Bruno Fernandes | Signed

[Bestietom]

Don't you have to knock something down first in order to start rebuilding it?

They are doing a hell of a job doing that.

 

[roonster09]

So you think Simon Stones tier 1 & reliable made the mistake but not the Portuguese article? What about you gave me the link. So we can both see it or you are the one who misread it.

In the above post I have posted article.

I didn't say Portuguese media don't make mistakes or Simon Stone is making mistake (all the time), Simon Stone reports what club tells him. Obviously they will tell him higher fee to save their face in case we dont sign the player.

On the other hand Portuguese media are consistent with their numbers, 70 million which is 60+10 is what Sporting president wants.

 

[peridigm]

A bid to look at him

That sounds creepy.

 

[devilish]

During he's later years it was not a very good situation. The World Class talent was on the decline and the buys were more in the Valencia, Young, old Owen, Obertan type while the Hazards of the World were "not good value". But i agree the squad was vastly superior anyway.

We've spend 70mil net on the first year of a "major rebuild" while letting go of a lot of players. It's inexcusable, i don't care who the manager is. Maybe we'll pull through the Bruno deal and it's going to be slightly better, but it should have been done in the summer anyway. A mid with 5-6 goals and 5-6 assists and a back up striker would have put us top 4 now imo.

Sir Alex probably didn't rock the boat cause he could win with that squad and he wanted to leave the money to his successor. However as said the team Sir Alex had was competitive. This is the weakest United side we had since before Atkinson

 

[devilish]

Where are the lies? He quite clearly said they’re looking to get one or two things done in this window.

The money is there bla bla bla

 

[theklr]

Don't you have to knock something down first in order to start rebuilding it?

Yeah, but usually you have already bought or ordered the materials to build it again.

 

[harms]

I'm hearing that we're interested in him. Is he any good?

I'm bored.

 

[Offside]

Yeah, but usually you have already bought or ordered the materials to build it again.

Sometimes you may just leave it as a wasteland, conduct surveys and then get planning permission. Maybe that's what all these negotiations symbolize.

 

[UNITED ACADEMY]

In the above post I have posted article.

I didn't say Portuguese media don't make mistakes or Simon Stone is making mistake, Simon Stone reports what club tells him. Obviously they will tell him higher fee to save their face in case we dont sign the player.

On the other hand Portuguese media are consistent with their numbers, 70 million which is 60+10 is what Sporting president wants.

Sport witness ”uk”. And you didn’t think they don’t make as per usual mistake of euro & pounds? Tier 1 vs Tier 5, surely you know which one is more believable. They wanted 80m euro. Our offer is still 20m-25m euro away but doesn’t mean they won’t accept it.

 

[Le Red]

Don't you have to knock something down first in order to start rebuilding it?

No. You don't need to sell every piece of deadwood to then start buying quality replacements.

 

[ReddBalls]

Yeah, but usually you have already bought or ordered the materials to build it again.

Problem is, the guys who put up the now demolished building went overboard and spent their entire budget on materials of the wrong quality, so it has to be sold as scrap materials before there are any money to spend on the new construction.

 

[JPRouve]

No. You don't need to sell every piece of deadwood to then start buying quality replacements.

It depends entirely on your discretionary incomes. You could very well have to sell most of your deadwood in order to buy quality replacements.

 

[roonster09]

Sport witness ”uk”. And you didn’t think they don’t make as per usual mistake of euro & pounds? Tier 1 vs Tier 5, surely you know which one is more believable. They wanted 80m euro. Our offer is still 20m-25m euro away but doesn’t mean they won’t accept it.

Tier 1, Tier 5

At least read the article and Sportwitness are not the site who reports news, they translate foreign papers to English. How can they be tier 5, that stupid tier was designed by reddit troll who pretended as ITK spouting bs every day.

And no, they don't make Euro and pound mistakes, that's the special skill of English journalists.

 

[Judas]

How have we got to transfer window in 2020 and people still questioning Sportwitness and not understanding them

 

[Lash]

Sport witness ”uk”. And you didn’t think they don’t make as per usual mistake of euro & pounds? Tier 1 vs Tier 5, surely you know which one is more believable. They wanted 80m euro. Our offer is still 20m-25m euro away but doesn’t mean they won’t accept it.

Why are you quoting tiers? SW is just aggregating multiple sources and stories to try and find the truth. What Stone says isn't gospel, it just means if he says it's done, the club have allowed him to get that information.

 

[BluesJr]

This whole ‘tier’ thing is so tedious. The tier 1 sources are often just briefed directly from the club, that actually makes me unreliable in my eyes. What we hear from Simon Stone etc during a negotiation is unlikely to be accurate but just club spin. When he confirms a transfer is close, then it’s obviously very reliable.

 

[ISMAIL-007]

Okey, lets look on the positives of not signing this guy,off the top of my head, we'll finally have gotten our negotiation tactics right ( though very debatable) and we refuse to be taken to cleaners.
The letter point is quite vital given our transfer history.

 

[roonster09]

Why are you quoting tiers? SW is just aggregating multiple sources and stories to try and find the truth. What Stone says isn't gospel, it just means if he says it's done, the club have allowed him to get that information.

Exactly. He just says what the club wants him to say. He reports when the deal is completely done as that's when club informs these reporters.

 

[BluesJr]

How have we got to transfer window in 2020 and people still questioning Sportwitness and not understanding them

People are incredibly thick.

 

[Lash]

This whole ‘tier’ thing is so tedious. The tier 1 sources are often just briefed directly from the club, that actually makes me unreliable in my eyes. What we hear from Simon Stone etc during a negotiation is unlikely to be accurate but just club spin. When he confirms a transfer is close, then it’s obviously very reliable.

Exactly.

What's probably most likely is that we quote an inflated price, so when we end up agreeing the fee originally asked by Sporting, it looks like we've negotiated them down.

 

[roonster09]

How have we got to transfer window in 2020 and people still questioning Sportwitness and not understanding them

It won't change. Maybe someone should open thread and explain what Sportwitness is.

People think they report all the news when they are just translators but instead of acting like robots they put effort to clear out bs.

 

[roonster09]

Exactly.

What's probably most likely is that we quote an inflated price, so when we end up agreeing the fee originally asked by Sporting, it looks like we've negotiated them down.

Exactly. And if we don't sign then people use BBC site and tell how Sporting are cnuts for asking huge price.

 

[Judas]

The Reddit generation.

 

[Lash]

Exactly. And if we don't sign then people use BBC site and tell how Sporting are cnuts for asking huge price.

I'm surprised people don't see how transparent it is!

 

[Classical Mechanic]

This whole ‘tier’ thing is so tedious. The tier 1 sources are often just briefed directly from the club, that actually makes me unreliable in my eyes. What we hear from Simon Stone etc during a negotiation is unlikely to be accurate but just club spin. When he confirms a transfer is close, then it’s obviously very reliable.

This is a tier 4 post for me.

 

[BluesJr]

This is a tier 4 post for me.

Tier 5 response.

 

[Classical Mechanic]

Tier 5 response.

I think we need to create a 6th tier for this response.

 

[BluesJr]

I think we need to create a 6th tier for this response.

This post belongs underground. Anyway, tier concept is shite.

 

[Sassy Colin]

It is PR stuff from the media, there is clear pattern too. There are few journalist who report story almost word by word, which is when you know it's the club briefing. Obviously when the club does that, they want to spin everything in their favor. Sportwitness did good work in collecting lot of info and put everything in single article.

Spoiler: Article

Manchester United were not interested in Bruno Fernandes in the summer. It’s what the club routinely told their closest media, leading to repeated sneering at claims of interest coming from Portugal.


Having had a scout at pretty much every Sporting fixture for the second half of last season, and therefore having seen the midfielder break all kinds of records, the Red Devils weren’t bothered.

Indeed, there was thought to be anger at Old Trafford that the club was even being linked, and then later on the message was sent out that Bruno’s passing statistics weren’t up to scratch.

Fast forward to Thursday January 9th, and there were claims from Portugal that Manchester United interest (which they never believed didn’t exist) had been reignited.

Ole Gunnar Solskjaer was presented as reevaluating the player ahead of a potential January swoop. There was, however, a problem presented. Sporting have long been looking for a €70m headline figure for their star and United were ‘reluctant’ to match that.

On Friday January 10th, it was reported in Portugal that Solskjaer and Mike Phelan had recently travelled to a Sporting match to watch Bruno in person. The BBC’s Simon Stone was informed about the report prior to the manager’s press conference that day, and asked about it.

Solskjaer was vague, although he didn’t deny it. The Manchester Evening News later reported: ‘United sources are guarded about the renewed speculation and noted the ‘noise is being driven out of Portugal”

That evening, claims came from Portugal of Frederico Varandas, Sporting’s president, travelling to London for talks about the move. Everything inevitably got carried away and the transfer was presented as closer than it was, by sections of both the Portuguese and English media.

But there was interest and talks, clearly. This time it was too difficult to present the whole thing as a figment of Portuguese imagination. Whilst the sniping towards the country’s media continued, by many who then spent much of the coming days covering it, it had to be tempered.

Claims were flying around, and, as ever, Portuguese newspapers were reported as saying things they hadn’t. This wasn’t just restricted to social media, but also from websites and newspapers, one of which is named above.

For complete clarity, the Portuguese media aren’t completely blameless in the hype, they’ve played a big part, although not as big a part as some would insist.

Then on the evening of Thursday 16th, TVI24, who had been the first to break Varandas’ trip to London, reported the transfer was at risk.

Sporting were said to be demanding €65m guaranteed, with Manchester United not wanting to go above €50m.

The Red Devils were reportedly putting on the table a big amount in bonuses, which could make the deal reach up to €70m or €80m. However, they were too hard to achieve.

That was the first time the €80m figure was pushed, and it was clearly from the perspective of the English club, who were said to be trying to have a low base price and lots more based on fanciful additions.

Rui Pedro Braz was the journalist pushing the story, and whilst he didn’t know the exact clauses, he believed the bonuses could refer to Premier League and Champions League titles, besides Bruno winning the Ballon d’Or.

The €15m difference, between €50m and €65m, is what Braz said was holding the deal up. There was no point offering Sporting bonuses they knew would be very hard to trigger.

Given the frenzy that had built up, TVI24’s claims got a bad reaction, how could they believe the transfer was at risk when others said it was imminent? Their claims were later backed up elsewhere, both by the Portuguese and English media.

Friday 17th was the big derby day. Sporting were believed to be doing anything to keep their player for the Benfica match, and then it was assumed he’d say goodbye. Sky Sports sent someone to Lisbon, who gave the impression the deal was pretty much done. There was talk of a potential flight after the match, and even claims a Sporting official had said it was agreed.

It was nonsense, Sky weren’t going to send someone to Lisbon to then reply they didn’t have a clue what was happening.

As the match was approaching, BBC 5 Live put out a segment on the situation. Darren Fletcher said Tottenham had made a £45m offer in the summer, and that Spurs walked away when that was rejected because they didn’t feel Bruno was worth any more.

Fletcher then said he’d been led to believe Sporting want €80m, a figure he later put as £80m, ‘about €35m more than Spurs offered‘. He said ‘it begs the question how he’s upped his value by €35m’ in the time since then.

He hasn’t, obviously, and that wasn’t even being suggested in Portugal. Tottenham’s offer, which was actually €45m (plus fanciful bonuses), was rejected.

This was the first of a series of leaks, or a briefing.

Saturday saw almost all the journalists who usually have Manchester United briefings go with the line that Sporting had drastically upped their valuation. It was all the Lisbon club’s fault, they were being unreasonable, and it was clear Tottenham’s summer offer had been a big part of the message sent out.

Enthusiastically, people went to work fighting this corner for the negotiating team at Old Trafford.

The BBC said ‘Sporting Lisbon are asking for nearly double what Tottenham rated the Portugal midfielder last summer’.

The Manchester Evening News said United are ‘baffled by Sporting Lisbon’s sudden change in demand for Bruno Fernandes’.

The Guardian reported ‘Manchester United have baulked at Sporting Lisbon’s £68m valuation of Bruno Fernandes, with their valuation of the midfielder closer to £38m plus add-ons’.

That made it sound very much like Bruno’s club were asking for €80m flat.

It’s even been suggested that Tottenham were offered the player for €45m, which is frankly nonsense.

How do we know this? Because Sporting’s president mocked it publicly. There’s the possibility he made it all up, but it’s surely not a high one. In September, Frederico Varandas said: “The only serious proposal, which was still only verbal, was a €45m bid from Tottenham for Bruno Fernandes, plus €20m in goals.

“Twenty million in goals which were about Tottenham becoming the Premier League winners, which they never were, and winning the Champions League, which has also never happened. So I found these goals extremely imposs…. difficult to accomplish. And I understood not to sell Bruno Fernandes.”

Despite all of that, and despite it being made clear in Portugal for a long time that a headline figure of €70m including reasonable bonuses would be acceptable, with a request for €80m (especially as a flat fee) not thought to be the case, the United brief was parroted without question.

Is there not the suspicion that these briefings… may not be true? And if so, which surely has to be the case, does the responsibility not to parrot them then weigh enough?

The targeted leaks work, with a section of Manchester United fans now believing Sporting hiked their price up massively (almost doubled it according to some) and therefore their club can’t be held to ransom.

They believe it, they believe United are having a gun held to their head and that giving in to unreasonable demands would be the worst step they could now take.

Major and respected sections of the English media turn into an extension of Manchester United’s PR arm. Some United fans, choosing to believe their club has been wronged, then jump to their defence, without realising that’s the entire point.

You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you can’t fool all the people all the time.

Taking a step back, it makes little sense for Sporting to put the message out there, and spend months doing so, that they want less than they actually do.

Some of the willingness to sneer at the Portuguese press, from people who have never opened a Portuguese newspaper in their life, has a worrying slant to it. Same as the attitude towards Sporting, who aren’t quite in the financial emergency they’re being presented as.

It doesn’t take too much critical thinking to believe Manchester United are getting a PR stance out. The briefing is so transparent, and has been covered so dutifully, that it may as well have been published on the club’s website.

Sporting will have been doing similar when hyping their player, although it doesn’t appear they’ve done it to the same extent.

Should the transfer fail, then Ed Woodward and his negotiating team can blame Sporting’s unrealistic requests, and should they manage to get Bruno Fernandes for €60-70m then that can be presented as a win, given the message sent out this weekend regarding the asking price.

It’s all a game, but some people shouldn’t be so willing to help Manchester United play it.

http://sportwitness.co.uk/bruno-fernandes-man-united-look-saga-willingness-parrot-club-pr/

Amazing how so much nonsense was repeated as facts.

Btw Simon Stone is part of PR team too, not directly. He gets the news from Woodward and he writes favorable articles or defends him on twitter. It's all good business.

This is fascinating stuff, but we still don't know if/when we are going to sign him and for how much!

 

[Sassy Colin]

I think we need to create a 6th tier for this response.

7th tier post

 

[UNITED ACADEMY]

Tier 1, Tier 5

At least read the article and Sportwitness are not the site who reports news, they translate foreign papers to English. How can they be tier 5, that stupid tier was designed by reddit troll who pretended as ITK spouting bs every day.

And no, they don't make Euro and pound mistakes, that's the special skill of English journalists.

And what makes you think the foreign papers aren’t not wrong when Simon stones himself got the information from the club? It’s not rocket science. The tier is about how reliable the media is which you should know Simon Stones is tier 1 while the other one is below.

 

[roonster09]

And what makes you think the foreign papers aren’t not wrong when Simon stones himself got the information from the club?

That's why.

 

[EireRed_GS]

Yawn... At this stage, this just feels like a complete rinse repeat of the summer fiasco regading Bruno.. Im at the stage now where i'm just bored of the whole thing and want the window to be closed.

Only difference this time round is, if the club walk away they cant pretend they weren't interested all long like last time. They will have to play it like they were being mugged off and knew better. It seems theyve put more efforts into hiring PR and journos to make them look good incase they mess this window up.

How they dont have other options on the go is beyond me.

 

[UNITED ACADEMY]

That's why.

And the unknown foreign article got the information from?

 

[fps]

What do you mean?

He’s referring to Lingard, that’s his goal for the year done.

 

[Ventura]

I'm hearing that we're interested in him. Is he any good?

I'm bored.

We're sending scouts to watch him in the next game to find out.

 

[UNITED ACADEMY]

Why are you quoting tiers? SW is just aggregating multiple sources and stories to try and find the truth. What Stone says isn't gospel, it just means if he says it's done, the club have allowed him to get that information.

To measure the reliability of the source. If an information directly from the club is not reliable then what is the reliable one?

 

[Bestietom]

Yawn... At this stage, this just feels like a complete rinse repeat of the summer fiasco regading Bruno.. Im at the stage now where i'm just bored of the whole thing and want the window to be closed.

Only difference this time round is, if the club walk away they cant pretend they weren't interested all long like last time. They will have to play it like they were being mugged off and knew better. It seems theyve put more efforts into hiring PR and journos to make them look good incase they mess this window up.

How they dont have other options on the go is beyond me.

Pretend, pretend, is all we seem to do now, mate. We will take until Friday to sign Fernandes and then we will tell fans we were in for Messi, Neymar, and half the French national team, but were too late.

 

[roonster09]

And the unknown foreign article got the information from?

Club, agents and other people. This isn't even something that happened for the first time, everytime we feck up a deal, we brief the journalists favoring club side.

This is exactly what happened, face saving exercise. Worst part is everyone knows this and don't fall for this gimmick anymore.

 

[BluesJr]

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