Village Idiot

We were never seriously linked with him though. It was always Dembelé, and Mbappé only being mentioned when Dortmund played hardball.

Bollocks. London clubs pay more seeing as it costs 2 grand a month to live in a shed, here. Its well known Northern clubs have had to pay more to get bigger players. Foreign players mostly, as they have more amenities available, don't think British players are as bothered. I think plenty of British players are bothered, but I think it's more the ones who have never spent more than 10 minutes in Newcastle that just assume it's a barren wasteland full of dole monkeys and bh home bargains's's. Basically they think the North is just an array of Sunderlands. I really don't agree, most Brits from other parts of the country see Newcastle as the premier northern city, the sunderlands and middlesbroughs are like the bogs and marshes on the way. Or maybe that's just my perception, I always thought we were a little bit special and everyone else saw us like Kevin Keegan did. He did great when managing Málaga and Villarreal, but struggled at really big clubs like Madrid or City. I'm not sure what went wrong for him at City (although he did win stuff), but at Madrid he just couldn't handle the politics. He's very tactically-minded - he's not called "the engineer" for nowt - but I don't mean that as an euphemism for "defensive", his teams always had a fair bit of flair. Think of him as a less extreme, non-insane, version of Bielsa.

Random jocularity.

"on the verge"? We cancelled his signing at the very last minute last season!

Our track record signing unknown Brazilians (in Europe) is downright awful. Hope we buck the trend for once. He's one of the reasons we sold Paulinho, since we had to free up a non-EU player slot.

You might win the WC...

Knowing him, he probably sees managing his country as a great honor. He can always snatch a bench at a decent Spanish club, the national team only rings once.

It was probably the best option among available Spanish managers.

€400m is the release fee. Not really much to do if PSG matches that. We reportedly turned down the €270m.

Well, Luís Enrique appointed as Spain coach.

We'd probably waste most of it, but surely we could nail at least one or two decent signings. Also there's the Camp Nou renovation. That sale would pay for all of it and with €100m remaining.

I'd think so. And I think he'll be class for us once he's settled. He already showed flashes of what he can do during the half season he had.

Spanish FA wants to appoint Luís Enrique as national coach, but apparently he has an unnamed offer from the Premier League.

I presume they are going to sell Neymar/Mbappé and want a replacement. Release fee is €400m, if they oblige I'll drive Coutinho to Paris myself.

PSG bids €270m for Coutinho, according to our press.

Any deal involving Barça and Brazilians usually is. Coutinho seems off the hook though.

Also Paulinho gets to nearly double his wages. Man, I really don't get China.

Paulinho was good for us, but the deal is a good deal. Not sure about Willian. He's had a class season for sure, but he's going to cost loads and I'd rather get somebody with more years ahead in his prime. Rabiot I'm not too sure about. He seems to go missing in about half the games I have seen him play - while being class in the other half.

No idea. Depends on what midfield we end up with after this window.

Looks like we might sell Paulinho back to China for €50m. A profit! He's beat expectations and done well for us, but we should sell him while we can, particularly at that price.

He won't start for Real Sociedad either. They lack depth though, so he'll get chances for sure.

Great player, but how long will they get out of him, 2 years and 25 + league goals a season? Is it simply for the prestige/shirt sales or such? He could potentially win them a champions league with how good his record is in the knockout rounds of that competition. No reason he won’t still be scoring a decent amount of goals for 3-4 years in a dominant Juve side in the Serie A too. Personally I don't think adding Ronaldo alone turns Juve into CL candidates unless they improve elsewhere. They'd secure their stranglehold on the Serie A title, for sure.

Rather they buy Neymar than Mbappé, fwiw. That performance against Argentina has to be one of the great WC performances of the past decade or two. That boy is so going to dominate football.

Yep, Marca claim that it has been agreed with the player, and they are essentially Pérez's mouthpiece. They probably need that cash to buy either one of Neymar/Mbpappé from PSG. Whoever goes further in the WC is my bet.