I think Kroos would have been a good signing if Van Gaal hadn’t inexplicably decided that he didn’t need him
De Ligt | €45+5m agreement reached pending medical | Signed!
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Along with Fab he is the one with the Oracle type status on herethat breaks the news on all the genuine targets so they get the most attention from me.
I just think that they put up posts that are fillers until the deal is done.
Comparing him to Romano is mental. Everyone is telling you you're wrong, probably just admit you might be barking up the wrong tree.
He did not have a clue
Aye, the good old doubling down phenomena!
Time will tell and we can look at our dealings this window and check the history behind them.
Trying to discredit Ornstein is one of the most bizarre hills to die on I’ve ever seen on this forum, some people are contrarian just because they don’t have an actual opinion to offer.
What do you mean time will tell?
it's already told. He's a well respected journalist who has been working in the industry for many many years, and there's countless examples of him doing his job well.But Bondi77 on RedCafe knows better.
Yep it's like a football fan being annoyed of Messi, Ronaldo, sir Bobby, scholes, maradona and van basten
Why are you making shit up? It was literally an exclusive from him and then everyone else followed:He did not have a clue
https://x.com/David_Ornstein/status/1800636648796864987?s=19
He did not have a clue
Your problem with him is that he doesn't make up stuff? He said he personally doesn't know what will happen, and then broke that he's staying a few days later when he got the info. And he was the first one to do it, like on countless other occasions as well.
It's either that he doesn't make up stuff or you believe absolutely every trash source like the Daily Mail and indykaila and when they inevitably manage to guess something right, you'll claim they were the first to report it?
What's his passing and technical ability like
What do you mean time will tell?
But Bondi77 on RedCafe knows better.
That is about it but I don"t believe any of the stories until they are virtually confirmed.
@Stadjer thank you for providing some sanity in here. I have given up.
I do think he’s hugely underrated on here. The injuries are a concern but as a player he would be incredible alongside Martinez.
Then you have no business being in the transfer forum or looking at transfer tweets and should just wait for official club announcements. Ornstein is as good as it gets in current football transfer journalism. if he isn't good enough for you, no one else can be.
I'm not following...?
Wonder if glass half full should be added to that highly appropriate tagline
They are going for two centre backs it seems, another forward and possibly two CMs depending on transfers.
If you add in another CB to rotate and prevent injuries, you have Willy and/or Evans as another option, Malacia hopefully back or a replacement. Midfield you still have squad players to come in, forwards it loooks like Zirkzee, plus you never know with Rashord.
The squad will be better and would challenge for CL. We need at least 2-3 windows to be title challengers. There is a massive amount of deadwood to ship out
You summed it up mate.
He announces it when it is virtually done.
I just pick on the posts like "confirmed interest" or other such titles that come to nothing that he posts as if they carry that much weight when they really don't.
That will do me
Football is indeed unpredictable. We at the supporters club heard that we signed Gazza out from SAF's own mouth. Years after the same thing happened with Shearer. Meanwhile we didn't sign a young Michael Owen cause his dad got greedy. The contract was already on the table ready to be signed
However Ornstein is the most reliable journalist out there. He once explained how he worked and it's quite impressive. Basically he gets a story, he double checks it through multiple sources and then he confronts the club with it. Usually the club would either confirm it (cause they know that Ornstein had done his due diligence, he will post it just the same and if they lie then they will look like fools) or simply say no comment. Either way he gets his confirmation
I’d imagine if Brailsford is genuinely running it then he will be a process and procedure guy. He won’t involve himself in the player selection. He’ll make sure they set up how they are going to scout and initiate/make a transfer, then that the correct people are involved and then ultimately it’s the right decision for the club.
Could obviously be wrong but he’s not going to be saying which players he fancies, unless it’s all based on analytics and the players are converted to essentially numbers where he has a list of desired attributes and player x matches them most closely.
I think they do. For example, not many people were paying attention to the Zirkzee or de Ligt links, because they came from questionable or straight up unreliable sources. However, it does mean something when Ornstein confirms it, as it means the interest is very likely real.
We get linked with hundreds of players every summer, but for how many of them do the best journalists actually confirm our interest?
Your attention to detail isn’t great
Martinez couldn’t get in the Argentinian side because of a 35 year old Otimendi and a Spurs centre half . Is he also shit ?
Did you read the part that Zirkzee was one of multiple attacking options we are looking at?
I understand your concerns, I have some myself, but this isn't mid-table.
Onana is a top 2 ball-playing keeper in the league behind Ederson. Every successful team plays with a technical keeper these days bar maybe PSG and Madrid, but that's also down to them not needing one for their respective domestic leagues.
Dalot has been one of the best right backs in the league.
If de Ligt is a 24 year old Maguire that we can get for 40-50m, that's great business. CBs of that level and pre-peak age come for 60-80m these days.
Martínez doesn't need me praising him, we all know how good he is. Same with Mainoo.
Shaw is arguably the best left back in world football, but needs to be managed carefully to avoid injuries.
Fernandes is a top 2 chance creation machine behind KDB in world football.
Hojlund is one of the biggest U21 striker prospects around.
Amad and Garnacho have both shown big promise and at the very least they are two solid PL wingers who can absolutely contribute massively for a top 6 team.
Ugarte definitely improves the current side, whether or not he's a player who can regularly start for a PL / CL contender.
Maybe mid-table has a different meaning for you?
Yeah, because that's probably true, mate.
I don't know what to say to this? Ornstein isn't claiming we'll 100% sign the guy. He also doesn't need articles like the Zirkzee one in order to boost his reputation. He has enough exclusives that come out of the blue and do certainly end up happening, in order for his reputation to stay intact. If anything, he's probably taking a risk with articles like the Zirkzee one, as you begin to suspect that he's not that great after all?
Brailsford definitely seems like a gift of the gab sort of dude so I imagine he'd mostly be involved in selling the project.
I don’t get this mid-table thing either. We had a historically bad season, both performance and injury wise and we weren’t a million miles away. Liverpool might have a regression, Spurs and Villa weren’t great and struggled to finish ahead, Newcastle limited by their manager and Chelsea will Chelsea. The league is difficult now but I’d be confident with the 4/5 signings were confirmed looking at that we’ll progress and challenge CL.
Just laugh at it. It's the only reasonable response.
Rare to see optimism on here. It's good.
I also firmly believe that this squad has at least 10, but closer to 15 players who didn't just turn shit overnight and forgot how to play football after ETH's first season, or after joining United in the case of Mount, for example. The tactical system and environment is the most important thing for player. Bad systems will make great players look average or even bad, but good systems can make average players look like great players. And then, with 4 or 5 new signings, there will be no excuse not to make top 4. I'd argue that we'll be favorites for 3rd place behind City and Arsenal, and definitely favorites for the Europa League unless Spurs produces the best transfer window of all time to jump ahead of us.
Based on what was seen from his cycling days he has a top down approach from where they want the team to be, what needs to happen to achieve that, where they currently have gaps vs what has to happen to achieve that and then how they will close when gaps. The whole “marginal gains” thing was seen as som sort of magic science by many, but in reality it’s just good project/working practice where they take emotion out of it, are good at understanding processes and procedures and have a talent for spotting gaps and opportunities to achieve progress. You see it with us already - the management structure is terrible, so they bring in a new organisation, we overspend in transfers so they negotiate better, training facilities poor so they fix them, we need better revenue so they look at the stadium. I think it will be in other areas too. In the cycling they looked at nutrition, training type, the environment the athletes are in (they pre-selected mattresses for the players to sleep to improve sleep quality). I’d imagine there will already be loads of this going on in the background. Little things that make a small difference and the amalgamation hopefully improves the club as a whole. I’d be really interested to see what they are up to regarding our injuries.
Does it look comfortably a top 6 side? Compare it to City, Liverpool, Arsenal, Chelsea, Villa, Spurs even before they all make their own improvements.
Personally I'd say not, outside of that is mid table.
I’d agree with this too, and hopefully some fresh ideas in the coaching staff stops ETH turning into his own worst enemy. I saw Steve Mc’s influence in a lot of our games last year. He had success at Middlesbrough but he often had a team containing Viduka, Hasselbaink, Yakuba and Maccarone struggling to score. Come to think of it I would love that forward line at United right now.
Fair enough, I do agree with you to a certain extent and I will endeavour to refrain from talking about him in the future.Yeah, because that's probably true, mate.
I don't know what to say to this? Ornstein isn't claiming we'll 100% sign the guy. He also doesn't need articles like the Zirkzee one in order to boost his reputation. He has enough exclusives that come out of the blue and do certainly end up happening, in order for his reputation to stay intact. If anything, he's probably taking a risk with articles like the Zirkzee one, as you begin to suspect that he's not that great after all?
You can't possibly think this.
I'm optimistic, because I think the Glazers' incompetence was so detrimental to the club, that even a half-decent new owner can make a huge difference to the results on the pitch. It might take 2 or 3 years, but Ineos' job isn't as difficult as some people would have you believe. Another reason I'm optimistic is because I think our current squad is way better than most people realize, and certainly way better, than 8th in the league.
If we're concerned about fitness issues could we not give him a lower base salary and a higher appearance fee?
Give him a base salary of £125k per week, and then a high appearance fee so that if he ends up playing every match in a season for us he would end up at around £250k per week.
This ensures that he only gets his current big wages if he A: stays fit, and B: plays well enough to keep earning his squad selection - which are people's concerns right now.
Give him a base salary of £125k per week, and then a high appearance fee so that if he ends up playing every match in a season for us he would end up at around £250k per week.
This ensures that he only gets his current big wages if he A: stays fit, and B: plays well enough to keep earning his squad selection - which are people's concerns right now.
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