It's sad because the player was desperate to join, he would have played his bollocks off here.
Ander Herrera is a Manchester United Player!
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I hope we're doing something behind the scenes soon to make a deal for January.
Seems like it would have been a perfect fit for both us and him. Damn shame.
On the, "Athletic had to be forced to accept the cheque," idea. Yes, it's been mentioned before today that a club can do it.
The lawyers (aka unknown impostors) knew that, the threat had been made to Munich as well.
However, saying the tax office made Athletic accept Bayern's cheque for political reasons isn't strictly accurate. I've been reminded (by someone who thinks the story is hilarious - the bastard) that there is a plan B defined in principle - you pay La Liga, they pay Athletic. However, once the LFP has the money, they can be asked to pay the club's protected creditors first, in particular the tax office.
As I've commented before, actual forced release clause deals are incredibly rare, so no one has ever seen this happen. That's why it needs lawyers.
The lawyers (aka unknown impostors) knew that, the threat had been made to Munich as well.
However, saying the tax office made Athletic accept Bayern's cheque for political reasons isn't strictly accurate. I've been reminded (by someone who thinks the story is hilarious - the bastard) that there is a plan B defined in principle - you pay La Liga, they pay Athletic. However, once the LFP has the money, they can be asked to pay the club's protected creditors first, in particular the tax office.
As I've commented before, actual forced release clause deals are incredibly rare, so no one has ever seen this happen. That's why it needs lawyers.
Did Athletic have the means to delay the deal yesterday if they so wished? And if so, in your opinion do you think that's what happened?
I didn't say we did that.. Those are the things I hope we do in the future.
Very likely. I said that surely 'they can refuse to accept the payment' is only part of the story. If it was so, Thiago would still be in Barca's bench.
From Reddit :
They could certainly delay it. The LFP would be very uncomfortable about using the threat of tax office intervention against its own club. I would think they would need a management committee meeting and would want to give Athletic time "to think it over."
As I said on Friday, if the groundwork hadn't been done I thought it would be tough. However I think we were still hesitating and haggling over the price, even on Monday so I don't think we got as far as putting it to the test.
Or you can read the rest of the post...
I've never said we can make them kneel in front of us and beg for our mercy, but there are certainly things we can do so we don't let them completely get away with this (again if true). After all, if you're talking that way, then the lesson we've learned is not that harsh either, we simply missed out on a player, who might or might not turn out well, and for whom we were willing to pay a lot of cash.
Oh and by the way, busting a tactic they've used 3 times already with three different clubs is not that insignificant when it comes to their future dealings.
Barca isn't Athletic. They are also now committed by statute to keep a lid on budget pressures (50M net per season, inc. wages I understand) so once they paid silly money for Neymar they needed to offload people. The consensus was either Thiago or Fabregas had to go, which explains why we would have been led to believe Fabregas was available... until Thiago left, of course
The "refusing to accept the money" thing is a delaying tactic, as it's been told to us at any rate. You can get some other authority involved to force it through, and since Bayern made the move in good time there was no threat of such a delay working. Plus, Athletic are a whole new level of stubbornness. I'm not saying that that part is true, but it's not illogical as you're suggesting.
It really doesn't matter, it was the clubs stupid fault to leave it until the final day. Surely they most of known it was complicated so you don't try getting shit done in 12 hours.
Woody is a massive 24 fan.
Do we need to publically apologise to Herrera?
1) for seriously fecking him about
2) for Woodward being an incompetent bastard
1) for seriously fecking him about
2) for Woodward being an incompetent bastard
We should definitely be talking to him in private if we want to try again in January. I'd be pissed off if I was him, we better start reassuring him that we'll be back again soon (if we are coming back).
From the sound of things it's Athletic he should be aggrieved with, not us.
Naah, that's stretching it too far. Whatever needs to be done between us and him needs to be done privately.
Please god or whoever, please don't let it be us who fecked things up... So we can go back in january.
Wonder if we'll go back in for him in January? Cant help but feel he was a panic buy this window so have my doubts whether we would go back in for him.
What needs to be done is a pre-contract arranged with him asap.
Delaying tactic, completely agree. I said on Thursday, that if Athletic doesn't accept a bid of 36m, I'm afraid that we can't complete the deal. Then answered on a question why I think so.
Which that brings us another question, what the feck were they doing since Cesc made it clear that he won't leave. If we were serious we should have done this 4 weeks ago (after Cesc said that he isn't leaving). Knowing all this, makes me believe that either we were completely incompetent and didn't knew the basics how Athletic deals with things (things that people in this forum know) or even worse, we used Herrera only to look that we aren't desperate for Fellaini in negotiations with Kenwright. Knowing how proud and stubborn Athletic are, it really makes me sad in case we really used Herrera (a player who apparently wanted to come here) just to bargain a better deal with Everon, which ultimately we failed in even that.
That "loophole" sounds quite interesting. I'm surprised a player hasn't sued them over what could be construed as a breach of contract.
So anyway how good is this Herrera?
If that loophole story is right, then it's Bilbao who should apologize to him, but we should definitely contact him in private to explain the situation..
No one knows, but he's a midfielder and Spanish. What more do you want?
We behaved like amateurs. Plain and simple.
bottom line is that when dealing with transfers involving sums of such vast amounts, you shouldn't be pissing about doing things on the last day! it smacks of desperation and lack of planning... if herrera was a genuine Moyes backup target, as soon as Fabregas was saying no, we should've put in a bid for Herrera soon after... but clearly there was no proper transfer strategy.
I didn't realise he was Spanish, this changes things.
Arguably worse. Even the amateurs-Caf transfer muppets seem to know about all the potential pitfalls. We should have started all this 2 weeks ago.
Big Dave should have been on this ages ago, like he was with Thiago.
Probably would have wrapped it up better than the actual people supposed to do this stuff.
I don't think he was a panic buy. He is nothing like Fellaini, more like Carrick's natural replacement who could also play alongside him. I was actually surprised after spending the entire Summer banging on about Thiago, Fabregas, Modric... that suddenly we were homing in on the sort of player we really could have done with.
I reckon it's off the table now though, whether the relationship can be repaired or not, our insistence on the release fee "being inaccurate" indicates we wouldn't be paying it in January either and that's what it will take.
"Inaccurate release clause"
I doubt he was a backup/bargaining chip. There would be easier and more credible ones than a Bilbao player being signed in such a short time. We were in for him but it was getting hard and the moment it transpired we were going to be paying MORE and not LESS than the original release fee for Fellaini it just died instantly.
Last thing a suit would do is blow the agreed budget, major no-no, particularly someone given the job for his fiscal prudence so recently (a green tight git, the most indecisive corporate slimeball you will find). Gill maybe could have risked it, Woody could have risked it and pinned the responsibility for the decision on a willing SAF. Woody and Moyes just had to narrow down to one target.
If it actually stopped the Herrera transfer then it's the first time it's happened.
The Martinez deal may have been delayed by it, but there was so many tax and contract law precedents being established on that deal that it would have been just one more delay in a bunch of them.
The Llorente case is different. He had one year to go on his contract, and he wanted Athletic to listen to offers below the release clause price. They wouldn't.
If he wasn't a panic buy why did we leave it till 96 hours till the window closed before we bid?
From best I can tell Fellaini was always going to be the go to guy should all our other deals have fell through, that's why it was done so late and that's why we paid more than his release clause stated, Herrera though? I think had he been a priority we'd of made the move a lot earlier than we did
Indeed, and eventually let him go on a free just to make their stance clear... only for us, in our infinite wisdom, to go and try haggle with them over release clauses on deadline day.
But no, many posters on here will tell you it's perfectly normal stuff that you try negotiate a fee and move on if you don't reach agreement. Nothing wrong with that. Except that we should know that was a complete waste of time in this case.
If you are looking for a rational explanation for anything Woody has done this Summer, don't ask me.
I know, I know, "we don't know all the facts". Fabregas, 26M quid bid, explain that one then.
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