I had to double check your join date because we had the exact same stuff said last summer and the summer before it.
Frenkie De Jong - Part 3?
- Thread starter Berbaclass
- Start date
Anyone follow Barca?
They’ve obviously not been great this year but they’ve had a good few injuries (including De Jong) that can’t have helped.
How has he performed?
Sofascore gives him a 7.30 (but Antony also has a 6.98 or something somehow so I have trust issues with that site).
They’ve obviously not been great this year but they’ve had a good few injuries (including De Jong) that can’t have helped.
How has he performed?
Sofascore gives him a 7.30 (but Antony also has a 6.98 or something somehow so I have trust issues with that site).
I don’t really see where he fits into this team?
Mainoo is clearly not a 6 yet, De Jong would be better suited playing the 8 in the premier league.
I think it’s just baseless rumours and there’s abso
Mainoo is clearly not a 6 yet, De Jong would be better suited playing the 8 in the premier league.
I think it’s just baseless rumours and there’s abso
Nobody follows Barca. That’s another trust issue.
We'll never get him
So are his wages back to normal next season or is there more backdated wages to come?
No means no. His heart 
lies elsewhere. People get arrested for stuff like this.
lies elsewhere. People get arrested for stuff like this.Just sign the fecker Fergie...
Despite multiple rejections, I'm always bang up for it.
Mainoo would be wasted as a 6. I'd play him as the progressive 8 Bellingham type, a 6 behind and FDJ connecting those two.
We have learned absolutely nothing if we go for him again.
He is not going to leave his deferred owed wages aside to join us.
He is not going to leave his deferred owed wages aside to join us.
Too much focus on physicality in this thread. Football has moved on. We need intelligent, technical, press resistant players, not destroyers. If we shift on Amrabat, Eriksen and VdB in the summer, to clear up the wage bill and add De Jong, our six midfielders, competing for 3 spots would be Casemiro, Mainoo, De Jong, Fernandes, Mount, and McTominay. Given the choice, I would also move on McTominay and bring in a DM of the profile of Onana. That would give us perfect balance. Casemiro/Onana, Mainoo/De Jong, Bruno/Mount. Great age profiles too.
I would most likely play Mainoo and De Jong plus one. The plus one being dependant on who we were playing. Tough away game against a top six? Casemiro or Onana plus Kobbie and Frankie. Most other teams? Mainoo and De Jong plus Bruno or Mount. We need versatile options, more than one way to play, and for the love of god we need a good, deep squad. It’s why I was so against selling Fred. Who I considered to be one of the best back up midfielders in the league. Not quite starting quality, but fecking brilliant as a rotation option or sub.
Lightweight isn’t an issue that plagues me. We just need a reference point in front of the defence, who knows how to read the game defensively and is tactically disciplined. Anyone who’s watched Mainoo this season, knows he is more than capable of being that player. Personally I would prefer to have someone like Casemiro or Onana behind Mainoo and De Jong, Bruno odd man out. But I’d have no concerns about a Mainoo, De Jong, Bruno/Mount midfield. Mainoo and De Jong are both such intelligent players, who keep the ball brilliantly and occupy the passing lanes in such a way that they are defensively effective without having to be brutish.
I would most likely play Mainoo and De Jong plus one. The plus one being dependant on who we were playing. Tough away game against a top six? Casemiro or Onana plus Kobbie and Frankie. Most other teams? Mainoo and De Jong plus Bruno or Mount. We need versatile options, more than one way to play, and for the love of god we need a good, deep squad. It’s why I was so against selling Fred. Who I considered to be one of the best back up midfielders in the league. Not quite starting quality, but fecking brilliant as a rotation option or sub.
Lightweight isn’t an issue that plagues me. We just need a reference point in front of the defence, who knows how to read the game defensively and is tactically disciplined. Anyone who’s watched Mainoo this season, knows he is more than capable of being that player. Personally I would prefer to have someone like Casemiro or Onana behind Mainoo and De Jong, Bruno odd man out. But I’d have no concerns about a Mainoo, De Jong, Bruno/Mount midfield. Mainoo and De Jong are both such intelligent players, who keep the ball brilliantly and occupy the passing lanes in such a way that they are defensively effective without having to be brutish.
This is where I’m at. Given the history with this guy it’s hard to be excited by it now. I’d rather see us linked to/chasing a proper proven striker.
Sorry De Jong you might have been able to give Murtough & Arnold the runaround,however the new guys are not going to fall for your games
De Jong is exactly the type of player we should be avoiding. Very talented but has no real interest in joining us and turned us down before. We need hungry players on the way up in their careers who buy into the club like Hojlund. There are plenty of players out there who would improve us.
If we want him, give a take it or leave it offer to the club and his agent. I cannot be fecked with another 3 month saga where he gives us the runaround.
Forget logic. I’m on that train! Ticket please!
- Barca manager leaving, new manager might not play his style
- His wages are a lever possibility for Barca
- They like greenwood, possible swap
Maybe even just give him a leave it offer, or as they say, ‘an offer he can refuse’?
No one is doubting his quality as a player.
We have been stung in this exact scenario before where the player was perfectly happy to stay where he was and didn’t push for a move. We didn’t take the hint and suddenly we ended up with Di Maria and Sancho. Entire summers were wasted over Thiago, Fabregas and Sneijder. I hope we’ve learnt our lesson.
It’s clear he’s not arsed and has no real passion to play for us - he should stay where he is and continue to pick up his over inflated paycheck whilst Barca scrabble around with levers to make ends meet.
Do newbies have a character limit now as well as a post limit?
Anyways, on-topic... Choo! Choo!
If we are really going to do this again, can we ban the words ‘****’ and ‘****’ etc or at least auto correct them to something insulting about the poster using them? That shite did my head in last summer. 
Edit- way ahead of me I see. good work!
Edit- way ahead of me I see. good work!
Now I'm curious! What were the words?If we are really going to do this again, can we ban the words ‘****’ and ‘****’ etc or at least auto correct them to something insulting about the poster using them? That shite did my head in last summer.
Edit- way ahead of me I see. good work!
Mainoo is just 18 fellas. Too much of an expectation here. Case, Mainoo , FDJ and a DM isn't bad for 2 positions
If Greenwood+the difference in wages for 1 year (£15m?) would get him I'd be in as long as he wants the move. Don't see why him and Mainoo couldn't work together, at least in some games, and Casemiro/A.N.Other DM rotate in for one of them as needed.
What is it with us always being linked to talanted Dutch footballers. The de Jong rumours is Wesley Sneijder all over again.
DeJong, DeLigt, Brobbey
ETH will get his band back together
ETH will get his band back together
Kobbie - De Jong would be the most press resistant midfield in Europe
But he very easily could do that. And if he does, then it would confirm what you are saying. The scenario in which he plays for us is a scenario where he has obviously decided that he is NOT going to simply stick around and collect his wages, but instead play for Manchester United. That’s literally the only way he can play for us, given he has a contract at Barcelona.
Also, I wouldn’t try to speculate too much on a footballer’s motivations bu cobbling together a few tweets. Nobody knows the details behind our last pursuit, or why he would choose to come here if he did. The only thing you should be concerned with are that the people actually involved in any deal are satisfied of his motivation. Despite the ‘Woodward is a stupid man’ rhetoric fans love to trot out about an extremely well educated and financially knowledgeable man, there’s every chance we were not simply in Spain trying to sign a player who got on the phone and told him he had no interest in joining the club. It’s also more likely than not that IF we attempt to sign him again, it’s not in spite of him getting on the phone and reiterating the same thing to us. I appreciate that makes a better tweet for journalists, but it’s quite far-fetched. Obviously our manager also knows the player personally, so if he’s satisfied then so am I. If he isn’t, and De Jong isn’t - then there will almost certainly be no deal anyway.
Don't do it to yourselves guys, let it go.
Cool. Still though, unless he made it clear it was us he only wanted to move to. We must stay clear
I’d like to see us sign a long term 6 to play next to Mainoo. I think making Mainoo sit would be a waste.
He would be a great signing but we won’t pay his wages.
I read that as DeJong daylight robbery.
This again? feck him.
Overpaid mercenary, no thanks.
We need good hungry players who want to prove themselves. Hope this is the new mantra.
We need good hungry players who want to prove themselves. Hope this is the new mantra.
Some people are reacting way too emotional to this. If we had a player that has swatted away interest from other big clubs and say he was committed to us we d praise him. However, situations and people change. I know I was a massive flake in my 20s - and I didn't have an agent and massive clubs filling my head with conflicting thoughts.
This is just emotional rhetoric. How exactly is he a ‘mercenary’, more than any other footballer anyway?
People are spinning some sort of narrative that he now apparently has an attitude issue, ‘the sort of player we should stay away from’. All without basis.
This is a player who turned down PSG to sign for his dream club, and didn’t walk the first moment things got difficult there. Instead, he fought his way back into the team and earned unanimous plaudits for his performances there. He was determined to make it there and did. Does Harry Maguire have problems, is he also a mercenary for not easily giving up on his United career and fighting back to form? Would he be the sort of player teams now need to stay away from?
There is nothing, literally nothing (in fact, only the opposite) that suggests that De Jong is not a ‘hungry player who wants to prove himself’. He’s playing for Barcelona, not Al-Ittihad for heaven’s sake!
Move on
Wait..may be....no...move on
Hmmm...what if...no... definitely definitely move on
wait...
Wait..may be....no...move on
Hmmm...what if...no... definitely definitely move on
wait...
No it’s not. If he comes here, he will be one of the biggest earner of the club while he hasn’t proved nothing here.
We did that the last 10 years. Haven’t you learn nothing ? It’s like the Woody’s strategy all over again.
We have to go back at the basics.
So don’t try to make a fool of me with your « emotional rhetoric » while you are creaming yourself about a new shiny overpaid footballer who rejected us already.
I just hope the Disneyland era is done for good.