Bit like saying if you can't book a table at Claridge's you'll head to burger king instead
Centre Midfielder Transfer Links
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People thought that about Wirtz too and being kind to him, it looks like he still hasn’t adapted to the pace
I suppose you could sign the lad at 18 and loan him out to a championship side to get adjusted to English football and go from there
So who is the middle ground then?
Been asking myself this question (because I don’t think Tonali is this kind of profile).
Yeah, there's always a risk, but I think the risks are worth it. Like us: we at times ended up with Bebe, Obertan, Djemba-Djemba, Memphis, etc. To a lesser degree, someone like Kagawa who, to be fair to him, did contribute in Fergie's last season but struggled a lot. Similar to Veron. In taking those risks, though, we ended up with Ronaldo, Nani, Chicharito, Bruno, Lammens, Kanchelskis, Solskjaer, etc. Controversial but I'd even put Martial in there as he's one of the few players we've had in the post Fergie years that could get you up off your seat, and played a big part in onevof the few cups we've won in said era, but I digress!
It's definitely different now in terms of it being more difficult as we aren't a settled team. Fergie, in most cases, was taking chances on these lads knowing we were a good team and that we could bring them through with less pressure as we had so many big characters. Still, I think it's a huge part of our identity as a club: taking risks on young talents.
The big thing as well is he's apparently available for only €12m, so the fact that we'd be loaning him out wouldn't be too detrimental to our overall plans for this window. Plus, if he doesn’t end up becoming as good as some of us think he could be, it's not a big loss either unlike how it's looking for Liverpool and Wirtz right now.
Maybe someone like Wharton or Scott?
Wharton would be an excellent choice if we didn’t have Mainoo.
In my mind, the way we stand, we lack a defensive-minded, ball-winning midfielder who can cover lots of space and can run for days, hang with pacey midfielders. Not sure Wharton fits that profile.
Don’t know about Scott.
Tonali appears to be the in between player, but his on the ball metrics are not ideal.
I am partial to a double bacon XL.
Yeah know what you mean about Tonali's on the ball metrics, however just got this feeling he would love it here and feel he could win over doubters too
Preaching to the choir, mate! Definitely the type of young midfielder we should be prioritizing, even though he needs quite a bit of development to make a real difference at first team level.
In fact, every year, we should set aside £20-25 million for transfers like this, with an eye on the medium term, instead of exclusively focusing on immediate first team objectives. U-17 players who are competing against adults and giving a good account of their abilities, youth players at other major clubs (Musiala at Chelsea, Yıldız at Bayern Munich, Huijsen at Juventus, Heaven at Arsenal and so forth), massive talents from smaller leagues (Gvardiol at Dinamo Zagreb and Vušković at Hajduk Split), players who are running out of contract. In the grand scheme of things, £20-25 million is not much for a club like Manchester United. Even if 1-2 of these players succeed every couple of seasons, you get your money's worth (and then some in case a player turns out to be a superstar.)
In fairness to us, we have made signings like this. Garnacho from Atlético (pure profit of £40 million when we sold him to Chelsea as well as a 10% sell-on clause), Heaven as mentioned above, Carreras from Real Madrid (profit of £9 million due to a 20% sell-on clause), Hannibal (initial fee of €5 million and sold for a base fee of £5.5m with a 50% sell-on clause) and so forth. But we could and should do more — especially with regard to elite talents like Eichhorn.
As I've said before in this thread, it's definitely worth the gamble, and it's what our club is about. Taking risks on young talents and getting them to fulfil their potential.
I also echo your last paragraph having made similar points before:
Amad is a good squad player, Heaven is looking promising, we made a huge profit off Garnacho, Chido Obi has time. I've been praising this strategy for years now. Alvaro probably would've been a good squad option now as well had ten Hag actually gave him a chance.
It's our transfers for the first team that I've always had a problem with but we've improved in that regard recently, too.
€12m for Eichhorn and €22m for Alajbegovic this window would be good business. Cheap enough that they wouldn't really affect our overall transfer plan, and, should they not fulfill their potential, cheap enough where neither are major losses.
Maza is also one I'd love but he'd definitely cost quite a bit more than both.
Somewhat surprised there doesn't appear to be any links for Marc Casado. Was excellent for Barca last year when they had a bunch of midfield injuries but now appears to be 5th choice at best (possibly 6th it seems behind Eric Garcia).
Given where he is in the pecking order and Barca looking to fuel anything spending spree for more attacking positions I'd imagine they'd be open to a deal? Could be a good, perhaps cheaper under-the-radar option.
Given where he is in the pecking order and Barca looking to fuel anything spending spree for more attacking positions I'd imagine they'd be open to a deal? Could be a good, perhaps cheaper under-the-radar option.
Obviously we need to get it right in cm this summer, but seeing loads of negativity about certain targets, especially tonali and baleba.
Think we need to remember in the last ten years weve signed Pogba, matic, fellaini, fred, van de beek, casemiro, Ugarte...with Fred and Herrera just before.....thats over more than a decade.
Thats 9 players. Can remember every signing....pogba and casemiro were the only 2 excited me, thats two signings, herrera and matic were meh decent but not what we need...thats when we signed them, not my thoughts of how they performed which varies...but thats four over 11seasons following keane, carrick scholes etc....i though all the other 5 were over priced poor signings.
Literally every big name linked and even some of the smaller ones in my opinion look better signings before arriving than all of them bar Pogba and Casemiro.
Matic and Herrera were decent here, better than i expected...but Tonali and Baleba are better foitballers than both of them.
Not saying they should be two we sign.....but people are being overly critical of some of these signings that all could well be upgrades on all the cm weve signed bar Casemiro...and not taking anythinh away from him, his first season he was tge best cm since Keane and this season pretty close to it tge second half....but he was pretty poor for periods the two seasons between.
Our cm should om paper improve to its best level in a decade pretty much regardless of the next to we sign....i mean hell weve had fred and mctominay for a fair while....we all have our preferences ability and suitability wise but all this "id not pay so much, hes rubbish on the ball, were screwed if hes tge casemiro replacement" etc etc.....think people forgetting state of our midfield for the last decade on the back of a good 6months
Think we need to remember in the last ten years weve signed Pogba, matic, fellaini, fred, van de beek, casemiro, Ugarte...with Fred and Herrera just before.....thats over more than a decade.
Thats 9 players. Can remember every signing....pogba and casemiro were the only 2 excited me, thats two signings, herrera and matic were meh decent but not what we need...thats when we signed them, not my thoughts of how they performed which varies...but thats four over 11seasons following keane, carrick scholes etc....i though all the other 5 were over priced poor signings.
Literally every big name linked and even some of the smaller ones in my opinion look better signings before arriving than all of them bar Pogba and Casemiro.
Matic and Herrera were decent here, better than i expected...but Tonali and Baleba are better foitballers than both of them.
Not saying they should be two we sign.....but people are being overly critical of some of these signings that all could well be upgrades on all the cm weve signed bar Casemiro...and not taking anythinh away from him, his first season he was tge best cm since Keane and this season pretty close to it tge second half....but he was pretty poor for periods the two seasons between.
Our cm should om paper improve to its best level in a decade pretty much regardless of the next to we sign....i mean hell weve had fred and mctominay for a fair while....we all have our preferences ability and suitability wise but all this "id not pay so much, hes rubbish on the ball, were screwed if hes tge casemiro replacement" etc etc.....think people forgetting state of our midfield for the last decade on the back of a good 6months
This is based on... what?!
Even in Matic's final season at United, when he was 33! and his legs had started to go, his passing and defensive stats were still far ahead of anything Tonali has shown.
Matic at 33! beats Tonali at basically his peak for everything bar receiving the ball and shooting... even dribbling ffs.
Sadly I don't have any earlier detailed stats for Herrerra or peak Matic, but I'm sure they would prove even more favourable. Herrerra at his peak was also a good player; he had a great engine and seems to have put up much better defensive numbers, and seems at least no worse on the ball.
I don't know where you are getting your overly optimistic opinion of Tonali from either?...
Perhaps watch this:
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Good watch. He doesn’t seem particularly keen on Ederson. In fact, he probably rates him the lowest of all the players we've been linked with.
What sort of midfield profile is Casado
This is based on... what?!
Even in Matic's final season at United, when he was 33! and his legs had started to go, his passing and defensive stats were still far ahead of anything Tonali has shown.
Matic at 33! beats Tonali at basically his peak for everything bar receiving the ball and shooting... even dribbling ffs.
Sadly I don't have any earlier detailed stats for Herrerra or peak Matic, but I'm sure they would prove even more favourable. Herrerra at his peak was also a good player; he had a great engine and seems to have put up much better defensive numbers, and seems at least no worse on the ball.
I don't know where you are getting your overly optimistic opinion of Tonali from either?...
Perhaps watch this:
My eyes statman....bee baa bo ba da bop
In what world is Baleba who gets hooked at half time consistently and can’t get ahead of 40 year old James Milner, better than either Matic or Herrera?
Wondering if Liverpool cool on Wharton now and his price drops a bit.
Yeah your takes suggest they're not very good.
Hey likes yours these are opinions, putting these stats doesnt make things factual...all this is simply emphasising the point i made in the first place, that the negativity towards many good names linked this summer when virtually every cm signing we have made in well over a decade has been dissapointing to dreadful, is pretty baffling. These namrs linked if signed may or may not work out, we have to sign them first or we never know...but im confident if we do, neither of you will be saying these vomments in 6months...if we dont sign them its irrelevant
Let’s see if we sign Baleba.
I think he would be an awful signing. But if we do sign him, then I will of course give him my support, and would love to be proved wrong. But I genuinely can’t see how he’s instantly better than Matic or Herrera - neither of who were great players, but were solid, above average operators. I don’t remember either of them being anywhere near as bad as Baleba.
Tonali and Baleba are much better athletes but I’m not convinced they are better footballers. Replacing Casemiro, who is one of if not the least athletic midfielder in the league, with a completely different skillset would have advantages and disadvantages.
But we’d have to massively overpay for Tonali and/or Baleba and I wouldn’t go near either for that reason. If we are signing from the Premier League, Anderson, Fernandes and maybe Scott are the only players we’re are linked to that I’d consider. I think they are all players with a much higher ceiling and although expensive would offer better long term value.
You are right in the sense that our midfield is weak and we’re also short on numbers so it’s not really a huge task to improve it. But we should be looking at younger and much cheaper players in Europe rather than getting fleeced for likes of Tonali and Baleba. I don’t think either of those are actually worth much more than what their current clubs paid for them but you’d have to pay considerably more.
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Small but tenacious ball-winner with a good technical floor in terms of his passing and ball control in tight spaces (being a La Masia graduate and all).
Bit risky in that he might end up simply lacking the physicality for the PL with his stature but if he's cheap it might be worth a punt.
Surprised we haven't been linked to de Jong yet, just for him to come out and say that he wants to stay at Barcelona and then Laporta coming out in an interview to call him lazy and telling him to feck off to United or stop being injured all the time.
Ederson is older and seems like a useful option but I think most are seeing him as our third midfielder. For the others we've got a few irons in the fire, but most of the ones we are linked with are relatively young.
Who do you feel is the experienced CM who can come in and take over the midfield, and when we're under pressure take the game by the scruff of the neck. The big names, Anderson and Tchouaméni, seem unlikely - so who could we get who would be that over 25 guy can do this job?
Who do you feel is the experienced CM who can come in and take over the midfield, and when we're under pressure take the game by the scruff of the neck. The big names, Anderson and Tchouaméni, seem unlikely - so who could we get who would be that over 25 guy can do this job?
I would say Guimaraes but will be a complete no go for INEOS due to him being 29 in November and little resale value. So will admit right now I'm struggling to think of anyone as looked priced out for Tonali
Thoughts on this German Pogba copy Assan Ouédraogo. Could be a good pick up now, before Bayern snap him up.
Don't know enough about him to comment
I like that most of our targets are not in the World Cup squads. That means our movements are not going to be hampered by waiting for the world cup to end. Also enable the new players to join for the pre season from the start
People really shouldn't underestimate that Pogba/Matic/Herrera midfield. Could've won a title with that, if our attack and defense would've been fit for purpose at the time. If we could get those three this summer, I'd be over the moon. All three can play,, good balance, physically strong, even quite a few goals in there.
That combo was great when we actually played all three together, but it only played a grand total of 20 games IIRC. Title winning form during that period though, with 17 wins, 2 draws and 1 loss (with the loss and 1 draw being in the first two games, then 17 wins and 1 draw in the next 18 games). Then Herrera got injured and left to PSG, and Ole and the club never seemed interested in recreating that midfield balance despite how well it had done.
Wouldn't really blame the defence and attack considering the results were there. It was more that we chose to only play that midfield for a run of games once. If we'd built around it who knows what would have happened.
Sounds like Ederson is a given and I’m going to assume Anderson is City bound so I won’t consider him here.
In order of preference:
1. Fernandes
2. Tchouameni
3. Wharton
4. Scott
5. Baleba
6. Tonali
I’ll be thrilled if we get 2 of these.
In order of preference:
1. Fernandes
2. Tchouameni
3. Wharton
4. Scott
5. Baleba
6. Tonali
I’ll be thrilled if we get 2 of these.
Surprised to see Tonali that far below Wharton
It was so strange that we didn’t. Obviously Bruno has been a godsend, but properly replacing Matic made the most sense as our next step. Was it that Pogba was already expected to leave at that point (thus needing a replacement)? I can’t remember.
There’s nothing what so ever in their careers so far to say either of those are better than Matic. He was an absolutely class player for periods of his career.
Element of me not watching too much of Tonali perhaps but every time I do, I just don’t get the buzz.
Yeah I know what you mean, however just feel he could become a bit of a cult hero if we signed him
not a massive fan of his
71 appearances....4 goals 4 assists for an attacking mid.....feck right off at 100m
71 appearances....4 goals 4 assists for an attacking mid.....feck right off at 100m
Yeah big fan as I am of him that's far too much