Whether some of you would like to agree or not, that is the fact.

Go ahead and call me and everyone who shares this opinion "spoilt" or whatever word you may feel like using, it won't change the fact.

I'm not going to blame Emenalo here. It's not his job to negotiate deals. It's his job to spot talent and point them out to Marina to negotiate the deals and he generally does a fantastic job at that (Azpi, Lukaku 2012, Courtois, Moses, De Bruyne, Salah, etc).

The problem here is Marina Granovskaia. For all the great sales she has gotten for us and the great buys every now and then, she has taken one too many L's for us at this point.

Since 2010, we haven't succeeded in having a great summer after a title winning season. There's no reason we should be going for Djilobodji and Hector after just winning a title in 2015. And those two were panic buys, mind.

We win another title and have a big summer planned. Between January and now, we've lost about 10 first team players (Ivanovic, Terry, Mikel, Oscar, Chalobah, Loftus-Cheek, Costa, Matic, Ake, Begovic) and only replaced them with 4 (Bakayoko, Rudiger, Morata, Caballero). 5 if you add Christensen. Holes in the squad needed to be filled and we've known this since January but we've waited till the last 24 hours of the window to try to get deals over the line. This isn't even mentioning the fact that we should have tried to strengthen our starting XI to keep up with the rest of the league but we didn't. 

We're looking for a RB yet we let Conti go to AC Milan, Cancelo go to Inter Milan, Toljan go to Dortmund and Aurier to Spurs. ALL of these deals were there for the taking and guess what? They were ALL cheap! Now we're going after a Bosingwa incarnate in Rafinha. We spent months and months chasing Sandro with no assurance that he actually wanted to come and we seemingly do not have a plan B for him. Even if we did have a plan B, the price of that player will be 50% higher at this point in the window. This is the same way we spent most of the window chasing our tail with Koulibaly last summer. And Pogba the summer before. And Rooney the summer before. None of these deals ever materialized yet we spent over 2 months doing f**k all in each case. And although I prefer the option we ended up with, it says a lot about them that we bottled seemingly the easiest deal to get over the line with Lukaku by being complacent. Or should I say...incompetent.

Last summer Luiz and Alonso were panic buys as well. If it weren't for Conte working hard to get them punching above their weight, we'd have had a terrible season. I give Marina and co ZERO credit for Alonso and Luiz doing well for us last year.

If it happens once, you can just put it down to bad luck. But if it happens more than once, it's time to accept that they're incompetent and they need to go. Peter Kenyon never had problems closing deals like this. For the life of me, even Ron Gourlay got things done when we needed to.

I think it's time to hire someone who'll do a better job. It's probably not going to happen considering how close Marina is to Roman but I sure f**king hope it does. How much more of this can we take? We've fallen behind Europe's elite in the past 4 years and we keep bottling every opportunity to get back up there. I can't be the only one of this mindset.

How can you debate someone who doesn't know what a fact is?

Oh I didn't even mention Danilo whom we could have wrapped up easily and quickly.

Just now, cuppaT said:

How can you debate someone who doesn't know what a fact is?

I don't know.....you could start by pointing out why/how I'm wrong.

You say it exactly right.

And for Sandro case. We should have send 1-2-3 offers and if we see all of them rejected, then wait a bit, send 1 more, if they reject and this, just ask for the price or move on. That is.

The player we missed and surely know for them are this: Lukaku, Danilo, Walker, Mendy, Sandro, Oxlade,

Incredibly incompetent, the other day they ran out of Brasso to buff up the trophy cabinet ! Arseholes !  

Here we go...

See if it wasnt for the shambles arsenal are in id be loosing my mind. 

The biggest problem isnt the fact of buying its selling all the youth. Take lukaku matic and kdb all 3 have came back to bite us in the arse.

Now ake,chalobah and solanke are all playing for decent teams that will come back to bite us if not cost us a fortune to buy back.

 

Oh then theres costa lets not forget about costa that situation has been handled so badly its a joke.

For f**k's sake.

1 hour ago, Barrettinator said:

Oh I didn't even mention Danilo whom we could have wrapped up easily and quickly.

he wanted to go to man city and play under pep. you can google his quotes. 

Cant get my head around people actually giving excuses for us going for the drinkwaters and barkleys,

few injuries and we are royally screwed 

49 minutes ago, enigma said:

he wanted to go to man city and play under pep. you can google his quotes. 

City were not interested in him early on. We should have closed the deal then but the board was faffing around for £2m difference with real.

The only problem is that we didn't scout multiple options and started buying early. Danilo rejected us to go to City, Ox rejected us to go to Liverpool, Lukaku rejected us to go to Man Utd. Nothing the board can do. The problem is within our scouting network. We don't have multiple options when we lose one option and we don't offer at early stage of the transfer window and wait until the end.

It's a myth we never use to miss out on deals, we did plenty of times. 

2 hours ago, TheAwesomeGem said:

The only problem is that we didn't scout multiple options and started buying early. Danilo rejected us to go to City, Ox rejected us to go to Liverpool, Lukaku rejected us to go to Man Utd. Nothing the board can do. The problem is within our scouting network. We don't have multiple options when we lose one option and we don't offer at early stage of the transfer window and wait until the end.

Danilo wanted to join us until late July when Pep and City came into the picture and offered more money. What stopped us from wrapping up that deal in early June? A flimsy £2m difference with Madrid. Despite the huge chest of cash we had at our disposal, Marina was faffing about over £2m. It's become an ego thing for her now and it as officially bitten us in the arse way more times than it has benefited us. Same with Lukaku. We could have wrapped it up as soon as the window opened if we weren't being lazy. Going after Ox in the first place shows our desperation. At the beginning of the window, there were at least 5 RWB options MUCH better than Ox. Even up until the past week there were a lot of other options. It's f**king pathetic.

I think of your 10 really only 7 were first teamers, and I also think Terry and Ivan were subsequently at the end of tehir shelf life.

If you'd have told em we would have added in Morata, Bakayoko, and Rudiger, Brought back Christensen (and lets imagine we sign one more top player) I would have been very happy with that.  I think we are a little light, but I also think we are sending a message that we won't be bullied into paying way over the odds.

The only thing I'd say the board are at fault for is letting players go before we have a replacement.  But, at the same time, if we buy then try sell our sales could be negotiated down as the buying team know that we no longer need that player.  It's the flip side of letting players go then clubs know we are desperate to buy.

Also, if we don't add this summer, but do in the January transfer window, (assuming we haven't been knocked out of the CL at that time) I don't think overall it's too bad.

21 minutes ago, mad_mac said:

I think of your 10 really only 7 were first teamers, and I also think Terry and Ivan were subsequently at the end of tehir shelf life.

If you'd have told em we would have added in Morata, Bakayoko, and Rudiger, Brought back Christensen (and lets imagine we sign one more top player) I would have been very happy with that.  I think we are a little light, but I also think we are sending a message that we won't be bullied into paying way over the odds.

The only thing I'd say the board are at fault for is letting players go before we have a replacement.  But, at the same time, if we buy then try sell our sales could be negotiated down as the buying team know that we no longer need that player.  It's the flip side of letting players go then clubs know we are desperate to buy.

Also, if we don't add this summer, but do in the January transfer window, (assuming we haven't been knocked out of the CL at that time) I don't think overall it's too bad.

Fair points but Terry and Brana were still members of the squad that could be called upon at any point if we'd been short due to injuries or suspension.

We're really light and it's disappointing that our board haven't taken this more seriously. If they did, we'd have our feet up in the air eating popcorn on deadline day rather than panic buying.

3 minutes ago, Barrettinator said:

Fair points but Terry and Brana were still members of the squad that could be called upon at any point if we'd been short due to injuries or suspension.

We're really light and it's disappointing that our board haven't taken this more seriously. If they did, we'd have our feet up in the air eating popcorn on deadline day rather than panic buying.

I think they were serious but are incompetent. Cant see it being otherwise.

We had a brilliant chance this summer to set ourselves up for the next 5 seasons (just like we had that chance in 2015) but now Conte will leave sometime this season and we would be back to the starting point.

42 minutes ago, mad_mac said:

Also, if we don't add this summer, but do in the January transfer window, (assuming we haven't been knocked out of the CL at that time) I don't think overall it's too bad.

The board is even less inclined to spend in January compared to the summer transfer window.  Also, there are no good players available in January as clubs aren't willing to sell their better players and the cup tie factor.

Edited August 31, 20178 yr by lchk

Fear not the blame will fall on conte and then all will seem right for a short while again...

As I don't know all the details about negotiating and so on it is impossible to slate someone. However the fact is we are 3-4 players short of what is needed. We have let players go to make space for these 3-4 players but forgot to fill the space.

To me Conte has done HIS job excellently someone else has dropped the ball.

Last day of the window so lets see what happens.

7 hours ago, Jamjar1986 said:

Cant get my head around people actually giving excuses for us going for the drinkwaters and barkleys,

But the OP of this thread says its NOT emenalo and target selection its all on the person negotiating with the targets he chose. The targets we apparently never even tried for.

Whatever our position is in the end of the campaing, if Conte leave, then the board messed big big time. I love Conte, great manager and want him to stay for long, long period, but i think he will be gone at the end of the season and i`m almost 100% sure in that. Atleast from his interview. He was trying to push them to make signing, by saying we need both quality and depth and not just 1 or 2 players, and he said that many times, also that he didn`t want Matic to be sold, and all that stuff make stress to the team, we lose to Burnley he see that and he try to lower ithe stress down. And he was starting saying, he is just a coach, not a manager and he is okay with the team.

If he leave Juventus for less i just don`t see how he will stay with us. It`s obviously he is not happy with the board and how the things work in the club.

That`s the main problem for me. Conte is that type of coach, that make players, looks a lot better, then they are, to play above their levels. And what happen if he leave? The next one with such players could fall hard.

Look at City and United, and how much quality they have in starting 11 and how much quality they have in the bench. We are so, so far behind them.

CB: Rudiger, Luis, Cahill, Christensen, Azpi

WB: Moses, Alonso, and reserve like injured Baba and Kenedy who s*** in defence.

CM: Kante, Bakayoko, Cesk

Wingers: Willian, Hazard, Pedro and Musonda, who can`t get regular starts at Real Betis.

Strikers: Batshuay and Morata

That`s a 15 senior players. Tell me other team with just 3 CM ? Just one.

Sorry but to me top team got to have 2 players in each position, and in the mid even more. Without counting youngs, who will probably play in a finished match 70+ minutes and in the Cup games.

Top team trying to defend the title and compete in CL, should not count on players like Kenedy, Musonda, Tumori and Kyle Scott and so on. Players that can`t get regular starts in a relegation team in Primera ....

They should be deep cover. Not guys that will come and save your season in injuries, tiredness, lost form, rotatation and so on.

Look at City option in the attacking position:
Gundogan, Toure, Fernando, Fernandinho, Delph, Bernardo Silva, David Silva, Sane, Sterling, De Bruyne, Jesus and Aguero, and they are for more players.

And they have 3 very good WB options.

And United:
Pogba, Herrera, Matic, Felaini, Mkhitaryan, Carrick, Mata, Rashford, Lingard, Young, Martial, Lukaku and Ibrahimovic.

So City have 15 options other then defense, United have 13, we have just 8. Just check the diffferents and quality on the bench and the starters they have and we have.

 

 

People weren't complaining when she got super prices for Ramires, Oscar and the like but now we aren't signing a ton and we aren't allowed to criticise emenalo so on to the next named board member we know.