Transfer Policy

[Modric THFC]

The main problem today that resulted from our transfer policy was that we had 2 strikers, in Adebayor and Saha, with no long term future at the club, who played like they didn't care about the result either way.

 

[punk_is_back`]

When we first qualified for the CL, the legitimate reason why we didnt sign a decent CF was that we didnt know that we would make the league stages til the 3rd week of August.

More generally, the problem with our trasnfer policy as I said in the Harry thread is that the longer he stays as manager, the more the new guy will have to do as Harry is filling the squad with short-term loans or 33+ year old players. Look at the work which the new manager will have to do over the next 12-24 months:

GK: all 3 GKs will probably be leaving, 2 because they're very old and 1 as its simply best for all that we part company given he will now never win over some parts of our fans and definitely not the media
FB: probably ok
CB: 3 old guys to be released over the next 2-14 months and Khumalo will go. We have no top 4 standard CB. We need to build a CB pairing
CM: parker will probably be fine for another 2 years in him but the biggest job the new guy has is to keep modric
Winger: we have two decent winger but no cover or ability to rest these two. New guy also has to try to retain Bale
CF: we have one loanee and one who is old and very much past his best. So only two permanent players, out of which defoe turns 30 in October and therefore wont be solving his problems. Lots of work needed here

That leaves a lot of cash to be spent and looking at the spine of the team, we have an ancient keeper, we dont have a settled CB pairing nor pairing of 'owned' CFs. The new guy wont therefore be inheriting an established top class team and will have his work cut out

I've been saying this all along that our team is threadbare and that the squad has no depth for the future. We definitely should be looking at young , hungry up and coming players aged 18-23 that play like they have a point to prove. Not old players who although are professional have been there and done that.

 

[Armchair Expert]

The main problem today that resulted from our transfer policy was that we had 2 striker in Adebayor and Saha with no long term future at the club who played like they didn't care about the result either way.

At least when we signed Saha he was on a hot streak for Everton. fudging banging them in from all sorts of angles.

 

[braineclipse]

Adam B I am glad you mentioned Khumalo, FFS if he was the answer what was the question? We sign a player who at 24 is not good enough to make our first team squad, and still is not. It was so obvious he was not good enough and still not good enough.

And what about Dos Santos? Lets forget about the fact that I rate him as a player. The important thing is that Harry obviously does not rate him, so instead of selling him in January we rejected a bid for him but since the window has closed we have played him for just 15 minutes. We were not happy with the offer we got in January and in the summer, but by not playing him his value continues to depreciate. Am I missing something? Is there a justifiable reason for not selling him if we do not rate him.

Our transfer policy worries me

Levy has a pretty good history with his waiting games, we got good money for Palacios, ?ú4m for Hutton in the end, recouped all our money on Bent and so on. It's a calculated gamble, you think player x is worth ?ú7m now, but you're only being offered ?ú4m. Do you keep him, and pay him another half a million in wages for half a season as well as possibly risking him dropping in value, or do you sell him now for less than you think he's worth? If you get ?ú5-6m in the next window then the gamble paid off, if you end up keeping him two years and then getting ?ú1m it really didn't. These are not easy, or obvious decisions, but I think Levy is quite good at them.

 

[NaijaSpurs]

Clearly but its hard not to have some sympathy with the comments from Levy/harry etc that without CL football then you cant attract top class players but without top class players you cant really get CL football. We had 'ok' CFs (ie top 6-8 standard) but any CF in the ?ú20m - ?ú30m bracket wants CL football or ?ú100k per week or both

Yet Saudi Sportswashing Machine, a team that is now seriously challenging for a CL place got rid of a number of high earners and have strengthened by bringing in quality without breaking th ebank. Demba Ba ?ú0, Cabaye ?ú4.8M, Tiote ?ú3.5m, Hatem Ben Arfa ?ú2m and Cisse ?ú9m - 5 players for under ?ú20m

 

[ess]

I like how our season had to turn brick before this came up for discussion again, I was labelled an idiot for making a point of this in September or whatever. Our transfer policy PRE Harry got us where we are. Harry is slowly destroying our club, so enjoy it while it lasts.

 

[Armchair Expert]

To be fair to Harry, Nelsen was looking solid for Blackburn. In that 45 minutes he played during the 6 - 1 loss to Macclesfield in October he was only responsible for 4 of the goals. He put in some serious shifts for Blackburn reserves too.

It makes you wonder; 3rd in the prem and then start signing players that Blackburn and Everton are desperate to bomb out of the club at the first opportunity.

 

[NaijaSpurs]

Levy has a pretty good history with his waiting games, we got good money for Palacios, ?ú4m for Hutton in the end, recouped all our money on Bent and so on. It's a calculated gamble, you think player x is worth ?ú7m now, but you're only being offered ?ú4m. Do you keep him, and pay him another half a million in wages for half a season as well as possibly risking him dropping in value, or do you sell him now for less than you think he's worth? If you get ?ú5-6m in the next window then the gamble paid off, if you end up keeping him two years and then getting ?ú1m it really didn't. These are not easy, or obvious decisions, but I think Levy is quite good at them.

The problem with GIo is that he has been first choice for Mexico even when not playing for us, and he only wants to play in Spain so this time I am not sure Levy's waiting game will work.

I heard we also asked for too much money for Gomes, and now he will leave in the summer for nothing. I do not know if it is true but I have been lead to believe that Gio's contract expires in the summer too

 

[NaijaSpurs]

It makes you wonder; 3rd in the prem and then start signing players that Blackburn and Everton are desperate to bomb out of the club at the first opportunity.

And therein lies the rub

 

[NaijaSpurs]

I like how our season had to turn brick before this came up for discussion again, I was labelled an idiot for making a point of this in September or whatever. Our transfer policy PRE Harry got us where we are. Harry is slowly destroying our club, so enjoy it while it lasts.

I complained about policy in August, Sept, Jan and Feb - because the problem was obvious

 

[Richie]

Last summer was excellent for us. Quality goalkeeper, quality DM, very good striker for peanuts.

 

[indianspur]

Last summer was excellent for us. Quality goalkeeper, quality DM, very good striker for peanuts.

but over a long season you have to wonder about the stamina of elder players like Brad and Scotty, and about the commitment of on loan Adebayor

 

[NaijaSpurs]

Last summer was excellent for us. Quality goalkeeper, quality DM, very good striker for peanuts.

Two of those 3 players were signed after we lost our first 2 matches so that was slack. Ade is only on loan which meant our number 1 striker could not play in a very important match against City when we were in excellent form. Like I said management dropped the ball

 

[braineclipse]

Yet Saudi Sportswashing Machine, a team that is now seriously challenging for a CL place got rid of a number of high earners and have strengthened by bringing in quality without breaking th ebank. Demba Ba ?ú0, Cabaye ?ú4.8M, Tiote ?ú3.5m, Hatem Ben Arfa ?ú2m and Cisse ?ú9m - 5 players for under ?ú20m

No denying that Saudi Sportswashing Machine have done brilliantly in the transfer market. It's a strange one cause Harry had a reputation for going for those kinds of cheapish deals bringing in foreigners when he came to Spurs, but now he doesn't seem willing to go for those moves anymore.

The problem with GIo is that he has been first choice for Mexico even when not playing for us, and he only wants to play in Spain so this time I am not sure Levy's waiting game will work.

I heard we also asked for too much money for Gomes, and now he will leave in the summer for nothing. I do not know if it is true but I have been lead to believe that Gio's contract expires in the summer too

Not sure, but I suppose only time will tell. In these cases only Levy knows what kind of offers have actually been coming in, what Harry thinks about the value of players to the team and what the players say themselves about where they would like to move etc. Gen Levy's good business sense and good track record in the transfer market this is one area where I struggle to see how we can second guess individual decisions he makes.

If I'm not mistaken we have the option to extend Gomes' contract and will most likely do so, I think it's the same with Gio. Either way, he wasn't exactly a hot sales object at any point and his wages probably prohibited a sale to some of the smaller leagues like Holland from what I've seen in rumour mills.

 

[AdamB]

Yet Saudi Sportswashing Machine, a team that is now seriously challenging for a CL place got rid of a number of high earners and have strengthened by bringing in quality without breaking th ebank. Demba Ba ?ú0, Cabaye ?ú4.8M, Tiote ?ú3.5m, Hatem Ben Arfa ?ú2m and Cisse ?ú9m - 5 players for under ?ú20m

Agree thats what any manager with half a brain would look to sign. Harry prefers players who are 33+ and who've played in the PL. Forget any foreign fancy-dans with names which he cant spell. Its why I was bloody pleased when Capello went as it should hopefully means that Harry fudges off before the trasnfer window. This summer is massive for us

 

[ess]

I complained about policy in August, Sept, Jan and Feb - because the problem was obvious

The problem was obvious from the very first day of him in charge, but I honestly thought Levy would be able to keep Harry away from the transfer market. He hasn't, and it's going to cost us badly. Looking at our current squad, Harry has done fudge all to improve us in the long term, which makes him stupid or selfish or both. I will eat my fudging pillow if he had anything to do with Sandro joining us, I know more about the Brazilian league than Redknapp does. We're now gonna miss out on the CL spot and we're gonna lose Modric or Bale or both. That's the end of our little honeymoon, because there's noone coming through to save us because we haven't bought anyone in the last three years to do so.

 

[AdamB]

I like how our season had to turn brick before this came up for discussion again, I was labelled an idiot for making a point of this in September or whatever. Our transfer policy PRE Harry got us where we are. Harry is slowly destroying our club, so enjoy it while it lasts.

Been saying this for months. Our transfer policy over the last 12-18 months has just been building up problems for us

 

[braineclipse]

Agree thats what any manager with half a brain would look to sign. Harry prefers players who are 33+ and who've played in the PL. Forget any foreign fancy-dans with names which he cant spell. Its why I was bloody pleased when Capello went as it should hopefully means that Harry fudges off before the trasnfer window. This summer is massive for us

But it's so easy to sit here, now, pointing at the transfers that worked out saying that those are the signings that any manager with half a brain would look to sign. Mertesacker, Park, Ruiz and Savic for example have been far from big hits.

Saudi Sportswashing Machine were also in a completely different situation from us, almost no expectations, anything mid-table would be a good season. So they could gamble on some cheaper options, give them game time from the get go and see how it worked out.

 

[suffolkspur]

I would say that our transfer policy the past couple of seasons in my opinion has left alot to be desired. It certainly hasnt been that of a team that wants to consistently be pushing to secure a top 4 finish. Van der vaart was a pleasent signing quality wise but this wasnt planned. It is like have had no idea where we want to go. Every signing we make we seem to be pushed into due to our own inaction or lack of a plan. When we did act in the summer a couple of important signings were to late in the window for the start of the season and we still lacked in a couple of areas. Are we (the club) happy to be just in the top 6 with a brief flirtation though not necessarily securing a spot in the top 4 and also risking being overtaken by those clubs looking to push on below us. Or do we really want to be in the top 4 regularly and look to push on and aim for the top of the table.

We have been in positions a couple of times both this season and last where January was such an important transfer window. We have failed on both occasions (especially this year) to sufficently strengthen. I truly believe this January we came out with a weaker squad than we went in and for a team who were sitting 3rd in the league still with a chance of challenging for the title (however unlikely that may have been) that is laughable.

Maybe we just dont have the money there. I dont know.

 

[NaijaSpurs]

I will eat my fudging pillow if he had anything to do with Sandro joining us, I know more about the Brazilian league than Redknapp does.

When he actually signed Harry admitted to have never seen him play. He was scouted and then Levy gave the final say so, totally had nothing to do with Harry

Just seen Ben Arfa's goal - not bad for ?ú2m