Let's say INEOS go full fire sale this summer: Who are your untouchables?

gaffs said:
I don't think it is realistic to do a huge fire sale with FFP.

The club benefits most from the sale of homegrown players, or those who's amortization period is over - i.e. off their initial contracts.

For that reason, I would be looking to shift Rashford, Lindelof and McTominay. If there are decent offers for AWB, Casemiro, Varane, Shaw and Maguire, they should be sold. Past their best and taking up a lot of space on the wage bill.

The issue will be trying to replace this number of players.
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What’s funny is that you start this off with we don’t need to do a huge fire sale and then proceed to list 8 players that we should look to sell, whilst missing off some of the more absolute departures in Sancho, Greenwood, Martial, DVB, maybe also Alvaro, Hannibal, Evans if we don’t extend, maybe Amad if ETH stays.

A fire sale is absolutely needed because we’re in a shocking position with a squad full of players not suited to dominate games of football in this modern era (eg. Our assortment of slow, passive CBs who aren’t great on the ball). We also have players OOC probably leaving for free this summer and players with only a year left that we either sell now, extend to protect their value (a la Woodward) and continue down this hole we are in or lose them for nothing in a year which won’t help FFP. We also have problem players like Sancho and Greenwood that will leave.

All in all, I don’t see how we avoid a firesale given our current predicament. I also don’t think replacing these players should be that difficult. We just need to be wise and make smart investments with young players in the £25-50m category, rather than the £60-80m category (eg. Todibo instead of Antonio Silva, Lucumi instead of Branthwaite), whilst picking up a free signing or two (eg. Doughty from Luton as LB cover).

I think we’ve been scarred by incompetency under the previous regime, thinking that it’s impossible to sign more than 4 players in a summer or sell any of our players full stop. I’m confident this will be completely different under Jim.
 
gaffs said:
I don't think it is realistic to do a huge fire sale with FFP.

The club benefits most from the sale of homegrown players, or those who's amortization period is over - i.e. off their initial contracts.

For that reason, I would be looking to shift Rashford, Lindelof and McTominay. If there are decent offers for AWB, Casemiro, Varane, Shaw and Maguire, they should be sold. Past their best and taking up a lot of space on the wage bill.

The issue will be trying to replace this number of players.
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Agreed. If we are going to spend this summer then we can only realistically sell players who have a market value considerably higher than there accounting book value. That would be

Rashford MV 80m BV 0m Profit 80m
Bruno MV 65m BV 15m Profit 50m

Don't think we'd get decent offers for any other players due to high wages and poor performances. Perhaps 30m for the likes of Shaw and McTominay.
 
RedCoffee said:
Agreed. If we are going to spend this summer then we can only realistically sell players who have a market value considerably higher than there accounting book value. That would be

Rashford MV 80m BV 0m Profit 80m
Bruno MV 65m BV 15m Profit 50m

Don't think we'd get decent offers for any other players due to high wages and poor performances. Perhaps 30m for the likes of Shaw and McTominay.
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Not sure how / cba to work out the actual book value of players, but all of the below are other players that should yield at least a small profit:

McTominay
Greenwood
Lindelof
AWB
Casemiro
Hannibal
Alvaro
Pellistri

More difficult ones are probably:

Maguire
Sancho
Antony

With those more difficult ones, we should either loan them out or cut our losses and sell for a negative, provided we make up for it by selling the likes of McT, Greenwood etc we should be alright.
 
Valencia Shin Crosses said:
My list:

Hojlund- promising striker prospect perhaps coming into his own recently. Far too much potential to ditch after 1 year though especially with how dry the market is
Garnacho- obvious choice. Has carried our attack at times this season as a teenager.
Mainoo- Again another obvious choice. Build the entire midfield around him.
Shaw - Getting up there in age but it's very hard to find fullbacks as complete as he is when fit.
Martinez- the injury issues give me pause, but he's far too good when fit.
Dalot- Not very well liked by the Cafe but he has a very solid skillset and is quietly having his best season so far with the club.
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Add Bruno and that'd pretty much be mine. I'd probably not include Dalot though, not because I don't think we should keep him, but I wouldn't call him untouchable
 
Keep:

McTominay
Rashford
Martial
Bruno
Maguire
Lindelof
Antony
Amrabat
Casemiro

Get Rid:

Hojlund
Licha
Onana
Evans
Garnacho
Mainoo
Dalot
Shaw
Garner
 
Very few untouchables for me. Martinez, mainoo, Hojlund, Garnacho.

Players I'd like to keep: dalot, Shaw, Mount.
 
Won't happen but in that scenario

Mainoo
Martinez
Hojlund

All the others can be sold for the right price.
 
Red in STL said:
So you think United should negotiate, with who exactly?
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With Rashford and his agent. Obviously. Who else?

I think the club should try to renegotiate deals (should try). If players don’t want to, fine, they have a contract. So I then think the club should try to sell them (should try).

It’s a simple concept (and one Berrada has demonstrated before). Just because something might not work, doesn’t mean we don’t try it
 
Just these players for me should be untouchable: Hojlund, Mainoo, Shaw, Martinez and Dalot. There are a few players I wouldn't actively sell but if a good offer came in for the likes of Varane, Casemiro, Garnacho, Onana, Mount and Amad (under a new manager) I'd consider them.
 
daba said:
What’s funny is that you start this off with we don’t need to do a huge fire sale and then proceed to list 8 players that we should look to sell, whilst missing off some of the more absolute departures in Sancho, Greenwood, Martial, DVB, maybe also Alvaro, Hannibal, Evans if we don’t extend, maybe Amad if ETH stays.

A fire sale is absolutely needed because we’re in a shocking position with a squad full of players not suited to dominate games of football in this modern era (eg. Our assortment of slow, passive CBs who aren’t great on the ball). We also have players OOC probably leaving for free this summer and players with only a year left that we either sell now, extend to protect their value (a la Woodward) and continue down this hole we are in or lose them for nothing in a year which won’t help FFP. We also have problem players like Sancho and Greenwood that will leave.

All in all, I don’t see how we avoid a firesale given our current predicament. I also don’t think replacing these players should be that difficult. We just need to be wise and make smart investments with young players in the £25-50m category, rather than the £60-80m category (eg. Todibo instead of Antonio Silva, Lucumi instead of Branthwaite), whilst picking up a free signing or two (eg. Doughty from Luton as LB cover).

I think we’ve been scarred by incompetency under the previous regime, thinking that it’s impossible to sign more than 4 players in a summer or sell any of our players full stop. I’m confident this will be completely different under Jim.
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I didn't say we don't need to have a fire sale.

I said it wasn't realistic due to FFP.

Lets say you bring in 5 players on 5 year contracts, you are carrying both salary and amortized transfer fee over the 5 years of the contract - that is a double FFP hit. It is why the club prefer to keep extending existing players as there is a much lower cap hit.

A fire sale wont work because there are enough enough sellable assets to balance the books. Even if you sell Casemiro for 30mil, we get his wages off the books, but we are still carrying 3 more years of his 60mil transfer fee.
 
RedCoffee said:
Agreed. If we are going to spend this summer then we can only realistically sell players who have a market value considerably higher than there accounting book value. That would be

Rashford MV 80m BV 0m Profit 80m
Bruno MV 65m BV 15m Profit 50m

Don't think we'd get decent offers for any other players due to high wages and poor performances. Perhaps 30m for the likes of Shaw and McTominay.
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Agree. Im glad someone understands how this works.

You could add McTominay to that list too.

Im not sure if we would get 80mil for Rashford. Salary too high and it would seem PSG are the only suiters. Just a hunch, but i think PSG will buy Khvicha Kvaratskhelia.

If the club really want room to rip it up and start again, they have to make sure really tough decisions and maybe let someone like Garnacho go.
 
Valencia Shin Crosses said:
Hojlund- promising striker prospect perhaps coming into his own recently. Far too much potential to ditch after 1 year though especially with how dry the market is
Garnacho- obvious choice. Has carried our attack at times this season as a teenager.
Mainoo- Again another obvious choice. Build the entire midfield around him.
Shaw - Getting up there in age but it's very hard to find fullbacks as complete as he is when fit.
Martinez- the injury issues give me pause, but he's far too good when fit.
Dalot- Not very well liked by the Cafe but he has a very solid skillset and is quietly having his best season so far with the club.
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For me, it's these guys too, plus Bruno. Wouldn't consider anyone else to be untouchable however there are some that I'd like to keep a little longer, even if it's out on loan somewhere, like Amad and Pellistri.
 
poleglass red said:
The same accusation could be levelled at Martinez, this is his 2nd season, he must have missed around 40 games now through injury. Great player and been unlucky but that's a lot of missed games.
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I feel there's a big difference between their injuries. Martinez has had 2 bad injuries. His metatarsal injury was poorly handled by the club, which resulted in him missing more games than he should have. When he finally returned, he had a player fall directly on his knee, which put him out for another long period. Fingers crossed that'll be the end of his bad luck.

On the other hand, Shaw misses games every season with muscle injuries. He walked off the pitch unaided against Luton, then we were told he's going to miss the rest of the season with yet another muscle injury. Unfortunately, he's the Martial of our defenders.
 
poleglass red said:
The same accusation could be levelled at Martinez, this is his 2nd season, he must have missed around 40 games now through injury. Great player and been unlucky but that's a lot of missed games.
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Any idea of Martinez's injury record at Ajax? Because in his three season at Ajax he made 24,26 & 24 appearances respectively in the Eredivisie. That's a lot of missed games for a central defender, who usually aren't rotated a lot.
 
Insanity said:
Any idea of Martinez's injury record at Ajax? Because in his three season at Ajax he made 24,26 & 24 appearances respectively in the Eredivisie. That's a lot of missed games for a central defender, who usually aren't rotated a lot.
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INJURY HISTORY

SeasonInjuryfromuntilDaysGames missed
23/24Knee injuryFeb 4, 2024Mar 31, 202456 days10
23/24Foot injurySep 21, 2023Jan 4, 2024105 days22
22/23Metatarsal fractureApr 14, 2023Jun 30, 202377 days12
21/22Muscle injuryMar 21, 2022May 22, 202262 days10
21/22unknown injuryDec 21, 2021Dec 31, 202110 days1
20/21KnockSep 13, 2020Sep 19, 20206 days1
19/20Hamstring injuryJul 5, 2019Jul 25, 201920 days1
TOTAL

SeasonDaysInjuriesGames missed
23/24161 days232
22/2377 days112
21/2272 days211
20/216 days11
19/2020 days11
 
iKeano said:
Untouchable - Garnacho, Mainoo, Hojlund.

Take or leave (partly due to injury/lack of reliability) - Martinez, Bruno, AWB, Erikson, Bayindir, Heaton, Evans, Amad

Should go - Rashford, Anthony, Sancho, McTominay, Onana, Varane, Amrabat, Shaw, Maguire, Lindelof, Malacia, Martial, VanDeBeek, Williams, Dalot, Casemiro, Huddlestone(!), Mount, Number 11.
Entire medical staff, entire physio staff, set piece coach, throw in coach, PR Team, social media team... probably left a few out but it's a start!
I'd get rid of Ten Hag too but the thought of Potter being Utd manager makes me.physically ill. The English Moyes. Southgate 2.0. A disaster in waiting.

The reality is we're stuck with underperforming, huge waged egos for the foreseeable.
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Huddlestone is a player-coach for the under 21s. Not sure why you’re listing him in a bunch of first team players to remove.
 
Insanity said:
Any idea of Martinez's injury record at Ajax? Because in his three season at Ajax he made 24,26 & 24 appearances respectively in the Eredivisie. That's a lot of missed games for a central defender, who usually aren't rotated a lot.
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There are only 34 games in the Eredivisie to begin with.
First season it was the Covid season, last game was played beginning of March. He played all games bar 1.
Second season, he was benched for a game or 4-5 in a row. He didn't miss a single game because of injury.
Last season he played there, he missed 7 games in a row because of a muscle injury.
 
Only mainoo, garnacho, Dalot, Rasmus and Martinez as untouchable.

Rest everyone should be deemed dispensable, if we plan to build for the future
 
Missing out on Europe altogether could be a blessing in disguise with regards to squad management.

We'd be able to go into next season with a much smaller squad, and players are less likely to hang around if they know there are less games for rotation.

We've got an absolutely humongous squad at the moment, so being able to cut that down would provide some much needed funds, and mean that the money could be better allocated to better players rather than having 30 something first teamers of nowhere near the quality required.
 
Untouchables?
Absolutely nobody, not one.

Although younger players should obviously be given a bit of leeway here, and I'm sure we'd all love to see Garnacho, Mainoo & Hoijlund hit the heights.
 
Just thought I'd check our squad to see the joke of it in full...

GK

Onana, Bayindir, Heaton

DEFENCE

Dalot, Varane, Martinez, Shaw, Lindelof, Maguire, Malacia, AWB, Williams, Evans, Fernandez, Kambwala

MIDFIELD

Casemiro, Mainoo, Fernandes, Mount, Eriksen, DvB, McTominay, Gore, Hannibal (Amrabat on loan)

WINGERS

Rashford, Garnacho, Amad, Forson, Pellistri, Sancho, Antony, Shoretire

STRIKERS

Hojlund, Martial

Bolded the ones that I think everyone is in agreement about not being here next year. Still leaves you with a 25 man squad without any reinforcements coming in. In an ideal world you'd probably want to cut that by a further 5 by adding the likes of Antony, Lindelof, McTominay and bringing in 5 starting 11 players, but selling 12 and releasing 3 players seems like fifa/fm level of fire sale.
 
Waynne said:
Keep:

McTominay
Rashford
Martial
Bruno
Maguire
Lindelof
Antony
Amrabat
Casemiro

Get Rid:

Hojlund
Licha
Onana
Evans
Garnacho
Mainoo
Dalot
Shaw
Garner
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You’re just too funny on here maybe you just do stand up
 
onemanarmy said:
There are only 34 games in the Eredivisie to begin with.
First season it was the Covid season, last game was played beginning of March. He played all games bar 1.
Second season, he was benched for a game or 4-5 in a row. He didn't miss a single game because of injury.
Last season he played there, he missed 7 games in a row because of a muscle injury.
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Cheers!
 
Zed 101 said:
INJURY HISTORY

SeasonInjuryfromuntilDaysGames missed
23/24Knee injuryFeb 4, 2024Mar 31, 202456 days10
23/24Foot injurySep 21, 2023Jan 4, 2024105 days22
22/23Metatarsal fractureApr 14, 2023Jun 30, 202377 days12
21/22Muscle injuryMar 21, 2022May 22, 202262 days10
21/22unknown injuryDec 21, 2021Dec 31, 202110 days1
20/21KnockSep 13, 2020Sep 19, 20206 days1
19/20Hamstring injuryJul 5, 2019Jul 25, 201920 days1
TOTAL

SeasonDaysInjuriesGames missed
23/24161 days232
22/2377 days112
21/2272 days211
20/216 days11
19/2020 days11
Click to expand...

Thanks, bud!
 
With Ineos, nobody is untouchable. I suggested a while back that SJR will introduce a new wage structure which will include incentive payments. This will be on a take it or leave basis to encourage some of them to run around a bit more. They have a motto at Ineos, FIFO. Fit In or F*** Off. This works in the Chemical business but maybe not in the rarified world of spoilt professional footballers and their agents. We'll see. My view on who to keep are similar to most. I love watching Martinez playing, but if you're injured for half a season what's the point? He is just another example of the piss poor recruitment by ETH and the former board. I would certainly be looking to promote some youngsters too. Rashford can go and boost the transfer kitty.
 
Surprised to see Shaw making so many lists. Has been a regular fixture for years under various managers. Blows hot and cold too frequently, and picks up too many injuries.

When he's fit and on form he's one of the best left backs in the world. We don't see it often enough though.
 
Carl said:
Surprised to see Shaw making so many lists. Has been a regular fixture for years under various managers. Blows hot and cold too frequently, and picks up too many injuries.

When he's fit and on form he's one of the best left backs in the world. We don't see it often enough though.
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I can’t understand the mentions of Shaw either. Great at his best, but his best is not nearly often enough, and seeing he is our first choice lb, his injuries are massive concern.
 
I think Shaw's minutes need to be managed a bit better. No rushing him back from injury or playing him constantly until he breaks down which has both happened this season. Last season he apparently only missed 3 games through injury when we could rotate him with Malacia.

I'd think of him as much as a centre half these days. If Martinez isn't playing I'd want him coming in for him to give us similar ball playing ability out, so we're not completely changing our style like this season when Maguire, Evans or Lindelof comes in instead. Also might protect him from injuries with less running. Id therefore sign a top young left back and have Shaw rotating for both him and for Martinez.
 
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