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Paul Mitchell

milo said:
Like I said, I suspect that he was the best or only available player to fill an identified gap in the squad and we might have thought that we could get more out of him. Our transfer policy is based around finding rough diamonds and polishing them. They cannot all pay off.
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A 27 year old with 3 EPL seasons under his belt isn't a potential rough diamond. That's a mid-table journeyman.
 
scaramanga said:
I'd be very concerned if we sent professional scouts to watch Sissoko and they saw anything they could even begin to work with.

I can imagine the kind of player they were looking for when they went to see him, but he simply has too much inertia and not nearly enough skill to be that kind of player. He may be fast in a straight line once he's going, but he can't turn and takes forever to get started. That's ignoring the very obvious technical flaws in his game. He's far to old for us to change his game or to teach him how to play football.

Bentaleb is a punt that didn't come off, Janssen is a punt that didn't come off (yet), Sissoko is just very clearly poor judgement. What concerns me is just how obvious a poor choice he was before the purchase.
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I agree with you on the weaknesses in his game. I think that the most likely reason for signing him is that we wanted a more direct player, I don't know who else we considered or how much of a priority we thought it was. It does look like we still think it is a gap in the squad though, hence the signing of Moura (I can't say that I have ever watched him that closely but I have heard plenty of people say that he can also be prone to playing with his head down and running into blind alleys).
 
Gutter Boy said:
A 27 year old with 3 EPL seasons under his belt isn't a potential rough diamond. That's a mid-table journeyman.
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Our model is based on finding value in the market and we do not have a record of signing mid-table journeymen. I assume that the terms of the deal were more favourable than reported and we thought that he offered something different and would be useful squad filler for a couple of seasons before being moved on at a profit or break even. Given inflation in fees since he signed, that could turn out to be the case.
 
If you want to look at expensive failures signings Emirates Marketing Project are your example not to follow, they just have 500m to spend for every 500m of failures.

Chelsea this summer, what a shower they bought.

I think generally as an overall club we have a decent record in the transfer market, I won't attribute it to anyone individually as I think like anything its a collective job, but if you want to even look at the buy low sell high method we have employed we are untouched
 
Grays_1890 said:
If you want to look at expensive failures signings Emirates Marketing Project are your example not to follow, they just have 500m to spend for every 500m of failures.

Chelsea this summer, what a shower they bought.

I think generally as an overall club we have a decent record in the transfer market, I won't attribute it to anyone individually as I think like anything its a collective job, but if you want to even look at the buy low sell high method we have employed we are untouched
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Definitely. It's the buy high method we generally fall on our arses.

Our top 10 record signings lists was generally 9 flops (Soldado, Paulinho, Sissoko, Janssen, Bent, Bentley, Rebrov etc) + Modric. The likes of Sanchez, Moura and Aurier have now entered the list, so hopefully they will buck the trend
 
Gutter Boy said:
Definitely. It's the buy high method we generally fall on our arses.

Our top 10 record signings lists was generally 9 flops (Soldado, Paulinho, Sissoko, Janssen, Bent, Bentley, Rebrov etc) + Modric. The likes of Sanchez, Moura and Aurier have now entered the list, so hopefully they will buck the trend
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You are being a little selective there, GB. These are a top 20 record signings

Davinson Sánchez - 40,00 Mill. €
Moussa Sissoko - 35,00 Mill. €
Roberto Soldado - 30,00 Mill. €
Érik Lamela - 30,00 Mill. €
Heung-Min Son - 30,00 Mill. €
Lucas Moura - 28,40 Mill. €
Serge Aurier - 25,00 Mill. €
Darren Bent - 24,75 Mill. €
Vincent Janssen - 22,10 Mill. €
David Bentley - 22,00 Mill. €
Luka Modric - 21,00 Mill. €
Paulinho - 19,73 Mill. €
Mousa Dembélé - 19,00 Mill. €
Sergiy Rebrov - 18,00 Mill. €
Roman Pavlyuchenko - 17,40 Mill. €
Robbie Keane - 16,70 Mill. €
Jermain Defoe - 16,40 Mill. €
Toby Alderweireld - 16,00 Mill. €
Dimitar Berbatov - 15,70 Mill. €
Fernando Llorente - 15,10 Mill. €
 
Roberto Soldado - 30,00 Mill. €
Érik Lamela - 30,00 Mill. €
Darren Bent - 24,75 Mill. €
David Bentley - 22,00 Mill. €
Luka Modric - 21,00 Mill. €
Paulinho - 19,73 Mill. €
Mousa Dembélé - 19,00 Mill. €
Sergiy Rebrov - 18,00 Mill. €
Roman Pavlyuchenko - 17,40 Mill. €
Robbie Keane - 16,70 Mill. €

This was the list in c.2014 though - where Modric was the only success out of 10. That was before Lamela and Dembele had big renaissances under Poch
 
milo said:
You are being a little selective there, GB. These are a top 20 record signings

Davinson Sánchez - 40,00 Mill. €
Moussa Sissoko - 35,00 Mill. €
Roberto Soldado - 30,00 Mill. €
Érik Lamela - 30,00 Mill. €
Heung-Min Son - 30,00 Mill. €
Lucas Moura - 28,40 Mill. €
Serge Aurier - 25,00 Mill. €
Darren Bent - 24,75 Mill. €
Vincent Janssen - 22,10 Mill. €
David Bentley - 22,00 Mill. €
Luka Modric - 21,00 Mill. €
Paulinho - 19,73 Mill. €
Mousa Dembélé - 19,00 Mill. €
Sergiy Rebrov - 18,00 Mill. €
Roman Pavlyuchenko - 17,40 Mill. €
Robbie Keane - 16,70 Mill. €
Jermain Defoe - 16,40 Mill. €
Toby Alderweireld - 16,00 Mill. €
Dimitar Berbatov - 15,70 Mill. €
Fernando Llorente - 15,10 Mill. €
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I'd argue there is only 1 definite dud on that list, Bentley, the rest either made valuable contributions, moved on for a profit or its still too early to judge
 
Gutter Boy said:
This was the list in c.2014 though - where Modric was the only success out of 10. That was before Lamela and Dembele had big renaissances under Poch
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Going back four years and excluding anyone that went on the be good, seems a rather selective way of looking at it. Any clubs' list is going to look bad, if you only count the duds.
 
milo said:
Going back four years and excluding anyone that went on the be good, seems a rather selective way of looking at it. Any clubs' list is going to look bad, if you only count the duds.
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But it was a big article/discussion point at that moment in time. Here are Spurs' 10 biggest signings and 9 of them were crap.
 
Gutter Boy said:
But it was a big article/discussion point at that moment in time. Here are Spurs' 10 biggest signings and 9 of them were crap.
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It seems unrelated to the point that you were making earlier and four years ago pre-dates Mitchell's time with us.
 
milo said:
You are being a little selective there, GB. These are a top 20 record signings

- undecided - Davinson Sánchez - 40,00 Mill. €
- total flop - Moussa Sissoko - 35,00 Mill. €
- failure - Roberto Soldado - 30,00 Mill. €
- ok plus - Érik Lamela - 30,00 Mill. €
- great - Heung-Min Son - 30,00 Mill. €
- undecided - Lucas Moura - 28,40 Mill. €
- undecided - Serge Aurier - 25,00 Mill. €
- flop - Darren Bent - 24,75 Mill. €
- undecided - possible flop - Vincent Janssen - 22,10 Mill. €
- total flop - David Bentley - 22,00 Mill. €
- great - Luka Modric - 21,00 Mill. €
- flop - Paulinho - 19,73 Mill. €
- good - Mousa Dembélé - 19,00 Mill. €
- total flop - Sergiy Rebrov - 18,00 Mill. €
- ok minus - Roman Pavlyuchenko - 17,40 Mill. €
- flop second time - Robbie Keane - 16,70 Mill. €
- ok -Jermain Defoe - 16,40 Mill. €
- great - Toby Alderweireld - 16,00 Mill. €
- great - Dimitar Berbatov - 15,70 Mill. €
- floppish to ok - Fernando Llorente - 15,10 Mill. €
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5 great
4(3) undecided
3 OK
8(9) flops

Bentley, Sissoko, Rebrov stand out as total flops.
Modric, Alderweireld, Son stand out as great signings.
 
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Sissoko has been on our radar since his Toulouse days. I remember us being heavily linked with him and Capoue when they burst on the scene back then.
 
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