David Gill Transfer warchest v2012

Our team is in a better team than 2004/2005. We may have had some great young players then, but they weren't top quality yet, the likes of scholes, keane and giggs were trying to adapt to their changing impact on games because of their age and the impact of chelsea and 451. On top of that we made some poor signings. This team now just needs to get a midfielder in and get better luck with injuries. The balance in the squad is good and there's a lot of top players and some exciting young products.

There really isn't as much wrong with this current team as some seem to think.
 
apotheosis said:
It is a myth that SAF has always bought youth, yours and Richio's struggle to recollect any of note, is surely testament to that!
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We haven't paid money for an outfield player over the age of 26 for 16 years. That's what is meant by youth, we almost always buy players who are between 18-25, who have yet to really hit their peak and who we feel we can make that step up at United. And yes, if you're 25 or under you are a young footballer, people have developed a weird attitude regarding this, largely due to truly exceptional players like Messi and Fabregas. I think I'll make a list of the age of every signing we've made since the premier league started, might take a few minutes.
 
Chabon said:
We haven't paid money for an outfield player over the age of 26 for 16 years. That's what is meant by youth, we almost always buy players who are between 18-25, who have yet to really hit their peak and who we feel we can make that step up at United. And yes, if you're 25 or under you are a young footballer, people have developed a weird attitude regarding this, largely due to truly exceptional players like Messi and Fabregas. I think I'll make a list of the age of every signing we've made since the premier league started, might take a few minutes.
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Wasn't Berbatov 27 when we signed him?
 
Chabon said:
We haven't paid money for an outfield player over the age of 26 for 16 years. That's what is meant by youth, we almost always buy players who are between 18-25, who have yet to really hit their peak and who we feel we can make that step up at United. And yes, if you're 25 or under you are a young footballer, people have developed a weird attitude regarding this, largely due to truly exceptional players like Messi and Fabregas. I think I'll make a list of the age of every signing we've made since the premier league started, might take a few minutes.
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Dimitar Berbatov, Juan Sebastian Verón, Teddy Sheringham, Dwight Yorke to name but a few.

A 25-year-old player is not "youth". That is stupid anyway. That's SAF's favourite age category: 24-26, already established players who've outgrown their club and can do better. The collection of youth prospects from all around the world is a very recent phenomenon for him.
 
Siorac said:
A 25-year-old player is not "youth". That is stupid anyway.
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Yet it is and no it isn't. I'm sorry if that doesn't fit your agenda, but under 25s are still young players, regardless of freaks like Messi. Apologies for forgetting Berbatov, he's the exception, and look how well that worked out. Seba and Yorke were 26, and yeah, I was supposed to say 15 years, but I'd miscounted. This list is taking ages because of the lack of narrow transfer windows in the 90s...
 
Chabon said:
Yet it is and no it isn't. I'm sorry if that doesn't fit your agenda, but under 25s are still young players, regardless of freaks like Messi. Apologies for forgetting Berbatov, he's the exception, and look how well that worked out. Seba and Yorke were 26, and yeah, I was supposed to say 15 years, but I'd miscounted. This list is taking ages because of the lack of narrow transfer windows in the 90s...
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Players at the age of 24-25 are nearing their peak. They are not young prospects anymore; those who are good enough for Manchester United are usually established players at very near the top level by that age.

Signing largely untested youth on potential only hasn't been our policy up until the last few years. Many of Fergie's best signings were already established players who reached their absolute peak at United (Cantona, Irwin, Bruce, Pallister, Cole, Yorke, Stam, Van Nistelrooy, Carrick, Evra, Vidic, etc.). Signing Modric, for example, would be the most typical "Fergie signing". Or Young from last summer, that was also a typical Fergie purchase.
 
Edit: I've added Fergie's pre-PL signings, so as to be more comprehensive. He was a little more favourable towards older signings back then. Also added the free signings.

Here's the list, keepers in italics, frees in bold:

Paul Scholes - 37
Phil Jones - 19
David De Gea - 20
Ashley Young - 25
Chris Smalling - 20
Javier Hernandez - 21
Bebe - 20
Anders Lindegaard - 26
Michael Owen - 29
Antonio Valencia - 23
Gabriel Obertan - 20
Mame Biram Diouf - 21
Demitar Berbatov - 27
Zoran Tosic - 21
Ritchie De Laet - 20
Manucho - 24
Carlos Tevez - 23
Nani - 21
Anderson - 19
Owen Hargreaves - 26
Rafael Da Silva - 17
Fabio Da Silva - 17
Tomasz Kuszczak - 24
Michael Carrick - 24
Patrice Evra - 24
Nemanja Vidic - 24
Ben Foster - 22
Ji-Sung Park - 24
Edwin Van Der Sar - 34
Wayne Rooney - 18
Giuseppe Rossi - 17
Liam Miller - 23
Gabriel Heinze - 26
Alan Smith - 23
Louis Saha - 25
Dong Fangzhou - 18
Cristiano Ronaldo - 18
Kleberson - 24
Tim Howard - 24
Eric Djemba-Djemba - 22
David Bellion - 20
Lee Martin - 16
Ricardo - 30
Rio Ferdinand - 23
Kieran Richardson - 16
Luke Steele - 17
Diego Forlan - 22
Laurent Blanc - 35
Roy Carroll - 23
Juan Veron - 26
Ruud Van Nistelrooy - 24
Fabien Barthez - 30
Mikael Silvestre - 22
Massimo Taibi - 29
Quinton Fortune - 22
Mark Bosnich - 27
Dwight Yorke - 26
Jesper Blomqvist - 24
Jaap Stam - 25
Jonathan Greening - 19
Henning Berg - 26
Erik Nevland - 19
Teddy Sheringham - 31
Jordi Cruyff - 22
Karel Poborsky - 24
Ole Solskjaer - 23
Ronny Johnsen - 26
Rai Van Der Gouw - 33
Tony Coton - 34
Nick Culkin - 17
Andy Cole - 23
David May - 24
Graeme Tomlinson - 19
Roy Keane - 22
Les Sealey - 35
Eric Cantona - 26
Dion Dublin - 23
Pat McGibbon - 19
Paul Parker - 27
Peter Schemeichel - 27
Andrei Kanchelskis - 24
Brian Carey - 21
Gary Pallister - 24
Paul Ince - 21
Danny Wallace - 25
Andy Rammel - 22
Dennis Irwin - 24
Les Sealey - 32
Neil Whitworth - 18
Mark Bosnich - 17
Mike Phelan - 26
Neil Webb - 25
Steve Bruce - 26
Paul Dalton - 21
Jim Leighton - 29
Lee Sharpe - 17
Mark Hughes - 24
Viv Anderson - 30
Brian McClair - 23

Keepers aside, we very rarely sign a player older than early-mid 20s, 24 being the highest we usually go. Rarer still do we actually pay good money for an older, well-established player. There have been a few 26 year olds, Parker and Berba a little older, and Teddy and Viv Anderson who really bucked the trend. The Messi thing is worth examining in light of this trend downwards in age. Players do generally seem to peak younger now, so you could perhaps say that a 24 year old eight years ago would be the equivalent of a 22 year old now.

Regardless, the likes of Modric, Van Persie, Sneijder et al are not the kind of players we sign, and we certainly won't be signing them now.
 
Chabon said:
Regardless, the likes of Modric, Van Persie, Sneijder et al are not the kind of players we sign, and we certainly won't be signing them now.
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Which is absolutely fine as longs as we can start to get some of those top bracket youngsters again - something we have tried but failed to do in the last few summers re; Benzema, Sanchez, Ozil. Hopefully will not be the case this season as the are so many exciting youngsters across Europe and our main competitors are largely stacked to the brim with talent (Barca, Real and to a large extent City)
 
I updated the list to include pre-PL signings. Which added four more over-25s. I think I'll add the frees as well, but bold them so they can be easily ignored.
 
Anyway, the point of all this is to reassert and support something I've been going on about repeatedly on this forum. Our approach to transfers hasn't really change substantially, in terms of spending, in terms of age, in terms of experience or in terms of nationality.* There's been a slow and steady decrease in the average age, but that, I would suggest, is simply a reflection of the earlier development of footballers.

*This is actually a fascinating quirk of Sir Alex's transfers. Go through that list and count the Englishmen...
 
Chabon said:
Anyway, the point of all this is to reassert and support something I've been going on about repeatedly on this forum. Our approach to transfers hasn't really change substantially, in terms of spending, in terms of age, in terms of experience or in terms of nationality.* There's been a slow and steady decrease in the average age, but that, I would suggest, is simply a reflection of the earlier development of footballers.

*This is actually a fascinating quirk of Sir Alex's transfers. Go through that list and count the Englishmen...
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Chabon, i don't really disagree with the figures you are presenting, but i don't see why age should have anything to do with established. I never claimed we didn't buy young players, i said we hardly bought untested youth, compared to now.

If you were 22/23 and had played 100/150 games for your club you would have to be considered an established player. Maybe not enough to be considered experienced, although many still were, but they had some experience of playing very well for their clubs and regularly.

That was the point i was making, in the past Fergie did sign a lot of fully established players, (established doesn't necessarily indicate old), and had a lot of success with that policy. We do now see ourselves looking at untested youngsters much more so than before, but it hasn't always been like that. I feel it is a myth to suggest that we have always bought youth, when we had for so long been regularly signing players who had already been established in first team football for at least a couple of years, in some cases far more.
 
apotheosis said:
Chabon, i don't really disagree with the figures you are presenting, but i don't see why age should have anything to do with established. I never claimed we didn't buy young players, i said we hardly bought untested youth, compared to now.

If you were 22/23 and had played 100/150 games for your club you would have to be considered an established player. Maybe not enough to be considered experienced, although many still were, but they had some experience of playing very well for their clubs and regularly.
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Don't most of our young signings fit the profile of established then? De Gea had played 84 times for one of the biggest clubs in Spain. Hernandez had been playing for years for the biggest club in Mexico, and by the time he joined up he'd played in a world cup. Phil Jones had 40 appearances for a top flight club by 19. Kagawa has won two titles with one of the biggest clubs in Germany. And so on and so forth. Sure you've got your Obertans, Smallings and Bebes, but we've always taken punts now and then. Players are getting more and more games at a younger age, so I just don't really see what the basis is for your complaint, things simply haven't changed much in our transfer policy.
 
If we could sign Modric and Kagawa I would be extremely happy, perhaps the RB from Palace too but I'm not sure how good he is, not really bothered with Hazard. Mainly because I think Modric could play the Scholes role, and Kagawa the Giggs role - but with more goals.

I reckon that the Glazers/Gill are distinctly aware of the threat City pose to our immediate success, much like the Summer of 06/07(?) where we bought Nani, Anderson, Hargreaves and signed Tevez, which secured our dominance over a very tough Chelsea for the next 5 years or so. My heart, and partly my head says that United won't want to allow City to get as ahead of us as Chelsea did, so I wouldn't be surprised if we flex the financial muscles a bit this Summer.

United are also distinctly aware of marketability, and the easiest way to market a player or a club is simply to win, so it's directly in their interest to invest, now that we have a serious threat to our short-term success that has just started to reach us.
 
Cannot see Modric signing. Might come down to how Chelsea do tonight though, with Spurs' Champions League hanging in the balance. Would Modric want to stay with playing in Europa League. I'll bet my life we don't sign both Hazard and Kagawa though.
 
Nick Coppack ‏@nickcoppack
Just spent 30 mins with David Gill in his office. Interview (11/12 season, transfers, FFP etc) on http://ManUtd.com next week.


Well at least we know Gill is in his office. GET ON THE FAX MACHINE DAVE! MAKE SOME DEALS!
 
Well done David. I guess you lost the Warchest key again and you're now turning your pockets out, checking down the back of the sofa, retracing your steps etc while our transfer targets fly away from us like a flock of swallows heading for warmer climes
 
:lol: I'd have loved to see the caf reaction when we lost out on Shearer, Zidane, Batistuta or Ronaldinho.
 
If he's on 200k a week at Chelsea then he can do one. He is 21 and still unproven at the highest level.
 
Crustanoid said:
Well done David. I guess you lost the Warchest key again and you're now turning your pockets out, checking down the back of the sofa, retracing your steps etc while our transfer targets fly away from us like a flock of swallows heading for warmer climes
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:lol: !
 
ummm....it was tongue in cheek, hence the poetic, RAWK-like ending to the sentence
 
gooDevil said:
Any honest man would have demanded to be paid less money. I've had to talk a few employers down before, I know the feeling.
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What? :lol: He can take what he wants. If Chelsea are stupid enough to pay it then that's their prerogative. I don't blame him for taking it, just he really isn't worth it, we are better off without. Say he comes here and struggles to adapt then Chelsea are going to find it hard to get rid as he is on astronomical wages. Say he wants to renew a contract in a year or two, what will Chelsea have to pay him then. Say more experienced members of the team want their contracts renewed in order to have parity with Hazard.

He is a good player and if he can make that money then he has done well. Personally I think a 21 year old from Ligue Un should not get paid anywhere near that. He isn't Messi.
 
RyanGoggs said:
What? :lol: He can take what he wants. If Chelsea are stupid enough to pay it then that's their prerogative. I don't blame him for taking it, just he really isn't worth it, we are better off without. Say he comes here and struggles to adapt then Chelsea are going to find it hard to get rid as he is on astronomical wages. Say he wants to renew a contract in a year or two, what will Chelsea have to pay him then. Say more experienced members of the team want their contracts renewed in order to have parity with Hazard.

He is a good player and if he can make that money then he has done well. Personally I think a 21 year old from Ligue Un should not get paid anywhere near that. He isn't Messi.
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I don't think that we're better off without him. If that's the case then SAF wouldn't have tried to sign him up.
 
I think some caftards should stop being hypocrites about his decision to join Chelsea. I think its perfectly understandably given 1) He's not a local lad, nor is he a manchester united fan, 2) London is a much more enjoyable place to stay, and 3) He will be paid a lot more. However, it doesn't not cloud the fact that Hazard would have been a luxury signing as he is most effective from the wings, as compared to our most immediate need, a central midfielder.
 
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