I think L'equipe are OK. Would depend on the journo, but there are better sources that I would wait on before getting excited.
Jean-Clair Todibo
- Thread starter L1nk
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In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik @Rood and Imran @Annihilate Now! start with the good news by celebrating Manchester United Women's emphatic FA Cup win over Spurs at Wembley and the future of manager Marc Skinner.
Then it's the bad news and the ever worsening form of our Men with losses to Arsenal and Palace.
Finally the main debate - ETH Out now or keep him until the end of the season - if not longer. Are you Team Nik or Team Imran?
Brandon Williams is on the way out. Not the same fee obviously but another body out..
To be fair that's more France Football but it's the same owners. L'Équipe is more known for being an integral part of Le Tour de France since its creation.
L'Équipe is by far the biggest sport media in France and I'd say they're as reliable as you can expect ie there's still unfounded clickbait rumours they just rehash to fill that content tube but they're not a complete rag.
As someone said, does depend on the journo involved and what sources they're cozy with.
Their transfer rumours are hit and miss. Some are clickbait others are genuine.
It would depend on the journalist that brought the news
If we had greater funds then maybe we could have got this deal done earlier in the summer which then may have forced Maguire’s hand. As it is, it seems like this deal might be dependent on Maguire moving first and he probably thinks that he will still get some minutes throughout the season with injuries and suspensions.
Maguire is going nowhere so we can forget about this . It’s not happening
We should just buy him and Amrabat, and let Maguire/McT deal with being 6th/7th choice. They would obviously leave. But maybe that weakens our hand during negotiations, but it cant be a worse position than now.
Unless there's rumours of a late bid for Maguire , I can't see this happening anytime soon, especially not in this window.
Theoretically, we could sign him regardless of what Maguire is doing
Definitely. I don't know why people think a defender has to leave for one to come in.
The funds from Henderson or others can fund it if that's what's needed.
It's not just the purchase price, the business won't want to be paying wages to surplus players who have no chance of getting minutes. I think the management are still hoping Maguire will realise that this is killing his career and he should take the financial hit now for the sake of his career. That is probably why he was left out of the match day squad last game. He will be dropped from the England team soon as well.
I know what you mean but the club seemingly doesn't have a problem overloading a position and paying needless wages. We've done it time and time again. We've just given Evans a contract for some reason.
And as you say, this might be the best way of really forcing Maguire out.
Not signing Pavard because the Maguire deal fell through suggests otherwise.
Evans is our Pavard /Tolibo unfortunately
This is not happening because of Maguire's greed and delusions, unfortunately.
Have a feeling we’re going to sanction a couple of signings at the end of the window and say there’s no budget for January again. There’s still too much smoke around certain names to suggest we’re done.
Fixed it for you
I'd like to think so, but it might take another dodgy result. I don't think there's anywhere near enough noise at the moment.
This approach could lead to “top 10 is our trophy” outcome, it’s a dangerous route to pursue
I think you're right. This is the only power the club has - presence in the match day squad.
I believe there is most likely a bit of brinkmanship going on between the four different parties that influence whether Maguire stays or goes:
- The player - he's now over 30 and wants to maintain or elevate (lol) his earnings since he has one last "big" contract left in him. His hope is that his last contract will maintain or increase his earnings. However, he also wants to maintain his status as a starting pick for the national side, and to some degree these two are linked - if he loses that he becomes a footnote and his value will decline rapidly.
- The players agent - doesn't really care about the playing aspect as much, just in it for maintaining the value and most likely getting a fat bonus at the point the next contract is signed. From their perspective I imagine they would want Maguire to wind his contract down and go on a free at the end of the contract, maximising their income at the next contract negotiation (under the assumption that he can maintain his "value" between now and then)
- Man Utd management - would prefer to get some value from the player, either from quality performances on the pitch so we win things, or by selling him off for some value before the end of his contract.
- Erik Ten Hag - he wants to have players in his squad that fit the way he wants to play. Obviously, given Maguires restricted minutes and some his ETH comments in the last couple of pressers, he would ideally like to get rid of Maguire and get a Todibo (or Pavard, KMJ, etc before they went off the market) who would be a massive step up in ability and better fit the way ETH wants to play.
Would be a brilliant signing. If he joins Martinez had better get his arse in gear or this guy will bench him.
Fake news 
It’s not happening .
Agreed.
Penny pinching Glazers would laugh at this though
If they had the balls to do this, they would have already done it. You don’t keep players you don’t want, especially when there were actual decent bids for them. Glazers didn’t sign off on McT because they value him too highly and didn’t want to pay Maguire off to leave. Holding the club back from progressing, as usual.
Thinking about this my knowledge of L'Equipe came from learning French at school in the 90s, so I'm a bit too far out of date to make any assumption
I suppose in theory MU could add another defender but :
The squad is already on the large end of the spectrum. Selling a player for roughly equivalent value (and one with heavier wages) makes for better accounting and that is, whatever the reason, clearly paramount for the club at the moment.
If West Ham was the only club interested for Maguire (and it seems they went with a different signing), there's no guarantee you can sell him even with the premise that a new signing would convince him to accept a transfer.
L'equipe has different layers of reliability. Their twitter account can tweet or retweet some rumors, same with the personal accounts of their journos, but when they post something on the site or in the newspaper, they are usually pretty reliable. When it comes to that tweet from GFFN, it's kind of bullshit because it comes from a huge article on l'equipe which lists all the hot names on the french market, including Todibo, but no new information is given outside of Man Utd's interest, so GFFN is kinda making it up for clicks.
I'm all for taking any opportunity to swipe at the Glazers - but £364 million spent in the last 12 months, without any real major outgoings to balance the books. It's fair to say the manager has been backed since he joined.
Whether or not this money has been spent correctly is a different question, but he's absolutely been backed.
I'm not a Maguire fan but he isn't the one running the club into the ground. He is just the latest scapegoat for owners who have destroyed our beloved club .
To add to this. The paper version(paid online version) is reliable, I haven't read it in a while but they used to separate rumors to the rest like BBC does. Online or on TV, they talk about everything and speculate a lot.
Are you familiar with them? Are they credible? I've heard of them but I've seen some far fetched things.
You sound like you might know.
If so, I expect riots again in short order. The moment Evans is named in the starting 11 of a pl or cl match should be cause for immediate revolution.
Would still trust Evans far more than Maguire
My rule with L'equipe TV is I dont watch it if I can see the people talking. They'll often show fun and unusual sports, but their football talk shows are the worst, they're like the french football version of Stephen A Smith and Skip Bayless.
It's entertaining and they share actual insider info. The issue is that unless you are familiar with Lequipe, France Football, Le Parisien and RMC, you could easily fail to spot who is a bullshitter/joker and who isn't. It's a bit like mixing articles from RCMsport and talk shows on RMC.
We probably have different tastes which is normal since we're different persons but while it's true they give infos, they are usually quickly reported in their recurring news. I just dont like talk shows in general, I dont want to sit through one hour of people arguing just to get a few infos I could read in a few seconds.
I remember Mitten at the start of the window said something along the lines of he'd spoke to someone at United (Murtough) on why they hadn't got some early signings wrapped up and that person had said the window is long and they don't want to have spent all their money at 10pm when the disco goes on until 2am. I think we have some names on standby incase players leave, like Arambat, but I also think we have some money saved for January that will get spent if a player like Casemiro comes available at the end of the window.
Oh god the RMC talk shows
You really expect ritos over the face a player will be in a starting 11...?