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Dirty Dealings or Hard Business


Guest sicko2ndbest

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Guest sicko2ndbest

We are getting a big reputation for aggressively pursuing targets. Most of our targets either

 

a) have buyout clauses which we manage to find out about without anyone else knowing

 

or

 

b) have arguements with the hierachy of their clubs and demand to leave

 

We also take the piss on our opening bids, before giving a take it or leave it offer.

 

We must have a raft of intermediataries who sound players out?

 

I know these tactics have had huge success over the past few years but i do worry our reputation may at some point lead to teams not wanting to deal with us.

 

In summarising, is this strategy going to lead to short term gain but ultimately long term pain??

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Pardew was complaining earlier that clubs keep trying to price us out of moves or something, so maybe backlash already. Having said that I don't think being crafty is a bad thing ultimately and will serve us much better than our clueless years. I hope rather than 'dirty' we get a reputation like Udinese for digging up great bargains. Less the selling part though...

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It's not even hard business. It's just normal business really. Why should we submit bids too high from the off or not sound out talented players with contract release clauses?

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If it means surviving in a world that increasingly favours the selling club and the mega rich, so be it.

 

Exactly, we can't compete for money (and in some ways I'm glad we're getting success without being soulless moneybags buying anyone and everyone, though a little more success would be nice...) so we have to compete anyway way we can

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Guest sicko2ndbest

Im all for it, and theres a definite sense of pride in unearthing gems and moulding a side on a modest budget

 

Our current buying policy seems to be very similar to the stance taken by MA and his business aquisitions and he dosnt seem to be the most popular.

 

Would hate us to gain a poor reputation as a result, but then again i suppose Arsenal have been doing similar for years

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It's a pretty ruthless and cut-throat way to sign/keep players but that's for Ashley and Llambias to deal with. I'm glad we're not a soft touch but we can't complain if selling clubs play the same game and we lose out on targets we go for. Turnabout's fair play. 

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I don't think we're behaving any worse than anyone else, and probably better than some.

 

Although clubs aren't supposed to contact players, agents approach clubs and are approached by them, and that's how it works. If you don't do it, you get left behind.

 

Where I think we do well is work out in advance which players are nearing the end of their contracts and might become available cheaply. Over a long period, we then work on attracting those players to the club. We don't reach the end of the season and then start chucking money around on players who happen to have acquired big reputations over the previous few months. Pro-active rather than reactive.

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17m for Owen. Cant remember exact numbers for Luque. 8m for boom-shite.  Shall I go on?

 

Very happy with current policy.

 

Anyway most clubs are at it - Harry/Ba. It seems to be the modern day tapping tactics. Play the game or loose out.

 

Credit where it is due to MA and Co.

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Guest BooBoo

Three times we've bid for players this year and been told publically that our bid "wasn't serious".

 

I'm all for cutting a good deal but I'm not sure what the point is of these uber low bids

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Think it's excellent. It goes against the way a lot of teams do business in football (throwing money around, basically), but it's nothing earth shattering. We evaluate talent, determine our own value, and then stick to it. In the past, silly money was thrown at players to get them here. That's not necessary. This is an incredible club with a majestic stadium playing in the most popular league in the world. We're finally using that to our advantage. When you combine that with the talented and together dressing room that we've built (partially by chance), it becomes a pretty attractive place.

 

We have also been opportunistic and move quickly when a deal presents itself. Ashley and company have fucked up a lot of things and they still deserve blame for the relegation, tacky advertising, and the stadium renaming. But beyond that it's an incredible time to be a fan of this club. Long may it continue.

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It's not even hard business. It's just normal business really. Why should we submit bids too high from the off or not sound out talented players with contract release clauses?

 

This is a good point. Are we just asking questions about this method because we're so not used to playing a bit of hardball? As far as I can see we're not being much harsher than other clubs, we're just not the pushovers we're used to being.

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Three times we've bid for players this year and been told publically that our bid "wasn't serious".

 

I'm all for cutting a good deal but I'm not sure what the point is of these uber low bids

 

the point is to unsettle the player so he makes things difficult for his current club. all a sudden their hand has been forced. we even used this same strategy saving pittance when it came to buying rob elliott from Charlton, who promptly reported us to the relevant authority.

 

can't say i'm entirely comfortable with the strategy but you can't deny it yields results. thing is - we just can't then turn around and be all precious and uppity if, for example, harry redknapp ever did the same thing to, i dunno, our then star striker.

 

saying that redknapp is still a cunt.

 

I also think the policy has another use - we seem to simultaneously make enquiries for a number of different players and weigh up the responses to determine who to pursue further.

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Don't we look after agents a lot more than we used to? Put them up in nice Hotels and that? This has been an approach used by clubs for a while, Shakhtar Donestk are one example. Certainly we seem to be 'playing the game' with agents a bit more than we used to. Definitely an Ashley thing as evidenced by the initial appointments of Tony Jiminez and Jeff Vetere and the Nacho Gonzalez affair. Its good (and smart) to see us greasing the wheel. Look at the turnover league table. This is one way of us at least being able to attempt to level the playing field.

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Don't we look after agents a lot more than we used to? Put them up in nice Hotels and that? This has been an approach used by clubs for a while, Shakhtar Donestk are one example. Certainly we seem to be 'playing the game' with agents a bit more than we used to. Definitely an Ashley thing as evidenced by the initial appointments of Tony Jiminez and Jeff Vetere and the Nacho Gonzalez affair. Its good (and smart) to see us greasing the wheel. Look at the turnover league table. This is one way of us at least being able to attempt to level the playing field.

 

Not sure what I'm basing this on, but I thought we had gone the other way in the post-Wise/Vetere/Keegan disaster.

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I think its getting increasingly hard for us. Our team has being doing a ridiculous job in negotiating for players, however we now have a reputation for it which means clubs are getting more and more prepared to deal with us. I think all hard business involves a little dirty dealing to work.

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Don't we look after agents a lot more than we used to? Put them up in nice Hotels and that? This has been an approach used by clubs for a while, Shakhtar Donestk are one example. Certainly we seem to be 'playing the game' with agents a bit more than we used to. Definitely an Ashley thing as evidenced by the initial appointments of Tony Jiminez and Jeff Vetere and the Nacho Gonzalez affair. Its good (and smart) to see us greasing the wheel. Look at the turnover league table. This is one way of us at least being able to attempt to level the playing field.

 

Not sure what I'm basing this on, but I thought we had gone the other way in the post-Wise/Vetere/Keegan disaster.

 

I think they just make better decisions on who to grease up. :lol:

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