Heard they was after Mame! Good thing we rapped that deal up quick.
Who do you want United to sign?
- Thread starter charlenefan
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In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik (@Rood) is joined by CEO Duncan Drasdo and Financial Director Andy Green from the Manchester United Supporters Trust for a special episode on all things behind the scenes at Old Trafford including a brief history of MUST and their aims today, views on INEOS and Sir Jim Ratcliffe so far, and the Old Trafford regeneration.
Heard they was after Mame! Good thing we rapped that deal up quick.
Great Muppetry.... But who should we look for if Vidic goes? I say the Fulham Centre half...
There is no-one that really grabs me, I've always liked Haangeland, but theres the likes of Cahill etc touted as good enough to play for United yet I'm unsure if they can make that step up. The pressure of playing for an elite team can get to some though if we're looking to replace Vidic it'll be easier to find rugged centre-halfs than classy ones.
I do think we should also invest in a young centre-half too with an eye for the future, if the likes of Rodwell and Kjaer are going to make it big, we don't want to be missing out.
So was Wenger.
Dunno. Word from Spain is they've got a pre-agreement sorted. Nothing to stop them making sure they aint got all their eggs in one basket.
This talk of signing Modric depends on two questions:
1) Will Man. Utd have enough money to spend this summer? I would forsee an asking price of at least 25m for Modric, assuming he wanted to leave. Given your growing financial problems, plus a probable need to strengthen other areas of your team/squad besides LM, I would tend to doubt you'll have the cash, despite your receipt of 80m for Ronaldo.
2) Will Spurs finish in the top 4 (if they do, then there is no way that Spurs would sell Modric and I doubt that Modric would even wish to leave)? At the start of the season I didn't think we had more than an outside chance (5th was my prediction), but now that chance has grown in size - at least a bit.
1) Will Man. Utd have enough money to spend this summer? I would forsee an asking price of at least 25m for Modric, assuming he wanted to leave. Given your growing financial problems, plus a probable need to strengthen other areas of your team/squad besides LM, I would tend to doubt you'll have the cash, despite your receipt of 80m for Ronaldo.
2) Will Spurs finish in the top 4 (if they do, then there is no way that Spurs would sell Modric and I doubt that Modric would even wish to leave)? At the start of the season I didn't think we had more than an outside chance (5th was my prediction), but now that chance has grown in size - at least a bit.
I hope you lot get in the top four, exciting team to watch and with a CL place you'll go from strength to strength
To be honest even if we did want Modric there would be no problem attracting him to us. Regardless of your final league position. I can't see it though.
I like them but still think they'll finish 6th.
You also doubted we would get Berbatov.
Any way. Seriously, 25 million is pretty cheap for a Modric. We can pay that easily.
You can't win the title or the champions league. Thus Modric would always be ready to leave y'all behind.
Yup we need our feeder club to be doing the best it can.
Benzema or Sergio Aguero. Both add some attacking flair which we lack. I think this years vintage is abit like the squad in 1991 which finished runners up to Leeds. Its a good squad packed with competent players. We are just not operating greater than the sum of our parts which is a consistent SAF hallmark.
Of course, in 1992, the King came along and the rest is history and likewise, we lost our marauding catalyst to Madrid in the summer. So there is no way that this current vintage has suddenly become a 'different squad' to last season, it just lacks a creative maverick. I think the singing of Valencia was a long term target and not expected to fill that void.
What we do know about SAF is that he has a very strategic approach and is well versed in operating within United's financial guidelines. I fully confident that he knows where his problems are and has very specific targets which will fill the gap. Its now just a question of timing.
BTW, though we have the Glazer debt problems, Im sure SAF has enough budget to get the players he wants. I totally agree with him on 'value' Lets remember, we only buy players who will enhance the capability of our squad. The only players who can do this are being touted at double the market value. And unfortunately, Benzema was desperate to join Madrid.
I wish all the transfer doomsday soothsayers would just do a little research on the history of our club ... This is Manchester United, if there is ever something our squad needs, it most often gets it. The club has literally taken my breath away with its signings over the years and it was a giddy feeling just after the news that the likes Robson, Pallister, Keane, Cole, Yorke, RvN, Ferdinand, Veron, Rooney and of course the 4 players signed in 2007/8! Im sure there are many more moments of giddiness to come.
Of course, in 1992, the King came along and the rest is history and likewise, we lost our marauding catalyst to Madrid in the summer. So there is no way that this current vintage has suddenly become a 'different squad' to last season, it just lacks a creative maverick. I think the singing of Valencia was a long term target and not expected to fill that void.
What we do know about SAF is that he has a very strategic approach and is well versed in operating within United's financial guidelines. I fully confident that he knows where his problems are and has very specific targets which will fill the gap. Its now just a question of timing.
BTW, though we have the Glazer debt problems, Im sure SAF has enough budget to get the players he wants. I totally agree with him on 'value' Lets remember, we only buy players who will enhance the capability of our squad. The only players who can do this are being touted at double the market value. And unfortunately, Benzema was desperate to join Madrid.
I wish all the transfer doomsday soothsayers would just do a little research on the history of our club ... This is Manchester United, if there is ever something our squad needs, it most often gets it. The club has literally taken my breath away with its signings over the years and it was a giddy feeling just after the news that the likes Robson, Pallister, Keane, Cole, Yorke, RvN, Ferdinand, Veron, Rooney and of course the 4 players signed in 2007/8! Im sure there are many more moments of giddiness to come.
I think you are wrong.
If Spurs did qualify for the CL then I'm pretty sure Modric would be as enthusiastic and excited as all the other Spurs players about taking things forwards with an achievement that he would have been part and parcel in creating in the first place. I strongly doubt he'd be especially keen to abandon all that even if Fergie wanted him.
Perhaps more to the point, if we finish 4th then Spurs simply wouldn't sell him (unless a totally stupid amount of cash was offered, and I do mean totally stupid). Even if Modric was somewhat keen on leaving, his motivation levels for doing so would be way below those of Carrick and Berbatov at the time (given the then prevailing circumstances) and he wouldn't be too unhappy if the club insisted he stay - and they certainly would: Spurs are not short of money and you don't begin a CL campaign by selling one of your very best players.
Analogies with Carrick and Berbatov wouldn't hold water in this event, because in those cases Spurs couldn't offer them CL football, and also in Berbatov's case time wasn't on his side in terms of future career length.
I'd also note that Modric has two Croatian mates at Spurs (Corluka and Kranjcar), which would provide an additional background reason for staying.
A midfielder with a brain would do me.
But then they might stop feeding us, not a good thing.
I think they will finish 5th/6th depending on Liverpool's end to the season and i seriously think Citeh can grab the 4th spot and make it theirs in the next few months.
Was he a boyhood Spurs supporter or something? There was me thinking he's just another foreign player playing for the revolving door of a football club, Spurs.
You're wrong: I didn't doubt that Berbatov would leave for Man. Utd last summer: I thought it was pretty likely. I did say, however, that it wouldn't be for the relatively low fee that quite a few on here were saying - and I was proved right.You also doubted we would get Berbatov.
Any way. Seriously, 25 million is pretty cheap for a Modric. We can pay that easily.
You can't win the title or the champions league. Thus Modric would always be ready to leave y'all behind.
The previous summer I did say that Berbatov wouldn't be sold (in the summer concerned) - and I stuck to that regardless of supposed "nailed-on" ITK info. from a W.Ham fan on here that many Caftards believed as I recall ... and again I was proved right.
You reckon that Man. Utd can "easily" pay 25m, whereas I think the financial problems at your club are pretty serious - and getting worse rather than better. Time will tell as to which view is right.
And as I've said, if Spurs finish 4th then Modric won't be sold regardless of who wants him and regardless of whether he wanted to leave (and I doubt he would) unless a stupid amount of cash was offered - meaning way, way, way beyond 25m
You just don't get it do you? Y'all are merely spurs and we are Manchester United. There is really no contest who he'd choose. Seriously.I don't know about Modric, but I reckon Berbatov would've stayed there at least one more season if Spurs had made the CL. He really did seem happy there, at a club that had shown faith in him and put the money on the table when others (namely ourselves) were umm'ing and arr'ing. I remember him mentioning that a few times, so that faith in him obviously did hold quite a bit of meaning to him. And if he was younger he probably would've been happy to stay there for a bit longer as well. It was just that he knew that he was too good not to give himself a shot at the top teams, and he wouldn't have many more opportunities if he didn't fight for a move to us.
I reckon Carrick would've wanted to join us regardless though. He never seemed to hold Spurs in any special way.
Only because City won the jackpot and came in with a much higher bid. If that hadn't happened you would've ended up selling him for about the 25m mark.
If you wish to blithely ignore the financial problems at Man. Utd - as well as to arrogantly underplay the lure of staying with a Spurs team that had qualified for the CL (as we're assuming for the sake of this discussion) - then that's your perogative.
It's also your perogative to be wrong.
Clearly you'd like to believe that - but you're wrong.
Berbatov would never have signed for Man. City in a million years regardless of money offered - everyone and his dog knew that, and both Levy and Fergie certainly did. Therefore Man. Utd did not have to outbid City to get Berbatov - they simply had to stump up what Levy insisted on getting, with time rapidly running out ... and stump up they did.
The Man. City bid was merely an entertaining side show.
If you want to believe the dom mongers. Go ahead. They've been pedaling this bullshit of 'United is in debt so can't spend'' sicne Glazer arrived. In that time we spent 60m on Hargreaves, Anderson and Nani, bought Berbatov for 30 million and loaned Tevez for 20 million without even signing him. Not to mention other smaller deals like Tosic, Diouf, Manucho to name a few.
You seriously want to believe your Spurs team has more of a lure than a side that can win the EPL every year and is in with a serious chance of wining the champions league plus a treble every year?
Rather it's my prerogative to laugh at you. Really hard
Bullshit. It was the reason you so succesfully over priced Berbatov.
i wouldn't even want Modric to be honest, good player but not in the same class as someone like fabregas - but its arrogant to think that every player wants to play for Man United
we didn't do that well attracting top talent last summer
we didn't do that well attracting top talent last summer
You should have stopped reading there, Chief...
You got 80m for Ronaldo 6 months ago. If it hasn't all been earmarked to pay current and future debt interest (or heaven forbid, actually pay back some of vast capital sums owed), then I await with interest to see how much of this you spend this January and next summer without having to first sell players to raise the cash involved.
I don't doubt that Man. Utd has more lure than Spurs.
I do doubt that the strength of that lure would be sufficient to make Modric strongly keen to abandon a Spurs CL campaign in favour of switching to your club.
I even more strongly doubt that Spurs would allow him to leave in the event of us finishihg 4th.
It wasn't, for the reason I've already given (a reason you haven't addressed), namely that Berbatov was never going to sign for City regardless, and therefore Man. United didn't have to outbid them in order to get him.
What you did have to do was pay what Levy insisted on getting.
So? What rule states we must spend some or any of that 80 million before next summer to prove we have money?
Why the heck do we have to ''spend in January'' to prove the cash is there? ( after all we bought Diouf after we sold Ronaldo ( no matter if he was cheap) yet people still swear we are broke and cashless
). Also, why the heck would us selling anyone in the summer have to do with us having the 80 million to spend or not? After all, we almost always sell players every summer. That logic in your argument is weak, man. Seriously.
Bullshit.
Below is why it's bullshit:Dude, since we have a bigger lure than you, it wont matter what you do! The player would still want to come to us! That should be obvious.
That is the only leg you have to stand on.
Yes we did. Spurs wouldn't have let him leave with Manc City offering that alterntive price. Whether he never would have played for them or not. That should be obvious. It's called market forces.
Only in your dreams. If Man City had never come in with that exhorbitant bid. You'd have swallowed your pride and let him go for his true value. Rather than risk your entire season by having an unhappy camper in your ranks.
What it did was give Spurs bargaining power against Berbatov. They would've accepted the City bid and then told Berbatov that either he goes there or he's going nowhere. Making it Berbatov's fault if he was still there once the window closed. And he may well have chosen to go to City rather than Spurs since he'd burnt his bridges there.
Exactly the same thing happened with Robinho. Chelsea wanted to sign him and he wanted to go there, and eventually Real would've had no option but to let him go. But at the last moment City came in with a larger offer and Real gave him a City or nothing option. The difference is that Chelsea didn't match the offer, so Robinho ended up at City.
How many years of transfer frustration do we have ahead of us with the Glazers in charge?
with Fergie's new buzz word value i wonder how many years we will watch teams like chelsea, city, barca and madrid compete for the world's best players while we try and find bargains....
we love the mantra we don't buy legends we make them but remember we broke transfer records to buy players like pallister, keane, cole, ferdinand, rooney, veron and berbatov (with a pretty good success rate)
I'm thinking maybe we're all wasting our time making wishlists of players we want to play for United with the Glazers in charge - the honeymoon period is well and truly over with them and i don't buy into the whole idea that fergie hasn't seen any transfer targets he fancies
a mate sent me this earlier and it made my blood boil - we are still very accepting of the glazers compared to the scousers - i think our transfer policy could be fecked until we get shot of those bloodsucking bastards
in case you havent read it
Manchester United’s owners are seeking to issue a £600 million bond in a bid to ease the club’s mounting debt burden, as Rant reported on Sunday. The bond, which in practice effectively swaps one kind of debt for another, will theoretically cut the overwhelming annual interest burden on the club – now at more than £70 million and rising.
But what does it really mean? Rant explains…
What does United owe?
When the Glazer family bought the club in 2005 they did so using two forms of debt in what City insiders call a leveraged buyout. Firstly, the family borrowed a touch over £130 million from various New York-based hedge funds. These so-called Payment-In-Kind (PIK) loans, which the family is ultimately responsible for meeting, roll-up interest annually. Secondly, the Glazers borrowed hundreds of millions more in principle cash debt from banks, including JP Morgan. In 2006 the family refinanced this debt placed it on the club’s books, securitised against the shares and club assets.
It is the PIK loans, which roll-up interest annually until the debt matures at a future date, that are causing greatest concern. In this case the interest charged is widely reported as an eye watering 14.35 per cent annually, with the maturation date in 2017. By then the initial £130 million loan will have reached £580 million.
The principal cash debt now stands at £519 million, according to the last published accounts, which are more than 18 months old. These loans are relatively inexpensive, attracting interest at between two and five per cent annually. Cheap money in times of extreme illiquidity in the commercial lending market.
Together – and with an assumption of interest added over the past 18 months – United owes more than £700 million.
What is a bond issue?
The Glazer family has asked US bank JP Morgan to explore a bond issue in which the club will effectively write IOU notes to potential investors who buy debt. On these IOUs the club promises to pay investors their money invested plus interest at a fixed date in the future. The success of the issue depends on how many investors buy United’s bonds: a factor of risk (default) versus potential rewards (interest payable). The risk to investors is diluted by spreading the debt among many parties.
Why refinance now?
The Glazer family has sought to refinance the PIK loans on many occasions over the past two years but the global recession has reduced to almost nothing the amount of money available on the commercial debt market. Unless the family can refinance it will be liable to pay the huge PIK loans in full on maturation. A firesale of the club – stripped of all its assets – is the inevitable outcome.
What are the advantages of the bond issue?
A successful bond issue will swap one kind of debt for another kind of debt but at a far cheaper interest rate. For the Glazer family this makes complete sense by removing the burden of the punishing PIK loans. The club’s books would actually be laden with more debt, although this point is moot: the Glazer’s debt, is effectively the club’s debt anyway.
What are the catches?
The principal bank lenders have a say in the running of the club under the terms of the £500 million cash loan but only if United does not meet certain financial targets. The club is meeting those targets but as preferential lenders JP Morgan and others expect the club to pay down some cash debt in addition to the PIK loans. This is why a full-scale £600 million bond issue is now mooted. This may have the effect of increasing interest payments on some parts of the club’s cash debt.
What do the fans’ groups say?
Manchester United’s Supporters’ Trust (MUST) questions why “any potential bond investor [would] be prepared to take on this risk if the return is going to be less than the current lenders receive and now in an environment where the risk is clearly much higher than the time at which these loans were first negotiated?”
“Is the financial situation for the Glazers as bad as recent speculation has suggested?” asks the group.
“Despite the extra income from TV and the huge ticket price rises they have been clawing back expenditure both at Manchester United as well as at the Tampa Bay Buccaneers where fan discontent is starting to mirror that at Old Trafford.”
“Whether they do manage to shift the debt onto other lenders the situation for United fans and our club will be little changed – weighed down by the millstone of the Glazers debt and with the supporters having to foot the bill through ever increasing ticket prices and reduced expenditure on players,” the group said in a statement.
“The Glazers have taken us from being a club that were the richest in the sporting world to now the most indebted. In the four years before the Glazers’ takeover Manchester United invested over £80 million in the form of players like Rooney and Ronaldo. In the four years since the Glazer takeover the turnover has doubled but, despite protestations to the contrary, independently published figures suggest the net transfer spend is now negative.”
“This is surely the time for the Glazers to exit and make way for a new investor interested in working with the supporters to build a stronger football club and business together,” it concludes.
What about transfer spending?
Simple arithmetic says that to pay down cash debt and account for rolled-up interest on the PIK loans United cannot spend more than £20 million per season. Even that figure is optimistic. Money from the sale of Cristiano Ronaldo remains unspent. The question is whether the Glazer family pays down debt more quickly than in the past or reinvests in the squad.
Will a white knight save United?
This is highly unlikely. While United is heavily indebted the club is as the leading sports franchise by the influential US-based Forbes magazine, ahead of Dallas Cowboys and Washington Redskins. With a market value reaching more than £1.3 billion, any investor in the club will need seriously deeps pockets. In comparison Roman Abramovic has invested a total of around £400 million in Chelsea, including buying the club, paying off debt and bringing in new players. Meanwhile, Sheik Mansour’s investment in Manchester City totals just £304 million.
So what does the future hold?
United must refinance or the club’s indebtedness will continue to climb sharply in the coming years. While the club can meet cash debts through revenues, the looming maturation of PIK loans is wiping out almost 100 per cent of the club’s annual profits. Despite making a pre-tax profit of £88 million, debt repayments, transfer spending and rolled-up interest meant United’s holding company – Red Football Joint Venture Limited – increased its indebtedness by £33 million in the last published accounts.
The catch: there is little incentive for current investors to swap cash debt for a bond and the financial market is still deeply frozen to commercial borrowers.
The club has doubled turnover in the past four years through strong growth in TV, commercial and match-day revenues. It may need to do so again in the next four years simply to stand still. The alternative is a frozen transfer budget and inevitable player sales.
with Fergie's new buzz word value i wonder how many years we will watch teams like chelsea, city, barca and madrid compete for the world's best players while we try and find bargains....
we love the mantra we don't buy legends we make them but remember we broke transfer records to buy players like pallister, keane, cole, ferdinand, rooney, veron and berbatov (with a pretty good success rate)
I'm thinking maybe we're all wasting our time making wishlists of players we want to play for United with the Glazers in charge - the honeymoon period is well and truly over with them and i don't buy into the whole idea that fergie hasn't seen any transfer targets he fancies
a mate sent me this earlier and it made my blood boil - we are still very accepting of the glazers compared to the scousers - i think our transfer policy could be fecked until we get shot of those bloodsucking bastards
in case you havent read it
Manchester United’s owners are seeking to issue a £600 million bond in a bid to ease the club’s mounting debt burden, as Rant reported on Sunday. The bond, which in practice effectively swaps one kind of debt for another, will theoretically cut the overwhelming annual interest burden on the club – now at more than £70 million and rising.
But what does it really mean? Rant explains…
What does United owe?
When the Glazer family bought the club in 2005 they did so using two forms of debt in what City insiders call a leveraged buyout. Firstly, the family borrowed a touch over £130 million from various New York-based hedge funds. These so-called Payment-In-Kind (PIK) loans, which the family is ultimately responsible for meeting, roll-up interest annually. Secondly, the Glazers borrowed hundreds of millions more in principle cash debt from banks, including JP Morgan. In 2006 the family refinanced this debt placed it on the club’s books, securitised against the shares and club assets.
It is the PIK loans, which roll-up interest annually until the debt matures at a future date, that are causing greatest concern. In this case the interest charged is widely reported as an eye watering 14.35 per cent annually, with the maturation date in 2017. By then the initial £130 million loan will have reached £580 million.
The principal cash debt now stands at £519 million, according to the last published accounts, which are more than 18 months old. These loans are relatively inexpensive, attracting interest at between two and five per cent annually. Cheap money in times of extreme illiquidity in the commercial lending market.
Together – and with an assumption of interest added over the past 18 months – United owes more than £700 million.
What is a bond issue?
The Glazer family has asked US bank JP Morgan to explore a bond issue in which the club will effectively write IOU notes to potential investors who buy debt. On these IOUs the club promises to pay investors their money invested plus interest at a fixed date in the future. The success of the issue depends on how many investors buy United’s bonds: a factor of risk (default) versus potential rewards (interest payable). The risk to investors is diluted by spreading the debt among many parties.
Why refinance now?
The Glazer family has sought to refinance the PIK loans on many occasions over the past two years but the global recession has reduced to almost nothing the amount of money available on the commercial debt market. Unless the family can refinance it will be liable to pay the huge PIK loans in full on maturation. A firesale of the club – stripped of all its assets – is the inevitable outcome.
What are the advantages of the bond issue?
A successful bond issue will swap one kind of debt for another kind of debt but at a far cheaper interest rate. For the Glazer family this makes complete sense by removing the burden of the punishing PIK loans. The club’s books would actually be laden with more debt, although this point is moot: the Glazer’s debt, is effectively the club’s debt anyway.
What are the catches?
The principal bank lenders have a say in the running of the club under the terms of the £500 million cash loan but only if United does not meet certain financial targets. The club is meeting those targets but as preferential lenders JP Morgan and others expect the club to pay down some cash debt in addition to the PIK loans. This is why a full-scale £600 million bond issue is now mooted. This may have the effect of increasing interest payments on some parts of the club’s cash debt.
What do the fans’ groups say?
Manchester United’s Supporters’ Trust (MUST) questions why “any potential bond investor [would] be prepared to take on this risk if the return is going to be less than the current lenders receive and now in an environment where the risk is clearly much higher than the time at which these loans were first negotiated?”
“Is the financial situation for the Glazers as bad as recent speculation has suggested?” asks the group.
“Despite the extra income from TV and the huge ticket price rises they have been clawing back expenditure both at Manchester United as well as at the Tampa Bay Buccaneers where fan discontent is starting to mirror that at Old Trafford.”
“Whether they do manage to shift the debt onto other lenders the situation for United fans and our club will be little changed – weighed down by the millstone of the Glazers debt and with the supporters having to foot the bill through ever increasing ticket prices and reduced expenditure on players,” the group said in a statement.
“The Glazers have taken us from being a club that were the richest in the sporting world to now the most indebted. In the four years before the Glazers’ takeover Manchester United invested over £80 million in the form of players like Rooney and Ronaldo. In the four years since the Glazer takeover the turnover has doubled but, despite protestations to the contrary, independently published figures suggest the net transfer spend is now negative.”
“This is surely the time for the Glazers to exit and make way for a new investor interested in working with the supporters to build a stronger football club and business together,” it concludes.
What about transfer spending?
Simple arithmetic says that to pay down cash debt and account for rolled-up interest on the PIK loans United cannot spend more than £20 million per season. Even that figure is optimistic. Money from the sale of Cristiano Ronaldo remains unspent. The question is whether the Glazer family pays down debt more quickly than in the past or reinvests in the squad.
Will a white knight save United?
This is highly unlikely. While United is heavily indebted the club is as the leading sports franchise by the influential US-based Forbes magazine, ahead of Dallas Cowboys and Washington Redskins. With a market value reaching more than £1.3 billion, any investor in the club will need seriously deeps pockets. In comparison Roman Abramovic has invested a total of around £400 million in Chelsea, including buying the club, paying off debt and bringing in new players. Meanwhile, Sheik Mansour’s investment in Manchester City totals just £304 million.
So what does the future hold?
United must refinance or the club’s indebtedness will continue to climb sharply in the coming years. While the club can meet cash debts through revenues, the looming maturation of PIK loans is wiping out almost 100 per cent of the club’s annual profits. Despite making a pre-tax profit of £88 million, debt repayments, transfer spending and rolled-up interest meant United’s holding company – Red Football Joint Venture Limited – increased its indebtedness by £33 million in the last published accounts.
The catch: there is little incentive for current investors to swap cash debt for a bond and the financial market is still deeply frozen to commercial borrowers.
The club has doubled turnover in the past four years through strong growth in TV, commercial and match-day revenues. It may need to do so again in the next four years simply to stand still. The alternative is a frozen transfer budget and inevitable player sales.
What nonsense.
If you can't sell a player for X amount of money because the player simply won't sign for the club concerned, then X becomes irrelevant as a market force - i.e. the offer has no force because it's just so much pie in the sky.
Spurs signed Crouch from Pompey for less than Sunderland had offered. Why? because Crouch refused to sign for Sunderland, knowing that Spurs were waiting in the wings. So Pompey had to accept the lower bid, especially since they needed the cash - that's market forces in operation.
By the same token, United didn't need to outbid City to get Berbatov, because City's offer had no effective market force (Berbatov was never going to sign for them regardless, and he especially wasn't going to sign for them knowing that Fergie was waiting in the wings).
Furthermore, and unlike Pompey with Crouch, Spurs were not desperate for cash.
Fergie wanted Berbatov badly, Spurs were reluctant sellers, the clock was ticking, Levy had a price in mind, stuck to it, and got it .. that's the market reality. City were a total irrelevance.
Not really true though is it
Noone else wanted Berbatov, he was desperate to leave and was being a bit of a twat about it, i hate to see players doing that, just get on with it and give it your all until you secure the move
But if City hadn't got money, no other team would have placed a bid for Berbatov, and Spurs would have sold for £25m as there is no point keeping an unhappy player, especially if they have become so disruptive. City had a bid accepted, which gave United little choice but to go to the level Spurs wanted
Tell that to Chelsea and Robinho.
If the selling team wants to sell then what you say is true. We sold Beckham and Ruud to Real despite having bigger offers from Barca and Bayern respectively. Same thing with Crouch for you guys.
But when they don't want to sell, it gives the selling club a much better bargaining point if another team comes in with a higher offer.
You're the one saying that 25m for Modric is "easily affordable" - not me. In any case, I didn't limit my reply to this January, I also included next summer ... and I'm happy to extend my the scope of my argument well beyond that if you wish.
The premise is that your financial chickens are finally starting to come home to roost, which would hardly be surprising given the current financial climate, the stupendously large sums of money owed and the interest payments being sucked outwards.
If the premise is correct, then logic says (a) that you might not have large sums of cash to spend lots on signing new players for the forseeable future - not without first selling players to raise the cash at least; and (b) that some or all of the Ronaldo cash will disappear into debt servicing.
You're saying that the premise is wrong - fair enough, although I note that some of your fellow supporters don't share this cosy view.
But if the premise is right, then the logic is pretty obvious and fairly strong it seems to me.
Unwarranted arrogance I'm afraid.
A 28 year-old Berbatov wanting CL football is not the same as a 24 year-old Modric who (we're assuming) would already have the promise of it at Spurs. Modric might still wish to come to Man. United in those circumstances, but I doubt he'd be that fussed about it if Spurs told him he was staying.
That is utter rubbish. As long as City is there with it's offer, it makes it easier for Spurs to pick a selling price. REAL played the same trick on Cheslea. Till Robinho just got tired and decided any where was better than REAL and jumped ship..... You are beyond deluded if you think Levy was going to keep Berbatov if we had refused to fork out near 30 million. Not a chance.
No. That is Pompey being desperate for cash. feck all to do with market forces. Berba's price went up ONLY because of City. That is market forces. Not someone having to mortgage an asset due to desperation. When there is another financial option on the table, the seller can do as they please. That is how PSG quoted a higher price to us for Ronaldinho, yet accepted much less from Barcelona to sell the player. That is how REAL conned Robinho out of a move to Chelsea.
Bullshit. City's offer was real enough. As long as that offer was there Spurs could pick a price. Regardless of what berba wanted. Without it they had no starting point to say we take this or else. Pompey caved in because they need cash. If they hadn't you wouldn't have paid as little as you did for Crouch. Just remember what happened when you tried to sell Bent to a higher bidder.
That is about as truthful as you claiming you don't believe your club has more lure than united.Giovinco.
Not read through this, but I'd love us to get Higuain.
Uh. I guess you missed the season where the common belief was he was moping and sulking because Spurs wouldnt let him leave.