João Pedro

[Ikon]

Taking everything with a massive pinch of salt like. Can only speak about the links hypothetically. 

[STM]

12 hours ago, Whitley mag said:

Seems mixed messages to me on one hand Howe says we can’t sign established stars, yet for me that’s exactly  what Pedro, Cunha and Mbeumo are with prices to match.

 

We don’t have the income of the cartel clubs, but seem loathe to take a risk on signings like this Greek lad.

 

The cartel clubs are quite happy to let other clubs take the risk and then pay the premium, we seem caught between two stools for me.

 

Can’t blame a manager for not taking risks when you’re under pressure after 2 defeats these days, but we seem very risk averse with this PL experience approach.

 

 

 

 

When he said established stars, he actually meant players who are already on huge wages and at big clubs. I remember the question.

[80]

1 hour ago, SUPERTOON said:

We also saw how well Howe rotated Isak and Wilson a couple of years back when we finished 4th. 

That rotation was mostly injury inspired... We were extremely lucky that they kept timing their injuries just as the other was returning to fitness from a long layoff that season.

[Sibierski]

Injury inspired or not, it showed that the workload can be split between two good strikers for the benefit of the side, and that’s only going to get more this season.
 

Especially since we’re showing more that we will target domestic cups too and never write them off. 
 

Whether Pedro is the man or not, a £30m+ outlay on a striker feels inevitable.

[SUPERTOON]

23 minutes ago, 80 said:

That rotation was mostly injury inspired... We were extremely lucky that they kept timing their injuries just as the other was returning to fitness from a long layoff that season.

Not for the run in, he rotated well in games against West Ham, Everton, Southampton i remember off the top of my head. Played them together at times as well. 

[southernmag]

1 hour ago, NSG said:

Staggered some people see having two competent forwards as having a first choice and a back up.

 

We’ll play nigh on 60 games next season. We saw what happened to Isak in the last third of this season when he played every game.

 

A second striker is a must.

 

You might be less staggered if you make fewer assumptions about what people are saying.

 

I'm not questioning whether we need a 'second striker' (aka a back up...), I'm questioning whether we need to spend 60 mill on one. You may think we do, but there's no need to be staggered by someone having an alternate opinion.

 

The fact is there are far, far cheaper alternatives. Are there many better than Joao Pedro? Probably not, but that doesn't automatically mean we should just go and blow half our budget on a (pardon my profanity) back up.

 

Would be nice if people could have different opinions on here (and negative thoughts about our club in some areas) without those opinions staggering people.

 

[The College Dropout]

Isak is our Haaland or Salah.  Neither player gets ‘rotated’ to any meaningful degree. 
 

Isak is playing every CL game and 95% of PL games he is fit for.  

[Monters]

A chunk of that is because he has to! Salah is pretty much indestructible, if Alex had that type of fitness I’d agree but he doesn’t. You can argue he should but at the moment he needs help 

[Sibierski]

24 minutes ago, The College Dropout said:

Isak is our Haaland or Salah.  Neither player gets ‘rotated’ to any meaningful degree. 
 

Isak is playing every CL game and 95% of PL games he is fit for.  

Salah is a physical freak, Haaland walks around 90% of games. Isak presses hard, so will pick up muscle niggles if workload isn’t managed. 

 

Also it can be understated, when you are in a top side that dominates 99% of games, your attackers naturally get a rest as there’s less tracking back. We’re not there yet so more is demanded of our striker and attackers.

[Sibierski]

Does feel from links though that who we sign as that 2nd striker, needs to be able to play another position for the £50m price point. Mbuemo was that, Pedro is that, not sure what other names could also be that?

 

If it’s just striker position only, it needs to be a lot less and the £20m-£30m mark which Delap would’ve been. Again, not sure who else is in that bracket?

 

Edit: With the player links I take it always as agent driven, club sending media down the wrong path, but it gives us an indication of what sort of value / position we’re looking at. Like Barella the name, then it was Tonali.

 

At the moment can say ST, RW, CAM, CB and GK are the confirmed positions we’re looking at.

 

 

Edited 20 hours ago by Sibierski

[80]

55 minutes ago, SUPERTOON said:

Not for the run in, he rotated well in games against West Ham, Everton, Southampton i remember off the top of my head. Played them together at times as well. 

Oh aye, we gave it both barrels for the last couple of months of the season, frequently playing them both together (Brentford away sticks in my head as being the first real time, rightly or wrongly - the Gordon hissy fit match). But it was as much that Isak became our favoured left winger in that period, it didn't exactly strike me as an official striker rotation policy... Not arguing about whether it can work with Pedro next season, mind.

[TRon]

13 hours ago, Whitley mag said:

There’s at least another 2 allegedly on the list in Guehi and Elanga that fall in the same category, think we’ll have our eye balls taken out for both, or have to pivot and that’s when the extent of our scouting network and will to explore other markets will be tested.

 

Tbf we've got a pretty good record of spending big on PL talent even if it seems we are overpaying at the time. Gordon, Tino and Hall would all go for more than we paid.

 

My main concern would be your second point of us not getting the deals done, then not having secured back up options like happened last summer with Guehi.

[Nine]

1 hour ago, The Prophet said:

I'm a big Pedro fan, but we're leaking enquiries and targeting players with enormous asking prices. I'm becoming dubious.

Same, we don’t usually do this drawn out in the press thing other than Guehi maybe. 
 

Our big signings come out of the blue.

[The Prophet]

52 minutes ago, Nine said:

Same, we don’t usually do this drawn out in the press thing other than Guehi maybe. 
 

Our big signings come out of the blue.

 

If they're coming from abroad they do, but we've had quite a few drawn out sagas with Gordon, Tino, Barnes, etc.

 

It's more that even when we pay, we usually look for value. Who knows we might see £60 million for Pedro as good value, but it'll take a fair chunk out the budget, with other positions still in need of strengthening.

[Chicken Dancer]

Gutted is probably the wrong word but I'd ask questions if we are paying £60m for Pedro when there isn't a clear place for him in the XI. Completely understand we need to have a squad but for us, the £50/60m players have to be the ones that are the ones playing week in, week out surely?

 

Good player and we definitely need another versatile forward, but at the prices quoted I'm not sure. But I was sure £40m for Gordon was an overpay too, and despite last season he's been worth every penny. So we have to trust the club, it just seems a lot for the type of player he is vs what we actually need.

[The Prophet]

2 minutes ago, Chicken Dancer said:

Gutted is probably the wrong word but I'd ask questions if we are paying £60m for Pedro when there isn't a clear place for him in the XI. Completely understand we need to have a squad but for us, the £50/60m players have to be the ones that are the ones playing week in, week out surely?

 

Good player and we definitely need another versatile forward, but at the prices quoted I'm not sure. But I was sure £40m for Gordon was an overpay too, and despite last season he's been worth every penny. So we have to trust the club, it just seems a lot for the type of player he is vs what we actually need.

 

If we're paying £60 million for him, it's fair to assume he'll be playing regularly.

[Ikon]

4 minutes ago, Chicken Dancer said:

Gutted is probably the wrong word but I'd ask questions if we are paying £60m for Pedro when there isn't a clear place for him in the XI. Completely understand we need to have a squad but for us, the £50/60m players have to be the ones that are the ones playing week in, week out surely?

 

Good player and we definitely need another versatile forward, but at the prices quoted I'm not sure. But I was sure £40m for Gordon was an overpay too, and despite last season he's been worth every penny. So we have to trust the club, it just seems a lot for the type of player he is vs what we actually need.

We don’t know, we might move towards a 4-2-3-1 at times. IF we sign Pedro he will start most games. Otherwise we wouldn’t spend this much and he definitely wouldn’t come. It also would solve the issue of having more depth in the striker area. As well as allowing us to play one CM less to rotate or for tactical reasons. As well as giving us a link between midfield and Isak which I’ve wanted for a long time personally. So I hope it’s true and we get him. 

 

 

Edited 19 hours ago by Ikon

[Chicken Dancer]

2 minutes ago, The Prophet said:

 

If we're paying £60 million for him, it's fair to assume he'll be playing regularly.

 

Yeah I would think/hope so. Maybe a change of system is the long-term plan, especially in some games against the lesser teams. I'm not against signing him by the way - just would seem odd on the face of it for £50/60m. But the only explanation would be maybe to go to the formation we played a few times in the back end of 22/23 with Isak just behind Wilson.

 

Would be nice if we mixed it up against certain teams at home, for sure.

[OverThere]

I'm thinking Isak and Pedro could be rotated quite a bit. Even CL games depending upon the opposition. There is no reason 2 forwards cannot be rotated to a large degree, so long as the drop off between the two isn't extreme. If we are playing 60 games, then 30 games each is plenty.

[The College Dropout]

2 hours ago, Sibierski said:

Salah is a physical freak, Haaland walks around 90% of games. Isak presses hard, so will pick up muscle niggles if workload isn’t managed. 

 

Also it can be understated, when you are in a top side that dominates 99% of games, your attackers naturally get a rest as there’s less tracking back. We’re not there yet so more is demanded of our striker and attackers.

Cool. Isak will still start 95% of league games and all CL games when fit. This is the case for ALL top players.  Kane, Son, Haaland, Rodri, Saka, Rice, Palmer, Fernandes, Salah, Mane etc. 
 

If we sign JP for £50m+ the intention will be to start him with Isak 80% of the time. 

[gazza ladra]

2 hours ago, The College Dropout said:

Isak is our Haaland or Salah.  Neither player gets ‘rotated’ to any meaningful degree. 
 

Isak is playing every CL game and 95% of PL games he is fit for.  

And Bruno, Tonali, Joe Linton...

 

hell, nobody gets rotated unless they're injured or we're playing a League 1 side.

[Chicken Dancer]

Just now, OverThere said:

I'm thinking Isak and Pedro could be rotated quite a bit. Even CL games depending upon the opposition. There is no reason 2 forwards cannot be rotated to a large degree, so long as the drop off between the two isn't extreme. If we are playing 60 games, then 30 games each is plenty.

 

There's no way Isak only starts 30 games out of 60. He's probably top 5 in his position in the world, he's playing most games if he's fit and so he should, obviously with exceptions in certain cup games.

 

Equally, if we are paying £60m for Pedro, he also would be starting more than 30 games. He won't be happy playing at home to Burton in the League Cup and warming the bench against Liverpool on the Saturday. I think a change in system is the most likely reason we are linked

[Nine]

39 minutes ago, The Prophet said:

 

If they're coming from abroad they do, but we've had quite a few drawn out sagas with Gordon, Tino, Barnes, etc.

 

It's more that even when we pay, we usually look for value. Who knows we might see £60 million for Pedro as good value, but it'll take a fair chunk out the budget, with other positions still in need of strengthening.

When I say big I mean Tonali & Isak particularly, although Botman and Bruno happened very quickly to iirc. As you say though, easier to keep it quiet when they come from outside the PL.

 

I know what you’re saying, the way we’ve seen Elanga and Pedro come out just isn’t our style really. They could well both be smokescreens of some description.

 

 

Edited 18 hours ago by Nine

[gazza ladra]

1 minute ago, Nine said:

When I say big I mean Tonali & Isak particularly, although Botman and Bruno happened very quickly to iirc. As you say though, easier to keep it quiet when they come from outside the PL.

 

I know what you’re saying, this way we’ve heard Elanga and Pedro come out just isn’t our style really. They could well both be smokescreens of some description.

 

 

 

Except we've been in for both previously.

 

 

[HawK]

Barella-style smokescreen?