I don't like it. It seems excessive to me. Yes he's young and has talent but that is still a lot of money for a defender. OK, he's played in a World Cup Final but by all accounts Argentina aren't exactly inundated with quality defenders.
Still, he's got to be an improvement on the current shower of troute we have at the back. To be honest, just the one new centre half is not gonna be enough to challenge for the top four.
LVG obviously thinks otherwise. Who are we to argue?
But again, I don't see this is a massive expense that is going to make us worse in any way. It's a position that needed strengthening and sadly we don't have CL so we can't attract The Best of The Best of The Best. But again, hey, if he's considered one of the best two Argentinian centre backs he can't be all bad. Personally I'm one of the few that are happy with Smalling, Evans and (although he needs more work) Jones. I just feel we need more than three central defenders if we're going to be playing with three central defenders. Blackett and Keane might be good, but I think experience counts in this regard.
Our defence didn't lose us the top four spot last season. Out attack failed to get it in the first place.
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Fergie thought Bebe, Kleberson, Djemba-Djemba, etc. were good too. Doesn't mean much.Originally Posted by Loony BoB
LVG is smarting at that loss and wants immediate action and that cretin Woodward is jumping through hoops to achieve it. By all accounts his #1 choice was Hummels though yeah, obviously not an option.
You're looking at it the wrong way.But again, I don't see this is a massive expense
Is £35m a lot for Andy Carroll?
Is £37m a lot for Juan Mata?
Would the same price be a lot for Cristiano Ronaldo?
The answers are of course "that is ridiculous", "probably overpaid a bit" and "smurfing bargain".
Just remember Southampton were the only other English team in for him, despite many top teams being after LBs and CBs. Speaks volumes.3 members of that defence have gone though. Players of that calibre or better should be recruited - and they've been available.
SAF also bought a lot of guys for minimal funds at the time (see: Vidic, Evra, Hernandez, Heinze, etc) who all turned out just fine. Big money players turn into big money flops, low money players turn into low money flops. This is football. However, for every flop, there is a success, too. I don't feel £16m is too much for a first team player, and if he turns out a success, fantastic, if not, we've not spent that much money on him anyway. We can only buy the players who are interested in a team without immediate CL football at the moment, unless we go to PSG/City levels and pay wages through the roof, which we're probably already doing to some extent. Again, though, LVG sees something in him, so I'll reserve judgement.
I got curious after my last post where I mentioned being pretty happy with Jones/Smalling/Evans overall, and went through the stats for the PL games they played in the central defence positions.
Rio & Vidic: 44% Win, 22% Draw, 33% Loss (0.89 goals conceded per game)
R/V & S/J/E: 33% Win, 22% Draw, 44% Loss (1.44 goals conceded per game)
S/J/E & S/J/E: 73% Win, 9% Draw, 18% Loss (0.82 goals conceded per game) - includes one game with Jones/Carrick in central defence.
Basically we played better without Rio & Vidic than when we played with them. Considering that the goals conceded aren't too different between Rio & Vidic playing and S/J/E combinations but the win ratio is much higher, that also says the attackers played better without Rio & Vidic being present.
EDIT: Continuing on that... conceded goals for individuals.
Rio: 15 goals in 12 games (1.25)
Vidic: 25 in 23 (1.09)
Evans: 19 in 14 (1.36)
Smalling: 7 in 10 (0.7)
Jones: 20 in 16 (1.25)
And...
Evans when with Rio/Vidic: 9 in 6 (1.5)
Evans without Rio/Vidic: 9 in 8 (1.13)
Smalling when with Rio/Vidic: 3 in 4 (0.75)
Smalling without Rio/Vidic: 4 in 6 (0.67)
Jones when with Rio/Vidic: 12 in 7 (1.71)
Jones without Rio/Vidic: 8 in 9 (0.89)
EDITRA: Attachment showing off just how often Moyes changed the CB's. Mental.
cbs.png
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Only one of Liverpool's starting XI at the weekend cost more than £16m. (Lovren!)
How many of those players were purchased in today's market?
EDIT: And check my previous post, I edited it. Those are some crazy statistics.
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In the past 2 years: Mignolet, Coutinho, Sturridge and Manquillo. Three of those were internationals for top nations too. Not bad, eh? And pretty crap, well, no - not vintage, but not awful - but even if it was that's pretty crap with 3 points and pretty crap with Champions League football.
Either way, you can't keep saying "He's good enough for LVG..." not only because "Moyes is good enough for Fergie..." but also because then there's no point in forming an opinion on players at all. You're allowed to disagree with managers! At some point, a Manchester United manager thought every member of that squad was good enough. Evidently they are not.
Interesting stats indeed, but let's not forget that's five (Carrick aside) players for two positions. Now it's three for three. The quality is fine but depth is needed, and I reiterate that players above or equal to the quality of those that have departed is a necessity.
It's just endemic of United under Woodward though. All four (five if you count Rojo) of their big transfers under him they have been taken for a ride. There's probably an excess of £30-40m and that can buy 2 good players or even 1 world class player. With the CL money not there, it all adds up...
Haven't I stated twice now that I'm reserving judgement? I'm not so blind as to think that any random person LVG picks will be the best in the world. What I am saying is that if the manager feels he can do something with a player I don't know, then I can only assume he sees something in the guy, and given I know nothing about the player, I'm not going to assume he's going to be trout before I've seen him kick a ball.
Sturridge you got on a massive bargain and you bloody know it.
EDIT: I'm pretty confident we have a hell of a lot more than £30-40m available, if that's what you meant. Whether or not we use it this season is another story.
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Alright, let me put it another way.
Luke Shaw, £30m. Calum Chambers, £11m rising to a possible £16m based on performance.
Ander Herrera £29m, Toni Kroos, £24m.
Juan Mata £37m, Cesc Fabregas £30m.
Marouane Fellaini £27.5m, Mousa Dembele £15m.
I would also tell you that the players on the right are, in each instance, superior to the ones on the left.
Which brings me right back around to why I compared United to how Liverpool used to love to operate in the days of Aquilani, Carroll, Downing, etc. Sometimes still do, though this Summer has been alright. Only £25m Lallana raises an eyebrow, though English premium and all that, part of PFA team of the year and compared to the £29m uncapped Herrera it doesn't seem too bad. Still overpaid though but hey ho.Don't have a limitless pot of money either though. And with FFP, every pound has to count.
With Shaw, we were challenging Chelsea for him. We needed a left back. Chambers isn't that left back.
With Kroos, he went to Real Madrid. We probably couldn't compete if we had wanted to.
With Fabregas, smurf knows what happened. People are still scratching their heads. The only guess is that Woodwards ballsed it up (likely) or that Fabregas didn't fancy playing for Moyes (also possible) and now that we're out of the CL he remained uninterested. Mata for £37m is pretty much in line with the market. Fabregas for £30m is a bargain in today's market. I mean, how Chelsea pawned off Luiz for £50m and bought Fab for £30m is beyond me!
Fellaini was overpriced and nobody objects to that, but Dembele doesn't really interest me so I'm not really bothered.
Herrera doesn't worry me, honestly. I think he's a great player from what I've seen of him so far. Mata is doing well enough for us, too. The bigger issues are the wide players for United, the lack of teamwork and the lack of depth in central midfield. We also lack a world class star behind the strikeforce. It was Sterling and Suarez that got you into the CL... it remains to be seen if we have that special creative player that can push us into the CL as well. Time will tell, I'm sure.Which brings me right back around to why I compared United to how Liverpool used to love to operate in the days of Aquilani, Carroll, Downing, etc. Sometimes still do, though this Summer has been alright. Only £25m Lallana raises an eyebrow, though English premium and all that, part of PFA team of the year and compared to the £29m uncapped Herrera it doesn't seem too bad.
EDIT: We might not have a limitless pot of money, but I'm confident we could shell out £50-70m if the right player or two were available and we felt it was the right price. As for FFP, United aren't even close to being in trouble there.
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I'm not saying United should have signed those players - I'm saying here is a comparable player, here is the fee paid for him, why did you pay that fee? Two additional notes, Chelsea withdraw from Shaw because of his wage demands - nothing to do with being outbid. And Dembele is hax! Don't diss, blood. Definitely would've improved United's midfield last season in a way Fellaini couldn't.
Also this is tangential and not quite relevant but I want to say it anyway. At the risk of having people go "wtf" as someone who watched every one of Liverpool's games last season, I don't think it was Sterling or even Suarez that were the keys to the CL - I believe Jordan Henderson was the most important player in that team. Yes, really. Yes, even moreso than Suarez. As Rodgers said, "I knew the title was gone as soon as he was sent off vs City" and lo and behold, we ballsed it up against Chelsea and Palace without him. There's a lot more to football than being the one to stick it in the back of the net.
xD It's easy to say that, but then he could have Fellaini'd just like Fellaini did. Even Veron, Berba and Tevez can fail at United, and those are players who had decent seasons. Also, again, United always get given a high fee, it's nothing new. It's also common knowledge that Ed Woodward is trout at player transfers, just awful.
If you didn't have Suarez last season you would not be in the CL. I genuinely believe this. *shrug* Perhaps the same could be said of Henderson, I dunno. But Suarez was worth at least 12 points to you.Also this is tangential and not quite relevant but I want to say it anyway. At the risk of having people go "wtf" as someone who watched every one of Liverpool's games last season, I don't think it was Sterling or even Suarez that were the keys to the CL - I believe Jordan Henderson was the most important player in that team. Yes, really. Yes, even moreso than Suarez. As Rodgers said, "I knew the title was gone as soon as he was sent off vs City" and lo and behold, we ballsed it up against Chelsea and Palace without him. There's a lot more to football than being the one to stick it in the back of the net.
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It's difficult to track points earned by running around a hell of a lot. But in terms of points earned by goals, Suarez was worth 15... but Sturridge was worth 18. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/foo...is-Suarez.html He just got three this weekend too come to think of it.
Liverpool get 2nd, go on about Suarez being player of the year.
Liverpool sell Suarez, go on about how their other players are better.
At least when we sold Ronaldo we didn't kid ourselves that we'd not sold our best player.
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Never said he wasn't the best player, just that Henderson had a bigger impact on our system. Suarez is one of the top 5 players in the world imho and to be honest you'd be hard pushed for any of the current squad to make the top 50. That being said, as someone who watched every game I do insist that people who think we were a one man team don't know what they're talking about and aren't worth listening to, and having the best team doesn't necessarily mean having the best players (though it helps!). It amuses me that people think Liverpool are doomed without Suarez... oh no, how can we replace the player with the most Premier League goals last season? If only we had the player with the next most goals to replace him wi...
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