Are transfers really that easy? 2 months are enough?

The Man Himself

asked for a tagline change and all I got was this.
Joined
Feb 12, 2013
Messages
22,406
OK, so we had a transfer window which according to our fans will range from underwhelming to colossal feck up. There were notable mistakes to be pointed out in our transfer dealings. Both Moyes and Woodward got little more than 2 months in the summer working together (together being key).
Is it enough time for a club to work out correct transfers, especially if they are not sugar daddy clubs, not minding spending even 10m extra for player and if flopped just letting him rot on bench and going after other?

Now, most of us are saying on the lines of: "It is not Moyes's fault, it is all Woody's.. he is some dumb moron who has been made CEO and was responsible to get the identified targets in which he didn't. Lets put all blame on him and make him sacrificial lamb for all our frustrations."

The point here is, (at least at our club): the manager identifies the target, he and his staff together with CEO and his staff work out valuation of player and then the management team is responsible to get player in. At every stage, there is work to be done. Moyes after taking charge, had to study team and identify weak areas. From the information we have, he made Cesc his prime target.

Let's study Cesc case: First, the reason we started bidding from 25m is simple. We assumed he is unhappy and Barca won't mind selling. This wasn't the case and Cesc wasn't too keen to join us. His relationship with Arsenal is similar to Ronaldo to us and that must have been one factor as well. Barca having lost Thiago, couldn't take risk of infuriating their fans further. I don't think we would have mind paying in region of 40m for him but it was clear he didn't want the move. In all these dealings we lost considerable amount of time. Also, if anyone of you have involved in big negotiations for your company, should know that you don't just start bidding at higher value straightaway, unless you have unlimited money flow like PSGs and Citys. Overall, not Woody's fault but case of our prime target not being available.

After this, it was the case of looking after alternatives and clearly there were issues with other clubs taking advantage of our desperation for midfielder and demanding higher sums(Fellaini, Herrera etc). For likes of Ozil, well the reports say Moyes didn't see the need of him and hence we can't blame Woody for that.

So, coming to the point, identifying right targets and completing the signing and if failed getting alternate options in quickly is not somethnig which can be worked out in 2 months just like that. Give these guys time and am sure next summer and if needed in January,we will be working early to get tragets in. I am sure they will keep working even in closed window to continue to identify targets and then figuring out if they deal could be struck. This doesn't mean there were no errors committed from Moyes's team and Woody's team but it was their first time working together and 2 months are simply not enough to get top player in. If it was easy as 'just sign anybody', we too could have gone after likes of Capoue, Paulinho etc and got them.

Last point, look at Liverpool's and City's dealings and contrast to their last transfer windows and this. For Rodgers and Ayre as well, there were same issues last time to ours.
They got 7-8 signings but they are in a different position than us in league. Getting in top 4 from 8th and strengthening squad is the objective. For us, it is about strengthening a squad which won league by 11 points and hence the options were limited given the time in hand for new staff at every level.

Keep calm and give them a year before passing verdict on their competency. (Moyes team and Woody's team included)
 
Grinner said:
I'm not reading all that...summary please.
Click to expand...


Buying isn't that easy, you don't just submit a paper with a number on it with the selling club circling yes or no.
Several stages for targets (identifying, inquiring, bidding).
Bidding techniques
Give the staff time, it's their first transfer window.

It's actually a good post.
 
Grinner said:
I'm not reading all that...summary please.
Click to expand...

I too hate writing and reading long posts but to avoid long arguments later I had to put all thoughts in one.

The summary: "Are two months enough to get the perfect target in especially when the management team and coaching staff have changed in summer and they are working together for first time and you are a team which has won league by 11 points and can't just add anyone for sake of it"
 
If others can do it, we should probably do it better being Manchester United and all

LFC secured 9 in the same space of time, with less money

I'm not saying it's easy, but surely a better preparation and more focus realistic target will bear more fruits than whatever the feck we're doing at the moment
 
Feck, if someone like Wenger, who has been as impotent in the transfer market as anyone for years now, can raise to the occasion and get Ozil within a month or two...
 
Sky1981 said:
If others can do it, we should probably do it better being Manchester United and all

LFC secured 9 in the same space of time, with less money

I'm not saying it's easy, but surely a better preparation and more focus realistic target will bear more fruits than whatever the feck we're doing at the moment
Click to expand...


LFC needed more than players than we do. We just needed 2 or 3, they needed a new squad.
 
Sky1981 said:
If others can do it, we should probably do it better being Manchester United and all

LFC secured 9 in the same space of time, with less money

I'm not saying it's easy, but surely a better preparation and more focus realistic target will bear more fruits than whatever the feck we're doing at the moment
Click to expand...

LFC too missed out on their prime targets like Henrikh Mkhitaryan, Toby Alderweireld etc. Tell me, of all the Liverpool summer signings would you have even wanted a single one at United or is anyone of those which solve our problems? We had one area to strengthen and needed particular type of player who will be good enough to play significant role in challenging for league and CL. We are dealing a lot smaller and different market than Liverpool at the moment.
 
Wenger missed out on several targets too. He's been following Ozil for years though. I'll never, ever understand the Santos deal though.
 
The Man Himself said:
Keep calm and give them a year before passing verdict on their competency. (Moyes team and Woody's team included)
Click to expand...

After the long post it really only comes down to this.

Fans in 'we support the club so therefore we think we know everything that goes on and think we control it' shocker. Bottom line even under your point is that we know less than feck all about what happens and we've gone a bit to far in trying to vicariously live our lives AS the club. Invested personal emotions in what is literally watching 22 blokes kick a ball around a paddock a couple of days a week.

Fans need to disconnect, stop over-analyzing every little minute detail and revitalize why they LOVE the club. Not why they aren't doing what they think the club should be doing.
 
Grinner said:
Wenger missed out on several targets too. He's been following Ozil for years though. I'll never, ever understand the Santos deal though.
Click to expand...

Nor us with Bebe. Every great manager gets it wrong once in a while I guess.
 
The Man Himself said:
LFC too missed out on their prime targets like Henrikh Mkhitaryan, Toby Alderweireld etc. Tell me, of all the Liverpool summer signings would you have even wanted a single one at United or is anyone of those which solve our problems? We had one area to strengthen and needed particular type of player who will be good enough to play significant role in challenging for league and CL. We are dealing a lot smaller and different market than Liverpool at the moment.
Click to expand...

You said it yourself, they missed their main but didn't come up short, at least they got their backup

We haven't got anyone, even with Fellaini we're still short in the middle, and several cheap prospect won't hurt anyone, specially at a club like ours with 50+ games to play
 
Not sure if that's the right thread out of all the transfer threads, but the following is bugging me for a while.

What I really don't understand about United's transfer business is the bidding part. I always thought that if a club is interested in buying someone, you go and ask the club for permission to talk to the player, ask the player directly if he's willing to leave, then if he's interested, go back to the club and sit down and actual talk. During the Lewandowski drama between Dortmund and Bayern this summer, Dortmund stated that they couldn't sell him, because Bayern never made an official bid while Rummenigge said, the club would love to sit down and talk terms, but will never (and has never before in any transfer) make an official bid without talking first and knowing that it won't be rejected and ridiculed in public. It was obvious Dortmund wasn't interested in negotiating or selling at all, so it never happened.

The bids for Fabregas were strange beyond anything I've ever read. How did United know he might want to leave? Did they analyse him through tv footage? Did they believe something the agent said but never talked to him personally? If Barca wasn't interested in sitting down and negotiating, why would anyone believe they would sell him for a reasonable fee? Why would a small bid cause a positive reaction but the question 'Would you be interested to sit down and talk?' not? I understand if a club makes a ridiculous high bid to get a reaction, when one of the clubs involved is desperate or the buyer doesn't care about money, but with United and Barca, especially after Thiago left? And I doubt you can call that "the right way" in comparison to actually talking to the club and player. It's basically the same than talking publicly about the player at a press conference, it means turning the player's head and trying to signal him that you want him without getting the permission to talk to him, but never commiting to the transfer because you know the ridiculously low bid will always be rejected. First I thought it's just media nonsense, but everyone here believed that these bids are the way to make transfers which sounds incredibly stupid to me and I doubt it will ever get the player for a reasonable fee.
 
Slevs said:
LFC needed more than players than we do. We just needed 2 or 3, they needed a new squad.
Click to expand...


wait.... Are you saying the more players you need to solve problems with the squad, the easier it gets?

Are you? Really? Think on it. Maybe give your head a wobble or two beforehand.
 
Grinner said:
I'm not reading all that...summary please.
Click to expand...


I think the summary is: "the trouble was that we only really needed to sign a player or two. Which made it much more difficult than say... Overhauling the squad."
 
The Glazers will think this debacle has damaged the 'brand' for sure.

It has made us look less desirable as a club that players want to join; being rejected so openly, more times than I can remember in the last five years but all within a two months span in this case.

This will cost us more in the long run but having to pay more both in transfer fees and salaries.
 
B20 said:
wait.... Are you saying the more players you need to solve problems with the squad, the easier it gets?

Are you? Really? Think on it. Maybe give your head a wobble or two beforehand.
Click to expand...


You needed more players in many positions. That gives you a load of targets, although it does take time to sign them, it's a bigger market than what we had. We just needed a midfielder who has a physical presence, which there isn't a lot in the market up to Utd quality. You've understood the context wrong. And no need for the wobble your head comment.
 
You could give them three months and they would still leave it until the last hour.
 
ghaliboy said:
Fans in 'we support the club so therefore we think we know everything that goes on and think we control it' shocker. Bottom line even under your point is that we know less than feck all about what happens and we've gone a bit too far in trying to vicariously live our lives AS the club. Fans need to disconnect, stop over-analyzing every little minute detail and revitalize why they LOVE the club. Not why they aren't doing what they think the club should be doing.
Click to expand...

This.

Too many FM wannabes around here.
 
ghaliboy said:
After the long post it really only comes down to this.

Fans in 'we support the club so therefore we think we know everything that goes on and think we control it' shocker. Bottom line even under your point is that we know less than feck all about what happens and we've gone a bit to far in trying to vicariously live our lives AS the club. Invested personal emotions in what is literally watching 22 blokes kick a ball around a paddock a couple of days a week.

Fans need to disconnect, stop over-analyzing every little minute detail and revitalize why they LOVE the club. Not why they aren't doing what they think the club should be doing.
Click to expand...

Well said. We are being suffocated with gossip these days, and despite every single football fan in the world claiming that they 'don't believe or read the tabloids' etc etc, most people on this forum have constructed entire viewpoints, becoming angry and emotional with it, over their version of events that exist almost entirely through the media.
 
Of course not every transfer is an easy thing to do especially not if the other club doesn't want to sell at any cost. But there are other people in charge of other clubs who can get their deals done in time, which usually is the majority of of them, so I feel it's definitely right to voice concern over how we did business this summer. It might very well be that all our transfer targets were unobtainable but I can't help but wonder why a club of our stature has so much problems obtaining our desired transfer targets in time.
 
No, they're not always easy but they could kind of be slightly less hard if you went about your business carefully and didn't ignore the reality out there. Putting bids like £25m for Cesc or £28m for Baines and Fellaini is never going to give you any sort of advantage, it's complete bollocks that it's a common negotiating strategy to start low and meet in the middle as it has finally been put to rest with us paying £27.5m for Fellaini alone.

Same with the timing really, right at the end of July Fabregas openly stated that he didn't want to leave Barda. You don't hang around 'preparing a bid' after that, you move on to realistic targets.
 
Balu said:
Not sure if that's the right thread out of all the transfer threads, but the following is bugging me for a while.

What I really don't understand about United's transfer business is the bidding part. I always thought that if a club is interested in buying someone, you go and ask the club for permission to talk to the player, ask the player directly if he's willing to leave, then if he's interested, go back to the club and sit down and actual talk. During the Lewandowski drama between Dortmund and Bayern this summer, Dortmund stated that they couldn't sell him, because Bayern never made an official bid while Rummenigge said, the club would love to sit down and talk terms, but will never (and has never before in any transfer) make an official bid without talking first and knowing that it won't be rejected and ridiculed in public. It was obvious Dortmund wasn't interested in negotiating or selling at all, so it never happened.

The bids for Fabregas were strange beyond anything I've ever read. How did United know he might want to leave? Did they analyse him through tv footage? Did they believe something the agent said but never talked to him personally? If Barca wasn't interested in sitting down and negotiating, why would anyone believe they would sell him for a reasonable fee? Why would a small bid cause a positive reaction but the question 'Would you be interested to sit down and talk?' not? I understand if a club makes a ridiculous high bid to get a reaction, when one of the clubs involved is desperate or the buyer doesn't care about money, but with United and Barca, especially after Thiago left? And I doubt you can call that "the right way" in comparison to actually talking to the club and player. It's basically the same than talking publicly about the player at a press conference, it means turning the player's head and trying to signal him that you want him without getting the permission to talk to him, but never commiting to the transfer because you know the ridiculously low bid will always be rejected. First I thought it's just media nonsense, but everyone here believed that these bids are the way to make transfers which sounds incredibly stupid to me and I doubt it will ever get the player for a reasonable fee.
Click to expand...

Well not like Bayern would ever do that without ever asking for permission.

But snide remarks aside, yes our behavior in the transfer market is quite baffling and comes across as pretty naive. I know "tapping up" players is usually frowned upon but it's pretty much what every team out there does and it's not without reason because without knowing you could agree terms with a player it's pretty much useless to even hand in a bid.
 
NoLogo said:
Well not like Bayern would ever do that without ever asking for permission.
Click to expand...
Of course we do, but I think we do it less often than fans of other clubs believe. I'm sure most clubs allow those conversations anyway unless the timing is really bad. I think with all the agents running around, the clubs are usually well informed about the players. Most agencys have several players under contract anyway and no one really knows who talks about which player when agents and clubs meet.
 
Being new to the job isn't an excuse, especially when you're walking into a club as big as ours.

Moyes would definitely benefited from seeing/training with our players first hand, but he had enough time to do that.

There should have been a proper hand over from the previous regime, a comprehensive list of targets we've been scouting for a while, weaknesses should have been identified in our squad, finances should have been considered (i.e. how much to spend) etc.

What we got up to during this transfer window was just plain amateurish tbh. And there are no excuses.

If 1 or 2 days are enough, than 2 months is certainly more than enough.
 
Ish84045 said:
Being new to the job isn't an excuse, especially when you're walking into a club as big as ours.

Moyes would definitely benefited from seeing/training with our players first hand, but he had enough time to do that.

There should have been a proper hand over from the previous regime, a comprehensive list of targets we've been scouting for a while, weaknesses should have been identified in our squad, finances should have been considered (i.e. how much to spend) etc.

What we got up to during this transfer window was just plain amateurish tbh. And there are no excuses.

If 1 or 2 days are enough, than 2 months is certainly more than enough.
Click to expand...

Thiago was supposed to have been identified by Ferguson as a prime midfield target but Moyes felt he was too inexperienced.
 
Sarni said:
Thiago was supposed to have been identified by Ferguson as a prime midfield target but Moyes felt he was too inexperienced.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I can understand from Moyes' POV - he didn't want to change too much until he's got a proper feel for the job etc and he's tried to surround him with staff and players he knows/trusts. ("don't change a winning formula" etc.)

But to think we passed up on players like Thiago/Ozil/Herrera - knowing how shit our "creative" players have been for a season or longer now etc, just makes little sense.

Anyhow. Upwards and onwards.
 
Balu said:
Of course we do, but I think we do it less often than fans of other clubs believe. I'm sure most clubs allow those conversations anyway unless the timing is really bad. I think with all the agents running around, the clubs are usually well informed about the players. Most agencys have several players under contract anyway and no one really knows who talks about which player when agents and clubs meet.
Click to expand...


That's the thing often enough clubs don't even talk to the players directly which makes the whole thing very obscure but to get back to your examples for with Dortmund you neither asked for permission to talk to Götze or Lewandowski but still both players end up playing for your club but it's not only Bayern who does that, Dortmund didn't say anything to Gladbach as well before offering a contract to Reus and I'm sure most clubs pretty much do their business this way. Like you mentioned most clubs never really make a written offer and see if it might be accepted, usually they talk to the agent, who then talks to his player and they make a decision, after that usually the clubs talk about if a transfer will be possible. It's pretty much so normal that the way we made our offers for Fabregas this summer seemed very odd.
 
NoLogo said:
That's the thing often enough clubs don't even talk to the players directly which makes the whole thing very obscure but to get back to your examples for with Dortmund you neither asked for permission to talk to Götze or Lewandowski but still both players end up playing for your club but it's not only Bayern who does that, Dortmund didn't say anything to Gladbach as well before offering a contract to Reus and I'm sure most clubs pretty much do their business this way. Like you mentioned most clubs never really make a written offer and see if it might be accepted, usually they talk to the agent, who then talks to his player and they make a decision, after that usually the clubs talk about if a transfer will be possible. It's pretty much so normal that the way we made our offers for Fabregas this summer seemed very odd.
Click to expand...
Afaik you don't need to ask for permission if the player has a transfer clause, because that gives him permission to talk with any club. If not, in theory no one could ever trigger the clause because no club would ever be allowed to agree terms with the player. And do we really know that Lewandowsi wasn't allowed to talk to other clubs? Again afaik he almost went to United last summer, definitely talked to several clubs, not only Bayern, so I highly doubt he or his agents weren't allowed to do that by the club.
 
Balu said:
Afaik you don't need to ask for permission if the player has a transfer clause, because that gives him permission to talk with any club. If not, in theory no one could ever trigger the clause because no club would ever be allowed to agree terms with the player. And do we really know that Lewandowsi wasn't allowed to talk to other clubs? Again afaik he almost went to United last summer, definitely talked to several clubs, not only Bayern, so I highly doubt he or his agents weren't allowed to do that by the club.
Click to expand...


You can talk to a player but you need to inform the club that you do so and afaik Bayern didn't even do this much which was pretty much the main reason Watzke was so pissed at Bayern after that deal and of course the fact that he somehow was leaked before the semi final against Real. Lewandowski was pretty much the same and he was basically approached around last summer without Dortmund knowing anything about it until Bild reported that Lewandowski essentially had a pre-contract with Bayern for either this summer or the next and I'm pretty sure Dortmund never gave any permission to talk to the player during this time as they were themselves still interested in extending the players contract at that time.

Of course I thought it was a bit hypocritical from Dortmund how they acted after those things happened and acted like they were the poor victims in all that despite being behaving not much differently when making their signings.

In all honesty I would love it if our CEO possessed only half of the ruthlessness that Sammer showed since he took over that job at Bayern, he might not be the nicest person on this earth but he gets the job done, something you can't really say of our man in charge of transfers.
 
Two months is plenty, judging by what other clubs are capable of. United just need to stop living in the past where only the very best players went for above £30m. With the amount of money the club generates we should be able to buy virtually everyone, but the club clearly wasn't prepared to spend the required money for one reason or another. Why didn't we try with a massive bid for Fabregas? There were a few indications that Barca could be persuaded to sell if the money was good, and I really can't think of a midfielder that'd fit in better alongside Carrick. Yet we were pissing about with £30m bids, or whatever it was. The club need to be willing to pay over the odds for the right player (like all other op clubs does (no, I'm not saying we should be like Real Madrid)) - like we were before the Glazers came. There's plenty of midfielders out there who would greatly improve our team, but we only got fecking Fellaini. I really hope he proves me wrong.
 
If you are willing to pay the selling club and player what they want, then I imagine a transfer could be done within two days or so. Just the legal stuff being drawn up.

If your intention is to enter a battle to get the player for less than the selling club require (particularly when the selling club is not deperate or even willing to sell) - then it's naturally going to take fecking ages.
 
NoLogo said:
You can talk to a player but you need to inform the club that you do so and afaik Bayern didn't even do this much which was pretty much the main reason Watzke was so pissed at Bayern after that deal and of course the fact that he somehow was leaked before the semi final against Real. Lewandowski was pretty much the same and he was basically approached around last summer without Dortmund knowing anything about it until Bild reported that Lewandowski essentially had a pre-contract with Bayern for either this summer or the next and I'm pretty sure Dortmund never gave any permission to talk to the player during this time as they were themselves still interested in extending the players contract at that time.

Of course I thought it was a bit hypocritical from Dortmund how they acted after those things happened and acted like they were the poor victims in all that despite being behaving not much differently when making their signings.

In all honesty I would love it if our CEO possessed only half of the ruthlessness that Sammer showed since he took over that job at Bayern, he might not be the nicest person on this earth but he gets the job done, something you can't really say of our man in charge of transfers.
Click to expand...
That wasn't about us not telling them we're interested before the deal was done. Watzke made a stupid statement that it was bad behavior no one contacted him in person after the deal was done and later made it a personal dig against Sammer, when he talked about his past at Dortmund. The whole thing was the usual Dortmund make themselves look like the hero and Bayern look like the villain nonsense, that Watzke and Klopp are performing now for about a year. We haven't broken any rules at all with the Götze deal.
 
Eboue said:
Two months? Are you under the impression that your executives just sat around eating Cheetos and watching Breaking Bad reruns until Moyes officially took the job on July 1st?
Click to expand...

That's probably exactly what they were doing.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.