Re: Tim Sherwood - Head Coach
Yeah...we could have got Moutinho had we not dingdonged around. That much is pretty obvious.
Hulk according to Castles was willing to take a wage cut to join us.
But these are just the ones we know about, I'm pretty sure that AVB's philosophy was to want a few top class 'game winners' rather than a bloated squad that he would need to rotate and keep happy. In the end that committee meant he couldn't function to his potential, meaning we either screwed up in backing him or we screwed up in hiring him in the first place.
But I just think saying 'anyone should have known how Levy works', knowing that how he works is searching for 'deals' rather than backing the manager with who he really wants isn't really useful. Just because that's 'how he works' it doesn't mean it will ever lead to us achieving the objectives he seems to have.
WE didn't dingdong around. We had a deal on the table with Porto that was supposedly acceptable to both parties, but a third party owner came in from nowhere at the last minute and put his demands on the table. Moutinho probably could have pushed through the deal if he'd have demanded to join Spurs, but the moment he boarded the team plane with Porto to fly out for their game, he pretty much gave the "i'm meh about the whole situation and fine if I stay at Porto" message and we were in a losing situation with time running out. At that point Levy saw himself and the club being held to ransom for a player that wasn't that interested with little time to negotiate a deal and rightly in my opinion pulled the plug.
In the next summer window Moutinho got a double-your-money offer from Monaco. It was a complex and expensive deal for us to pull off, negotiating with a player that wasn't that bothered about coming, with a club that drives a hard price and is financially well off and complex third party ownership issues. Its interesting to note that after the deal collapsed, Porto spent the next year buying out Moutinho's third party owners, presumably smoothing the way for their big pay-day to go through without any hitches this time in the summer.
Hulk - forget what Castles says, Hulk might have taken a pay-cut, but I'm pretty sure he'd have had to be in the highest earners bracket along with Ade. Not to mention Zenit would have wanted a ridiculous transfer fee, probably well in excess of what we paid for Lamela, our current record signing. Chelsea have been linked with Hulk but haven't been willing to meet their asking price. That should tell you all you need to know. The over all package for Hulk would have blown what we did for Soldado and Lamela out the water, in terms of wages over the life of his contract and transfer fee, you'd probably be looking at a close to £500-600m deal! No chance!
Willian - the club did everything they could to get him. He stalled us and got his club president to badger Abramovich into doing the deal. Moutinho is willing to do deals to prevent rivals from strengthening so it suited them all round. Nothing we could have done, he was never coming to us, no matter how close it might have seemed to get.
Villa - Atletico were always in the driving seat with this. We did all we could again, but they were a better proposition for him on all counts and that's been proven by their season challenging Barca & Real's dominance, compared to ours. Again, he was just never coming.
Coentrao - Again, he just wasn't interested.
The reality is for us, until we get the stadium, the revenues and naming right deals and push our annual turnover closer to the £200m a year bracket and beyond, we are shopping in the young up and coming players from South America/Eastern Europe/smaller English clubs/Dutch league etc bracket.
We're doing deals for your Vertonghens, Modrics, Bales, Chadlis. The occasional punt on your Soldados/Berbatovs/Pavs/VDV if they're available on a cheap deal if their club is in financial difficulty or there are question marks over the player. Very occasionally the situation might allow us to sign a Lloris if no top CL club is looking for a new goalkeeper at the time. Also occasionally, a deal might present itself for an older player that can add some quality and experience, like a Davids/Naybet/Gallas.
Lamela was our real punt with the Bale cash, but probably taken in the knowledge there would be plenty of big Italian clubs willing to take him back on a money-back offer due to his age and potential.
We just aren't in a position to realistically afford the players AVB or Ramos wanted. As I said, Redknapp was able to work with our transfer committee (minus a director of football).
It's like starting a new job and going to your new boss "this is the working conditions you're going to give me, I'm incapable of performing or working well unless these demands are met, if you don't give me what I want, i'm going to throw a big paddy and not do my job properly."
