Well, we can only judge on what's happened so far.
I'm all for going for players like Fabregas, i.e. an actual midfielder, and not just a midfielder, a fecking excellent one, but it always seemed like a very optimistic bid on the clubs behalf and surely they knew when being so public about it that it could have a bad effect if it never happened. If it somehow does still happen (unlikely) then I'll happily admit defeat myself cause I've been pretty pessimistic of this whole thing so far.
oh and I'm also not sure how the club can possibly have more of a chance by going public, you think the Barca president will go "shit, they told the whole world about the bid, better sell now lads!"