We cannot. It's a poor quote from Woodward who then went on to offer £25m for a player worth around double that. I reckon £40m is the absolute maximum we could pay for a single player now but due to the mentality presented recently we'd probably not break our current record which stands at £31m for anyone.
Gareth Bale Transfer Speculation | Done
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We cannot. It's a poor quote from Woodward who then went on to offer £25m for a player worth around double that. I reckon £40m is the absolute maximum we could pay for a single player now but due to the mentality presented recently we'd probably not break our current record which stands at £31m for anyone.
With Bale unsettled, and Madrid's interest cooling (apparently) - it wouldn't surprise me if we swooped in like a sardine.
With a £80m bid? Because Spurs probably wouldn't accept anything lower from a PL rival.
Marca's latest cracker:
"Los Blancos' feel that their part of the bargain is done – they have reached an agreement with Bale and offered Tottenham a world record fee of €98 million – and now it is up to Levy to come to his senses."
"Los Blancos' feel that their part of the bargain is done – they have reached an agreement with Bale and offered Tottenham a world record fee of €98 million – and now it is up to Levy to come to his senses."
The amazing Daniel Levy laughing at €98m bid for Bale I presume?
Nobody knows the details. I very much suspect the offer won't be the whole sum upfront. So maybe not as attractive as it seems.
Laughing at the whole thing. This is the same Marca that said - more than two weeks ago - that Bale's signing was just "hours away".
You have to admire Levy. He works for a smaller club, but just refuses to be bullied. He does an incredible job and when he does have to sell, he gets very good fees for the players
Sorry but, I don't admire him because while he does get the most he can for selling to bigger clubs - he ends up leaving Spurs in a stupid situation half the time because the deals are done so late that they can't get adequate replacement with the money for the coming season. As such Spurs end up in a situation of almost there and can look back at the season and say - well if we had a more depth or just that bit of adequate quality we would be at least in the CL. Then what happens is the next season they end up losing another piece because they aren't in the CL and the cycle continues.
If he does end up selling Bale for even a record amount now - they are going to be left in a precarious situation for making the deal so late. Sometimes it might be better for the club to make a few million less and have time to strengthen with the money they do get from the sale earlier.
The belief is that there's an offer of 98.7m Euros (about 85m quid) to be paid over 4 years, 2m Euros more than they paid for Ronaldo. Or a cash offer of 87m Euros (about 75m quid). Madrid are said to be at the take it or leave it stage.
And if Levy does anything other than take it he's a fool. They'll be able to build a tremendous squad with £75m, they already have a very good team with or without Bale.
Levy is successful in his strategy because he always sells eventually.
For the same reason I think, they can't believe Levy won't take the deal. Sky Sports reported a £85m offer at the end of July and it has probably not changed since, except maybe to reduce the payment period from 6 years to 4.
We've already signed Soldado, Paulinho, Capoue and Chadli. So that would hardly leave us in a "precarious situation" even IF Bale were to be sold.
Spurs have added some good additions this summer, and with the injuries easing I really don't think they'll be as reliant on him anyway.
We'll have an even better team with Bale. And we don't need Bale money to strengthen it further.
When ze seagulls follow ze trawler it is because zey think sardines will be thrown into ze sea..
Hence it makes sense to refuse to take an insane amount of money for a player who wants to leave. Okay.
Soldado would still be the key to that. If he settles and gets them goals, that'll be a major plus. If not, they wouldn't have gained all that much and still need a whole lot from Bale.
I certainly wouldn't rule out refusing a mega bid from Real. Tottenham are in it to win, not to gain cash. But it would depend on how much Bale wants to leave.
Basically it makes sense either way: a win-win situation. Keep Bale and retain one of the best players in the world. Or sell him and use the money wisely to strengthen the team/squad in other ways.
Which one of those players is a winger? How many wide players do you have - even with Bale you are short in terms of depth. Yes, you've strengthened as you had in seasons past but, then you end up short in one department due to Levy waiting till last minute to squeeze every last bit he can, which ends up breaking all the good work. The way he leaves the team is why I don't think Levy is that great but, if you like it - great for you.
Aside from Bale we have Lennon, Townsend and Chadli.
Except such stories are always bullshit and in any case they probably only make $20 at most per shirt rather than the full price and many of those shirts would have been sold anyway with one name or another on them. Always assuming they don't have a deal like we do with Nike in which case it will just influence the price they get from Nike next time around.
No, it doesn't make sense to keep Bale when they're offering you £85m for him, same way it made no sense for Inter to keep Adriano, Maicon, Cesar and Sneijder when other teams wanted to buy them for significant amounts of money. Obviously it doesn't mean you'll have to lose Bale for a lower price in the future but there's nothing certain in football and if someone's giving you a world record fee for a player who isn't even that good you should take the money and run.
Clubs rarely make anything from shirt sales unless they are sold in their official store, in which case part of the money goes to the club as the store owner. That's why companies like Nike and Adidas are prepared to pay €30m or €40m a year to strike a deal with major clubs, they profit from selling merchandise.
It's absolutely insane to even think that Nike would give up all their money from shirt sales to Barcelona, or that over half a million people would go and buy Neymar shirts within the first month.
Lennon on his day is a good player, Townsend is pretty average and I won't be surprised if he leaves by the end of window and Chadli I know feck all about. You should be looking for a winger even if Bale stays.
I think AVB wants to play 4-3-3, so rather than another winger as such we'll be after another wide forward player like Lamela or Willian:
Bale - Soldado - Willian would be fantastic as a front three.
Willian is available and has been linked with you lot, he was great at Shakhtar not so long ago and couldn't have lost that much during the poor spell at Anzhi. He probably won't come on the cheap, Anzhi are going to want to recoup most of the money they had paid and he cost them over €30m.
I'm not so sure they can. They'd have to offload a few other players for this to make financial sense. For example, bringing in 4 players at 15-20M/each brings a shitload of wages. At 100K/week that is 100M over 5 years.
Let's say they sold 500,000 of his shirts. How many out of those people would gone and buy a Barca jersey with another number anyway ? Maybe 80% at least and 20% probably buy the shirt only because of him. I can't imagine many people would buy two jersey with 2 numbers the same year.
Even in case they made all that money, I can't figure out how can it be attributed to Neymar's signing?
I reckon a fraction of those jerseys that can be directly attributed to the signing of Neymar. Most of the fans decide to get a jersey this calendar year, whether it's Neymar or not. When a new signing comes up, the fans automatically get a jersey number with the new player's number because the choice is available to them. It's very easy to argue that they would have bought the jersey anyway without Neymar's name on it.
Unless they prove it conclusively that the number of Neymar jerseys sold this year is over and beyond the normal trend of Barcelona jersey sales,
and prove it that every Neymar jersey sold is only because he signed for the club, not because the fans had plans to get a jersey but chose Neymar's number because the choice was available, it's bullshit. It's like saying if Barcelona didn't waste the money on Neymar, they would have made additional money on jersey sales, because they didn't have to make up the money spent on him, a bit of scouse like logic on net spend.
I reckon a fraction of those jerseys that can be directly attributed to the signing of Neymar. Most of the fans decide to get a jersey this calendar year, whether it's Neymar or not. When a new signing comes up, the fans automatically get a jersey number with the new player's number because the choice is available to them. It's very easy to argue that they would have bought the jersey anyway without Neymar's name on it.
Unless they prove it conclusively that the number of Neymar jerseys sold this year is over and beyond the normal trend of Barcelona jersey sales,
and prove it that every Neymar jersey sold is only because he signed for the club, not because the fans had plans to get a jersey but chose Neymar's number because the choice was available, it's bullshit. It's like saying if Barcelona didn't waste the money on Neymar, they would have made additional money on jersey sales, because they didn't have to make up the money spent on him, a bit of scouse like logic on net spend.
Getting rid of Bale notionally brings in about £100M in fee and saved wages: a Soldado costs about half that. So you lose Bale and get two decent players.
It's not even worth considering because they haven't made that money. If it was so simple football clubs would be making €200m a year in revenue from shirt sales alone. They receive €33m a year from Nike and that's what they make from their shirts, perhaps there is extra money for merchandise sold but it won't be anything spectacular. United and Barcelona sell about 1.5 million shirts a year.
AS are reporting that Levy has reduced the asking price to 85m Euros cash + Coentrao + a forward 
Bale is believed to be feeling increasingly trapped. The season's about to start, he's had no pre-season and the deal still hasn't been struck. He's reportedly meeting Levy today.
Bale is believed to be feeling increasingly trapped. The season's about to start, he's had no pre-season and the deal still hasn't been struck. He's reportedly meeting Levy today.
AVB says Bale won't be involved "at the start of the season" because he is recovering from Injury.
What forward could they possibly give them? They only have Benzema.AS are reporting that Levy has reduced the asking price to 85m Euros cash + Coentrao + a forward
Bale is believed to be feeling increasingly trapped. The season's about to start, he's had no pre-season and the deal still hasn't been struck. He's reportedly meeting Levy today.
Morata. Most reports agreed that Spurs wanted him from the start.
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