Exactly. Slackers rule the world.
Ed's a proper financial genius.
Wot, no transfers? It's all happening now!
- Thread starter Sassy Colin
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In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik and Imran hold a long overdue conversation about United's awful league form with 1 win in 7. They discuss a disappointing draw at Bournemouth, a not so disappointing draw against Liverpool and a crushing defeat at Chelsea - Is time nearly over for Erik Ten Hag?
Then in a special second half of the pod, Nik welcomes Natalie ( https://twitter.com/natalie_17) to discuss the fortunes of Manchester United Women as they booked a place in the FA Cup Final after a historic first ever win vs. Chelsea.
Ed's a proper financial genius.
Grealish is an AVERAGE player who would actually make our team worse. He's too similar to other players we already have - I see him.as a poor mans Juan Mata and probably the most over rated player in the league. Worth a punt for ~£15M but Villa will want 4 times that.
We need an out and out right winger with pace and skill.
Also need a midfielder with world class technical ability to control games, another centre back with genuine pace to compliment Maguire, and ideally an attacking left back who can provide extra width and link up play.
I still think we are a bit lightweight up front also and could do with a strong target man in certain games.
Agree though well probably spank all of the budget on Grealish which will set us back at least another 2 years.
Truth is, as fans we don't really know our finances. I can assume we have enough to buy a player or two, but outside of that, given the crisis, we don't really know. We have one massive need and a few areas that are not so desperate but could be improved.
Our Need:
Depth in attack. We need to buy at least one attacker that can play multiple positions. This could mean Greenwood acting as depth or simply signing a player good enough to start for most teams with some versatility. In quality this could range from Sancho to someone like Lallana. It would lead to us having quality despite an injury to one of our attackers or in case one of them is off form or needs rest. It's something which we haven't been able to do and has forced Daniel James to play a more significant role than he would otherwise have done. the 94 team had Lee Sharpe, the treble team had Blomquist, the invincibles had Wiltord/Reyes, Mourinho's chelsea had Joe Cole, our 08-09 team had Nani and even the current Liverpool side has Shaqiri. I'm sure Greenwood will keep progressing, so signing a star like Sancho isn't particularly necessary if we don't have the funds, but at least a capable competitor would be great.
Our long term needs for improvement:
a. we need have a left back who can provide consistency in appearances and performance. Shaw is a good player, but I can't trust him to befit for most of the season and Williams will likely never be better than him. Signing a left back to compete or replace Shaw would help us.
b. Lindelof is not that good, especially for a top team like us. A premier league centre back needs to be good in the air and have much better strength and balance than Lindelof currently has. Furthermore his skillset does not complement our best centre back, Macguire. If we decide not to use smalling and neither Mengi or Tuanzebe show the quality or fitness to be a potential partner for Macguire, we should sign a centre back.
c. We may also need a Defensive midfielder in a year or two as Matic is aging. Fred has shown that he can cover effectively for him, but I can't trust him as a permanent starter and Mctominay hasn't shown the ability to play as a DM yet.
Our Need:
Depth in attack. We need to buy at least one attacker that can play multiple positions. This could mean Greenwood acting as depth or simply signing a player good enough to start for most teams with some versatility. In quality this could range from Sancho to someone like Lallana. It would lead to us having quality despite an injury to one of our attackers or in case one of them is off form or needs rest. It's something which we haven't been able to do and has forced Daniel James to play a more significant role than he would otherwise have done. the 94 team had Lee Sharpe, the treble team had Blomquist, the invincibles had Wiltord/Reyes, Mourinho's chelsea had Joe Cole, our 08-09 team had Nani and even the current Liverpool side has Shaqiri. I'm sure Greenwood will keep progressing, so signing a star like Sancho isn't particularly necessary if we don't have the funds, but at least a capable competitor would be great.
Our long term needs for improvement:
a. we need have a left back who can provide consistency in appearances and performance. Shaw is a good player, but I can't trust him to befit for most of the season and Williams will likely never be better than him. Signing a left back to compete or replace Shaw would help us.
b. Lindelof is not that good, especially for a top team like us. A premier league centre back needs to be good in the air and have much better strength and balance than Lindelof currently has. Furthermore his skillset does not complement our best centre back, Macguire. If we decide not to use smalling and neither Mengi or Tuanzebe show the quality or fitness to be a potential partner for Macguire, we should sign a centre back.
c. We may also need a Defensive midfielder in a year or two as Matic is aging. Fred has shown that he can cover effectively for him, but I can't trust him as a permanent starter and Mctominay hasn't shown the ability to play as a DM yet.
If we spend 65 on Grealish but don’t get anyone else I actually give up. Grealish is a good player but not a 60/70 million player. I feel we’ve seen his top level and yes it’s good but he’s too expensive. He could easily end up another baffling transfer by us at those figures. He’s not a winger. He’d be bought as rotation for Bruno. We could probably get Donny VDB from Ajax and a good DLP for that or go for someone who actually plays on the right in the meantime and wait for sancho. He’ll probably go elsewhere after this year but we’ll need a RW either way.
yeah I kind of agree. He’s not average but he’s not worth that money. We also need a physical but clinical box striker and a backup to Bruno. Surely with a top of the range scouting operation (That has no problems identifying the more talented 14-16 year olds out there) we could be doing cheaper and smarter business in Europe and South America, especially on the backup/rotation players but we can’t because our squad is backed up with players who are hanging on for dear life. Anyone who was fit and couldn’t get a game after the lockdown while the team was dead on its feet should probably take the hint but it’s all our own fault for tying these often subpar players down on long and expensive contracts that literally no other club would pay.
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Well there is Thiago who fits that midfielder with world class ability,however he clearly only has eyes for the scousers so that is why I think we should look at Bruno cover and honestly believe Jack fits that criteria.
Sancho is obviously the ideal RW signing if you want someone who offers that pace and skill.
I do agree with you that a target man would be useful but don't expect any movement there until Ighalo goes in Jan.
We could be sorted for the next few seasons if we just had another push this window. So far it looks like we haven’t learnt our lessons from the last 7 years.
Feel confident that if it was around £60m on Grealish then we would still buy a CB,however it may well see us look in the bargain bin for a RW which is definitely not the right way to go.
Grealish is a poor man's Juan Mata.. feck me..
Well said about Grealish. I couldn't agree more.
Gotta be one of the worst comparisons I've read in a while...
I think Grealish for 60m is a fair price. Pre-COVID he was on 80+m bracket.
80 million? wow....
I’d say he was 60-50 now tops. I know he’s been good and he can be a difference maker but absolutely everything at Villa goes through him. He won’t get that here. There’s a very good chance he’d end up a squad player here or playing out of position. For the love of god can we stop buying really expensive players and playing them in the wrong position.
Yeah I reckon it is too
You could, and you have.
Gutted with our transfer activity to be honest, cant stand watching chelsea piling on good transfer after transfer and us not making any clear move on anyone although there is actually value in the feckin market. Hate to say this is starting to feel as a failure of a window although i still expect something to happen. Grealish for 20mill more than Fernandes for backup is no good. Yeez
Have we been linked with anyone else apart from Sancho? Its seems we only ever move for one target at a time. It's so frustrating.
You are absolutely right, we are saving £1.8 million. We should all expect a transfer deadline day signing on October 5th.
Brilliant move by Ed, he is a mastermind.
I fecking hate the Glazers so much.
Our biggest and only deal this summer is getting Henderson to sign a new deal. LUHG
Watching Chelsea pull off deals with ease and other clubs like Spurs, Arsenal, Inter etc despite Covid continuing to pick up seasonable deals (Docherty, Gabriel , Tonali etc ), it's really quite sad how slow and cumbersome we are in our transfer activity. Then you have us failing to get Sancho over the line and City possibly signing Lionel fecking Messi and this really has been a bit of a trainreck so far.
I'm usually patient with transfer market stuff but the whole United are poorly run thing, although you want to believe as a supporter that it isn't the case, after 7 years of being weak in how we are run, one just can't help but feel it is the case. Up to Ed to prove that sense wrong but can't blame fans for feeling it is true.
I'm usually patient with transfer market stuff but the whole United are poorly run thing, although you want to believe as a supporter that it isn't the case, after 7 years of being weak in how we are run, one just can't help but feel it is the case. Up to Ed to prove that sense wrong but can't blame fans for feeling it is true.
2 weeks from now you will see us signing Jadon & Benoit and then people will make meme overhyping Mr Ed. Bookmark this, I'm the ITK.
Would love it if that happens. Hopefully this Badiashille chap is actually good if we sign him.
Our Arsenalisation is complete. We should now be known as Arsechester United.
Did he not see Juan play this year? He was one of, if not the most, expensive bench player in the world.
Ake is 40m, Chilwell is 50m, AWB was 50+m. And Grealish is much better than all these players.
Whether people like it or not, that's just his price. The crying won't lower the price. Hahha..
Yeh. Just look at the number of posters celebrating 3rd place over real trophies. It reeks Arsenalisation.
I'm not saying that we should get him. But if Ole wants him, 60m is a fair market price.
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If we don't have the funds to go for big targets this the season, the least we can do is to look for bargains who are technically superior that what we already have, and are either squad depth options or sure starters. There are many.
Marc Roca from Espanyol is a great CM/CDM in 4-5-1 for around 25 - 30 millions.
Sergio Reguilon is an excellent LB Real Madrid on loan to Sevilla, we all knew how good he is, for 25 mill.
Dominik Szoboszlai from RB Salzburg is a technically gifted player who can play as RW, LW or AM, he won't cost more than 20 millions.
I didn't not made up these prices, these are offers made for these players by other clubs and negotiations are underway already.
I'm sure there are plenty of good smart options in this window in all positions. We don't need to splash 120 millions on Sancho and another 80 millions on Jack Grealish!
Marc Roca from Espanyol is a great CM/CDM in 4-5-1 for around 25 - 30 millions.
Sergio Reguilon is an excellent LB Real Madrid on loan to Sevilla, we all knew how good he is, for 25 mill.
Dominik Szoboszlai from RB Salzburg is a technically gifted player who can play as RW, LW or AM, he won't cost more than 20 millions.
I didn't not made up these prices, these are offers made for these players by other clubs and negotiations are underway already.
I'm sure there are plenty of good smart options in this window in all positions. We don't need to splash 120 millions on Sancho and another 80 millions on Jack Grealish!
I propose 'Manchester U tight, Ed'.
Depressing isn’t it.
No real links, hints that money isn’t available. We never push on after getting top 4 it’s ridiculous.
No real links, hints that money isn’t available. We never push on after getting top 4 it’s ridiculous.
Perhaps Chelsea have spotted that Liverpool and City have ageing squads and now its the time to spend big and try to capitalise over the next 2 years and try to have the best team for when their downturn comes.
Knowing us, we prpbably intended to capitalise too with Sancho etc but instead saw Chelsea spending big and thought that we'd let them go first and wait a few years till they're on the wane and we'll spend our money then.
Knowing us, we prpbably intended to capitalise too with Sancho etc but instead saw Chelsea spending big and thought that we'd let them go first and wait a few years till they're on the wane and we'll spend our money then.
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I knew we would be inept coming into this window as well we always are but the level of ineptitude to the point Ole has no chance of kicking the club on after improving last year is an absolute disgrace.
He needs to put some pressure on the board and soon
He needs to put some pressure on the board and soon
Please explain what's been inept about it other than we haven't signed anyone?
Other than Chelsea no one has really signed anyone of note.
I still have full confidence that we will get at least two if not three deals over the line in the next two weeks.
Fully expecting two transfers and one loan.
Just be patient.
I really didn’t expect us to go this long without making any moves yet. Only way I can justify it is that we’ve gone balls deep into Sancho and won’t look elsewhere until it’s utterly dead. Even then, it’s shambolic.
Other clubs have pulled off transfers with ease??
Arsenal first made contact with Lille for Gabriel in February, that doesn't strike me as an easy deal,
Doherty is just conjecture right now, no confirmed deals, us is hardly a marquee signing.
Again, Chelsea are the only ones who have really excelled so far, but two of the deals were done months ago in Ziyech and Werner, Chilwell deal has taken weeks.
Well I think lots personally. Not a good look that every team ahead of us has done something for one.
Or that training starts next week.
I'd also point towards the thousands of posts during the 2018 window saying that Fred wouldn't be our only first team addition as we would be trying to catch city. Spoiler he was and we didnt.
Now that's not to say that will happen this season but when over half the window is gone and our season starts in 3 weeks it isn't a good sign. Best case we get a few in and Chelsea are still more prepared than us.
Worst case we get no one. Only time will tell.
But the immeasurably dissapointing thing about it all is without real additions the best finish we can hope for realistically would be behind Chelsea so 4th.
Not trying to kick on will never sit with me and I've seen this club do it a hell of a lot so I no longer give them the benefit of the doubt.
Badiashile is the only one I have seen we might have bid for.
But then pool and city will rejuvenate and we can continue going in circles.
He is a very raw talent, probably not ready for a first team spot for 1-2 years
Yeah, I think Mancini quoted something like 'to stand still you have to move forward' when City signed barely anyone after they'd won the league.
Liverpool you could argue will fall into that category, they haven't made any tracks in the market yet.
City too. Are they inept?
Without doubt the club is working behind the scenes, but it's pointless to start throwing money at random players as that's what got us into a mess in the first place.
I'd much prefer a methodical approach this time round, but the fans need to be patient with that.
If in two weeks we are in the same situation then I'll start agreeing with you and probably want to start smashing stuff!!