Listening to the everton fans this kid is very thick and doesn't sound like an improvement on any of them.
This seems to me to be classic Levy, hoping to get a precocious talent on the cheap as he has one year left and see if Poch can work his magic, which will then allow Levy to accept a mega bid for Eriksen or Dele next summer.
thick
θɪk/
adjective
4.
informal
of low intelligence; stupid.
"he's a bit thick"
precocious
prɪˈkəʊʃəs/
adjective
- (of a child) having developed certain abilities or inclinations at an earlier age than is usual or expected.
"a precocious, solitary boy"
synonyms: advanced, old beyond one's years, forward, ahead of one's peers, mature, prematurely developed, ahead, gifted, talented, clever, intelligent, quick;
talent
ˈtalənt/
noun
- 1.
natural aptitude or skill.
"he possesses more talent than any other player"
synonyms: flair, aptitude, facility, gift, knack, technique, touch, bent, ability, expertise, capacity, power, faculty;
Maybe seeing an opportunity to acquire such a "precocious talent" "on the cheap" is not such bad vision? Maybe Barkley is what Poch wants. Many people have called Walker stupid. Yet with the right coaching his game improved enormously, such that he is being spoken of as the best RB in the country (and yes, has been sold for a record fee). Maybe Poch
can work magic on "thick" Barkley. Maybe it will be Barkley being sold on for a world record fee after a season or two under Poch's tutelage. Who knows. (Well, that might be stretching things...).
I don't understand why we are pursuing this deal when we already have Dele, Eriksen, Son and Lamela competing for two positions.
Very sad but signing this guy is just a prelude to selling Dele or Eriksen for massive money.
Statement of the obvious : there are a lot of games between August and end of the season. Lamela is still injured and out until October. Dele will miss our first 4 CL games. Son has a broken arm (although hopefully there's enough healing time for him to play in a light cast). Eriksen has played pretty much non-stop for the past two seasons, which is unlikely to be sustainable.
There's been plenty of noise about lack of decent options off the bench. There's been plenty of noise about us taking the domestic cups seriously from the beginning and winning one of them. Squad depth is needed to meet both of those scenarios. So Levy going after that, presumably a player identified by Poch, is a bad thing? There are opinions on this board reaching to both ends of the spectrum as to Barkley's potential, so we have to assume that, if he is a target, our management veers towards the positive end of that scale. Trust in Poch and all that.
There is no doubt that IF Dele or Eriksen ever leave (and I think it's generally accepted that both are likely to at some point) then Levy will extract the best possible fee for them. Huge for Eriksen. Mega-huge in respect of Dele. And IF that does happen, then it's far better to have understudies in place in advance (cf. Trippier). That doesn't mean in buying one player that we are actively planning to sell off our best (and in Dele's case, very highly marketable) players in return.
