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Summer 2013 signings thread

Here's a tonic. Pool's 2014 signings. Levy also has our young talented players signed up. Whereas Sterling and Herderson are both coming to the end of their contracts, and Gerard is off. Will the yanks keep bankrolling pool each year? How many of these lot could you call a hit?

Rickie Lambert, £4.5m, Soton
Adam Lallana, £25m, Soton
Emre Can, £9.8m, B Leverkusen
Dejan Lovren, £20m, Soton
Javier Manquillo, loan, At Madrid
Alberto Moreno, £12m, Sevilla
Divock Origi, £9.8m,
Lazar Markovic, £20m, Benfica
Mario Balotelli £16m, Milan
 
SpurMeUp said:
Here's a tonic. Pool's 2014 signings. Levy also has our young talented players signed up. Whereas Sterling and Herderson are both coming to the end of their contracts, and Gerard is off. Will the yanks keep bankrolling pool each year? How many of these lot could you call a hit?

Rickie Lambert, £4.5m, Soton
Adam Lallana, £25m, Soton
Emre Can, £9.8m, B Leverkusen
Dejan Lovren, £20m, Soton
Javier Manquillo, loan, At Madrid
Alberto Moreno, £12m, Sevilla
Divock Origi, £9.8m,
Lazar Markovic, £20m, Benfica
Mario Balotelli £16m, Milan
Click to expand...

Thanks. That does make me feel a tad better.
 
What happens with Sterling and his contract could shape what happens with Hendersen. A good move for Liverpoool would be to move now and get Hendersen signed on a better contract as a sign that all is still well there.

Anyways back to Spurs. I reckon that if we sold all of the magnificent 7 this summer we would probably end up with a loss of £10-15 million. That is not taking into account the aforementionned worth in euro's etc.
On the subject of hit and miss; I would base my decision on the value a player has to the first XI. With that in mind, I could only call Eriksen a hit. Chadli and Lamela are in the maybe column whilst the rest are misses. Lamela could quite conceivably also end up in the miss column, but I would like to see him given another year just because the first was so injury ravaged.
 
Firstly, I'd like to qualify this by saying that I'm not singling anyone out from the performance yesterday. It was a poor team performance all round.

But it occurred to me that the re-introduction of one of summer 12/13's' "record signings" disrupted our attacking play. Its a curious aspect of the majority of that summer's signings that the majority of the players bought that summer have instincts largely unsuitable for our style of play. Or potentially for the fast-paced English game.

Paulinho is not a player that's "already decided the next move before he receives the ball". Neither is he confident on the ball, nor does he release it quickly.

He and Capoue both stay on the ball once received looking for an easy option to pass to. Their decision making is hesitant. The ball often goes short, sideways or backwards.

They dwell too long on the ball and passing options are closed down, and cut out.

Lamela dwells too long on the ball. We've all been waiting for him to cut it out of his game, but he hasn't. Chiriches is another who invites trouble by lingering in possession.

Regardless of relative abilities, it was clear that Sherwood was forced to introduce Bentleb due to his bravery on the ball and quick release. Mason was similarly required this season by Poch for the same reason.

The only players in the squad capable of releasing the ball quickly and decisively from deep midfield positions cost us nothing.

I'll include Soldado in the list of dud signings. Who was responsible for this? We had the opportunity to build a title-challenging squad with the money received from Bale but it appears we spectacularly blew it.

Paulinho, Soldado and Lamela must represent the worst top three record signings for any club
 
Most bad things are not as simple as people would like to make it, it's like a car crash - if I left home 30 seconds earlier, if I took a left instead of a right ... etc, etc.

First, you have to understand the place Spurs operates from

- Not only is it difficult for us to spend the kind of money for big name players
- We don't have the CL draw, and we won't pay obscene wages
- That means we have to take a slightly bigger risk that other re that expensive player

I also think you have to look at a lot of those players in terms of AVB, not Poch
- Speed of recycling is not a core of AVB's Spurs

Re the players themselves
- Lamela was a justifiable risk, overpriced but this is a kid that has been the next big thing for a long time (not one season) as was hugely influential in Italy. His issue as you pointed out is too much time on the ball, the best players adapt, unfortunately he hasn't.
- Soldado for me was bought to play with Bale, and when I watch Bale play for Wales/RM, I still believe Soldado would have worked in that system.
- Paulinho, I don't know, guy had a decent role in a Brazil team, seemed like the "Lampard role", overplayed, injuries, lack of bravery/commit and just doesn't fit system.

Money badly spent, no question, but lets not all pretend its that easy the buy the right player, for it to all work out.

You could make a list much bigger than those 5 or 6, even from the best clubs/managers
 
Raziel said:
Most bad things are not as simple as people would like to make it, it's like a car crash - if I left home 30 seconds earlier, if I took a left instead of a right ... etc, etc.

First, you have to understand the place Spurs operates from

- Not only is it difficult for us to spend the kind of money for big name players
- We don't have the CL draw, and we won't pay obscene wages
- That means we have to take a slightly bigger risk that other re that expensive player

I also think you have to look at a lot of those players in terms of AVB, not Poch
- Speed of recycling is not a core of AVB's Spurs

Re the players themselves
- Lamela was a justifiable risk, overpriced but this is a kid that has been the next big thing for a long time (not one season) as was hugely influential in Italy. His issue as you pointed out is too much time on the ball, the best players adapt, unfortunately he hasn't.
- Soldado for me was bought to play with Bale, and when I watch Bale play for Wales/RM, I still believe Soldado would have worked in that system.
- Paulinho, I don't know, guy had a decent role in a Brazil team, seemed like the "Lampard role", overplayed, injuries, lack of bravery/commit and just doesn't fit system.

Money badly spent, no question, but lets not all pretend its that easy the buy the right player, for it to all work out.

You could make a list much bigger than those 5 or 6, even from the best clubs/managers
Click to expand...

It is on the abacus games, problem is so many fans think its as easy in the real world. ;)
 
While no signing is ever a dead cert for success, what you can do is minimise the risk as much as you can. Basically, blowing all that money on 7 players who had never kicked a ball in English football was ludicrous. Complete and utter madness.
 
shaney said:
While no signing is ever a dead cert for success, what you can do is minimise the risk as much as you can. Basically, blowing all that money on 7 players who had never kicked a ball in English football was ludicrous. Complete and utter madness.
Click to expand...

I agree, in isolation they all made sense, as a group it was unbalanced

<looking forward to Milo seeing this thread ;-)>
 
Kane, Bentaleb, Mason, Townsend and Rose combined are probably worth £90, but together cost us £1m.

brick happens.
 
Where's Milo?

I think you need to look at Pool for comparison. Almost exactly the same scenario, stellar sale to Spain, even more cash spent than us, and probably less successes. Despite everything, Eriksen was an amazing bargain, Lamela is not done yet, Chadli has scored a few very important goals and has something which may develop. Chiriches likewise has contributed, he played okay yesterday. Moreover, bar Soldado (the post Bale splurge to get goals), they all have reasonable resale value.

Compare that to pools outlay on Baloteli, Lalana and a bunch of others. We're far better off. What is interesting is that it happened to both sides with home grown players coming to the fore over multi-million £ signings. The players we carefully scouted and signed are not intrinsically bad players. Almost all internationals. But bringing in that many players at once, without a direction or a replacement for Bale (/Suarez) created problems. Too many average options. Scatter gun and ineffective.

I created a thread on this yesterday. It is galling, so much money and just Eriksen as a definite hit. But we have home grown players who have pushed back the underachievers - who were heading into their second season - which is ultimately a positive. And all bar Soldado are young with resale value.
 
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Raziel said:
Most bad things are not as simple as people would like to make it, it's like a car crash - if I left home 30 seconds earlier, if I took a left instead of a right ... etc, etc.

First, you have to understand the place Spurs operates from

- Not only is it difficult for us to spend the kind of money for big name players
- We don't have the CL draw, and we won't pay obscene wages
- That means we have to take a slightly bigger risk that other re that expensive player

I also think you have to look at a lot of those players in terms of AVB, not Poch
- Speed of recycling is not a core of AVB's Spurs

Re the players themselves
- Lamela was a justifiable risk, overpriced but this is a kid that has been the next big thing for a long time (not one season) as was hugely influential in Italy. His issue as you pointed out is too much time on the ball, the best players adapt, unfortunately he hasn't.
- Soldado for me was bought to play with Bale, and when I watch Bale play for Wales/RM, I still believe Soldado would have worked in that system.
- Paulinho, I don't know, guy had a decent role in a Brazil team, seemed like the "Lampard role", overplayed, injuries, lack of bravery/commit and just doesn't fit system.

Money badly spent, no question, but lets not all pretend its that easy the buy the right player, for it to all work out.

You could make a list much bigger than those 5 or 6, even from the best clubs/managers
Click to expand...

Not record signings though. You're essentially saying that we took massive punts with the money. Its not that easy to get it right, but surely it's also not hard to avoid the devastating disasters we have ended up spending our three biggest outlays on. Okay, okay, Lamela isn't done, but he's looking like he's sliding that way. I don't think Poch is convinced by Townsend, but currently he's in the team ahead of Lamela. What does that say?

You can point to other teams, but seriously:

£26m = Soldado
£26m = Lamela
£17m = Paulinho

For a club of our size and spending power to invest that much in those three, it literally makes you want to cry. And this is where the decision-making HAS to be questioned. Sure, every signing has an element of risk. It's the opportunity that we had and the extent to which we tinkled it all up the wall that gets me.

And I also think it seems to be that Levy has had his fingers well and truely burnt. It will be a while, if ever, that we return to spending over £15m on a player, if you consider what he said to the THST.
 
SpurMeUp said:
Where's Milo?

I think you need to look at Pool for comparison. Almost exactly the same scenario, stellar sale to Spain, even more cash spent than us, and probably less successes. Despite everything, Eriksen was an amazing bargain, Lamela is not done yet, Chadli has score a few very important goals, and has something. Chiriches likewise has contributed, he played okay yesterday. Moreover, bar Soldado (the post Bale splurge to get goals), they all have reasonable resale value.

Compare that to pools outlay on Baloteli, Lalana and bunch of others. We're far better off. What is interesting is that it happened to both sides with home grown players coming to the fore over multi-million £ signings. The players we carefully scouted and signed are not intrinsically bad players. Almost all internationals. But bringing in that many players in at once, without a direction or direct replacement for Bale (or Suarez) creates problems. Too many average options. Scatter gun and ineffective.

I created a thread on this yesterday. It is galling, so much money and just Eriksen as a definite hit. But we have home grown players who have pushed back the underachievers who were heading into their second season - which is ultimately a positive - and all bar Soldado are young players with resale value.
Click to expand...

I don't think we're better off than Pool. I don't think they will end up having to get rid of anyone other than Balotelli. Lallana is a quality player. He's been very unlucky with injuries. Can looks a great prospect and I think Lovren will prove to be a good signing also. These players are proven Premiership performers, so there is the confidence that they will do it.

The difference for me is that our 3 biggest signings of ALL TIME look almost certain to be sold at a loss less than two seasons into their THFC careers.

Pool also have a bigger turnover and budget than us and can absorb transfer losses more easily.
 
Spur of the moment said:
So if I've understood that correctly, since 1992 we have made an overall profit of £85m on transfer dealings?

Despite shipping an enormous amount of dross over that period we've also enjoyed a raft of top players - the likes of Sheringham, Klinsmann, Ginola, Carrick, Berbatov, Keane, Bale, VDV, Modric - so overall we've probably done rasonably well thank you very much.
Click to expand...

This is the point that people miss, it's not a single year view you have to take. I'd actually like to see that list of buy/sell in the Levy era

For every Lamela/Soldado, there are multiple Carrick, Berbatov, Modric, Bale +the "smaller" Dawson, Caulker, Lennon (when we do sell), Hudd, etc. and that doesn't even include the potential revenue of Lloris, Eriksen, Vert, Walker, Kane, Bentaleb in current squad (would easily wipe out the 90M numbers)
 
NWND said:
Not record signings though. You're essentially saying that we took massive punts with the money. Its not that easy to get it right, but surely it's also not hard to avoid the devastating disasters we have ended up spending our three biggest outlays on. Okay, okay, Lamela isn't done, but he's looking like he's sliding that way. I don't think Poch is convinced by Townsend, but currently he's in the team ahead of Lamela. What does that say?

You can point to other teams, but seriously:

£26m = Soldado
£26m = Lamela
£17m = Paulinho

For a club of our size and spending power to invest that much in those three, it literally makes you want to cry. And this is where the decision-making HAS to be questioned. Sure, every signing has an element of risk. It's the opportunity that we had and the extent to which we tinkleed it all up the wall that gets me.

And I also think it seems to be that Levy has had his fingers well and truely burnt. It will be a while, if ever, that we return to spending over £15m on a player, if you consider what he said to the THST.
Click to expand...

It is a bad group of purchases, no question

However as I pointed out in the merged thread, the club squad cost vs. value is probably well in profit (for all we lost on those 3, look at the values of Lloris, Vert, Walker, Rose, Bentaleb, Eriksen, Kane)

I do think we will probably be reluctant to go to the 25M soon again, however, the new tv rights deal will probably mean 20M is the new 10M
 
shaney said:
While no signing is ever a dead cert for success, what you can do is minimise the risk as much as you can. Basically, blowing all that money on 7 players who had never kicked a ball in English football was ludicrous. Complete and utter madness.
Click to expand...

We needed to spend the money and hold it in assets rather than cash or we would have been taxed on it. Given this, what transfer strategy do you think we should have adopted?
 
So who else should we have gone for at the time, who would realistically have come to us?

Remember we have to shop at Co-op, when 4 teams in our league can shop at M&S

Look at CF. First we tried for David Villa, but he rejected us. Then we explored Benteke, but our coach didn’t fancy him and he’s had 2 terrible seasons since. So we went for Soldado, who was at that point the best striker in Europe not already at a club bigger than us. Hindsight is fantastic, but at the time Soldado looked like a superb signing
 
SpurMeUp said:
Here's a tonic. Pool's 2014 signings. Levy also has our young talented players signed up. Whereas Sterling and Herderson are both coming to the end of their contracts, and Gerard is off. Will the yanks keep bankrolling pool each year? How many of these lot could you call a hit?

Rickie Lambert, £4.5m, Soton
Adam Lallana, £25m, Soton
Emre Can, £9.8m, B Leverkusen
Dejan Lovren, £20m, Soton
Javier Manquillo, loan, At Madrid
Alberto Moreno, £12m, Sevilla
Divock Origi, £9.8m,
Lazar Markovic, £20m, Benfica
Mario Balotelli £16m, Milan
Click to expand...

fudge me, makes me smile ..

Balotelli and Lovren are the outright disasters with very little recoverable there, Markovic I really don't know enough about and is young.

Lallana was just an overpriced buy, has improved but never was and never will be a 20M+ player, probably moves on for 10M range
 
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