Finney Is Back
Andy Thompson
Selling Hart doesn’t really solve any problems. I’d keep him as third choice and try to bring in proper competition/successor to Lloris (Pope or Maignan.... As a wildcard Dinamo’s keeper also looked very capable and I think he has recently broke into his national team?).We don't need a rebuild. We neededa rebuild 2 years + ago but we've done a lot of the work post CL final, don't let the wrong manager being in charge distract from that.
What i will say regarding the squad is that there is definitely some fat that needs trimming and there's several players that can be moved on where we already have capable options available.
Sessegnon > Davies
Skipp > Sissoko
Tanganga > Dier
Rodon > Sanchez
That's four young players already on our books which can be used as cover without there being any obvious drop in quality - you could possibly even include the Portuguese RB that we have seen a couple of times in the EL, Lavenier bring him in, sell Doherty & Aurier and buy Aarons.
Lloris/New Gk
Aarons/Lavenier
Regulion/Sessegnon
Alderweireld/Tanganga
New CB/Rodon
Hojbjerg/Skipp
Ndombele/New CM
GLC/New AM
Son/Bergwijn
Kane/Vinicius
Sell : Hart, Davies, Aurier, Doherty, Sanchez, Dier, Winks, Sissoko, Dele, Lamela, Moura, Bale, Foyth
13 players out, 5 players in and a leaner younger squad ready to be moulded by a modern manager free of the old squad players who seemingly are stinking the place out
I don’t think we can afford to be spending £35m on Arrons. The time to buy him was 2 years ago. We’ve missed that boat. Hysaj is on a free from Napoli and would be a great option for zero transfer outlay. Bogle is the smart buy for a young, English player just as Matty Cash was a year ago, I expect a forward thinking club like Leicester, Villa or Leeds will buy him. In theory we could get both Hysaj and Bogle, sell Aurier and Doherty and make funds overall. Problem is that Levy will probably not want to make a paper loss on Doherty which means we'll be stuck with him.
I think we need to buy 2 CBs unless Rodin is better than I expect (I’m figuring he must be pretty poor to not get a look in?). If we only buy one CB then I’d keep Sanchez who at least has something to work with.
Your squad list there has some VERY raw options.... Lavenier, Tanganga, Rodon all have had very little PL football. All would probably benefit far more from good loan spells. I’m not sure how you can even list Lavenier as there really is zero evidence to judge him on?
I’d certainly sell Davies, Doherty, Dier and Winks and let Bale return to Madrid unless they want to pay another £100k a week of his wages next year. Especially as all of these players would be likely to bring in at least some funds.
Others I think we have to be more careful with.... I see no point selling Moura, he is more than good enough as a squad option.
With Lamela it depends on the fee, we need bodies and while his injury record is appalling I don’t have much confidence in Levy going out and getting lots of players so we’ll need to keep some squad options around.
Sissoko can go as long as we do bring in at least 2 more midfielders (again, not sure I have confidence in the chairman to do it so he might need to stay considering there would be no transfer fee.
Dele depends on the new manager, if we have a forward thinking, front foot football manager then I think Dele will have a big part to play. I think he is a better player than Lo Celso as well as being far less injury prone.
Vinicius depends on the fee. He has looked alright against 3rd rate opponents, but not trusted against second rate opponents. Marega is on a free from Porto. Him for nothing or Vinicius for £25m+ and Vinicius looks poor value.
We also have to address the elephant in the room of Son. Two years left on his contract now.... He’d be mad to stay. We might have to sell him this summer to the highest bidder unfortunately (will be same situation for Kane in a years time.
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