Shadow Puppets

The Sky Germany guy seems to be the only one suggesting Man Utd will match our offer. Everyone else just seems to say they’re “trying”.

Selling Isak (who appears hell bent and desperate to join Liverpool and never play for us again) and replacing him (and Wilson) with a proven PL goalscorer and one of Europe’s most in demand young players would be a “shocking indictment”? Come on man. (Unless of course you’re only pissed off that’s it’s Liverpool specifically? I am too… but it appears to be the only club he is pushing for)

Woke up to texts from a few of the usual sources saying we’re pushing really hard to get this agreed in the next 72 hours. They want him in for the weekend. (All usual caveats apply… I’m just passing on some info from decent sources) EDIT: seems like Craig Hope has had similar information…

🤷‍♂️

Not according to him. He says the bid isn’t “new”… we’ve told them for the past week that we’re willing to pay whatever the asking price is.

Romano in his latest video (uploaded 20 mins ago) says nothing has changed… player still hasn’t decided and Man Utd still working on it too. He also says we told Leipzig what we were willing to pay a week ago, so (according to him) our “bid” has been known for a week.

I’d love you to be right, but that only happens if we don’t get a replacement.

Of course they’re going to bid again. We get Sesko, Isak will go, no doubt about it.

?

I mean that would be class, but I can’t see it!

I mean, if that’s true, that’s pretty huge news, but it’s definitely imperative that we get the Wissa one over the line too. We need someone with experience.

This all seems very much bollocks, but I’ll take it.

I mean, I know I’ve shared a lot of my own views and some from behind the scenes in the last few days, but imagine how mint it would be if we somehow announced a new contract and number 9 shirt before next weekends friendlies 😁

I mean, that would be lovely and all, but I don't believe it for a second.

I'm not saying we accept it today and move on... I'm saying we can't let the whole thing drag on into late in the window.

I still don't understand that argument. Surely signing two almost guaranteed premier league goalscorers is exactly what will help build our revenue long term. And I don't buy that, if Watkins and Wissa performed well for two years for us, we couldn't recoup a decent chunk of change from someone... Saudi or wherever. We need to attack this season with the aim of another Top 5 or 6 finish. In my opinion, we aren't going to remotely give ourselves the best chance with unproven players like the Porto lad or Sesko. We're much more likely to have a couple of good years, with players who WANT to be here, with players like Watkins or Wissa. Both, also, crucially have good fitness records.

Please explain? We don't NEED to sell Isak, no. But we most certainly aren't rolling in it from a PSR point of view and most definitely need to not go into the season with a player who doesn't want to be here and who's massively pissed off (some of) his teammates and staff. I don't see any feasible way for him to still be our player by the end of the window and for it to go well. It's most definitely our problem like.

I'd be VERY surprised if he's still here at the end of the window, yeah. The chatter I was hearing last night was how pissed off some of his teammates and staff are at him. Not really sure how he feasibly comes back from this to be honest.

I get where you're coming from, but at the same time the longer this drags on, the bigger the shit we're going to find ourselves in in terms of any form of adequate replacements.

His highlight reels and "last 50 shots" reels are OK, but I'd much rather have Watkins and Wissa. for the next 2 years and then scout the shit out of finding "another Isak".

If he scores 15-20 goals a season for the next couple of years and it fires us into Europe again, and we cash in for £25m-£30m, isn’t that a risk worth taking, PSR or no PSR. Also, who knows what the landscape looks like in terms of PSR in 2-3 years time. Who’s to say the rules aren’t relaxed slightly and/or we have a bigger commercial income so it matters less?

We don’t have to sell him, no. You’re right. But I’m sick to fucking death of hearing about him now. He (or his agent) has clearly fucked us over. Extract as much money as we can (hopefully north of £135m), and let’s get some players who actually want to play for us who can score goals, with good injury records.

If Isak goes, to me Ollie Watkins and Yoane Wissa are about as perfect as you can get to guaranteeing PL goals. Don’t get the hate at all. Re: Watkins, I admittedly don’t fully understand PSR, but why would it be PSR suicide? £60m on a 29 year old who scores tonnes of goals… even if we get two good, European qualifying, years out of him and sold him in a couple of years for £40m… isn’t that better than taking a £70m risk on some random kid who’s had a decent season in Porto or Leipzig who may or may not become a great player? All I know is Watkins + Wissa excites me a lot of more than Sesko + Wissa, and excites me more than keeping a disgruntled Isak.

Nothing that you wouldn’t expect really, but some of his teammates are really really annoyed with how he’s going about this, as well as some of the staff that I know. Not sure on what the management / execs think, but he’s burning through bridges very quickly it seems. And again, as I said a few days ago, the feeling is it’s very very out of character.