Liverpool

I think even Madrid would draw the line at spending almost £100m on a player they did not need.

Bale was their 4th choice target this summer and they didn't need him. They arguably do need Suarez anyway as Benzema is not a top level player. He is very flaky.

I am not saying this to be an annoying United fan but if I were a Liverpool fan then I wouldn't put any faith in Suarez to turn down Madrid if they do come calling. Real Madrid is a better place to be than Liverpool in the eyes of 99% of footballers, especially the South American players.
 
It was £70m for clubs outside of England if we failed to make the CL if iirc.

I think even Madrid would draw the line at spending almost £100m on a player they did not need.
Only clause for if we don't qualify for the CL.

You're right it hasn't stopped them, but it will take even more than 70 m to get him, the cards are in our hands.

They could probably sell Benzema and get 30m i would think. I'm sure both Monaco and PSG would love to have a French Striker leading the line and there are people like Arsenal, Chelsea, who would possibly be interested. So they would be spending 40-60m net on a player they would have starting every game available. They could possibly sell Di Maria aswell so it wouldn't be that bad for them.
 
There is an argument for saying that Liverpool were the biggest club in the world in the 80s but that didn't stop the slump we went through. This may well be a blip season for united and certainly based on the last 20 years it would seem to be so but sometimes businesses make poor decisions and problems can last longer than anticipated.

the simple fact is Football is a huge business these days...unfortunately for clubs that have huge history like United and Liverpool. Rightly or wrongly clubs like ours in those days stuck with their managers through thick and thin....personally I think that is admirable.

Honestly we don't know what the future holds....but I know enough about business to know that money talks.

For the day to day supporter....the money people have taken what is precious away from us.....
 
sometimes they shell out tens of millions to buy a player just because its a 'gift' from an incoming president, etc.

a front 3 of Ronaldo-Suarez-Bale is frightening
 
sometimes they shell out tens of millions to buy a player just because its a 'gift' from an incoming president, etc.

a front 3 of Ronaldo-Suarez-Bale is frightening
Do they have elections there next year? If so then Suarez will be played as a buying card for anyone who's running for it.

He's certainly attainable. At the right price they could get him.
 
They could probably sell Benzema and get 30m i would think. I'm sure both Monaco and PSG would love to have a French Striker leading the line and there are people like Arsenal, Chelsea, who would possibly be interested. So they would be spending 40-60m net on a player they would have starting every game available. They could possibly sell Di Maria aswell so it wouldn't be that bad for them.
They could give Liverpool Benzema and Di Maria and throw in a few quid, they'd be better off.
 
Bale was their 4th choice target this summer and they didn't need him. They arguably do need Suarez anyway as Benzema is not a top level player. He is very flaky.

I am not saying this to be an annoying United fan but if I were a Liverpool fan then I wouldn't put any faith in Suarez to turn down Madrid if they do come calling. Real Madrid is a better place to be than Liverpool in the eyes of 99% of footballers, especially the South American players.
4th choice, behind who?
 
The emergence of Jese at Madrid means that Di Maria is very disposable. They could almost cover the Suarez fee by moving on Di Maria and Benzema. This is Madrid though, they could sign Suarez for 70m and keep Benzema and Di Maria.
 
The owners and the board will be wary of this, I don't see a repeat of what happened to you. The infrastructure in place is too significant.

Which infrastructure? It seems pretty clear that it was all bullshit from SAF for the amazing infrastructure that we had. He and Gill (and the Law's daughter who apparently was very important to have we dealt with media) semi left and the club went down. The owners seems to now know that much for football which makes them unable to interfere that much. I would take with a pinch of salt every word that SAF said in the last few years, especially after reading his book.
 
Which infrastructure? It seems pretty clear that it was all bullshit from SAF for the amazing infrastructure that we had. He and Gill (and the Law's daughter who apparently was very important to have we dealt with media) semi left and the club went down. The owners seems to now know that much for football which makes them unable to interfere that much. I would take with a pinch of salt every word that SAF said in the last few years, especially after reading his book.
I suppose I'm a bit more relaxed with regards the more distant future of Manchester United. We'll be fine, as Ferguson said, just maybe without Moyes at the helm.
 
Do they have elections there next year? If so then Suarez will be played as a buying card for anyone who's running for it.

He's certainly attainable. At the right price they could get him.

Interesting comments from John Henry (if that's what he's called) the other day - to the end that even though he had a release clause in his contract they just refused to sell him, even though it seems the player wanted away.

He believes that the contracts are worth nothing - because they have to be enforced, and that takes a lot of time and expense. He's right in terms of the legal process - its no easy to get injunctions and would cost the buying club a fortune with potentially no certainty of success. More likely they would just move onto other targets who were actually attainable before the season starts.

Suggests they're not overly keen to sell, regardless. be interesting to see what happened if Madrid made a big offer.
 
I suppose I'm a bit more relaxed with regards the more distant future of Manchester United. We'll be fine, as Ferguson said, just maybe without Moyes at the helm.

We don't know that and because Ferguson hasn't come from the future, he don't know it too. 'Fine' doesn't mean anything though, we won't go bankrupt and neither get relegated but there isn't much to suggest that we will be an elite club in the next few years. Or like Liverpool, ever. Pretty sure, no Liverpool fan, player or ex-manager predicted how bad things will go. And it is very possible that the same thing will happen here. Once you become a mediocre club, it is very difficult coming back to top. Just look how much Milano clubs are struggling after only few years of mediocricity despite that they are in a less competitive league than EPL (which can become even more competitive if City/Chelsea scenarion happens to another club or two).
 
I dont think that's accurate Greg. Havent you signed RVP and Mata under the glazer guidance? They are huge signings for big money.

The Glazers are just putting a small part back in of what the club makes.

Liverpool were bankrolled for decades by the Moores family. They final had to sell up in 2004 because they couldnt subsidize Liverpool anymore. Up till then they even were spending more than United despite the fact that we had a much larger stadium and won much more in that ten years.

http://www.liverpool-kop.com/2012/08/lfc-vs-man-utd-21-year-grossnet.html

Even now the new owners are subsidizing you lot.
 
@BarneyLFC @Snipers Breath

I genuinely believe Suarez will still go if any of the big 2 Spanish teams make a serious bid for him. Its ingrained into South American players to play for Madrid or Barca. He's obviously happy at the moment, but say Madrid put in a opening bid of 50 million, you'll soon know all about it! Its not a relection on LFC, just the way it is. The fact that he signed a new contract recently will mean nothing other than Liverpool will get a bigger fee. We all know that contracts arent worth the money they are written on if a player starts posturing to go.

They're apparently trying to renew Benzema's contract.

I don't think he'll go.
 
No point in trying to second guess Madrid's transfer plans, they don't play by any rules.

At the moment he looks like staying, but I wouldn't be surprised to see that position change in the summer.
 
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I'll eat my own shit if Suarez is still at Liverpool in 4 years time.

I'm not saying he will be, just saying it gives us more leverage, he will be here next year if he was going to leave this year wouldn't have signed a new contract after what we went through in the summer.
 
The Glazers are just putting a small part back in of what the club makes.

Liverpool were bankrolled for decades by the Moores family. They final had to sell up in 2004 because they couldnt subsidize Liverpool anymore. Up till then they even were spending more than United despite the fact that we had a much larger stadium and won much more in that ten years.

http://www.liverpool-kop.com/2012/08/lfc-vs-man-utd-21-year-grossnet.html

Even now the new owners are subsidizing you lot.

It's no difference to our period of domination during the 70's & 80's. We didn't need the Moores cash as we were totally self-sufficient thanks to our success on the pitch. Whereas United quite often spent big. A typical example being us signing Dalglish for £440,000 from the proceeds of the Keegan sale (£500,000) in 1977, & United paying almost £2,500,000 for Robson & Stapleton just 4 years later. The money for those players came largely out of the pocket of Martin Edwards. The past 40 years or so has shown us one thing though. Money alone isn't the be all & end all in building a successful football club. It's only a tool, & you need the right personnel in capable of operating that tool. That's the difficult bit.
 
The past 40 years or so has shown us one thing though. Money alone isn't the be all & end all in building a successful football club. It's only a tool, & you need the right personnel in capable of operating that tool. That's the difficult bit.
For 30 of the 40 perhaps but the last 10 have proved that money talks loudest.
 
Increase the capacity of the stadium, get in some top players to stay in Europe, increase the revenue of the club by investing in building new business ie restaurants etc etc., better get cracking on that then :lol:
 
Tony Evans saying he expects the owners to commit big in the summer if we finish top 4. Good to hear.
They'd be stupid not to. Now's the chance to push on and stamp their authority on the top four, and from a business point of view benefit from increased revenue. Even if we return next year, there's a chance that Arsenal could be pushed out. I don't see it happening to City/Chelsea for a long while, unless City opt for a new manager every 6 months.
 
Jesus, I'm listening to the 2nd partof the Game podcast and apparently amongst Liverpool players Andy Carroll was nicknamed the traffic cone. :lol:
 
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FSG actually brought a bit of sense to Liverpool's conduct off the pitch once they learned from Suarezgate
 
Some interesting stuff said by Evans and Barrett recently.

  • Sturridge was originally vetoed by Rodgers the summer before we signed him. This caused the board to lose faith in him in the market.
  • Aspas and Alberto weren't Rodgers' signings.
  • Rodgers wanted defenders last summer and was left disappointed when the transfer committee focus seemed to be on an attacker.
  • Rodgers is negotiating a new deal. Very likely he asks for more control re. transfers.
  • Board want to sanction big spend in the summer.
  • And for those that haven't seen (it was announced a few days ago) Borrell has joined City's academy.
 
Some interesting stuff said by Evans and Barrett recently.

  • Sturridge was originally vetoed by Rodgers the summer before we signed him. This caused the board to lose faith in him in the market.
  • Aspas and Alberto weren't Rodgers' signings.
  • Rodgers wanted defenders last summer and was left disappointed when the transfer committee focus seemed to be on an attacker.
  • Rodgers is negotiating a new deal. Very likely he asks for more control re. transfers.
  • Board want to sanction big spend in the summer.
  • And for those that haven't seen (it was announced a few days ago) Borrell has joined City's academy.

This I don't understand, I mean, what's the fecking point in buying X when manager asks you for Y? It's been a luxury to us to have good Gill / Fergie relationship and Fergie always picked his targets. How can some kind of 'transfer committee', who can be quite clueless, pick targets before Rodgers? It's him who builds the team, who forces some ideology about the team's play, who sees where the squad's lacking. Baffling stuff really.

Same was with AVB and his 1240918241 players bought in the summer. 'Lamela was not a AVB buy', 'Eriksen was not a AVB purchase', it's either absolving the manager from blame for shit transfers or somebody from the higher echelon is full of himself.
 
This I don't understand, I mean, what's the fecking point in buying X when manager asks you for Y? It's been a luxury to us to have good Gill / Fergie relationship and Fergie always picked his targets. How can some kind of 'transfer committee', who can be quite clueless, pick targets before Rodgers? It's him who builds the team, who forces some ideology about the team's play, who sees where the squad's lacking. Baffling stuff really.

Same was with AVB and his 1240918241 players bought in the summer. 'Lamela was not a AVB buy', 'Eriksen was not a AVB purchase', it's either absolving the manager from blame for shit transfers or somebody from the higher echelon is full of himself.

I dont get the surprise. Its quite common, similar to the DoF model?
 
It's not a surprise, I do know it's quite common but it's absolutely idiotic nonetheless.

Not really. It depends totally on the kind of setup regarding the manager. If a club sees managerial changes every few years, it makes absolute sense to not give every new manager 100% freedom on how to go about business. In any case, it isnt as if the DoF simply imposes his transfers on the manager, things get discussed.
 
This I don't understand, I mean, what's the fecking point in buying X when manager asks you for Y? It's been a luxury to us to have good Gill / Fergie relationship and Fergie always picked his targets. How can some kind of 'transfer committee', who can be quite clueless, pick targets before Rodgers? It's him who builds the team, who forces some ideology about the team's play, who sees where the squad's lacking. Baffling stuff really.

Same was with AVB and his 1240918241 players bought in the summer. 'Lamela was not a AVB buy', 'Eriksen was not a AVB purchase', it's either absolving the manager from blame for shit transfers or somebody from the higher echelon is full of himself.

TBF , Spurs wasn't doing too bad with their purchase so far, so I guess that counts as a points for DoF

Not every team are managed by Alex Ferguson, managers come and go, and if you have a "knowledgeable and astute DoF who worth his salt" he can better employ the club long term's policy.

Althought I believe DoF have inputs from the manager (as Gill / SAF collaboration type) and more often than not probably agrees with the manager (unless some baffling choices / targets are inbound).

There's no bad system, it really depends on the personnel at play. If we're having SAF as DOF, surely nobody would bat an eye on who he decided to buy, even if it goes against the manager's list, and vice versa, I don't think Gill would vetoed anyone SAF wanted because he clearly knows better about players and stuff.
 
Not really. It depends totally on the kind of setup regarding the manager. If a club sees managerial changes every few years, it makes absolute sense to not give every new manager 100% freedom on how to go about business. In any case, it isnt as if the DoF simply imposes his transfers on the manager, things get discussed.

He brought them the book with magic tactics of his, pretty long read, giving them insight and needed information about his long, medium and short term plans, they know that he needs a certain set of players that would fit into his system. What's the point of 'discussing' things with DoF when in the end, he buys Rodgers players that are not 'his transfers' ?

TBF , Spurs wasn't doing too bad with their purchase so far, so I guess that counts as a points for DoF

Not every team are managed by Alex Ferguson, managers come and go, and if you have a "knowledgeable and astute DoF who worth his salt" he can better employ the club long term's policy.

Althought I believe DoF have inputs from the manager (as Gill / SAF collaboration type) and more often than not probably agrees with the manager (unless some baffling choices / targets are inbound).

There's no bad system, it really depends on the personnel at play. If we're having SAF as DOF, surely nobody would bat an eye on who he decided to buy, even if it goes against the manager's list, and vice versa, I don't think Gill would vetoed anyone SAF wanted because he clearly knows better about players and stuff.

Chiriches and Eriksen are so far ones that can be named as good buys, rest is either absolute garbage or average ( stretching it here ) players. I think that DOF + manager is implemented at BVB, can't see Kloppo complaining about the transfers though, whereas you could see such complaints from AVB and now Rodgers.
 
He brought them the book with magic tactics of his, pretty long read, giving them insight and needed information about his long, medium and short term plans, they know that he needs a certain set of players that would fit into his system. What's the point of 'discussing' things with DoF when in the end, he buys Rodgers players that are not 'his transfers' ?

Because discussion doesnt mean you always get your way at the end regardless of anything?
 
Because discussion doesnt mean you always get your way at the end regardless of anything?

Of course, but in this case it's a discussion that seems to be lost from the start and in the end, it's manager who's getting judged on his performances that are produced by players who DOF picked for him and such might not fit his vision.