Nick05

This has 2022 written all over it. Argentina stuttering and sputtering on the red carpet to the final they have been given. Fifa doing their best to give a grand farewell tour to Messi. Next up Switzerland.

Owners doing their best to get us relegated. Slow and steady decline from a CL winner Tuchel to a guy who finished 7th in the second tier. So even winning the championship is a distant prospect if we play in it next season.

Ofcourse. We panic and throw insane money at this like we did for Enzo Fernandez. All Napoli has to do is stand firm on their valuation. Egghead and co. will eventually panic and pay way over the top.

It's quite clear that the owners are not stacking up the GK position to strengthen the first team. If it were then there was a much simpler way to go about it. We're stockpiling decent options in the hope that 2-3 of these become good and can be flipped for 40+ mill in the next couple of seasons. For the first team they are quite happy to have below average GKs who can do a job. It's evident that the aim for the owners is not to challenge for the league or the CL. For them it's about top 4 and the revenue that comes with it and the side business of trying to book profit by selling players. It's like they are trying to build 2 streams of income, i.e., money from the first team and money from the sale of all the obscure signings who will likely never play for the club.

I thought Palmer would be the highest. Who's buying Mudryk shirts ? The guy literally can't play.

Our transfer policy is not based on footballing ability now. Our transfer decisions are based on the following factors - 1. Fees amortization 2. Player age 3. Wage structure 4. Pure profit 5. The next wonderkid 6. Youtube compilations 7. Buy cheap sell higher 8. Stockpiling players I thought football was a simple game where transfer decisions were made based on signing players best suited to play in a certain role or formation and the club's budget available. But we're into all sorts of rubbish and the actual footballing reasons are not even evident in these decisions.

Charity FC at it again. Doing social service by signing a luxury expensive player nobody else wants and giving him employment and a paycheck for the next 6 years. Do we get extra points for this community service ?

He’s a ridiculous footballer but pure entertainment value. On the offside play he moved across the box almost to the other side just to get that sh*t shot away.

City are coasting through this game, doing just enough to see out the win. We’re playing safe and are afraid to get hammered.

City are literally sleep walking through this game. We’re making it so easy for them.

A new, inexperienced manager who, according to those who've seen Leicester last season, doesn't have plan B. We've frozen out our best CB (Chalobah) and Gallagher's likely to be sold. Badiashile in defence and Sanchez in goal is a disaster-class defence. The overall quality of the squad will reduce with the exit of Silva, Chalobah and Gallagher. What are we banking on to challenge for a top 4 spot ? 1. A one trick pony first time PL manager ? 2. A bunch of average new signings ? 3. An average goalie and defence ? All the momentum we gathered at the end of last season is gone. Starting from scratch is a big blow. Confidence is not cheap and it could get ugly if we play poorly in the first few games. I expect us to not get relegated but neither does a top 4 finish seem plausible. This season is essentially a write off even if Maresca survives. Arteta is the gold standard for new coaches in the PL and he too is a Pep disciple. We know how long it took him to finish top 4 and challenge for the league and how many times he was close to the sack. And that's after they got their act together in the transfer market. By all indicators it's a long road ahead for us.

If we value the Omdorion guy at 40 million then a proven performer in Serie A like Lukaku should be valued at atleast 60 million by the club. And Casedei is easily 30 million. 135 million + monster wages for Oshimen is really not a good deal.

Sums it up perfectly.

I think we're sniffing around literally every young player in this solar system. I simply can't get my head around the fact that we're willing to spend 40 million on this guy without it being some sort of scam. Let's remember we sold such a promising player in Ian Maatsen for less than that. To offer 40 million for someone who's scored a grand total of 9 goals in La liga is beyond reason.

It's insane what's going on. Never in the history of football transfers we've seen sh*t like this. Atletico are basically saying - "We buy your good experienced player but in turn you have buy our sh*t inexperienced player for the same amount" with the Samu deal and we're going along with this sh*t as if it's a sound strategy.

Retail therapy/distraction.

40 mill ain't cheap for 99% clubs around Europe. Add to that the management's new found fetish of selling players outside the PL. What we end up with are 3-4 customer clubs(Barca, Real, PSG, Bayern) willing to pay more than this to buy players.

I miss the time when football was a simpler game, when the focus was on things that mattered. Now it's full of a load of useless stats most of which are invented to jack up player values. People are trying to make football into baseball with all these ridiculous stats. Comparing Lewandowski with Jackson is more of a joke than an actual comparison because if offered a choice, all of us would prefer the 21/22 Lewandowski over Jackson inspite of the similar looking stats. What matters is quality and stats like these cannot quantify the quality of the players.

Maybe this is the assessment the SDs read before deciding he's worth the money.

This will surely send a chill down the spine of our relegation rivals.

The cycle we go through these days - Step 1. Rumours link us to unknown sh*t players. Step 2. We express our frustration and disappointment with said rumours and hope they're untrue. Step 3. Rumours surface of outrageous price tags of the said unknown sh*t players. Step 4. We express more frustration and disappointment with said rumours and hope they're untrue. Step 5. We pay outrageous money and sign said players on 7-8 year contracts. Step 6. The frustration and disappointment turn to dismay and apathy with the trajectory of the club.

That's a bullcrap deal. So you offer unproven sh*t players 7-8 year contracts but a proven perfomer only a 2+1 year. It's nothing more than a way to force him out without having to take the blame for his exit.

Sarri had much better and experienced players available at his disposal. Currently this lot is neither better nor experienced.

How do these owners define the value of any player? Paying amounts which no other club is willing to pay is not signing undervalued players but suicidal way over the top money. Probably a closer assessment would be to ask the top 10 clubs across Europe how much they'd be willing to pay for the players we've signed. I suspect other club would value most of our players at or less than 50% of what we paid.