I dont get why people have a problem with Erik signing a player he wants. He's been managing him for the last 3 month, seen him playing in his system and feels he brings values to the team. So if he thinks Wout is someone who is "United Quality" then that's fine with me.
At the end of the day, its Erik's job on the line and we as fans should trust his decision making. I feel he has earned that considering what he has managed to do so far in his first season.
ETH has been doing very well, but he's not earned the power to decide all the transfer. A well run club needs its DoF, and its recruitment team to have their input. Why? Because however good the manager is, he doesn't have the time to study all the players out there, especially someone like ETH a hand on manager working on the training pitch.
Hypothetically if ETH makes mistakes which would end up costing himself the job in the future, then he would leave the mess of his mistake for us to clean up just like previous managers. ETH may be building a more solid foundation than Mourinho LVG Ole, but he's not yet build our team as consistent big title contenders. This team ceiling is not exactly on different level. Winning League Cup or even adding EL and FA Cup this season is not high enough to position to start messing around. You look at Liverpool and you see how easy few mistakes can set a top teams back several level.
Perhaps expensive signings, the manager should have the final say because he has to put his job on the line. For cheap squad signing, I find it difficult to believe that it's that difficult for professional scouting team to find better forward than Weghorst.
As a back up striker I’ve no issue signing Wout for say 5 million! He’s the sort of guy that loves being here, would happily sit on the bench and give 1000% whenever he gets minutes!
We're not the one to decide the price. Burnley soon to be a PL club next season likely ask for more when they could ask 3mil already for half season loan. He has two more seasons on his contract. They're not exactly desperate to offload him. I meant they may as well use him as their back up forward. Difficult to get value with 5mil these days even bargain shopping from lower leagues.