Evan Ferguson - Top Irish Prospect

Mike Smalling

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Looks like an interesting prospect, but he can never be our only striker signing in the summer. We can't put our hopes on an 18 year old with a total of three league goals to his name. Either he needs to grow behind a more senior striker, or stay with Brighton for another season or two.
 

Mike Smalling

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29 is twilight of a career. And he will be 30 by the time next season starts.
He might have another good three or four years - its a massive Might! Certainly not five
Benzema is playing some of his best ever football at ages 34 and 35, and Lewandowski is also still going strong at 34. Kane arguably relies less on pace than those two. I think it's more likely than not that Kane will have 3-4 seasons at a very high level. I would still go for Osimhen over him for other reasons though.
 

McGrathsipan

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Benzema is playing some of his best ever football at ages 34 and 35, and Lewandowski is also still going strong at 34. Kane arguably relies less on pace than those two. I think it's more likely than not that Kane will have 3-4 seasons at a very high level. I would still go for Osimhen over him for other reasons though.
he might and might not - thats what the suits looking at a 100million plus transfer fee must consider. Personally I would opt for a younger player.
Kanes fee will be too high for his age
 

Pogue Mahone

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Benzema is playing some of his best ever football at ages 34 and 35, and Lewandowski is also still going strong at 34. Kane arguably relies less on pace than those two. I think it's more likely than not that Kane will have 3-4 seasons at a very high level. I would still go for Osimhen over him for other reasons though.
Kane has had some serious and recurrent ankle injuries over his career. That’s usually a bad prognosis in terms of durability.
 

Bebestation

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he might and might not - thats what the suits looking at a 100million plus transfer fee must consider. Personally I would opt for a younger player.
Kanes fee will be too high for his age
If Kane cost 70 mil would that be too much for you?
 

Mike Smalling

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he might and might not - thats what the suits looking at a 100million plus transfer fee must consider. Personally I would opt for a younger player.
Kanes fee will be too high for his age
Well, that's obvious. Everyone might and might not play at a high level next season. I'm just saying that, I would assess it as being more likely than not, that Kane has another 3-4 years at a very high level, based on his previous record and his general degree of professionalism. In my view it's not a "massive might" as you put it.

But I agree that we should look elsewhere, because we would massively overpay for Kane.
 

kidbob

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I post here on Brighton players when they are inevitably coveted/linked to Manchester United. I posted extensively in the Caicedo thread and really appreciated the very positive feedback so I thought I’d give my thoughts on this thread too.

There seems to be some confusion with the points made in the sampled quotes above.

Ferguson signed an improved contract until 2026 in October 2022 - the likelihood of the player winding down his contract is rather slim, and in truth the club have never in the last 30 years allowed this to happen. Recently, Trossard (final year), Maupay (final year), Bissouma (final year) and even a handful of unused prospects have been sold for relatively large fees rather than allowing this to happen. In fact, these transfer fees combined have totalled over £70m+ add-ons.

There are two main reasons for this. Firstly our players are still in demand when sold. There is often no shortage of potential buyers, which means that we don’t get lowballed on want-away players. Secondly, and related to this, our players are on relatively low wages in comparison to the top clubs and even many clubs who are doing less well. Everton, for example, are said to have practically doubled Maupay’s wage.

In practice this means the club “sitting on” a player isn’t a financial nightmare, because other clubs can afford to sign them and they’re still all relatively young. We don’t have Phil Jones’s, Oxlade-Chamberlain’s and the like on huge money that we want rid of. Both earn considerably more than our highest earners.

I did get quite a few mocking replies re: Caicedo, because - respectfully - some fans of the biggest clubs find it quite incredulous that Brighton are where they are in a business and footballing sense. Points made along the lines of “they’re just Brighton, offer them £20m and force a move. They only paid £5m for him, that’s a huge profit”.

I stated at the time that Caicedo was unlikely to go anywhere for south of £70m - and many spat out their coffee. Fair enough, it does sound mental, but it’s worth remembering that reputation isn’t the benchmark of a player’s value any more - ability, age and potential are. Whether they play for Barca or Bournemouth.

What Brighton pay for a player is irrelevant to outgoing dealings, speaking in terms of historical precedent. The club view profit/loss in strictly business terms. Maupay, for example, had amortised his transfer fee prior to his sale. Therefore, with use of the player for several seasons, the club view his sale for £5m less than we paid as a “profit”.

Brighton in particular, but many other smaller clubs than Manchester United, Chelsea, Arsenal, Liverpool, Manchester City aren’t pushovers any more when it comes to fees. And as was shown with Caicedo/White to Arsenal and Cucurella to Manchester City trying to force transfers, our chairman Tony Bloom will only sell on his terms and if he wants to.

Going back specifically to Evan Ferguson, he has shown huge promise. He’s physically finished aged 18 (made his professional debut in Ireland for Bohemians aged 14) - he’s a unit. His touch is superb and has shown some excellent finishing.
He speaks well, seems very mature and grounded and his family - his Father in particular - keep him on the straight and narrow and focused on football and development. I know this first hand.

If I HAD to speculate on what it would take fee wise in the summer, assuming he gets a few more goals in the next 11-12 games, I’d guess something in the region of £75-80m would do it.

Thanks for reading! If you have any questions about Evan or anything please feel free to ask and I’ll do my best to answer. Bear in mind I’m limited still to five posts per day. Cheers!
Great post. As a United fan I'd selfishly love us to sign him but as an Ireland fan I believe that him staying at Brighton for at least another year is best for him. He's at the perfect club to develop him. A good manager, in a team that plays good football and one where he won't lack in game time and has a bit less pressure on him than if he were to move to one of the 'bigger' clubs so young.
 

Mike Smalling

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Kane has had some serious and recurrent ankle injuries over his career. That’s usually a bad prognosis in terms of durability.
His injury problems are vastly overstated, in my opinion. Since his first full season as a starter for Tottenham, he has averaged 45 games a season (not including this one). Add around 10 international games a year to that. That's not bad.
 

Doracle

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29 is twilight of a career. And he will be 30 by the time next season starts.
He might have another good three or four years - its a massive Might! Certainly not five
How old are Benzema, Lewa and Ibra currently?
 

Shinjch

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He is best staying with Brighton for at least another full season. He won't be cheap at all whenever anyone moves for him, but a full season (or longer) as a starting striker would be good for the player.
 

Doracle

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So, Ferguson is signed up with Brighton until 2026, by which time he will be 21? Feels like the ideal time to aim to sign him will be 2025, when you would think Brighton will have to look to sell if he is doing well. As it is, I think he would be eye-wateringly expensive to sign now anyway.
 

Doracle

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why is that relevant?
Because they are extremely similar players and level to Kane. It’s just bizarre to assume that a player of his style is going to fade much earlier than his peers. It’s obviously a risk, as everyone ages differently, but a minor one.

Anyway, I’ve now realised this is the Ferguson thread so I’ll leave it there!
 

Pat_Mustard

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A never-nude? I thought he just liked cut-offs.
Good for an 18 year old but he's nowhere near the top level currently. Brighton struggle for goals when he plays.

I get we have a strong Irish fanbase but it's no reason to go overboard on players like him and Bazunu. If they get better then maybe it's an option but they'd be way out of their depth playing currently for us.
'Struggling for goals' seems a bit strong given the season they're having, although I take your point in that they're 4th in the league for possession percentage per game but only 7th for goals scored per game. They have however been much more prolific in the league with Ferguson on the pitch than without him, albeit we're dealing with a very small sample size here.

OPPONENTSMINUTES PLAYED BY FERGUSONGOALS SCORED BY BRIGHTON WHEN HE WAS ON THE PITCH
Southampton70
Arsenal292
Everton714
Liverpool662
Leicester241
Crystal Palace331
Fulham730
West Ham833
Leeds682
Crystal Palace110
TOTAL46515

So if I haven't completely botched some element of this, which is distinctly possible in fairness, that's 15 in 465 minutes = 2.9 goals per 90 minutes with Ferguson, compared with 1.8 goals per match overall, and 1.56 goals per 90 minutes without him on the pitch.

I was hoping that they'd at least scored at the same rate with him on the pitch, but that actually seems quite impressive. The likelihood of me looking all that up if he wasn't Irish is minimal, so you may be onto something as regards his nationality contributing to the hype on here ;)
 

Marwood

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Benzema is playing some of his best ever football at ages 34 and 35, and Lewandowski is also still going strong at 34. Kane arguably relies less on pace than those two. I think it's more likely than not that Kane will have 3-4 seasons at a very high level. I would still go for Osimhen over him for other reasons though.
There are also plenty of strikers who drop a level or two after 30. In fact most do.
 

Slevs

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Honestly I hate these types of Twitter accounts.

"Dominate for decades to come".

They do know a decade is 10 years right? Decades is plural, meaning a minimum of 2. So are they expecting him to dominate football from now (18) until minimum 38 years old?
 

Marwood

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So, Ferguson is signed up with Brighton until 2026, by which time he will be 21? Feels like the ideal time to aim to sign him will be 2025, when you would think Brighton will have to look to sell if he is doing well. As it is, I think he would be eye-wateringly expensive to sign now anyway.
It'll be the ideal time for everybody to sign him though.

Right now probably only ourselves and Chelsea need a No.9. I don't see him choosing the latter over us.
 

redcafe_reader

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Honestly I hate these types of Twitter accounts.

"Dominate for decades to come".

They do know a decade is 10 years right? Decades is plural, meaning a minimum of 2. So are they expecting him to dominate football from now (18) until minimum 38 years old?
To be fair the other Ferguson did dominate football for decades.
 

amolbhatia50k

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Can someone post any good clips of great individual games he’s had? As I’m not seeing a Rooney esque talent in the ones I’ve seen. Or has the twatterer above forgotten how good Rooney was?
 

Robbie Boy

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I don't know if his comment was sarky. It definitely was factual. He wasn't playing regularly at the time.
Yours was unnecessarily insulting though.
Seemed sarky? I mean, I posted something that I saw online. The minutes were slightly off, so there was no need for the sarky bullshit.
 

Robbie Boy

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Can someone post any good clips of great individual games he’s had? As I’m not seeing a Rooney esque talent in the ones I’ve seen. Or has the twatterer above forgotten how good Rooney was?
As time has gone on, you would be led to believe that Rooney was some fat clogger who just ran around a-lot. Mental.
 

Doracle

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It'll be the ideal time for everybody to sign him though.

Right now probably only ourselves and Chelsea need a No.9. I don't see him choosing the latter over us.
Yes but he’s probably not ready to lead the line for a top club. It would be a massive gamble to pay the type of money needed to bring him in as an expected starter when he’s only played a handful of games. Rooney had two full seasons when we brought him in and even then he wasn’t expected to be the main man in that squad.