Real Madrid strategy is awesome, but they did all that from position of strength. They had awesome 11 and squad, they could rely on this approach.
The Real Madrid transfer approach…
- Thread starter Rozay
- Start date
United spent 90 millIon on antony who is not even better than brahim
This is it essentially it. Hard to say no to the best run club in the world. CL football guaranteed every year and a very good chance of lifting the trophy most years.
Is it really enough anymore? Its 10 years since fergie left and the prestige has to have/be dwindling
I dont think their approach has changed much at all, the players mentioned by the OP are no brained signings and I suspect most top sides were in for them at their respective Brazilian sides. Madrid have that draw, if they show you attention, you go their. It's that simple.
You need a good core of leaders and experienced players first to compensate getting the talented youngsters. We already have two very talented teenagers as starters and one 21 year old CF, so I would rather try to try to get more leadership on the pitch.
We only have a few players with leadership (Bruno, Licha, Maguire, Casemiro, Varane, maybe Eriksen and Shaw), but we gotta sell 3-4 of them next summer. Players such as Dalot, AWB, McTominay, Lindelof, Antony, Rashford, etc. have zero leadership imo.
It's gonna be hard to find the right players in, but players like Bremer, Koopmeiners or Guido Rodriguez and even Barkley would probably bring experience and quality.
Look at Bayer Leverkusen, their signings of Xhaka and Hofmann was one of the keys to get their league title with such a young squad.
At the same time, we can''t make the same mistake again of overpaying for players that are over 28.
Just to show you a possiblity:
Sell Bayindir -> get Koen Casteels or Keylor Navas for free (make him no.1)
Sell Wan Bissaka -> get Lutsharel Geertruida (vice captain of Feyenoord)
Sell Casemiro -> get Guido Rodriguez for free (looks better than current Casemiro in every aspect)
Let Eriksen & Amrabat go -> get Koopmeiners (versatile, leadership)
Sell McTominar & Van de Beek -> get Barkley for free
Let Varane go -> get Bremer
Of course most of those transfers won't happen but that could be a way to get experience and still have some money left for other positions (LB, RW, CF) as we would have spent around 110m. We can't make a 100m signing like Neves in this scenario though, who would be the best example of a talent that Real Madrid would sign. I hope you still get what I mean. Build a core first, get the talents after that:
Sell Greenwood & Sancho -> get a young RW
Sell Lindelof -> get a young LCB
Sell A.Fernandez -> get a young LB
Sell Martial -> get a young CF backup
We only have a few players with leadership (Bruno, Licha, Maguire, Casemiro, Varane, maybe Eriksen and Shaw), but we gotta sell 3-4 of them next summer. Players such as Dalot, AWB, McTominay, Lindelof, Antony, Rashford, etc. have zero leadership imo.
It's gonna be hard to find the right players in, but players like Bremer, Koopmeiners or Guido Rodriguez and even Barkley would probably bring experience and quality.
Look at Bayer Leverkusen, their signings of Xhaka and Hofmann was one of the keys to get their league title with such a young squad.
At the same time, we can''t make the same mistake again of overpaying for players that are over 28.
Just to show you a possiblity:
Sell Bayindir -> get Koen Casteels or Keylor Navas for free (make him no.1)
Sell Wan Bissaka -> get Lutsharel Geertruida (vice captain of Feyenoord)
Sell Casemiro -> get Guido Rodriguez for free (looks better than current Casemiro in every aspect)
Let Eriksen & Amrabat go -> get Koopmeiners (versatile, leadership)
Sell McTominar & Van de Beek -> get Barkley for free
Let Varane go -> get Bremer
Of course most of those transfers won't happen but that could be a way to get experience and still have some money left for other positions (LB, RW, CF) as we would have spent around 110m. We can't make a 100m signing like Neves in this scenario though, who would be the best example of a talent that Real Madrid would sign. I hope you still get what I mean. Build a core first, get the talents after that:
Sell Greenwood & Sancho -> get a young RW
Sell Lindelof -> get a young LCB
Sell A.Fernandez -> get a young LB
Sell Martial -> get a young CF backup
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We bring more players through the academy than any other big club in Europe outside of maybe Barca but over the past 10 years we adopted a ‘Galactico’ model under Woodward then a clusterfeck of players no better than we had just because.
We’ve ruined so many players by either not giving them game time (Hannibal, Laird and countless keepers) or playing them out of position due to having zero direction and zero planning because every manager that came in was given total tactical power yet all played different ways meaning the previous managers players were a horrible fit.
I’d much rather bring Jackson, Kambwala, Amass, Fitzgerald, the Fletcher’s, Lacey and Rooney through over the next year or two than keep doing what we’ve done over the past 10 years. On the other hand Real don’t bring many players through their own academy, their strike rate with young South American’s is brilliant but due to brexit that isn’t an option for us.
I’d look at the French, Portuguese and Spanish youth teams then look at loaning them out to some kind of affiliated club like we used to do which is a way around work permits but also heavily scout the English youth leagues and get the best prospects, we’ve got a great academy set up again now that are regularly winning things which will appeal to kids and parents.
We’ve ruined so many players by either not giving them game time (Hannibal, Laird and countless keepers) or playing them out of position due to having zero direction and zero planning because every manager that came in was given total tactical power yet all played different ways meaning the previous managers players were a horrible fit.
I’d much rather bring Jackson, Kambwala, Amass, Fitzgerald, the Fletcher’s, Lacey and Rooney through over the next year or two than keep doing what we’ve done over the past 10 years. On the other hand Real don’t bring many players through their own academy, their strike rate with young South American’s is brilliant but due to brexit that isn’t an option for us.
I’d look at the French, Portuguese and Spanish youth teams then look at loaning them out to some kind of affiliated club like we used to do which is a way around work permits but also heavily scout the English youth leagues and get the best prospects, we’ve got a great academy set up again now that are regularly winning things which will appeal to kids and parents.
They have created an aura around themselves and work hard to maintain it. I think Woody tried to adopt a similar approach and failed miserably. He couldn't even make us a dollar store Madrid.
It's a way of doing things, certainly. You can't do every signing like that because you're never going to have a PL team that makes sense, you need some maturity in a side. Madrid are adding them to experienced quality players too. There's still a balance to strike but we certainly need to do more of this and less Casemiro and Varanes.
I wouldn't buy into this theory we can't do it because Real Madrid or Barcelona will outcompete us. Nope, that's depressive defeatism. There's more than a handful of future stars out there. The next crop of say 40-50 talents that will be making up the biggest sides in Europe are all out there somewhere, it's not like there's 2 of them. The fact is you cannot buy everyone at once and you cannot get them all right so some of it also comes down to judgement and making sure yours is up there, even surpassing other clubs and seeing what they don't. Which I'm guessing is the whole point of upgrading our recruitment.
I wouldn't buy into this theory we can't do it because Real Madrid or Barcelona will outcompete us. Nope, that's depressive defeatism. There's more than a handful of future stars out there. The next crop of say 40-50 talents that will be making up the biggest sides in Europe are all out there somewhere, it's not like there's 2 of them. The fact is you cannot buy everyone at once and you cannot get them all right so some of it also comes down to judgement and making sure yours is up there, even surpassing other clubs and seeing what they don't. Which I'm guessing is the whole point of upgrading our recruitment.
I’m sure it’s what all owners wants but currently we’re not in the position to do so. Real Madrids current methods is similar to Sir Alex’s methods - it wasn’t always with youngsters, but quite often mid level players, making them into ones capable of winning the league.
As mentioned, without a strong, stable squad, it’s very difficult - eg Ronaldo spent most of his first season coming off the bench (iirc) whilst Rooney had the likes of RVN and Saha ahead of him. They were still given chances, but were giving time to gel and grow, without as much pressure. In an ideal world, someone like Hojlund would be sharing minutes with the existing main striker (eg Martial) instead of starting every single game. We also tried to build something like this recently where the FIFA potential of the front line was always high (Rashford, Martial, Greenwood, Sancho, Lingard) - unfortunately it just didn’t work.
I’m not sure about Rodrygo, but I recall the early days Vinicius was labeled a flop, and fans wanted him out etc. so patience is also needed with these young players. I’ve named the successful ones, but there’s probably ones that didn’t end up as successful, for both Fergie and Real Madrid - both which did ok despite the unsuccessful gambles.
The other factor is managerial stability. Sir Alex was untouchable and was able to take these risks; likewise Ancelotti, or someone like Klopp. Someone like ETH wouldn’t even know if they’ll still be in the job next week, so it’ll be in their best interests to play the strongest squad now, rather than what may happen in the future. (Mainoo and Garnacho are the best in the positions at the current time; whereas someone like Diallo isn’t, but would have more potential than say Antony)
As mentioned, without a strong, stable squad, it’s very difficult - eg Ronaldo spent most of his first season coming off the bench (iirc) whilst Rooney had the likes of RVN and Saha ahead of him. They were still given chances, but were giving time to gel and grow, without as much pressure. In an ideal world, someone like Hojlund would be sharing minutes with the existing main striker (eg Martial) instead of starting every single game. We also tried to build something like this recently where the FIFA potential of the front line was always high (Rashford, Martial, Greenwood, Sancho, Lingard) - unfortunately it just didn’t work.
I’m not sure about Rodrygo, but I recall the early days Vinicius was labeled a flop, and fans wanted him out etc. so patience is also needed with these young players. I’ve named the successful ones, but there’s probably ones that didn’t end up as successful, for both Fergie and Real Madrid - both which did ok despite the unsuccessful gambles.
The other factor is managerial stability. Sir Alex was untouchable and was able to take these risks; likewise Ancelotti, or someone like Klopp. Someone like ETH wouldn’t even know if they’ll still be in the job next week, so it’ll be in their best interests to play the strongest squad now, rather than what may happen in the future. (Mainoo and Garnacho are the best in the positions at the current time; whereas someone like Diallo isn’t, but would have more potential than say Antony)
The South American market is no longer some vast untapped reserve waiting to be plundered. It’s crawling with agents from all the superclubs, and has been since the days of Robinho.
Sticking a (new) vast scouting structure in place for a club like united who previously have had minimal presence there doesn’t add much. You’ll still be losing all those players to the RM and Barca and city and benfica/porto scouts, simply because they’re established and the players know it’s a well-trodden path.
Plus the gems are no longer underpriced - you’re paying top dollar for the genuine talent. And the risk of a player not adapting after a cross continent move is far greater than the risk of the same player not adapting after they’ve already got used to European football.
The way forward is the multi-club model - buy a Spanish or Portuguese club and then try and fight Madrid/barca/the Portuguese clubs on a more level playing field by offering the boys a move to the Spanish/portuguese feeder to blood them prior to the big league.
Sticking a (new) vast scouting structure in place for a club like united who previously have had minimal presence there doesn’t add much. You’ll still be losing all those players to the RM and Barca and city and benfica/porto scouts, simply because they’re established and the players know it’s a well-trodden path.
Plus the gems are no longer underpriced - you’re paying top dollar for the genuine talent. And the risk of a player not adapting after a cross continent move is far greater than the risk of the same player not adapting after they’ve already got used to European football.
The way forward is the multi-club model - buy a Spanish or Portuguese club and then try and fight Madrid/barca/the Portuguese clubs on a more level playing field by offering the boys a move to the Spanish/portuguese feeder to blood them prior to the big league.
It's the 'football manager' approach.
They sign the top rated young players in world football. Rarely are they finding 'gems' but rather those that are very highly rated at a certain age range and it's working wonders
They sign the top rated young players in world football. Rarely are they finding 'gems' but rather those that are very highly rated at a certain age range and it's working wonders
Pretty much. We’ll have to get the baseline settled and operate more like a smart club for a while and once we’re in a comfortable position we can start successfully putting our hat in the ringer for the S-tier talents.
It is still insane to me how this is even legal. Fecking city.
Enzo Fernandez was a prime example. We could have gotten him for 20mil but Woodward had other ideas.
And how much prestige exactly is needed to buy a teenager from Brazil or France or wherever? More than Manchester United have apparently? So Spurs can sign Vuskovic and Bergvall (ahead of Barcelona at that), Brentford can sign Nusa if not for a failed medical, any Portuguese team can sign big talent - basically anyone except United? You guys need to chill with the self-loathing, we can sign young talent if we decide to.
Came here to post this.
It’s easier to integrate young players when you already have Ballon d’Or winners and contenders in your squad, off record breaking seasons in the UCL
Whats Manchester United to a teenager from Brazil or France? For more than half their lifetime we've been dung.
How good are those players listed?
Strategy? More tapping than Fred Astaire.
It remains to be seen. What we do know is that they were coveted players.
And Manchester United is Manchester United. Do you think only 40 year olds think we’re a big club or something?
Compared to city Barca real BM I don't think we'll get any players vs those teams at the moment no. Do you?
Well Spurs did, in just the last window. And yea, we could do, or maybe it’s not as simple as that. If Chelsea get Estevão, did they ‘get him ahead of City’? Maybe City didn’t try to buy him. Did Chelsea get Kendry Paez ahead of Real Madrid?
If your grand plan is to exclusively target players who would only be of interest to Brentford we’ll be going absolutely nowhere.
I think the bolded point is key. We seem to have a constantly need to heavily invest in the starting 11.
As good as Vini Jr is now, I don't think him at 18 at United would have been able to succeed.
You do feature young players and give them minutes but with the team performing the way it does I still think it's not the most appealing environment. You're already playing in the strongest league so that in itself should attract players but I was more about the current Manchester United is not playing a particularly good brand of football nor is competing for the major titles which is something other top clubs would have over United.
That's a fair point. We certainly aren't very stable or playing well at the moment. However, I do think we could sell them on the vision that INEOS are changing things. Maybe we aren't competing for titles now, but in 3-4 years when these young players will be starting to enter their early primes, we could be competing.
Ultimately, I don't think Chelsea have more prestige than Utd, but they are convincing talented youngsters to join them and Kendry Paez in particular was extremely highly rated. If Real are genuinely interested in the same young Brazilian or Argentinian that Utd are interested in, then yes, they will probably choose Real. However, there will still be talented youngsters that Real or Barca aren't seriously interested in.
Personally, I really like Roony Bardghji of Copenhagen, and he's already scored a goal against us this season. That feels like an obvious, less than £30-40m young player we could go for, but at this moment there haven't been any links I'm aware of.
EDIT: Just googled him and saw that Roony actually just suffered a bad knee injury and had surgery 1 week ago, so he's out for 9-12 months. Unfortunate.
Well the whole Football ecosystem is a bit skewed.
A Manager who earns 10m/year dictates buying a player. The players are signed on 5 yr contracts while manager generally 3 yrs max. The total outlay for a single player the manager recommends can be 150m+ (fees +wages). And this is not even a STAR player. Any random player costs this much these days.
In which stream do you see this when both Manager and Player are providing a service. If the most important person at the club is a manager he should be paid as such.
I just cannot understand how Guardiola get paid lower than Haaland. City can easily win the title without Haaland but would be very difficult to do that without Guardiola.
You can also immediately sack a manager but to get rid of a player you have to find a buyer or let their contract run out.
Well thats incorrect, You can hire a new manager just like a new player but to get old manager off your payroll you still have to agree a payoff. You can do those for players aswell. Only issue is player contracts are generally longer/expensive so more money involved.
We could absolutely pull it off, but it requires an extensive restructuring of our scouting network. And we need to make sure that they work in unison with management and board. And that means not only finding the right talent, but establishing the right kind of long term dialogue with the player and family and be able to present a coherent and long term vision for all involved. Juni Calafat does this for Real Madrid and all the young players he's scouted love him to bits (literally call him in the middle of title celebrations).
I would suggest that this approach isn’t really limited to Madrid. The four most successful clubs in the last 10 years: Madrid, City, Bayern and Liverpool all do the same thing. The only over-25 players signed for significant fees by those clubs in the last decade are Hazard (27, flop), Grealish (26, flop), Mane (29, flop) and Kane (30 and we’ll see how his signing is perceived at the end of his contract).
Ralf may have been a poor manager but he wasn’t wrong when he talked about signing players who are on their first or second professional contracts. You get them on low wages, in their physical prime and with some resale value if it doesn’t work. So the opposite of a signing like Casemiro, who is finished physically, making him an unattractive purchase for any club which is amplified by his massive wage demands.
Ralf may have been a poor manager but he wasn’t wrong when he talked about signing players who are on their first or second professional contracts. You get them on low wages, in their physical prime and with some resale value if it doesn’t work. So the opposite of a signing like Casemiro, who is finished physically, making him an unattractive purchase for any club which is amplified by his massive wage demands.
Yes, not signing players over 25 has been a good policy for the club. Like if the player doesn't perform right away the club can still move those players rather quickly and they don't command the same wages a senior player does. You can make an exception here and there but that shouldn't be the general rule.
It's a shame that Barca is such a questionable club on the administrative and ethical end, because their record for continually progressing their own youth graduates into first-team roles is one area that I have more respect for them than Real. With Real going out and buying blue chip kids all ready made, who from their youth setups even stands a chance these days.
Well no. Well run clubs don't let the manager on the 3 year contract dictate transfers. Because he's on a 3 year contract.
And this being a thread about Madrid, the only manager in Madrid's history who dictated transfers was José Mourinho, and even in his case it came with checks, and he was even allowed that much because of the context - barcelona's dominance vs Madrid seemingly lost at sea - and Florentino being charmed by his charisma.
Real Madrid's academy produce more first team players in top flight european football than any other club's. It is maddening that we haven't produced a bona fide star for the first team since Iker Casillas, or that the closest to star players coming out of our academy(Hakimi, Llorente) don't play for us. It is especially maddening that that radioactive waste of a club keeps somehow churning out Ansu Fati, Gavi, Fermin, Cubarsi, Lamine fecking Yamal...
On the other hand, Nacho, Carvajal and lord Lucas V have been giving us 8/10 seasons for a decade, playing key roles in 4/5 CL runs, winning clasicos, etc...we brought back Joselu and
What are you talking about? Fati, Gavi, Fermin, Cubarsi, Yamal? That's why Barcelona haven't won the CL since 2015. Their players from academy are usually overrated. At Madrid most of them wouldn't be good enough to be on the bench. If Nico Paz was from La Masia they would tout him as a new Maradona. Both clubs have just different standards and different budget. If Barca were a well-run club with healthy finances Fermin, Cubarsi, Gavi, Yamal would be still playing for their B team.Real Madrid's academy produce more first team players in top flight european football than any other club's. It is maddening that we haven't produced a bona fide star for the first team since Iker Casillas, or that the closest to star players coming out of our academy(Hakimi, Llorente) don't play for us. It is especially maddening that that radioactive waste of a club keeps somehow churning out Ansu Fati, Gavi, Fermin, Cubarsi, Lamine fecking Yamal...
On the other hand, Nacho, Carvajal and lord Lucas V have been giving us 8/10 seasons for a decade, playing key roles in 4/5 CL runs, winning clasicos, etc...we brought back Joselu and
Carvajal? Of course he is a star. He's been arguably the best right back in the world for the last 10 years (at least top 3)
Hakimi? Again, Carvajal was and still is a better defender. Don't forget that he was sold due to Covid. The club needed money.
Llorente? As I said, different standards. Casemiro was better and now Camavinga and Tchouameni are better.
Barcelona had their golden generation with Messi, Iniesta, Xavi, Pique Puyol etc. Just like Madrid had La Quinta del Buitre in the 1980 or United had The Class of '92. Some things can't be repeated, even if you have an exemplary academy.
No, they haven't won because the entire club is a fecking joke. Because they even with the best attack in club football history they managed to get dunked on by Atletico Madrid and Juventus, and because they have the mentality of little kids. That's what happens when you spend your entire existence blaming others for your failures. Even their greatest ever legend(other than Messi), Johan Cruyff, told them so
Some are. The ones I mentioned aren't. Fati they broke by overplaying him because, well, see the "entire club is a joke" above. The others are great. Yamal is ridiculous honestly, I'm kinda desperate their money problems get so bad City can steal him
Cubarsi would have played a bit this season due to injuries, the others would be getting minutes. Gavi isn't the next Xavi or Modric, but he's about as good as Camavinga for example. Yamal we'd probably wait before giving him serious minutes because we're a serious club and we don't need a 16 year old to save our season
No, but they also wouldn't be their key players
Llorente is essentially a carbon copy of Fede. We could have had both. *Should* have had both.