Good evening.
Gregg Stobart is a correspondent for Goal.com and as has been highlighted on the COYS forum earlier today, there are some interesting interesting suggestions by him in relation to this transfer saga via Stobart’s Twitter account, @gstobart.
The situation was relatively straightforward. Adebayor and City have a contract whereby he is due (let’s say) £175k a week.
So if somebody else wants to take him the player has a choice to either take a pay cut (if City are willing to sell him) or for City to subsidise his salary, the latter happened while he was loaned to Spurs.
It was said by a few (yes, including me) that he had signed. He’d agreed terms with Spurs and this was communicated to City. City agreed to continue to subsidise him in order to lessen their load for a player that wasn’t ever going to kick a ball for them again.
So at this point, Adebayor is all set to formally join Spurs.
Then we get this line about Adebayor not wanting his charity to suffer. But his charity wouldn’t beacause he’d be in receipt of the same monies that he was at City and while on loan, the partially subsidised £175,000 a week.
Stobart claims that Adebayor has now announced that he wants the £4M transfer fee which was set to pass from Spurs to Manchester City …to instead be handed …directly to him.
Which would in effect result in Manchester City letting him go ‘on a free’.
I understand that footballers want to keep their financial affairs low key as not everyone ‘admires’ the vast amounts of cold hard cash that they earn in return for kicking a ball about.
But given that so many elements of this tale are in the public domain, now is the time for Adebayor to – as they say in certain parts of the North of England – shat or get off the pot. He should step out of the shadows and make a statement and put the record straight.
The Spurs end of this were sewn up a good few weeks ago. City hummed and harred but decided as I say to cut their losses.
I believe that Stobart could well have got the goods on Ade here. If so, this ‘playing the charity card’ stunt is in poor taste.
If modric does finally leave, I think a great option i haven’t really heard many people mention is Susaeta from Athletic Bilbao. Classy player, and would probably cost less than Moutinho. He was excellent last season along with Munain, helped tear Man U apart in europa league, and it wasn’t just one game either.
well then seeing as the delivery charges would be the same for one or two Bilbao players lets get Llorente as well.
The thing is Levy is not just looking for good players,he is looking for value as well.
Thats a difficult combination.
He has some leverage with the Modric situation if Jose wants him bad enough,so Sahin could be a possibility and Rondon is with a financially strapped team so that might work.
You get one more striker for insurance.Somebody cheap and experienced like Berba (even though the boos are ringing out) and you have something.If Berba comes good for instance you could turn the 3.5 mil into 20 mil with lets say PSG the next season)
I understand your thinking Ronnie, If its one thing Harry proved,it was how important an experienced or handy to have cheaper option on the bench is if needed.
In saying that ,personally i would never have that particular prick back,just my personal opinion!
Also, I didn’t mean to buy both Susaeta and Munain, just Susaeta. Munain would cost around 30 mil, wheras Susaeta is a little more understated but brilliant and probably available for around 20-25 mil, which we could afford with the Modric money. Again, just my personal opinion.
What’s happened to our scouting network? Graham Carr at Newcastle (ex of THFC) seems to have unearthed a few gems recently. Who’s in charge of identifying the fresh talent ? Have they been down to the Olympics talent spotting?
What would we give for another Burkinshaw, Villa and Ardiles moment?
I’m sure AVB and his staff has something up their sleeves, Levy certainly always has, it’s just a pity that whatever new signings are left, won’t have much or any of a pre season with the team.
I’m pretty sure that they are waiting until the Olympics are over…
Still the same name, eh? Optimism, or hasn’t the paperwork come through yet?
Just some suggestions from the Olympics…Bardsley, Houghton, Carney and Smith all available at a tenth of Pienaar’s fee.
And all have better hairstyles as well
So, two weeks until the start of the season and it’s patently obvious that, yet again, we are trying to play hardball on too many fronts. Last season this cost us six points as we farted around with Adebayor, Parker and “my head’s not right” Modric. We may well have saved a few bob with this kind of brinkmanship but it cost us six points and, ultimately, CL football. Daniel, bite the bullet son, get the deals done and let’s not be bottom of the league at the end of August for the sake of a few million quid and your ego.