Why? Barca were more than willing to talk until DeJong pulled the not going anywhere until you pay me what you owe me. United were led to believe that there was a deal to be had at that point.
Anyway onwards and upwards. Round 1. Ding Ding
Frenkie de Jong - Part 2 - Chase Harder.
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Anyway onwards and upwards. Round 1. Ding Ding
There’s always been a special connection for Dutch internationals (specifically Ajax players) playing for Barcelona.
Putting out feelers is fine. Negotiating with the club without having any personal terms discussed or even knowing the player's interest level is pure amateur hour.
Personally I don’t think we’ve gone there, the 2 main men, putting themselves out on a limb without some kind of encouragement
We should send them Wout
Please please don't waste the entire summer chasing this guy.
Brilliant idea. Messi and Bobo, reunited at Barca.
Remember all the ***** in here claiming he didn't leave Barca because they didn't pay him the money he was owed 
Yeah, I heard they all park their caravans there in the summer.
The chasing did seem amateur. Just like any good project management, every thing need to have scheduled deadline. Chasing all the way until window closed, just made United looked stupid.
If we're back on this, I hope there's a lesson learned session by putting in deadline.
If we're back on this, I hope there's a lesson learned session by putting in deadline.
Well they didn't.Remember all the ***** in here claiming he didn't leave Barca because they didn't pay him the money he was owed
To be fair "Frenkie de Jong is Man United's priority target in the transfer window and John Murtough and Richard Arnold have been filmed in Barcelona" was the headline in Manchester News in July so it really not folks fault, some were encouraged to think there was positive contact. In hindsight the fans were fooled but its no wonder our transfer team has been comical , if you indeed arrive in Barcelona with no prior agreement from player. We have a history of being a lead pony for agents and players to screw an advantage out of the teams they are playing for and have no intention of leaving. Ramos RM ,anyone ? How many times do we need to see Player A in negotations with Man Utd to a week later Player A sign new improved deal with parent club.Remember all the ***** in here claiming he didn't leave Barca because they didn't pay him the money he was owed
Correct FDJ only contact with United, present or future, should be Bruno leaving him lying on the ground after a 50/50
I’m not sure why people are so mad that we ‘chased him’ across the summer. People moan at anything. There is nothing ‘amateur’ about a football club trying to sign a football player during a fecking transfer window. Whether the truth was that we were simply trying to convince him, or that he was already convinced and wanted to resolve a financial issue - there is no shame in pursuing a player you really want.
Too many fans just treat football like a damn tv drama with a storyline.
Too many fans just treat football like a damn tv drama with a storyline.
Perception is reality in football and we didn’t come out of it looking great.
It isn’t.
It’s actually moaners who don’t come out of it looking great. It makes you look like a highly strung emotional 12 year old if the only take is along the lines of ‘ooooh, you got burnt man!’ Or whatever it is 12 years olds say. Like grow up. We wanted to sign a footballer, and gave it a fecking good go. The idea of ‘perception’ should not even be a factor, certainly not to the club I hope anyway. This is serious business. We should not refrain to pursue a player because it ‘makes us look bad’ if we don’t get him. And the fact that it ‘makes us look bad’ in the first place just underlines where football has sunk to, particularly in the offseason, where it descends into a farcical high-school drama of the press trying to declare a club the ‘winner of the transfer window’.
We tried to sign De Jong, because we wanted him. We eventually signed a different player. Anyone trying to attach any sort of embarrassment to that is, in my humble opinion, an idiot.
I think, the embarrassment part has a bit of substance but you can take that away and at least we don't look good in all this. We chased Frenkie all summer and due to his price we had to delay other transfers (apparently) which resulted in us grossly overpaying for Antony. I agree with you, you don't just do stuff because of what other people perceive of it - but you should have a plan in place with options. Getting involved in the theater that was Barcelona last year wasn't very pragmatic. The managers task was already challenging enough, there wasn't a real pre-season with the new additions. All things considered, the club didn't come across well prepared or having a good plan.
Hmm, I still don’t think I agree, but fair enough. I’m not sure how it looked as if we had no plan when the plan to sign Frenkie De Jong seemed incredibly clear to me. It was a complex deal of course, but clearly, the reward of achieving it was one we considered to be worth it, so we went for it.
The Antony stuff is again, for me, fan driven drama. Firstly, the people who paid the money are not complaining about it. Clearly, we felt comfortable to pay what we did, so we did. Also, it is highly speculative that Antony could have been picked up earlier for relative peanuts. To me, the greater likelihood is that he was always going to cost huge money. Delaying it was likely because we’d have rather spent huge money on De Jong. Which is our right to do.
Any transfers we ‘delayed’ were completed within the designated window. Fans, again, live in this fantasy world where clubs announce all deals on 1st July so they can ‘have a full preseason’, which again lends no appreciation to the actual mechanics of these things. Also, the window runs until 1 September for a reason. Players signed within the window are not signed ‘late’. They are, by definition, signed ‘in time’.
I don’t think we got involved in any theatre with Barcelona. We got out of the way and let them get on with it themselves. We simply made it clear that once they had sorted their shit out, we were ready to sign De Jong. The remaining drama around Barcelona had nothing to do with us.
I’m pretty sure FdJ’s agent wouldn’t exactly have said to them “no thanks, not interested” - in fact, it’s in his best interest always, to drum up interest for his client. Also, technically we’re not even allowed to approach the player/agent without speaking to Barca first - isn’t that law? (though I think we all know it happens).
Anyway, not really trying to defend them because the extent we pursued him and the time we wasted (rumor at the time was the entire transfer budget was dependent on what we would spend on recruiting FdJ which seems logical) - resulting in inflated, panic deals, late in the window.
Should have walked away the second or third (or tenth!) time FDJ categorically stated he wasn’t interested in leaving.
Hardly. Frenkies agent was at Carrington a couple of times last summer, he’s Donny and I think Lindelofs agent too. You don’t think it crossed either Arnie or Johnny M’s mind to ask the question? They did the deal with Barca in case FDJ was forced out, and they made sure they were first in the queue. It’s not our fault Frenkie dug his claws in and hung on.
In the meantime they were signing Casemiro, Martinez, Malacia and Eriksen. The only deal it seemed to throw out was Antony, although that was as much about Ajax driving the price up and up as it was about waiting for Frenkie.
I pretty sure he is going to join a Saudi club, I mean they made Ronaldo the best paid footballer on the planet again at the age of 37, and I think if Messi has proven one thing that he isn't just playing football for the love of the game, he is going to want some of that Saudi-money as well.
Now we have (99%) CL football and Ten Hag has improved us...it should be more possible to get him....De Jong has confirmed that Barca have already sold him to us last summer therefore "WHY NOT AGAIN?".
Barca must reduce their wage bill (Apparently between 150-200m) and they want Messi back therefore this time De Jong has zero chance to stay there if Barca decides to sell him.
They will not sell Lewandowski, Ter Stegen, Pedri, Gavi or Balde.
Either they will sell a player like De Jong (Massive contract) for 80-90m or 3-4 players like Dembele, Raphinha, Ferran, Fati or Kessie (That what would be a big risk to weak their bench so much).
I still want him....a midfield with De Jong - Casemiro - Fernandes/Eriksen would improve our game so much against most sides in the league.
Of course we need a striker too....but to have big control in the midfield was and is never possible with players like Fred, McTominay and Eriksen (in this deeper position).
Barca must reduce their wage bill (Apparently between 150-200m) and they want Messi back therefore this time De Jong has zero chance to stay there if Barca decides to sell him.
They will not sell Lewandowski, Ter Stegen, Pedri, Gavi or Balde.
Either they will sell a player like De Jong (Massive contract) for 80-90m or 3-4 players like Dembele, Raphinha, Ferran, Fati or Kessie (That what would be a big risk to weak their bench so much).
I still want him....a midfield with De Jong - Casemiro - Fernandes/Eriksen would improve our game so much against most sides in the league.
Of course we need a striker too....but to have big control in the midfield was and is never possible with players like Fred, McTominay and Eriksen (in this deeper position).
No tweet of us actually moving for him again but we Muppets are here camping, you love to see it
Alas, the Holy Muppet Trinity of @Plant0x84 @Berbaclass and @Brownie85 reconvene over another summer of spiritual speculation.
We shouldn't waste out time on a player who said Barcelona agreed to sell and he said no because he loves Barcelona and wants to stay there.
NO, never again
You can hardly blame someone for not living in a silo. You want fans to forget the preceding decade of transfer ineptitude, hope that the new crew will manoeuvre effectively in the market, believe that we acted accordingly when we chased a player who never wanted to leave in the first place and not feel bad about it afterwards? We weren't burned. We've been burning for a decade.
there has to be a more interesting muppet train than this one. It was so tedious and boring last summer.
I'm on board with this, as long as the deadline is 2022.
Don't worry, we won't be chasing anyone as we won't get sold til 3 weeks into August.
And that’s sounding optimistic.
Barcelona won't sell Frenkie..or Frenkie wont leave...they certainly won't sell us Frenkie AND Araujo
Failing to sign a player is not ‘ineptitude’. It’s failing to sign a player.
Wow, I almost thought you wrote, "Fellaini to sign a player is not ‘ineptitude’. It’s fellaini to sign a player."
FFS
This thread is close worthy after those most recent comments from Frenkie.
This is pure cope. Well-run clubs do the majority of their business early. Waiting until the end, more often than not, results in overpaying for backup targets and risks disrupting the start of the campaign.
I agree the intention to sign him was absolutely there. And rightly so as a midfilder with such skillset was(is) clearly missing from the squad. But when such a signing is so important, there must be a point where you go from option A to option B. Just to make sure you don't end up with nothing (as we did with Sancho...)
We will never know exactly what happend. I had the feeling that we went in for Antony so strong because the FDJ saga has made us look pretty desperate, I mean, lets be honest, even here in the caf most people were suprised that United really went through with it. And if the people responsible for the deal are now happy or not isn't really substantial - tendentially they will always opt to justify their decisions. Who knows what could have been but what we paid for Antony was enough to bring in him and another young striker or something. Plus back then there was talk about part of the Antony money would come out of the budget for coming transfer windows. Again - we don't know how things really went but overpaying always comes with a price. I see your point - you could see it from a glass half empty or half full perspective.
Well yeah for sure but we all know that the sooner the end of the window, the more difficult it gets to sign players clubs are trying to keep. I agree, I think Ajax stated relatively early that they had no intentions to sell anybody else so you are right, maybe there was no chance to save money. But at the end of day they took us to the cleaners and we went through with. Be that because the club kind of forgot that we needed an RW for 90% of the window only to go full force at the end or they wanted some good news after what appeared a painful lesson for United.
That is true. Not that we tried to infere or something (that would have been highlight of the summer though). But again - if you take 70 or 80 million aside just in case you need it, then you restrict yourself and of course that will have an impact.
It might not have been our fault but a club I consider to be competent and ambitious has plans in place for all eventualities. You don't throw out a plan because "Frenkie dug his claws in". It wouldn't be proactive but reactionary.
And from my personal perspective - nobody really asked for Malacia and Eriksen as always going to come here. Don't think it makes sense to use those things to rectify something. The big thing was a tier 1 midfielder. And we followed one for a long time which meant we had to put the money aside. And of course Ajax will drive up the price even more if a desperate club comes around 5minutes before the end with no chance to bring in a replacement. They did what any club would do - they fleece the desperate club. Which is exactly what happend.
Not sure I'm ready to camp here for a whole new summer
Any new links?
Probably gonna wait until owner situation gets sorted before getting sucked into transfer threads (if my inner muppet can withstand)
Any new links?
Probably gonna wait until owner situation gets sorted before getting sucked into transfer threads (if my inner muppet can withstand)
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