Good morning.
This is one to divide opinion. We appear to be selling Michael Dawson. Sir Les as he was, is affectionately known is understood to be weighing up his preferred choice of destination between QPR and Stoke.
It’s been suggested to me that the business of Liverpool being linked with Michael last week was simply a lose lipped agent discovering that the player was ‘available’.
There are a number of factors at play here. He has frequently had to combat injury and with the arrival of Villas-Boas he’s been found to be not quite sophisticated enough. Is this fair? Well, having a big heart and a desire to do your best are separate issues. Notable features of the boss’s new system is the control and focus on ball retention.
All hands to the pump type hoooooooofs up field aren’t desirable. They are old school and at best turn possession into a 50/50 ball. You’ll notice that Brad has mostly been rolling the ball to the back four’s feet.
Another issue has been development. Daws was always doing his best and improved over time, but did he ever really look ready to replace Ledley King? I’d argue not. He frequently looked the business when teamed up with Ledders but Kaboul looks a better long term bet. The addition of Jan Vertonghen the last nail in his first team coffin.
If we were on the same financial footing as Manchester City, we could afford to keep him in the squad. Alas we are not.
Getting Ade back is brilliant. If we can now get Damaio in as well that would be fantastic. With Ade definitely in it makes it less likely that Llorente would join as he would surely see himself as number one striker. Damaio could be seen as sharing the lone striker role with Ade especiallynas we want to make a proper effort in all competitions? Other inward moves… Still think Moutinho for Modders would be brilliant if we can get him at the right price or Sahin would also be a good option. Fryers will no doub eventually get sorted by tribunal which would leave a new keeper as the next priority so Lloris, Butland or Cesar ?
Having said all that this is Spurs and DL so expect the unexpected !!! Literally anything can happen and possibly nothing but with all the outgoings AVB has to be backed surely.
people like daimo and llorente would be playing anywhere along the front 3 i hope,as that’s the way we will play not that i think/know they will be coming
If these deals happen , we can all listen to the spastics saying”where would we be if we didnt give everyone a 3 point head start” Yanited lost, and they will probably have 15 points more than us by the end of the season, we took a good side to the barcodes, got unlucky imo, we can hopefully buttfuck the gooners twice and finish above them, im fairly happy
All this talk about 4 centre backs is wrong – we have 5.
Kaboom, Gallas, Vert, Caulker and finally Daws. AVB has obviously decided that Daws is the one to go.
Makes me think that Carvallo may be coming in as part of the Modric deal – experienced head for when Gallas is injured.
possible :daumen: , i want caulker in the squad and getting games, of the four, daws is easily the biggest hoofer and has an uncanny knack of trying to snap his legs everytime he gets a bit of form going
That is a very good shout . Carvalho as a back up, experienced mentor might be useful especially in the Europa League. Obviously he is past his best but still has vast experience to,pass onto the younger guys like Caulker , Naughton, Walker even Kaboom. We shall see.
Smith
According to the BBC, we paid £5 million for Ade and City will continue to pay a large proportion of his wages as we are not breaking our pay structure for him.
Not a bad bit of business, let’s hope he is fit for the weekend.
Yup, they will pay him the extra 70k on his 170k a week wages. That’s preferable to them than giving him the balance in a lump sum – around 7.2m – which would be standard practice in any other transfer (usually the difference in wages wouldn’t be so high, but that’s City’s fault for paying people too much).
Delighted Ade has signed. Unfortunately the vibe from AVB is that will be it in the striker department, which means if Ade gets injured we’re back to square one. Hope they are just playing their cards close to the vest though and they have another striker lined up. Next up….. a modric shaped hole that needs to be filled.
COYS!
Don’t believe it. Defoe – as much as I personally rate him (even though he is one-dimensional) – can’t do the lone striker thing. Plus Levy I’m sure would be overjoyed to cash in on him at 29. 1+1 equals – they are still looking for another and Defoe can go on and score his goals elsewhere if they pull it off.
Maybe, but i just can’t see AVB going back on his word and selling defoe after telling him that we wanted to keep him. Defoe is a good player, but i agree, he just can’t play the lone role, and i don’t think he’d be happy as third choice.
We don’t know exactly what he told Defoe. All he said was that he’d had a conversation with him and his agent. My guess would be they wanted to know what the deal was, AVB probably told him, we are in for this one and that one, if we get both then we won’t keep you, you can leave to play, if we only get one then you will be our 2nd striker and thus play a fair amount.
True, sounds plausible. Guess we’re going to find out soon enough, as things finally seem to have started moving. Wouldn’t have minded Daws staying, but if we get the reported £10 mil for him and reinvest, it would be a good deal.
Don’t forget, AVB doesn’t exactly favour the lone striker – he favours a central striker and a wide striker…
JD might be able to do that, coming in from the left… which would be Bale goes right and both have the chance to come inside and shoot on their stronger feet… not going to please many on here, but it’s an option…