İlkay Gündoğan

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Before his injury when he was on form, he was regarded as one of the best CM's in football. Caftards were desperate for us to sign him and people were saying as much as £50m would be reasonable.

He's recovered from his injury, played a fair whack of footie this year and some of his stats are impressive this season, despite playing in a very poor performing Dortmund team. Think about us last season, everyone bar Rooney/DDG were shite but they are on fire this season. I see no reason why, at £22m, we shouldn't sign this guy. He's only 24 and i'm sure LvG could get even more out of him.

I hope the deal goes through, he's certainly worth the risk.
 
Was he one of the main men at Dortmund when beat lvg's Bayern to the title? I'm not sure if lvg left before that or not.
 
There's a lot of people in here saying they're worried about his weight, but if our interest is real do you really think LVG would let him come here and stay in that state?
He signed a near £30mill English teenager last summer and immediately told him he was too unfit to play for the club publicly. He has no qualms about upsetting players. Let him sort it out.
 
He's played 27 games for Dortmund with no recurrence of his back injury apart from a couple hamstring injury which made him miss around a total of 2-3 weeks of football which is to be expected with his condition being so bad before he started playing again.
 
Any popular Borussia Dortmund forums around? Can read german.
 
I've got a friend who works at the BBC and just been chatting to him about this. One of the journos there who has a direct line to Woody advised them not to run the story last night (of an imminent deal). Not to say it won't happen in the summer, though.
 
Was he one of the main men at Dortmund when beat lvg's Bayern to the title? I'm not sure if lvg left before that or not.
nope. 2010/11 was lvg's last season as bayern's manager. gündogan signed for dortmund in the summer of 2011.
 
He's played 27 games for Dortmund with no recurrence of his back injury apart from a couple hamstring injury which made him miss around a total of 2-3 weeks of football which is to be expected with his condition being so bad before he started playing again.
However he's nowhere near his old self, so I've heard. I reckon he could come good again though.
 
with sahin they win. without him, not so much. in numbers: with sahin they gain two points per game on average, without him: one. make of that what you wish.

i also wish gündogan all the best at his new club (given that a deal is in the making) and i do not intend to talk him down. cheers.
He's played even less than I thought. 6 league starts. I don't think you can call him crucial at all.
 
This ones gonna drag a bit I reckon...May as well get the sleeping bags and pitch a tent gents.
 
I've got a friend who works at the BBC and just been chatting to him about this. One of the journos there who has a direct line to Woody advised them not to run the story last night (of an imminent deal). Not to say it won't happen in the summer, though.

That doesn't mean anything. The club has briefed that nothing was happening to the English press immediately before a number of transfers last summer.
 
They wont announce anything before the end of the season imo, lets hope it's 'in the bag' and we can now look at other players without dragging this one out over the course of the summer.
 
Some people are so far away removed from the reality. If you have been out for over a year with a serious injury it'll probably take a good 6 months or so to regain any where near your best form.
Even longer than that if the team you're playing for is itself struggling for form and results
 
with sahin they win. without him, not so much. in numbers: with sahin they gain two points per game on average, without him: one. make of that what you wish.

i also wish gündogan all the best at his new club (given that a deal is in the making) and i do not intend to talk him down. cheers.

But Sahin has hardly played this season from what I can see?
 
Maybe that's why they spent half the season bottom of the league :lol:
He's s cracking player, but he's certainly not THAT important. Everyone thought Gundogan was their best midfielder in 2012/13, because he was. But they had better options going forward (Lewandowski) and it covered up a few cracks.

Not having that balance going forward has definitely affected their unit defensively. And I suppose relying on Bender and Kehl a lot isn't ideal. But let's be real, neither Sahin or Gundogan are that influential individually. Not to the point where it derails Dortmund's entire season.
 
If you want a journo with the most up to date info then Ian Ladyman of the Mail is your best bet. Broke some stories of the behind the scenes madness of the Moyes era. Was also the first journo who committed to the Di Maria transfer.
 
I quess 21m for a player who was 50m a couple of years ago is worth the gamble.
 
But Sahin has hardly played this season from what I can see?
you're not wrong. but wouldn't that kinda add to my hypothesis, given dortmund's poor outcome? i just found the team to look much more composed in the few matches that sahin has been able to play this season, while i just can't exactly state the same about gündogan, who had much more minutes. i do, of course, not deny that there are obvious reasons to it. and yes, gündogan has been showing a rise in form lately, IMHO, so the whole thing might possibly turn out to be great for all parties involved?! let's see what happens.
 
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This would be a brilliant signing given the price tag, provided Van Gaal and the club doctors are satisfied by his medical reports. Sealing up the deal by pre-season would be ideal, then we can allow him some time to bed in, get him on a club regulated fitness regimen and assess the progress periodically. We have to consider that back injuries can be kind of debilitating for footballers who are used to consuming high calorie diets. Subtract the usual amount of training and match day rigors because of the back concerns, and it's no surprise that he ballooned up so quickly. Gundogan just has a naturally beefy figure and it's not necessarily a bad thing. These same issues cropped up with Shaw and Rooney, and it's kind of unwarranted. All that matters is performance on the field, not every player has to be shredded.

Anyway, if we had bring him along slowly and rebuild some of the drive and stamina he evidenced at his peak, then we could potentially have one of the Top 5 young-ish central midfielders at the club. He really has it all in his box. Combined with Herrera and Carrick, he would make United's midfield the best in the league. One thing to really like about Gundogan is his positional flexibility. He has played at #10 for Dortmund ahead of Sahin and Bender, in a midfield duo with Bender and in a pivot role with Sahin. He could be an upgrade in Fellaini's current position and bring some added creativity, or in Herrera's position freeing Ander to roam further up the pitch, or even in Carrick's current role (he'll have to brush up some of his positioning flaws, but Van Gaal can coach him up and he will have a good mentor in Carrick, who made a transition to that position). Also, his Sir Bobby-esque ambidexterous (ambipedal ?) style of play is very aesthetically pleasing and makes him a dangerous proposition in passing positions.

Ouch, that can't be helping his back.
 
People who were ITK under Fergie and Gill aren't necessarily going to be ITK under LvG and Woody.

Woody was using Ogden as a mouthpiece in the press initially. His info dried up last summer however and all the connected journalists got blanket denials on transfers that were happening.
 
Are you aware of his recent injury? If he can return to the level he was, 21,5 million will be an absolute bargain. But I don't believe that it'll happen. To be honest, I haven't watched him at all after his injury so if I'm wrong, I apologize to the people who actually have watched him and disagree with me. But like I said, when you're out for over a year, you don't just return instantly to the level you were at before. Judging by whoscored.com, he hasn't been near his pre-injury level, and to me, it just seems like a stupid risk. I'm so sick of us building a squad of injury prone players. Look at the top teams, Barca, Real and Bayern. One major reason why they're the three best teams in the world right now is that they can rely on their players. They can plan the future around their players. SAF admitted that he could never plan the future around Louis Saha. We can't plan the future around players like Rafael, Jones, Evans and possibly Gündogan.

He's had one bad injury! Just like Van Nistelrooy did and look how good a sining he turned out for us!

Also Bayern have been having injury problems all year so that statement makes no sense
 
If you want a journo with the most up to date info then Ian Ladyman of the Mail is your best bet. Broke some stories of the behind the scenes madness of the Moyes era. Was also the first journo who committed to the Di Maria transfer.

Ladyman is a well connected Manchester journalist but most of them operate via the same sources. Ducker and Ogden were printing the behind the scenes mutterings, too. Jackson at the Guardian tends to lag behind but then he's worked the patch for the shortest amount of time. He's also a bit of an oddball on social media.

As for Di Maria, one of the better connected people in Spanish football is Guillem Balague. He takes a lot of stick, but he's incredibly well connected. His relationship with the Mata family was evident when we signed him and he was well ahead of the curve regarding Di Maria.
 

general thread on the transfer rumour: http://www.transfermarkt.de/newsforum/thread/forum/228/thread_id/58522/from/newsansicht
gündogan thread in the TM dortmund section: http://www.transfermarkt.de/ilkay-gundogan-8-/thread/forum/12/thread_id/805008

summed up: if united intend to shell out that amount of money, then THANKS AND FAREWELL ILKAY!

Thanks. Maze, yeah that is what I have gathered from page 75 in that Gundogan thread. And a bit of bitterness and lots of ''wouldn't surprise me if he fails'' or ''unlike Kagawa and Sahin, we would not take him back as he doesn't have that status with the fans''... not strange considering the circumstances.
 
Ladyman is a well connected Manchester journalist but most of them operate via the same sources. Ducker and Ogden were printing the behind the scenes mutterings, too. Jackson at the Guardian tends to lag behind but then he's worked the patch for the shortest amount of time. He's also a bit of an oddball on social media.

As for Di Maria, one of the better connected people in Spanish football is Guillem Balague. He takes a lot of stick, but he's incredibly well connected. His relationship with the Mata family was evident when we signed him and he was well ahead of the curve regarding Di Maria.

Balague goes missing in the media during the summer transfer window its beyond a joke! His column pieces actually stopped for months!
 
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