Re: Football Chat Thread : Wed Jun 08, 2011 1:23 pm  

Ordsall Quays Red wrote:

I was thinking the exact same thing, especially players at the same ages as Henderson and Jones are. Both Henderson and Jones have plenty of PL experience too. Both are really good signings for the future I'd say but both would be able to play first team football immediately if need be. Immediate plus point for Jones = speaking to Wenger last night but deciding to sign for Nited instead!!

Absolutely agree. I like Jones and whilst £15m may seem steep, it's what you have to pay. Not sure that a foreign youngster with a years PL experience would cost any less. Look at Valencia, he cost £16m and he's neither U21 nor English.

Henderson looks very good at Sunderland and whilst the latest figure of £16m looks steep, look at how Aquilani has got on costing £18m. My only concern is that he may get Scott Parker bigclubitis, but he has to move to a big club for us to find out!

This myth that cheaper alternatives are available is ridiculous.

Re: Football Chat Thread : Wed Jun 08, 2011 1:27 pm  

ash4hullfc wrote:

Raphael Varane will probably go for around half of what Man Utd are paying for Jones.

Who has never done anything outside of Ligue 1. How many first team games has he played? He's only come on the scene towards the back end of this season. If he goes for anything near £10m Lens have played a blinder.

Re: Football Chat Thread : Wed Jun 08, 2011 1:34 pm  

Roddy B wrote:

Compare the price of Henderson to the likely price of Arturo Vidal when he signs for Bayern. Look at how much Nuri Sahin cost. Look at the predicted price for Gervinho (some are saying £10m, but I thought he was going to be about £15m). The rumoured fee for Juan Mata is between E18m and E20m. IMO, the gap between Mata and Downing is more than £5m/£6m, whilst I'd say Mata is a better player than Ashley Young.

There will be plenty of players that move across Europe this summer who will go for much better value than the English players. I'm not saying the English players are bad, just highly overpriced and clubs seemingly bend over and accept it.

I'd say Sahin is a one off. He had a buy out clause in his contract!

Gervinho, Mata et al have proved nothing in the PL. If they had they would go for a fortune. Look at non English inter-premier league transfers. Torres - £50m, Valencia - £16m, Berbatov - £32m. It has nothing to do with them being Englaish, it's about having a proven premiership pedigree.

Re: Football Chat Thread : Wed Jun 08, 2011 1:40 pm  

Roddy B wrote:

Compare the price of Henderson to the likely price of Arturo Vidal when he signs for Bayern. Look at how much Nuri Sahin cost. Look at the predicted price for Gervinho (some are saying £10m, but I thought he was going to be about £15m). The rumoured fee for Juan Mata is between E18m and E20m. IMO, the gap between Mata and Downing is more than £5m/£6m, whilst I'd say Mata is a better player than Ashley Young.
There will be plenty of players that move across Europe this summer who will go for much better value than the English players. I'm not saying the English players are bad, just highly overpriced and clubs seemingly bend over and accept it.

Comparing Mata and Downing isn't really fair. Mata is a good player who can pass with either foot. Do you really rate Vidal? How long has he been at Leverkusen? I'd have thought if he was really that good he'd have gone to one of Europe's 'bigger' clubs before now.
We're talking about youngsters aren't we? Gervinho is 27 and while I have no doubt he'd be a cracking signing for Newcastle I'd be underwhelmed if he came to Old Trafford.

Re: Football Chat Thread : Wed Jun 08, 2011 1:49 pm  

Lord God Jose Mourinho wrote:

Can't make a comment on Tiote, as I wouldn't know who he was if I tripped over him, but I'd offer the name of Didier Drogba as proof that a player can be of a far higher quality than their early career suggests.

Agreed but that is beside the point. I'm not saying he's not far higher quality than his earlier career suggests. I was attacking the suggestion that Tiote was some sort of shining example of a foreigner who was thought to be average but turned out to be awesome. Maybe he will get to that level but he's not yet. If he does get to that level we'll know about it because Newcastle will sell him.

Re: Football Chat Thread : Wed Jun 08, 2011 2:20 pm  

I'll be honest and say that I'm fairly gutted that United have beaten us to Jones. If he continues to grow as he has done so far, he'll be England centre back for the next 15 years and make a great partner for Vidic. He must realise that it's a long term transfer because I can't see him playing anywhere near the amount of games at United that he would at Liverpool in the next couple of years and it's arguable that he'll be more than 4th choice for the forseeable future at United, as Smalling has surely won the right to be 3rd choice now.

Re: Football Chat Thread : Wed Jun 08, 2011 2:52 pm  

I'd say Jones is the long term replacement for Vidic. The no messing, traditional centre half. Smalling is surely the replacement for Ferdinand, he's looked all class tbf after I was sceptical about the big fee (which looks a bargain now)

Re: Football Chat Thread : Wed Jun 08, 2011 3:05 pm  

RedTez wrote:

Who has never done anything outside of Ligue 1. How many first team games has he played? He's only come on the scene towards the back end of this season. If he goes for anything near £10m Lens have played a blinder.

He's been linked with Utd/Arsenal for weeks now for around £7/8m.

The £10m we paid for Smalling now looks good value but at the time I thought it was a bit steep.

Re: Football Chat Thread : Wed Jun 08, 2011 3:05 pm  

Give it a few years and 15/16 million will seem like a steal for Jones,all Rovers fans knew he'd eventually make the move to one of the top 4 but he's only 19 and we were hoping he'd stay at least another year at least.I can't see him playing much for the next couple of years with Vidic and Rio not looking likely to be leaving soon.He played just in front of the back 4 more than CB for us this season,maybe Fergie sees him doing that for a while until a cb position is up for grabs.

Re: Football Chat Thread : Wed Jun 08, 2011 3:19 pm  

Roddy B wrote:

Compare the price of Henderson to the likely price of Arturo Vidal when he signs for Bayern. Look at how much Nuri Sahin cost. Look at the predicted price for Gervinho (some are saying £10m, but I thought he was going to be about £15m). The rumoured fee for Juan Mata is between E18m and E20m. IMO, the gap between Mata and Downing is more than £5m/£6m, whilst I'd say Mata is a better player than Ashley Young.

There will be plenty of players that move across Europe this summer who will go for much better value than the English players. I'm not saying the English players are bad, just highly overpriced and clubs seemingly bend over and accept it.

Both Jones and Henderson have a fair amount of first team PL experience, both look like they have the potential to be two stars of PL and England for the next 10-15 years. It's a gamble, every transfer is but surely it's a bit less of gamble when we've seen the players performing well at Premier League level already. You'd have to be paying close to 20 million Euro, I'd guess, for Mata - maybe Catalancs could give us an accurate valuation on him, so if you pay that sort of money for someone who may not settle in England, may not like the PL and just may be a big flop (we've seen enough of them!) it doesn't seem as much of a risk behind players who are showing exceptional ability in the league already. Jones and Smalling future United CB partnership?

Player from the continent aren't always what they're cracked up to be mate.