, 2019 Share Posted July 19, 2019 1 hour ago, polishgenius said: That certainly wasn't true at the time we got Pogba, especially compared to Neymar who was obviously incredibly promising but coming straight from Brazil (86mil is a monster fee from a player from outside UEFA - the only other two fees in the top 100 transfers were for Vinicius Junior and Rodrygo to Madrid, both of which have only happened since the transfer market balooned like it has and are still only half what Barca paid). Whatever you think of what's happened since and why, we were paying for a player who'd been helping Juve run Italy and get to the CL final. Yeah, I think people are starting to underrate Pogba. He can be inconsistent from time to time but even that tends to be exaggerated. By far the biggest problem is that he has been part of a very dysfunctional United side where every player has struggled (De Gea and Pogba have actually been the best and most consistent players). If he had stayed at Juve or gone to Real Madrid, there'd be no question of him being among the best CMs in world football. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Consigliere Posted July 21, 2019 Share Posted July 21, 2019 Yeah, he's been great for us and would be very difficult to replace but that is waaay too much for a keeper. It all stems from the gross incompetence of giving Sanchez a ludicrous contract. That move really fucked up the club's wages and, considering the cost vs performances + knock-on effects, I'd consider Sanchez to be the worst transfer United has ever made. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeor Posted July 21, 2019 Share Posted July 21, 2019 United were obviously a bit stuck having set the precedent for astronomical wages with Alexiis Sanchez, but I feel this De Gea contract really stuffs it up even more. Sanchez can be expected to retire, be sold off (with United eating a significant cost of the wages for whoever the buying club is) or otherwise not be at the club within a couple of years' time and the wage problem would eventually be forgotten, or at least the accountants at the club could say "look at what a disaster that was, you can't expect to negotiate wages like that again". But now with De Gea being at the club long-term on those wages it will remain a sticking point for any other signings and contract renewals for ages to come. They've really made a rod for their own backs, although I guess they were just desperate for him not to leave. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Consigliere Posted July 21, 2019 Share Posted July 21, 2019 I doubt anyone is dumb enough to actually take on Sanchez's wages - only a Chinese club would do so and it's unclear whether Sanchez would even agree moving to China. Most likely is that we are stuck with Sanchez for the duration of his contract. What makes the Sanchez contract much worse than De Gea is that DDG has at least performed at a world class level for years whereas Sanchez, since joining the club, has been outscored by Smalling. Another thing to consider is that keepers are generally still at their peak in their thirties whereas forwards usually start declining at that point. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeor Posted July 21, 2019 Share Posted July 21, 2019 United might find someone for Sanchez's wages if they were to subsidise them somehow - don't know if that's done in football circles but in other sports sometimes the old club still assumes responsibility for some percentage of the wages going forward. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Consigliere Posted July 21, 2019 Share Posted July 21, 2019 It all depends on how much United would have to subsidise. If it's 20-30% then it might be worth it but if it's 50-80% then we might as well just keep him at the club as what would be the point of subsidising that much of his wages for him to play for another club? The reality though is that Sanchez will remain at United for the duration of his contract unless he is open to moving to China or agrees to a substantial pay cut to move elsewhere in Europe. I also think we should try playing Sanchez up front. He's finished as a winger imo and his best goal scoring season came when Wenger used him primarily as a CF. Nothing to lose by trying that seeing as how we are stuck with him. ETA. Kane with a fantastic goal to win the game against Juve. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
A Horse Named Stranger Posted July 21, 2019 Author Share Posted July 21, 2019 3 hours ago, Consigliere said: It all depends on how much United would have to subsidise. If it's 20-30% then it might be worth it but if it's 50-80% then we might as well just keep him at the club as what would be the point of subsidising that much of his wages for him to play for another club? The reality though is that Sanchez will remain at United for the duration of his contract unless he is open to moving to China or agrees to a substantial pay cut to move elsewhere in Europe. 50% would still mean, you got rid off a good EPL player's wage, doesn't it? I agree, that you have to draw a line somewhere, when it comes down to whether it is worth actually keeping Sanchez. But if you don't play him, I think you at least want to get rid of what 160k/w? On the other hand, you finally got Moyes off the books. So there's some financial wiggle room. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Consigliere Posted July 21, 2019 Share Posted July 21, 2019 37 minutes ago, A Horse Named Stranger said: 50% would still mean, you got rid off a good EPL player's wage, doesn't it? I agree, that you have to draw a line somewhere, when it comes down to whether it is worth actually keeping Sanchez. But if you don't play him, I think you at least want to get rid of what 160k/w? On the other hand, you finally got Moyes off the books. So there's some financial wiggle room. Moyes's contract was off the books years ago. I don't know where this bullshit story of him still being paid came from. He had a performance break-clause in his contract which limited compensation to 1 years salary (£4.5m) should CL qualification not be achieved. https://www.lawinsport.com/blog/littleton-chambers/item/david-moyes-sacking-legal-rights-and-options Re Sanchez. The issue is that even 50% of Sanchez's salary equates to £195k/week. There are only a few clubs that could take on such wages and none of those clubs would sign Sanchez. There's no point loaning him out to a club paying £100-150k/week as that means United would be paying £12-15m/year in wages for a player to play for another club. We might as well just keep him as a squad player in that case. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeor Posted July 21, 2019 Share Posted July 21, 2019 I guess it depends on how much the United hierarchy are willing to write him (Sanchez) off or not. If it's unlikely they were going to play him, then they might as well eat some of his salary in the interests of writing off the rest and giving themselves some headroom. He's got, what, 4 more years on his contract? At 350K per week that contract is worth 72M. Getting even just half of that money off the books is worth a decent player's transfer fee. Then again, if Lukaku gets sold you may as well keep Sanchez as a CF, it would be worth a try. He was a pretty good finisher for us (Arsenal) when he was playing there so could do a job. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Consigliere Posted July 21, 2019 Share Posted July 21, 2019 He's got 3 years remaining. I was also thinking that it wouldn't be the worst move to use Sanchez as a CF if Lukaku leaves and use the money from his sale to sign a right winger instead of another CF but it's now looking unlikely that Inter can meet the asking price without selling Icardi first. Also, it's not just up to United - Sanchez has a contract and doesn't have to agree to any move. I doubt Solskjaer would freeze him out either - he wouldn't be first choice but I expect Solskjaer still intends to use him. ETA. the issue with Sanchez is exactly the same as the issue with Ozil. It's all well and good thinking about how to solve their wage problem in theory but in reality there are no clubs interested in taking these players. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heartofice Posted July 21, 2019 Share Posted July 21, 2019 I mean is Sanchez really all that broken? He's only 30. Maybe with the right motivation he can get it back. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
baxus Posted July 22, 2019 Share Posted July 22, 2019 It seems to me that his only motivation now is to do the bare minimum required to get all that money every week. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jordan La Cabra Posted July 22, 2019 Share Posted July 22, 2019 Zidane's comments suggesting Bale is close to leaving Real Madrid are strange, as there are very few teams out there with the financial power to take him on. In Europe, unless he was willing to take a massive pay cut, I wonder if there are any clubs at all that could pay a transfer fee and his wages. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mark Antony Posted July 22, 2019 Share Posted July 22, 2019 The main rumor seems to be he is China bound Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jordan La Cabra Posted July 22, 2019 Share Posted July 22, 2019 The noise coming from Bale's camp had suggested that Bale wants to stay at Real Madrid. If he wanted to stay, that would suggest he feels he can still play at the level required to be a Real Madrid player. Going to China -while the most lucrative option if he wants to keep his salary - is a massive downgrade in terms of competition, which would be a waste if he still feels he can compete at Champions League level. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Consigliere Posted July 22, 2019 Share Posted July 22, 2019 Reports that Real Betis have reached an agreement with Lyon for Fekir (€20m + €10m in add ons + 20% sell on clause). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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