January Transfer Window

Pexbo said:
What this squad needs more than anything is for whatever midfield signing we make, be it January or July, to be a big personality. Someone who shoulder's responsibility and leads us on the pitch and can inspire those around him through his actions.

Just a small ask.
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What you are asking for costs big bucks. Unless you are thinking of bringing Roy Keane out of retirement. I just don't see us paying £45-50m to get us that world class midfielder we all want.
 
Sixpence said:
What you are asking for costs big bucks. Unless you are thinking of bringing Roy Keane out of retirement. I just don't see us paying £45-50m to get us that world class midfielder we all want.
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Transfer fees aren't the issue - we made big bids in the summer. The problem is wages and agent fees - something we don't budge on
 
LonelyFire said:
Transfer fees aren't the issue - we made big bids in the summer. The problem is wages and agent fees - something we don't budge on
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We didn't go higher than £29m for Fabregas, wouldn't buy out Herrera's contract and tried to get De Rossi on loan. If we really want to get a midfielder of the quality we'd want we're going to have to do better than that.
 
LonelyFire said:
The reality is there is a number who would considerably improve us. Matuidi, matic, gundogan, Koke, bender, rakitic, witsel, defour, fernando, carvahlo - all would be an improvement.
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That's fine, but they are not all the same type of player, they are not all exactly the same. At the end you pick up the options you feel are best suited to you. If you're told they could be bought in a few months but not right now, you'll wait rather than go on to secondary targets you feel are not as good.
 
RORY65 said:
We didn't go higher than £29m for Fabregas, wouldn't buy out Herrera's contract and tried to get De Rossi on loan. If we really want to get a midfielder of the quality we'd want we're going to have to do better than that.
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Actually, if you believe those who would know, we did bid more than ) circa 10m more. Herrera wasn't bought because the club didn't think he was worth that money (not cause we didn't have it). The de Rossi interest was way overplayed - and again, problem was wages
 
LonelyFire said:
Actually, if you believe those who would know, we did bid more than ) circa 10m more. Herrera wasn't bought because the club didn't think he was worth that money (not cause we didn't have it). The de Rossi interest was way overplayed - and again, problem was wages
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Maybe you're right, it just seems dubious that our club record transfer has gone up by £1 million since 2002 while Chelsea, Liverpool, Arsenal and City (through different means) have all spent way more than they had previously and gone past our record while we spent about the same as Norwich in a summer when we desperately needed to support our new manager.
 
I find it strange that we would apparently bid so much for Bale and then proceed to play hardball for Fabregas and the like.
 
RORY65 said:
Maybe you're right, it just seems dubious that our club record transfer has gone up by £1 million since 2002 while Chelsea, Liverpool, Arsenal and City (through different means) have all spent way more than they had previously and gone past our record while we spent about the same as Norwich in a summer when we desperately needed to support our new manager.
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I know mate - the numbers don't look good. There is no doubt there was a few years there when money was an issue but this summer it wasn't.
 
mickeza said:
It's absolutely astounding the amount of people who think we didn't sign Fabregas because Woodward wasn't willing to bid more than £30m.
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I know pal!! Yes, he made mistakes this summer but that wasn't one. That said, an experienced CEO would have worked out what was really happening well before Woody did
 
SirFergie said:
Perhaps we were, however publicly we didn't really justify our supposed level of interest in him going off the bids that were tabled.
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We were given impression player would push for move. If you were in same situation, would you go in with a high bid "knowing" player was going to push for it? I don't think so. Woodward bid low knowing there would be negotiation. What he came to realise (far too late) was he had been 100% lied too by those in Fabregas camp.
 
LonelyFire said:
We were given impression player would push for move. If you were in same situation, would you go in with a high bid "knowing" player was going to push for it? I don't think so. Woodward bid low knowing there would be negotiation. What he came to realise (far too late) was he had been 100% lied too by those in Fabregas camp.
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Wouldn't it have been better, in that case, to force the clubs hand? Make a bid that's potentially inviting and make them think about it. If they reject it and they're adamant they won't sell then fine, but for me we should have made a serious bid making the club think about it. If the club stall over the bid then that may have had an effect on Fabregas making him think about his future. I realise that we were led on by his agent and whoever else was involved but initially I believe there was interest.
 
mickeza said:
It's absolutely astounding the amount of people who think we didn't sign Fabregas because Woodward wasn't willing to bid more than £30m.
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I was goin to say it's baffling but in reality we know a lot of people aren't too bright at looking at the bigger picture to work out what was going on.


It's clear as day he wanted his position secured for the coming season and in doing so a strengthend position for next seasons transfer talks.

His agents encouraged us to bid and keep testing the water and Barcelona's resolve. It was more about getting dialogue out in the press and finding out Barcelona's real position. As it was they wanted to keep him and made it clear. Whether it was a £30m bid or £50m made no difference, if they wanted to sell we'd have been willing to match the price. There'snodoughboughthah.
 
SirFergie said:
Wouldn't it have been better, in that case, to force the clubs hand? Make a bid that's potentially inviting and make them think about it. If they reject it and they're adamant they won't sell then fine, but for me we should have made a serious bid making the club think about it. If the club stall over the bid then that may have had an effect on Fabregas making him think about his future. I realise that we were led on by his agent and whoever else was involved but initially I believe there was interest.
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Barca were prepared to accept 35m - which was bid. It was up to the player to then "force" the move. It was nothing but PR between Fabregas and Barca all along.
 
I think there will probably be less competition in Jan rather than the summer for the players we might be interested in.

We just have to pay proper fees for top players and we will get a couple. Koke, Gundongan are both realistic if we cough up the £35m+ and pay them a handsome wage - if we move before Real/Barca/Chelski/City/Bayern/PSG all of which will, it seems, beat us to any player they compete with us for.
 
We're half way through this league campaign now. We're 3 points off 4th place. I know I was saying that midfielders aren't realistically available, but ensuring top four is so, so important. If there was a time to buy big then it's now.
 
Kag said:
We're half way through this league campaign now. We're 3 points off 4th place. I know I was saying that midfielders aren't realistically available, but ensuring top four is so, so important. If there was a time to buy big then it's now.
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Exactly what ive been saying all day. We have to act now - more than ever.
 
Get one good midfielder, it doesn't have to be top class and we'll see us going for the top4 easily I reckon.

I hope we also sign a left back too.
 
I still think we'll get top four with the squad we have, so I hope that isn't the focus of this transfer window. Short term thinking could lead to some mediocre signings.

Forget about signing players to get us 4th place. Try to sign players who can help us win the PL and CL over the next few seasons. We need real quality and ambition, no more glorified squad players.
 
KM said:
Get one good midfielder, it doesn't have to be top class and we'll see us going for the top4 easily I reckon.

I hope we also sign a left back too.
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This. Anderson is hopeless at this stage. Get rid of him, buy in a good CM and then go for the top bracket one in the summer.
 
If we bring in a "good" midfielder we'll have Carrick, Fletcher, Cleverley, good midfielder and Fellaini next season, there won't be room for a top class one on top of that. Our next CM signing has to be in, or at least potentially in the top bracket, it can't be someone like Cabaye, it's just a waste of money, we've done that already with Fellaini.
 
mickeza said:
If we bring in a "good" midfielder we'll have Carrick, Fletcher, Cleverley, good midfielder and Fellaini next season, there won't be room for a top class one on top of that. Our next CM signing has to be in, or at least potentially in the top bracket, it can't be someone like Cabaye, it's just a waste of money, we've done that already with Fellaini.
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Exactly. You'll get a reply soon which is essentially: <insert Fletcher is finished and Cleverley isn't good enough comment here> - even though we should all know that both players are almost guaranteed to be here come September.
 
Torn on this one, I mean we definitely need left back cover, if Fabio isn't in Moyes's plans and Buttner clearlny isn't up to scratch than we need someone there and there's no reason we can't find a left back in Jan, as we did with Evra himself. Plus if we don't look to another midfielder and need to use Jones there then another fullback is required anyway.

I initially thought we needed to purchase a midfielder but not sure whether we should wait until the summer now where we'll likely have more options. With Fletcher hopefully back for good and being Carrick cover, clev and jones both stepping up in recent weeks and hopefully Fellaini doing better following surgery it's looking less of a problem to really address in Jan unless someone who is clearly gonna take us forward becomes available. Someone like Cabaye would be an upgrade but isn't likely to really push us to another level.

Moyes has mentioned bringing back some of the loan players and it could well be that Powell takes Ando's spot in the squad who I think could be shipped off. Unfortunately though whilst he's been playing it doesn't seem like he's been playing in the middle from what I've heard. Still thats where he'll hopefully end up and tbh he couldn't do Ando's role any worse than Ando is now.

But right now things aren't looking so bad. We need a fullback but we've got the numbers in the midfield and some of them are finding form and hopefully won't be long before Carrick is fully fit. Valencia and Young have both improved in attack and nani is still to return as is RVP. Don't think top 4 is at threat so much now, will be hard work but don't think we need to do any panic buys injuries permitting.
 
Plus all of that assumes we need just one top class cm. If we're looking to compete with the likes of Barca and Bayern then we're more than one brilliant cm away.
 
KingMinger22 said:
I think there will probably be less competition in Jan rather than the summer for the players we might be interested in.

We just have to pay proper fees for top players and we will get a couple. Koke, Gundongan are both realistic if we cough up the £35m+ and pay them a handsome wage - if we move before Real/Barca/Chelski/City/Bayern/PSG all of which will, it seems, beat us to any player they compete with us for.
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They are not realistic if you expect them to join in January. Their clubs haven't exactly finished their season.
 
mickeza said:
If we bring in a "good" midfielder we'll have Carrick, Fletcher, Cleverley, good midfielder and Fellaini next season, there won't be room for a top class one on top of that. Our next CM signing has to be in, or at least potentially in the top bracket, it can't be someone like Cabaye, it's just a waste of money, we've done that already with Fellaini.
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I'd agree with you generally but I think these are different circumstances.
 
LonelyFire said:
I know mate - the numbers don't look good. There is no doubt there was a few years there when money was an issue but this summer it wasn't.
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For me the club was absolutely mad not to prepare better for SAF retiring. A manager who's won nothing really needed a sound platform to start off from and a couple of major signings would have helped him settle better. Not only because we lack quality when compared to the top sides in Europe, but also because those players would have been Moyes purchases and established him better in the dressing room. Whether such a sorry start to a new chapter can be overturned remains to be seen. Moyes is not the only one needing to prove himself, but also the owners and the board, who now face a new world with no untouchable manager to defend them at every turn. If there's another Glazer backlash it might just snowball into major opposition.

There's plenty of talk that we tried to sign Bale for a world record fee. Well, if that was the case, maybe the club did so knowing it was a no-go. Until cash is actually spent on unquestionable talent, the doubters are supported by the facts. This January window is tricky, but along with the summer it will represent what actual ambition the board (and owners) have as well as the foresight of Moyes or lack thereof. I'd say he has to get top 4 to stay in the job and to do so it would seem rather obvious that going all out for quality in midfield now (nearer the start of the window than the end of it) would greatly enhance those prospects.

The bottom line though, regardless of rumours or Moyes boasting of unlimited budget, until the deals are done, it's a moot point. A charade.
 
I suppose though the other thing to consider is what the other teams around us are gonna do. I mean assuming that Chelsea, City and Arsenal are set for the top 3 spots then you've got ourselves, Everton and Liverpool fighting it out for the fourth spot plus Spurs can easily challenge for it. We have a lot of players that need to get fit and in form in terms of carrick, rvp, kagawa, nani and fellaini, who could make a real difference. But it's not guaranteed they will step up or that others will maintain their relatively new found form. So if those other teams invest well then the fight could be a lot harder, particularly from Liverpool if they find another attacker to take the burden of Suarez which is their big problem atm.
 
Mersault said:
For me the club was absolutely mad not to prepare better for SAF retiring. A manager who's won nothing really needed a sound platform to start off from and a couple of major signings would have helped him settle better. Not only because we lack quality when compared to the top sides in Europe, but also because those players would have been Moyes purchases and established him better in the dressing room. Whether such a sorry start to a new chapter can be overturned remains to be seen. Moyes is not the only one needing to prove himself, but also the owners and the board, who now face a new world with no untouchable manager to defend them at every turn. If there's another Glazer backlash it might just snowball into major opposition.

There's plenty of talk that we tried to sign Bale for a world record fee. Well, if that was the case, maybe the club did so knowing it was a no-go. Until cash is actually spent on unquestionable talent, the doubters are supported by the facts. This January window is tricky, but along with the summer it will represent what actual ambition the board (and owners) have as well as the foresight of Moyes or lack thereof. I'd say he has to get top 4 to stay in the job and to do so it would seem rather obvious that going all out for quality in midfield now (nearer the start of the window than the end of it) would greatly enhance those prospects.

The bottom line though, regardless of rumours or Moyes boasting of unlimited budget, until the deals are done, it's a moot point. A charade.
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I agree with a lot if what you're saying but the club had deals lined up in the summer - moyes chose not to go for them as he wasn't sure about them. Got to respect its his team.

He has to strengthen now its that simple. If he doesn't, then i would think top 4 will be unlikely....at which point we will then be in the fecking shit.
 
LonelyFire said:
I agree with a lot if what you're saying but the club had deals lined up in the summer - moyes chose not to go for them as he wasn't sure about them. Got to respect its his team.

He has to strengthen now its that simple. If he doesn't, then i would think top 4 will be unlikely....at which point we will then be in the fecking shit.
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Same. Agree with your sentiments and if we were to finish outside of the top 4 (though I wouldn't object qualifying through winning the CL, distant a dream that may be) we will definitely struggle to attract the players we need and Moyes will be hindered by his lack of experience at that level even further (if he stays in the job).
 
Martinez says he is 100% sure that Baines will stay apparently. We will see. If Moyes really wants a LB then he'll get him like he got Fellaini IMO, less risk involved too.
 
SilentWitness said:
Martinez says he is 100% sure that Baines will stay apparently. We will see. If Moyes really wants a LB then he'll get him like he got Fellaini IMO, less risk involved too.
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If we pay you £20m+ for him and then you go and spend that on Shaw I might just kill myself.
 
Sixpence said:
If we pay you £20m+ for him and then you go and spend that on Shaw I might just kill myself.
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Shaw is Chelsea bound in a few years i'd have thought. Ben Davies would be someone to look at though.

Sunny Jim said:
i hope Baines stays at your club. More, you can have the Afroman back.
Can we please get a refund?
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He will come good once he's given a regular run of games and the team around him is playing well too.
 
We should buy someone in January if that someone is the right someone. And that would be, for instance, a left back who would provide instant competition for Evra. We could do with one of those. A midfielder would come in handy too, but I largely agree with those who are skeptical of bringing in another contender, as it were: someone who isn't a dramatic upgrade on what we have. If a top class CM is actually available, we should obviously jump at the chance - but the likelihood of that happening seems slim.

The fact is that we're three points off 4th as we speak. After having played largely - far - below par. And after having sustained injuries to key players. If we assume that Moyes is starting to get through to these boys - and that we are in fact capable of much better than we've shown - it's not an impossible task to finish the season decently with the current squad.

We need to strengthen certain areas, obviously. But I don't think it's absolutely necessary to do so in January. Not if the goal is to qualify for the CL.
 
SilentWitness said:
Shaw is Chelsea bound in a few years i'd have thought. Ben Davies would be someone to look at though.
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Ben Davies is an excellent left back who if he was English would be talked about like £20m rated Shaw is. Neil Taylor is also very good at Swansea but has struggled to get back into the team after breaking his ankle as Davies has kept him out.
 
Mersault said:
For me the club was absolutely mad not to prepare better for SAF retiring. A manager who's won nothing really needed a sound platform to start off from and a couple of major signings would have helped him settle better.
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But the new manager needs to offer his targets. Realistic targets.
 
KM said:
I'd agree with you generally but I think these are different circumstances.
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I don't believe it will be seen as such. We're not Chelsea or City and fees we spend and contacts we sign cannot be brushed aside. A mediocre deal done now will limit us going forward. If we're going to do a complete overhaul in our midfield, we can sign a good player who'll later become backup, but I don't we're really going to replace almost each of our midfielders.
 
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