Álvaro Carreras | Benfica

When we sold him, I was really disappointed. But, he made wise decision to leave and have game time to develop. If he keeps working hard, he will become a top player, no doubt about it.
 
Just with our injury issues, we should not have sold him. Think we paid more for that pointless Reguillon loan for half a season.
 
Just one of the many baffling decisions Hag made letting this lad go.
 
Gabb said:
Just one of the many baffling decisions Hag made letting this lad go.
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Was this Ten Hags decision? Just wondering, since I would have thought Ashworth would have given him some pushback.

Just baffling how he was let go by the club.
 
Gabb said:
Just one of the many baffling decisions Hag made letting this lad go.
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VWW said:
Was this Ten Hags decision? Just wondering, since I would have thought Ashworth would have given him some pushback.

Just baffling how he was let go by the club.
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Just quoting my reply from another thread. For Alvaro to progress we couldn't guarantee gametime and loaning him at that time with a buy back option was the correct decision. I don't think anyone could have predicted both Shaw and Malacia would be out indefinitely since Feb.
saik said:
Hindsight is a wonderful thing. There's a lot that went on during that time. We loaned him out in January of last season with an option to buy. At that time Shaw was already playing/very close to returning and ETH was promised that Malacia would also be back by February. This was also the reason why we sent back Reguilon.

Having two full backs ahead of him meant Alvaro wouldn't get the regular gametime he needed to progress. He wouldn't be starting ahead of Shaw if he was fit. It's just our shit luck that Shaw got injured again in Feb and Malacia had a botched surgery which meant we ended up in this situation with no fit left backs.
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VWW said:
Was this Ten Hags decision? Just wondering, since I would have thought Ashworth would have given him some pushback.

Just baffling how he was let go by the club.
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Ashworth and INEOS were not in the picture when all this was going down.

Heading into last season ETH decided that he would rather loan Reguillon from Spurs than give game time to Alvaro and so he was sent on loan to Granada where he had an indifferent first half of a season. In the January window we terminated the Reguillon loan but allegedly ETH was assured he would have Shaw and Malacia available and so we recalled Alvaro from Granada and loaned him to Benfica instead with the 6M option to buy included. Obviously we should have kept him but ETH was supposedly stitched up by the medical department. The inclusion of the buy option had a lot to do with our perilous position regarding Profit and Sustainability during that January window and the quick fix that transfer income from academy plyers represents. Classic bit of self harm for the sake of short term expediency.
 
Trust us to feck about with Shaw, Malacia, Reguilon, be left with NONE of them, and sell Alvaro. Clown show.
 
So many comments saying it’s a no-brainer re-signing him, ignoring the fact that the player might not want to join us. He’s finally found himself a club and a manager that trusts him. He gets to play CL football more or less every season. Even with Spain being as strong as they are, I wouldn’t be surprised if he makes his senior debut soon.

I noticed that he never even posted anything thanking United or the coaches when he left us. Not saying everyone should, but it could very well be that he has no intention of coming back. If I was him, it would take a lot of convincing from Amorim. And even with that, well we seem to fire and hire managers quite consistently, so it might not matter too much what the current one says.
 
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saik said:
Just quoting my reply from another thread. For Alvaro to progress we couldn't guarantee gametime and loaning him at that time with a buy back option was the correct decision. I don't think anyone could have predicted both Shaw and Malacia would be out indefinitely since Feb.
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How could no one have predicted it when they were both injured when he was loaned last summer? There was plenty of game time to guarantee as we literally had no fit LBs and it was very easy to predict that we’d end up having to play people out of position like Amrabat and Lindelof who were predictably shit at LB.

He was recalled in January and loaned again with option to sell while Shaw and Malacia were still both injured. You didn’t even need to predict anything, they were both injured during both windows he was sent out.

Malacia required surgery in the summer so it was known he would be out long term, the surgery was botched so it was also known he’d continue to be out long term in January. Reguillon was sent back and Shaw had returned for a short time but got injured again in January. It isn’t hard to predict that Shaw wasn’t going to be capable of playing every single match.

That’s the laziest cop out ever, there was no bad luck or impossible to predict. It was plainly obvious and slapping everyone in the face at the time.
 
saik said:
Just quoting my reply from another thread. For Alvaro to progress we couldn't guarantee gametime and loaning him at that time with a buy back option was the correct decision. I don't think anyone could have predicted both Shaw and Malacia would be out indefinitely since Feb.
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I agree that first team football was definitely best for his career. However, it didn’t take a genius to realise that Shaw and Malacia would more than likely be injured for the second half of last season. In terms of team planning it was incompetence of the highest order relying on two very obviously injury prone players when we had a very exciting youngster ready to step up
 
top1whoisman said:
So many comments saying it’s a no-brainer re-signing him, ignoring the fact that the player might not want to join us. He’s finally found himself a club and a manager that trusts him. Even with Spain being as strong as they are, I wouldn’t be surprised if he makes his senior debut soon.

I noticed that he never even posted anything thanking United or the coaches when he left us. Not saying everyone should, but it could very well be that he has no intention of coming back. If I was him, it would take a lot of convincing from Amorim. And even with that, well we seem to fire and hire managers quite consistently, so it might not matter too much what the current one says.
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Basically that, the way how we let him go - that was very meh. And we didn't have a set leftback then.
 
limerickcitykid said:
How could no one have predicted it when they were both injured when he was loaned last summer? There was plenty of game time to guarantee as we literally had no fit LBs and it was very easy to predict that we’d end up having to play people out of position like Amrabat and Lindelof who were predictably shit at LB.

He was recalled in January and loaned again with option to sell while Shaw and Malacia were still both injured. You didn’t even need to predict anything, they were both injured during both windows he was sent out.

Malacia required surgery in the summer so it was known he would be out long term, the surgery was botched so it was also known he’d continue to be out long term in January. Reguillon was sent back and Shaw had returned for a short time but got injured again in January. It isn’t hard to predict that Shaw wasn’t going to be capable of playing every single match.

That’s the laziest cop out ever, there was no bad luck or impossible to predict. It was plainly obvious and slapping everyone in the face at the time.
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Feels like you went on a complete tangent while messing up when Shaw and Malacia were injured and were expected to be back. Alvaro was loaned to Benfica in January with an option to buy, which they exercised in the summer. By that time, our hands were tied, and we couldn’t make any moves to keep him.

Shaw played on December 23rd and was injured shortly afterward. He was back playing in the FA Cup against Newport on January 28th, well before the transfer window closed. So, it was clear that he was close to being fit, if not already fully recovered. Additionally, Malacia was expected back in February, so it made little sense to keep all three players vying for the same position.

Realistically, if Shaw had been fit, he would have started, limiting Alvaro's opportunities for development. Shaw had been relatively injury-free the season prior, and Malacia, as mentioned earlier, was anticipated to return in February after having his surgery so a decision was made on Alvaro to send him out.

Did you predict that Malacia would have a botched surgery and require another surgery, delaying his return beyond February? Or that Shaw would suffer another injury right after the transfer window closed, sidelining him for the entire season? How is that something that's easy to predict?
 
top1whoisman said:
So many comments saying it’s a no-brainer re-signing him, ignoring the fact that the player might not want to join us. He’s finally found himself a club and a manager that trusts him. Even with Spain being as strong as they are, I wouldn’t be surprised if he makes his senior debut soon.

I noticed that he never even posted anything thanking United or the coaches when he left us. Not saying everyone should, but it could very well be that he has no intention of coming back. If I was him, it would take a lot of convincing from Amorim. And even with that, well we seem to fire and hire managers quite consistently, so it might not matter too much what the current one says.
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Yeah that's significant. Most players post something even if it's perfunctory and for show. Posting that stuff doesn't mean much but not posting it raises the the question if he is happy to get away from us.
 
saik said:
Feels like you went on a complete tangent while messing up when Shaw and Malacia were injured and were expected to be back. Alvaro was loaned to Benfica in January with an option to buy, which they exercised in the summer. By that time, our hands were tied, and we couldn’t make any moves to keep him.

Shaw played on December 23rd and was injured shortly afterward. He was back playing in the FA Cup against Newport on January 28th, well before the transfer window closed. So, it was clear that he was close to being fit, if not already fully recovered. Additionally, Malacia was expected back in February, so it made little sense to keep all three players vying for the same position.

Realistically, if Shaw had been fit, he would have started, limiting Alvaro's opportunities for development. Shaw had been relatively injury-free the season prior, and Malacia, as mentioned earlier, was anticipated to return in February after having his surgery so a decision was made on Alvaro to send him out.

Did you predict that Malacia would have a botched surgery and require another surgery, delaying his return beyond February? Or that Shaw would suffer another injury right after the transfer window closed, sidelining him for the entire season? How is that something that's easy to predict?
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But it was a poor decision. Malacia was injured before the season started, and both were injured in Jan window as well. We had a chance to recall him from loan as both are unreliable.

It was a stupid decision, and that has been proven. The simple fact is that ETH just did not rate him, as we spent about the same amount of money that we sold this guy on Reguillon, who also was barely played in favour of playing shit like Amrabat and Lindelof there. The fact that he went and loaned in Reguillon showed that ETH was not confident in Shaw and Malacia being fit either. We just made a big mess of a situation that had a simple solution.
 
Why the hell did we sell him in the first place? Could have just sent him on loan so we dont need to spend an extra €10m to get him back a year later.
 
RDCR07 said:
Why the hell did we sell him in the first place? Could have just sent him on loan so we dont need to spend an extra €10m to get him back a year later.
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Probably as he had a year left on his deal and possibly wasn't going to extend. Who knows, what's past is past and time to move on.
 
Ace of Spades said:
But it was a poor decision. Malacia was injured before the season started, and both were injured in Jan window as well. We had a chance to recall him from loan as both are unreliable.

It was a stupid decision, and that has been proven. The simple fact is that ETH just did not rate him, as we spent about the same amount of money that we sold this guy on Reguillon, who also was barely played in favour of playing shit like Amrabat and Lindelof there. The fact that he went and loaned in Reguillon showed that ETH was not confident in Shaw and Malacia being fit either. We just made a big mess of a situation that had a simple solution.
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Again, easier to say in hindsight. We recalled him from a loan at Granada where he was not playing regularly and if Shaw was fit, would have been getting next to zero gametime here which would have stagnated his development even further. We don't even know if Alvaro preferred staying here 2nd or even 3rd choice choice behind Shaw and Malacia. For all we know, he wanted to leave to get regular playing time. He's got it now and we have a reasonable buy back option which we can exercise and then it comes down to him if he wants to return.
 
Gabb said:
Just one of the many baffling decisions Hag made letting this lad go.
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Weird to try and pin that on ETH. We sold a lot of young players likely because PSR rules are changing re how academy players feed are calculated.
 
top1whoisman said:
So many comments saying it’s a no-brainer re-signing him, ignoring the fact that the player might not want to join us. He’s finally found himself a club and a manager that trusts him. He gets to play CL football more or less every season. Even with Spain being as strong as they are, I wouldn’t be surprised if he makes his senior debut soon.

I noticed that he never even posted anything thanking United or the coaches when he left us. Not saying everyone should, but it could very well be that he has no intention of coming back. If I was him, it would take a lot of convincing from Amorim. And even with that, well we seem to fire and hire managers quite consistently, so it might not matter too much what the current one says.
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I mean I don’t think that’s how it works.

The player will have had some input on the clause itself otherwise what would be the point in it?
 
Irrational. said:
Of all the shit decisions and bad calls ETH made (and there were a lot of them), this was amongst the worst.
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Think the decision to loan him with an option to buy would be more of a Murtough decision than an ETH one. So far as Erik knew he had Shaw back fit and Malacia to return in another month so there was no rom in the squad for Alvaro, based on that he would not have objected but he also won't have made the call on where to send him or the terms of the deal. I do fault him for not keeping him during the first half of the season to rotate with Shaw when Malacia was out though, pointless to let him go just to do Spurs a favor by loaning Reguillon.
 
saik said:
Again, easier to say in hindsight. We recalled him from a loan at Granada where he was not playing regularly and if Shaw was fit, would have been getting next to zero gametime here which would have stagnated his development even further. We don't even know if Alvaro preferred staying here 2nd or even 3rd choice choice behind Shaw and Malacia. For all we know, he wanted to leave to get regular playing time. He's got it now and we have a reasonable buy back option which we can exercise and then it comes down to him if he wants to return.
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No, it is not easier to say with hindsight. We literally got Reguillon at the start of the season, which means that the staff and manager were aware of the injury concerns with Shaw and Malacia. He would have easily got plenty of game time, if the manager wanted. Even after loaning Reguillon and him being available, we barely played him, and instead tried all sorts of other players at LB, which makes the loan of Reguillon a waste of money as well. It was a simple solution, which we made a mess of.
 
Ace of Spades said:
No, it is not easier to say with hindsight. We literally got Reguillon at the start of the season, which means that the staff and manager were aware of the injury concerns with Shaw and Malacia. He would have easily got plenty of game time, if the manager wanted. Even after loaning Reguillon and him being available, we barely played him, and instead tried all sorts of other players at LB, which makes the loan of Reguillon a waste of money as well. It was a simple solution, which we made a mess of.
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I think it’s easy to oversimplify it and hindsight is relevant. At the time, Alvaro had not shown that he could be trusted defensively at high PL level. He had so far shown the opposite.

Hypothetically, you can imagine him playing in place of Reguilon in the chaos of an everchanging back four behind a depleted midfield, yes, but how would it have turned out for him? We are talking anout the lad that was too open to play for Granada, not the lad that now has developped to a more dependable defender at Benfica.

I’m not so sure he has that development as the fall guy in subsequent butcherings vs Spurs and Galatasaray, for instance.
 
Grande said:
I think it’s easy to oversimplify it and hindsight is relevant. At the time, Alvaro had not shown that he could be trusted defensively at high PL level. He had so far shown the opposite.

Hypothetically, you can imagine him playing in place of Reguilon in the chaos of an everchanging back four behind a depleted midfield, yes, but how would it have turned out for him? We are talking anout the lad that was too open to play for Granada, not the lad that now has developped to a more dependable defender at Benfica.

I’m not so sure he has that development as the fall guy in subsequent butcherings vs Spurs and Galatasaray, for instance.
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It does not matter, we just wasted a bunch of money. The little money we got for selling Alvaro was spent on that pointless Reguillon loan for half a season. This is not a good way to manage the squad at all.

Your hypotheticals are pointless, as the reality is that our LB position is a mess, and we sold a good talent that we had in the academy for that position for peanuts.
 
Maybe we can take the positive in that he did go somewhere and get game time and progress and we were clever enough to insert a buy back clause. Hindsight is wonderful but I think we did right here. He still had a bit of naivety in his game for the top level.
 
Where ex players are concerned, I think him and Gomes are pretty well suited to Amorims setup. Isn't Gomes available on a free too?
 
top1whoisman said:
As far as I know it’s an agreement between the clubs.
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You can see why I’d find that unlikely though as if the player refused to move then the clause would serve no useful purpose.

What is more likely, and I suspect accurate, is the player and agent agree to the clause as part of the terms of the deal.

It would make no sense otherwise.
 
Has his pace picked up as he's matured? May not be an issue in Portugal, but in the EPL, pace is a huge asset.

All that said, Portugal have form in producing pacy wingers!
 
TheReligion said:
You can see why I’d find that unlikely though as if the player refused to move then the clause would serve no useful purpose.

What is more likely, and I suspect accurate, is the player and agent agree to the clause as part of the terms of the deal.

It would make no sense otherwise.
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Whereas it would be weird in my opinion that the player would have no say and would be obligated to join the club at any time.
 
top1whoisman said:
Whereas it would be weird in my opinion that the player would have no say and would be obligated to join the club at any time.
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You could argue he’s had his say by agreeing to the move and package.

You don’t see lots of these clauses active for this very reason though. I suspect they are difficult to thrash out.

It would seem odd to me though that the selling club would insert a clause and let a player go though if the departing player had no interest and agreement.

Anyway, I’m pretty certain Alvaro would happily return to get a shot at the PL. He was at United from a young age and the club invested in him and his development. I doubt there’s any animosity and with EtH gone he’d be coming back with guaranteed game time.
 
TheReligion said:
You could argue he’s had his say by agreeing to the move and package.

You don’t see lots of these clauses active for this very reason though. I suspect they are difficult to thrash out.

It would seem odd to me though that the selling club would insert a clause and let a player go though if the departing player had no interest and agreement.

Anyway, I’m pretty certain Alvaro would happily return to get a shot at the PL. He was at United from a young age and the club invested in him and his development. I doubt there’s any animosity and with EtH gone he’d be coming back with guaranteed game time.
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Guess we’ll find out soon.
 
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