More transfer rumours

[macphisto]

3 minutes ago, Shak said:

Seeing the Lodi link and remembering that Digne was supposedly our first choice at LB in January, I do wonder if eventually Howe sees us playing three at the back. Might be the hesitancy on Targett, he's been pretty solid on the ball since joining but I don't know if he has enough about him to play wing back.

 

Trippier and Lodi would be a very interesting wing back duo.

We also apparently put a bid in for Gosens in January too.

[The College Dropout]

28 minutes ago, macphisto said:

100% agree about going for real quality. I know it doesn't apply to all players and you can get quality free transfers, etc. but I do think the graph below shows you where Everton have gone wrong. Buying a lot of £20 million players is false economy as you end up buying as many bad players as good ones or players who are not an improvement on what you already have. I'm not saying it's the only reason for Everton's struggles but it does partially explain the trouble they are in.

 

I'd much rather go for real quality over quantity.

 

 

Everton also have had inferior managers, different managers with different approaches. But I agree quality is #1. No point signing players for 6-8 from now. It's about signing players for the CL. That's Bruno, that's Trippier. That's Lodi.

 

But I don't think we'll cap the number. We can improve in every area and will try to sign players for the right deals. The 50m Lodi figure for a non-urgent position indicates that. If the right striker becomes available at 70m we will go for it. The only position i think we'll be forced to just try and get a body in is ST and maybe RW.

[TheInfiniteOdyssey]

33 minutes ago, Nine said:

The thing is the standard of our squad right now is not even close to being enough to finish in a CL spot next season, it would take a mass turnover of players to achieve that goal.. far to many for one window. We also need to strengthen again on top of that for the demands of the extra European ties which are all against high quality teams to.

Agree, you would think that the two arguments are completely contradictory.

 

However, perhaps Howe has such faith in his coaching qualities and that of his wider team that he can extract even more out of certain players.

 

Most of our players look completely reinvigorated under Howe and perhaps there’s a wider realisation in the squad in these past few months that they can achieve something spectacular in their career if they seize their opportunities now.

 

Just to clarify though, personally I’d say this team are absolutely miles off CL and not even top 10 quality. 

[sushimonster85]

51 minutes ago, TheInfiniteOdyssey said:

To date, the message has been from the club that this will be a gradual rebuild, which lends support for players like Shelvey, Fraser, Schar etc continuing at the club for the next couple seasons as the squad redevelops.

 

However, the comments from Bruno’s agent suggest that the plan presented to prospective signings is far more ambitious and immediate i.e. targeting CL qualification. With the greatest of respect to the mentioned players, they’re not going to get you to that aim.

 

Think the truth likely lies somewhere in the middle. The club are always going to try and play down the speed of the rebuild, or else transfer fees (and fan expectations) get more inflated than they already are for us. But to players we want to attract we are likely presenting what we hope to be the best case scenario. 

 

I imagine the likes of Shelvey, Fraser, Schar, Wilson, Wood etc to all be in the squad next season, and potentially the season after. The goal will be getting to the stage where they're the squad players, rather than starting every week. 

[sushimonster85]

4 minutes ago, TheInfiniteOdyssey said:

Just to clarify though, personally I’d say this team are absolutely miles off CL and not even top 10 quality. 

 

I'd say they're 11th - 9th quality. They're over-performing now, but lets not kid ourselves that this was the worst squad of players in the league before the takeover. Bruce had them chronically under-performing/wasn't picking the best players. Even without any Summer investment, a Howe coached 11 of:

 

Dub

 

Trippier

Schar

Burn

Targett (ok, let me have him for this purpose)

 

Joelinton

Bruno

Willock

 

Max

Wilson

Fraser

 

would have a good shout at top ten. 

[TheInfiniteOdyssey]

Just now, sushimonster85 said:

 

Think the truth likely lies somewhere in the middle. The club are always going to try and play down the speed of the rebuild, or else transfer fees (and fan expectations) get more inflated than they already are for us. But to players we want to attract we are likely presenting what we hope to be the best case scenario. 

 

I imagine the likes of Shelvey, Fraser, Schar, Wilson, Wood etc to all be in the squad next season, and potentially the season after. The goal will be getting to the stage where they're the squad players, rather than starting every week. 

Yeah that’s how I read it too.

 

 

 

Another good thing about Bruno’s success and his agent telling the world is that it demonstrates to other players, and perhaps more crucially their representatives, that Newcastle is a viable place to go to further their ambitions.

 

With the impending arrival of Ashworth, as well as a new CEO, I’m fully expecting the club to deepen their relationships within football networks and markets in the coming months and years.

This is both a blessing and a curse obviously, no doubt we’ll be offered some terrible options by agents on eye-watering wages, but we’re in that mix now and that’s what’s most exciting about it all.

[Hanshithispantz]

I've completely changed my tune on the needs of the squad tbh, last January I thought we needed to completely overhaul our midfield but now I think the best thing going forward is to continue strengthening from the back. Obviously we need a striker too. 

 

Basically I'm hoping for a GK, CB (at least 1) & a CF who could arguably walk into any team on the planet. Strengthening other areas with youth and/or smart buys.

[Mike]

I signed Lodi as a bairn from Brazil in FM so I'm an expert. He's class.

 

I've seen him twice live, mind.

[The Prophet]

Our biggest problem at present is a chronic lack of creativity. We've been getting by on set piece routines and being clinical enough on the counter. 

[AyeDubbleYoo]

I think Bruno was originally signed to play the deeper Shelvey role that he occupied against Norwich, so it’ll be interesting to see what midfielders we go for. 
 

Shelvey as backup for Bruno is probably alright, if Bruno plays the vast majority of PL games. 

[AyeDubbleYoo]

Just now, The Prophet said:

Our biggest problem at present is a chronic lack of creativity. We've been getting by on set piece routines and being clinical enough on the counter. 

Yeah, and ball retention as well, guess the two go together to some extent.
 

Bruno signing fills me with confidence though, they couldn’t have identified a more perfect set of attributes for what we need. 

[The Prophet]

Just now, AyeDubbleYoo said:

Yeah, and ball retention as well, guess the two go together to some extent.
 

Bruno signing fills me with confidence though, they couldn’t have identified a more perfect set of attributes for what we need. 

 

Totally agree. Bruno was pretty much the perfect flagship signing.

[DahnSahf]

20 minutes ago, Mike said:

I signed Lodi as a bairn from Brazil in FM so I'm an expert. He's class.

 

I've seen him twice live, mind.

 

Oh Lord, stuck on Lodi again.

[Keegans Export]

40 minutes ago, The College Dropout said:

Everton also have had inferior managers, different managers with different approaches. But I agree quality is #1. No point signing players for 6-8 from now. It's about signing players for the CL. That's Bruno, that's Trippier. That's Lodi.

 

But I don't think we'll cap the number. We can improve in every area and will try to sign players for the right deals. The 50m Lodi figure for a non-urgent position indicates that. If the right striker becomes available at 70m we will go for it. The only position i think we'll be forced to just try and get a body in is ST and maybe RW.

 

The thing with FFP is that we can't spend £300m on players to get us into the top 8, then another £300m to get us into the top six then another £300m to get us into the top four - at least not if the aim is to do that in less than 8-10 seasons.

 

So to an extent we have to be ambitious and try to sell the dream (like we did with Bruno) and buy players that are already top 4-6 quality already because if we spend a huge chunk of our available funds (limited by FFP) on players that are just a bit better than what we have, it's then going to be difficult to find the funds to upgrade all those players in 2/3 seasons.

 

Obviously there has to be flexibility as we saw in January (the Wood signing is a great example) and if we are really struggling to bring in a priority target (eg Gosens, Lodi) then we just move for a stop-gap (eg Targett) but I think that we might see us really push for players like Bruno who will hopefully be part of the hypothetical top-4 Newcastle squad of 2024/25 (or whenever)

[Ikon]

I reckon that Trippier and Lodi are a step above Ritchie and Krafth at fullback. 

[Ikon]

One thing regarding quality vs quantity is that if we get the right quality players in right away then hopefully we dont need to replace half the squad again to get to the next level. Go mostly for players of high quality but players than can still grow with the club bot age and quality wise. Buy it nice or buy it twice.  We obviously need a few players but Rome wasn’t built in a day. Clichy cunt me like..

 

Get the starting eleven as good as possible in 2-3 windows, and use many of the current players as backup to begin with, with maybe a super promising youngster or two. 
 

Get Ashworth in to sort out the whole infrastructure and make our academy very good by getting in tons of quality youngsters through the scouting staff and various contacts. We will spend a lot in the beginning now but in a few years we will have some promising quality players coming through hopefully.

[Keegans Export]

8 minutes ago, Ikon said:

One thing regarding quality vs quantity is that if we get the right quality players in right away then hopefully we dont need to replace half the squad again to get to the next level. Go mostly for players of high quality but players than can still grow with the club bot age and quality wise. Buy it nice or buy it twice.  We obviously need a few players but Rome wasn’t built in a day. Clichy cunt me like..

 

Get the starting eleven as good as possible in 2-3 windows, and use many of the current players as backup to begin with, with maybe a super promising youngster or two. 
 

Get Ashworth in to sort out the whole infrastructure and make our academy very good by getting in tons of quality youngsters through the scouting staff and various contacts. We will spend a lot in the beginning now but in a few years we will have some promising quality players coming through hopefully.

That's absolutely how I feel and hopefully it's how Staveley etc feel too.

 

The point is whether signing players better than lower-half PL level (Krafth, arguably Richie isn't even that good) but not quite CL-level is worth it, if our ambition is to become a top four side within four or five years. Players like Targett would fall into that category and although £15m isn't a lot in todays market, that still eats into our FFP-limited available spend and we'd probably have to replace him within a couple of seasons.

 

It's a pretty bold strategy and it could easily fail if we don't buy well - then you end up with players who were promised a certain level of success (eg Bruno) who want to leave because we are still languishing in midtable and players who ultimately weren't good enough to get us to the top level that we'd have to try and shift (maybe someone like Nunez comes in for £70m on £170k/week and is a total bust).

 

Edit - I still have to pinch myself that we're even able to speculate about things like this, imagine having this conversation back in September...

 

 

Edited April 27, 2022 by Keegans Export

[Slim]

19 minutes ago, Keegans Export said:

 

The thing with FFP is that we can't spend £300m on players to get us into the top 8, then another £300m to get us into the top six then another £300m to get us into the top four - at least not if the aim is to do that in less than 8-10 seasons.

 

So to an extent we have to be ambitious and try to sell the dream (like we did with Bruno) and buy players that are already top 4-6 quality already because if we spend a huge chunk of our available funds (limited by FFP) on players that are just a bit better than what we have, it's then going to be difficult to find the funds to upgrade all those players in 2/3 seasons.

 

Obviously there has to be flexibility as we saw in January (the Wood signing is a great example) and if we are really struggling to bring in a priority target (eg Gosens, Lodi) then we just move for a stop-gap (eg Targett) but I think that we might see us really push for players like Bruno who will hopefully be part of the hypothetical top-4 Newcastle squad of 2024/25 (or whenever)

We actually can.

[Unlucky Luque]

18 minutes ago, Ikon said:

I reckon that Trippier and Lodi are a step above Ritchie and Krafth at fullback. 

Controversial, but brave statement.

[The College Dropout]

Signing a £50m fullback suggests a push for European football next season and a CL push the following season.

[Keegans Export]

2 minutes ago, Slim said:

We actually can.

I'm pretty sure we can't, unless we repeatedly manage to sell players for more than their market value when they need to be replaced.

 

If we spend £300m this coming season (between summer and January windows), even if they're all spread over 5 year contracts, that's still £60m this season, then £60m amortisation in each of the following four seasons, which reduces our available spend by the same amount (eg if we made £100m profit, we'd actually only have £40m to spend due to that amortisation still appearing on the accounts). Obviously that's an oversimplification but that is my understanding of how FFP works.

[Guest HTT II]

My number one target would be Tammy Abraham of Roma who can play wide right, wide left or centrally in a 3, in a two or as the single focal point up front on his own, he has scored goals everywhere he’s went at numerous levels. He’s quick, strong, athletic, adaptable and has a great attitude and character and he’s still very young.

Appearances/Goals 

 

2016–2021 Chelsea 58 (21)

2016–2017 Bristol City (loan) 41 (23)

2017–2018 Swansea City (loan) 31 (5)

2018–2019 Aston Villa (loan) 37 (25)

2021–present Roma 33 (15)

 

National team

 

2014–2015 England U18 5 (2)

2015–2016 England U19 14 (5)

2016–2019 England U21 25 (9)

2017–present England 10 (3)

114 goals in 255 cub career games thus far, a lot of those games which were from the bench, Championship, Premier League, Serie A

 

 

Edited April 27, 2022 by HTT II

[Ikon]

Just now, The College Dropout said:

Signing a £50m fullback suggests a push for European football next season and a CL push the following season.

If true then most definitely. Especially since we have a very good option available for about £15m who has done really well. This would mean that the ambition of the owners is ridiculous high. No waiting, just going for it big time straight away. Time will tell.

[NUFCPAUL]

1 hour ago, Hanshithispantz said:

I've completely changed my tune on the needs of the squad tbh, last January I thought we needed to completely overhaul our midfield but now I think the best thing going forward is to continue strengthening from the back. Obviously we need a striker too. 

 

Basically I'm hoping for a GK, CB (at least 1) & a CF who could arguably walk into any team on the planet. Strengthening other areas with youth and/or smart buys.

Who do you suggest as the striker?

[Nine]

 

Might be worth keeping an eye on this one