Dodging a Bullet thread

Robertd0803

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I'm sure this was just us thinking we could get him for £10-15 million like Dan James and Newcastle said they wanted £50 million.


On this topic, Ron Vlaar and Bruno Martins-Indi when LVG joined (although I'm not sure we fared much better with Rojo).
I think we were linked with the entire Dutch team when LvG arrived.

Jose Fonte was another one.
 

Robertd0803

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Weren’t we heavily linked to thomas vermahlen at one point.

that guy makes Phil Jones injury record look decent.
Yeah, early LvG days again. Think Van Gaal was intent on a left footed central defender but Wenger wouldnt allow it if I recall.
 

foolsgold

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I'm sure this was just us thinking we could get him for £10-15 million like Dan James and Newcastle said they wanted £50 million.
What were Newcastle thinking about not selling him? If we'd offered 20m they should have torn our arm off
 

Alex99

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I think we were linked with the entire Dutch team when LvG arrived.

Jose Fonte was another one.
I remember us being linked with Cillessen, Vlaar, Martins-Indi, and Sneijder (again), and we ended up signing Blind and Depay, as well as already having van Persie.

What were Newcastle thinking about not selling him? If we'd offered 20m they should have torn our arm off
He was 21 years old and was breaking through into their first team. They obviously thought he had a far higher ceiling than he does. I imagine there was also an element of protecting squad depth in the middle of the pitch as they'd spent basically all of their transfer budget on Joelinton and Saint-Maximin that summer.

United at the time were looking for cheap options, with a preference for young, British players (according to Ole). I'm not sure if we ever actually got as far as making an offer, or how concrete our interest in him was, but any interest we had would have certainly been along the same lines ast the Dan James move.

Given he was linked with £15 million moves away this summer, it does look poor business on their behalf and a bullet dodged on ours if remotely true.
 

dannyrhinos89

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Yeah, early LvG days again. Think Van Gaal was intent on a left footed central defender but Wenger wouldnt allow it if I recall.
yeah that’s it, now I fully remember. It was frustrating how adamant LVG was having a left foot centreback.
 

Ikon

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In recent years, I confess, that I was banging on the drum for United to sign Serge Aurier from PSG.......
Least said about that the better... :rolleyes:
 

Redcy

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Quaresma was mentioned at various points before a number of moves
 

Alex99

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We had to endure Tyler Blackett and Rojo as a result!
You forgot Cameron Borthwick-Jackson!

And the right-back carousel that gave us Paddy McNair, Reece James (not that one), Guillermo Varela and Donald Love!
 

Robbie Boy

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You forgot Cameron Borthwick-Jackson!

And the right-back carousel that gave us Paddy McNair, Reece James (not that one), Guillermo Varela and Donald Love!
I had literally forgotten that Donald Love, James and CBJ existed. Didn't James play a worldie against Real in pre-season under LvG?

I just Googled the others and Donald Love at the age of 26 is now at Salford City! Seems James and CBJ have done ok, with James playing Championship level. McNair has actually turned out to be pretty decent at Championship level; Varela has had a nomadic career and is in Russia now. Crazy that this lot played games for us at first team level!
 

Nytram Shakes

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He went to Inter and was instrumental in them winning the treble?
I was referring to when we were trying to sign him, or at least papers and forums said we were trying to sign him, from Inter in 2010 might of been 2011? one of those summers

Edit: it was 2011 looked it up
 
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PSV

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The one that always strikes me is Celio Silva. Would have become our second most expensive signing ever at the time.

Can't say I even remember hearing his name beyond that summer.
 

WPMUFC

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Josh King
Morata
Not signing Ighalo to a deal
Strootman
Sneijder
Dybala
Renato Sanches
Willian
Vermaelen
Vidal
Ings
Longstaff
Garay
Milinković-Savić
Firmino
Alderweireld


probably more but off the top of my head
 

jesperjaap

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Pretty much any midfielder we were linked to in that period a few years ago where fans were just desperate for us to sign basically anyone for the position

Yohan Cabaye
Kevin Strootman
Yann M'Vila
Geoffery Kondogbia
Grzegorz Krychowiak
Steven Nzonzi
Well we have hardly fared better since with our midfield aquisitions in all honesty. But would agree with a lot of them M'Vila and Strootman especially got raved about and did very little, obviously injuries played a part.

I have to say though, I always liked Kondogbia. He was outstanding at times, but also very sloppy, especially defensively......blimey just googled him, cant believe is just 28 still! We spent a lot more on a better but very similar player since who is the same age pretty much.

The other one I always thought looked so good who never really kicked on was Veloso
 

dinostar77

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Alan Shearer was f#@&*n dearer ... so we got Ole the treble and hopefully the start of more trophies soon.
Fergie said in his books that had he got shearer utd would have won 2-3 more european cups. He was that good a striker at the time.
 

dinostar77

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Who was the belgium midfielder fergie was after. He broke his leg and fergie sent him a get well soon card, with a note that he'd be watching his recovery closely or something. The actual card picture was in the papers.

Sure that CM went on to do nothing of note really.
 

GueRed

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Who was the belgium midfielder fergie was after. He broke his leg and fergie sent him a get well soon card, with a note that he'd be watching his recovery closely or something. The actual card picture was in the papers.

Sure that CM went on to do nothing of note really.
Defour
 

GueRed

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Roberto Rios in 1997. Dominant Spanish centre-half from Real Betis.

Moved to Athletic Bilbao instead.

After a good debut year with them ended up terribly injury prone. Retired at 30yrs old.

Fergie and the board most probably would not of went for Jaap Stam in 1998
 

WPMUFC

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ngl, i forgot sturridge existed, wow what a decline :nervous:

on the other hand....how someone hasn't picked up Romero is just crazy. Is it wage demands and wanting to still be seen at the top tier? Because you're telling me not even a championship/League One (or international equiv) couldn't use him?
 

Lay

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Vlaar
Marcelo Salas back in the day. Injury hit after he turned us down for Juventus.
Josh King
Belotti
 

GDaly95

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Strootman is probably one isn't he?

Don't think there was ever a time when he was at the level we'd have needed him at.
 

Zlatattack

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Some complete random nobody who plays in a Spanish middle table side. I can't remember his name but for some reason 1 newspaper article linked him to us and people were going mad for him. Nobody had even heard of the guy.
 

acolyte

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Some complete random nobody who plays in a Spanish middle table side. I can't remember his name but for some reason 1 newspaper article linked him to us and people were going mad for him. Nobody had even heard of the guy.
Recently? Wissam Ben Yedder from Sevilla?

In the mid-2000s there was Aldo Duscher from Deportivo who I mentioned before. There was also Marcos Senna from Villarreal but he wasn't a nobody.